Tucker Carlson has revealed that during the brief Iran-Israel war earlier this year, Israeli soldiers were barging into U.S. military meetings at the Pentagon, issuing demands, and telling American officers what to do.
FOR YEARS, Democrats have unapologetically argued FOR putting illegals on Medicaid. Several Dem governors have already done it. Why lie about it now? The American people aren’t fooled. I don’t give an INCH on @cnn in my latest debate. pic.twitter.com/G99AjTZkCJ
Vice President JD Vance shrugged off liberal outrage over President Donald Trump sharing a meme video of House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries wearing a sombrero, saying he couldn’t understand claims that it was “racist.” The radical left truly has no sense of humor. Is it any wonder they always look miserable, mean, and nasty to anyone who holds different beliefs? Maybe if they learned how to laugh once in a while, they wouldn’t be so violent. A reporter asked Vance on Wednesday if Trump’s meme helped efforts to reach a government funding deal. “Oh, I think it’s funny. The president’s joking and we’re having a good time,” Vance replied. “You can negotiate in good faith while still poking fun at the absurdity of Democrats’ positions—and yes, even the absurdity of Democrats themselves.”
Then he added with a grin: “I’ll tell Hakeem Jeffries right now, I make this solemn promise to you—help us reopen the government, and the sombrero memes will stop.” Vance appeared at a White House briefing on Wednesday to discuss the government shutdown, which took effect after Democrats and Republicans failed to reach a funding deal. The Trump administration blamed Democrats, saying they tried to sneak in healthcare for illegal migrants. Leftists denied it, of course. But given the left’s agenda, I’d bet the administration is right.Fox News reported the now-infamous meme appeared on Truth Social. The video showed Jeffries with a sombrero and mustache while mariachi music played in the background. Honestly? That sounds hilarious.
After Hakeem Jeffries lost it on MSNBC over Trump’s meme putting him in a sombrero, 47 went right back at him, this time with Trump popping up as part of a mariachi band.
Jeffries’ buddy, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, also made a cameo in the video. An AI-generated voice mocked Democrats for their “woke, trans agenda” and quipped that “nobody likes Democrats anymore.” Again—hilarious. The video, laced with profanity, mocked Democrats for pandering to illegal immigrants as potential new voters. Predictably, Jeffries and his liberal pals pulled the tired “racist” card. “Mr. P resident, the next time you have something to say about me, don’t cop out through a racist and fake AI video,” Jeffries fumed to reporters Tuesday. “When I’m back in the Oval Office, say it to my face.” Vance pushed back, blasting liberal media outlets for obsessing over the fact that the video was AI-generated.
“Hakeem Jeffries said it was racist, and I know he said that,” Vance noted. “And I honestly don’t even know what that means. Is he a Mexican-American who feels offended by a sombrero meme?” He laughed off the media’s pearl-clutching: “One of the major networks even showed the meme and solemnly announced it was AI-generated. But the guy had a curly cartoon mustache and a sombrero! Do you really think Americans believe Jeffries walked into the White House dressed like that? Give the country a little credit.”
Democrats assume Americans are both stupid and uneducated. It’s the very line of thinking that made them so arrogant as to believe they could get away with the destruction wrought during the Biden administration and still defeat Republicans in 2024. Once again, the perpetually offended Democratic Party exposed itself as the party of intolerance, anger, violence—and absolutely no fun.
The Russian military has modified its missiles to better evade Ukrainian air defenses, including US-made Patriot systems – often seen as a key linchpin of Kiev’s shield – the Financial Times reported on Thursday, citing officials in Kiev and the West. According to officials interviewed by the FT, Russian missiles can now follow a normal arc before veering into a steep terminal dive or executing maneuvers that “confuse and avoid” Patriot interceptors. The outlet cited recent strikes against Ukrainian drone facilities as a strong indication that Russia has likely upgraded the Iskander-M mobile system and the air-launched Kinzhal.
One former Ukrainian official called the added maneuverability “a game changer for Russia,” the newspaper reported, adding that deliveries of US-supplied Patriot interceptors, essentially the only weapon in Ukraine’s arsenal capable of tackling Moscow’s ballistic missiles, are not coming as quickly as planned. The paper also noted that data released by the Ukrainian Air Force shows that the rate of interception of Russian ballistic missiles improved over the summer, reaching 37% in August, but then fell to just 6% in September. Ukraine shares data on Patriot battlefield performance with the Pentagon and weapons producers, according to the FT. Officials told the outlet that while efforts are being made to improve the Patriots’ performance, they often lag behind Moscow’s evolving tactics.
Ukraine’s Air Force flagged similar concerns in May. Spokesman Yury Ignat said that the ballistic trajectories of the Iskander-M missiles “have been improved and modernized” while the projectiles could fire off radar decoys. He also complained that Ukraine’s domestically designed air defenses are unable to shoot down most of the Russian missiles, while those produced in the West are used to cover key infrastructure and other high-priority targets. Moscow has repeatedly said its strikes only target military-related infrastructure, defense industry, and troop deployment bases and are never aimed at civilians.
German Chancellor Friedrich Merz is seeking to claw back decision-making power from European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, Bloomberg reported on Tuesday, citing diplomats familiar with the matter. Merz, increasingly critical of Brussels, wants Berlin to have greater influence over issues directly affecting EU members, according to one of the sources. He has already opposed von der Leyen’s proposals for new EU taxes and her plan to send peacekeepers to Ukraine, while also clashing with her over a tariff agreement with the US and climate regulations. “We must now put a stick in the wheels of this machine in Brussels,” Merz told business leaders on Friday, Bloomberg noted.
Ahead of an informal EU leaders’ summit in Copenhagen on Wednesday, he again pressed for a “fundamental correction” of what he described as excessive regulation. “It is simply too much,” he said, as quoted by the German Press Agency. The European Commission has introduced several measures to cut red tape this year, including the Defense Readiness Omnibus, aimed at streamlining EU defense market procedures. The initiative is part of von der Leyen’s broader effort to raise up to €800 billion ($938 billion) in investments for weapons and ammunition procurement by 2030.
Tesla and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk has become the world’s first person to reach a net worth of $500 billion, according to Forbes. Musk’s fortune has been boosted recently by a rally in Tesla shares and soaring valuations of his private firms. Tesla stock jumped nearly 4% on Wednesday, adding $9.3 billion to Musk’s fortune and pushing it to $500.1 billion, according to the Forbes Billionaires List. Musk’s 12% stake in the carmaker is valued at $191 billion. Analysts credit the recent surge in Musk’s wealth to his renewed focus on business. Tesla shares have nearly doubled since April, when he first announced during an earnings call that he would step down from his post as head of US President Donald Trump’s Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) to devote more time to the automaker and his other business interests. Musk departed the agency after a rift with the president over a major tax-and-spending bill.
Tesla board chair Robyn Denholm said last month that Musk was again “front and center” after months of distraction. Days later, he bought nearly $1 billion worth of Tesla stock, signaling confidence as the company expands into AI and robotics. Outside Tesla, Musk’s space venture SpaceX was valued at $400 billion in an August tender offer, up from $350 billion in December. His 42% stake is worth $168 billion. Musk also owns 53% of xAI Holdings, the company formed when he merged his AI startup with X. Currently valued at $113 billion, reports suggest xAI could soon target $200 billion.
Musk has repeatedly set net worth records. He first topped Forbes’ list in January 2021 at $190 billion, hit $300 billion that November and crossed $400 billion in December 2024. He now outpaces Oracle founder Larry Ellison, the second-richest person, by $150 billion. The Bloomberg Billionaires Index, which uses a different wealth tracking method, places Musk’s fortune slightly lower – at $470 billion – but still the highest among the world’s top 500.
A Norwegian-led training center for Ukrainian soldiers opened in southeastern Poland on Wednesday. Camp Jomsborg, constructed by engineers from Norway’s Brigade Nord in the town of Lipa, can host up to 1,200 troops at a time, Polish Defense Minister Wladyslaw Kosiniak-Kamysz wrote on X. He added that the base will focus on “developing drone capabilities.” Kosiniak-Kamysz stressed that NATO would also benefit from Ukrainian combat experience. “This is not a one-way street. An important element is that we will draw on Ukrainian experience. Right next to us is a drone launch strip,” he said.
Poland has been a key logistical and training hub for Western military aid to Ukraine since the outbreak of open conflict with Russia in 2022.Also on Wednesday, EU leaders agreed to create a “drone wall” along the bloc’s eastern flank, following Polish claims last month that Russian UAVs had violated its airspace. Estonia likewise alleged that three Russian fighter jets entered its airspace in September. Moscow dismissed both accusations as baseless and accused the EU of warmongering.
A week ago on September 23, President Donald Trump called President Vladimir Putin’s military power a “paper tiger”, and declared ”this is the time for Ukraine to act”.By that he said he meant “to take back their Country in its original form and, who knows, maybe even go further than that!” Five days later, the successor president, Vice President J D Vance, explained that deployment on the Ukrainian battlefield by NATO-supplied Tomahawk cruise missiles, with a 2,500-km range, is the next step he and Trump are considering. “Russia is really stalled,” Vance claimed, “The Russian economy is in shambles. The Russians are not gaining much on the battlefield… The Russians have refused to sit down in any bilateral meetings with the Ukrainians. They have refused to sit down in any trilateral meetings with the President…
The Russians have got to wake up and accept reality here… About Tomahawks, it’s something the President is going to make the final determination on. What the President is going to do is what’s in the best interest of the United States of America.” The scheme, Vance intimated, is to allow NATO member states with Tomahawk batteries – at the moment this means the UK and Germany – to deliver them to Kiev, or for other European states to buy the missiles from the US and send them on. This means that the crews operating the Tomahawk systems in the Ukraine would be British, German, or other Europeans. “What we’re doing,” Vance said, “is asking the Europeans to buy that weaponry that shows some European skin in the game. I think that gets them really invested in both what’s happening in their own backyard, but also in the peace process that the president has been pushing for, for the last eight months,” Vance said.
The skins at risk of Russian counterattack, Vance meant but omitted to acknowledge, would be European, not American. The Kremlin spokesman, Dmitry Peskov, responded with the obvious followed by a placebo. “We have heard these statements. We are thoroughly analyzing them. Our military specialists are closely monitoring it.” “Even if it happens that the United States sends its Tomahawk missiles to Ukraine, currently there is no cure-all that could be a game changer on the front lines for the Kiev regime. No magical weapons exist, and Tomahawk or other missiles simply won’t be a game changer.”
Then Peskov muffled a warning: “The question… is this: who can launch these missiles…? Can only Ukrainians launch them, or do American soldiers have to do that?” The answer is already obvious – Vance made it plain. The operators of the Tomahawks would be Europeans. Peskov’s questions also avoided Vance’s and Trump’s strategic point. They are now aiming to intensify the domestic damage they can inflict deep inside Russian territory – Moscow and St. Petersburg if they can — in the belief this will trigger loss of Russian morale and voter opposition to Putin. “This war is terrible for their economy,” Vance repeated several times, as has Trump. The Russians, Vance declared, “have to ask themselves how many more people are they willing to lose…for very little military advantage.”
What is happening from the Russian point of view which isn’t public?The US “understanding” from the Anchorage summit meeting on August 16 is no longer the Russian interpretation as Putin himself first explained it. “Hopefully, the understanding [singular] we have reached will bring us closer to this goal and open up the road to peace in Ukraine,” Putin said at his brief press conference after meeting with Trump. “We see that the US President has a clear idea of what he wants to achieve, that he sincerely cares about his country’s prosperity while showing awareness of Russia’s national interests. I hope that today’s agreements [plural] will become a reference point, not only for resolving the Ukrainian problem but also for resuming the pragmatic business relations between Russia and the United States.”
Escalation to Tomahawk attacks on the Russia hinterland is also not the “understanding” with the US which the Russian Foreign Ministry announced after Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov met at the United Nations with Secretary of State Marco Rubio: “The heads of the foreign offices exchanged opinions on the Ukraine crisis settlement as a follow up to the understandings [plural] reached at the Russia-US summit in Anchorage. The parties have reaffirmed mutual interest in the search for peaceful solutions. Sergey Lavrov emphasised our country’s readiness to adhere to the line developed by the Russian and US leaders in Alaska, including to coordinate efforts with the US side to remove the root causes of the Ukraine conflict. The minister stressed the unacceptability of the schemes intended to protract the conflict promoted by Kiev and some European countries. The parties compared their positions on the entire bilateral agenda including the prospects of restoring their socio-political contacts. They have reaffirmed the importance of using the impetus given by Russian and US presidents to the process of normalising bilateral relations.”
Speaking to Russian reporters, Lavrov then added: “We operate on the premise that everything we have heard from our US colleagues at the top and other levels tells us that they want to help us end this conflict by addressing and eliminating its root causes. There are no other countries in the Western camp that abide by such a position. I have no doubt that the US President is genuinely interested in this outcome. Some people are trying to have influence on him, but that’s another matter… The 2022 borders are off the table today. What we are now discussing are the borders as enshrined in the Constitution of the Russian Federation.”
The “reality on the ground”, as Vance and Trump say they understand it on the battlefield, is plainly now not the reality on the ground as the Russian side sees it. The US is announcing that Russia the paper tiger has lost escalation dominance on the battlefield, and is vulnerable to even greater domestic insecurity than it faced three years ago, when the Special Military Operation began. If that was the “root cause” of the war, as Putin and Lavrov say they have explained to their US counterparts, Trump and Vance are now dismissing “root cause” as the basis for terms to end the war.
When Vance announced that the Tomahawk deployment will be decided “in the interests of the United States of America”, he meant to say that the Russian military and Putin have lost their power of deterrence. A Moscow source in a position to know says the General Staff will convince the President on the measures required to prove the Americans wrong. “I believe the Russians will secure victory using the Oreshniki rather than a massive ground offensive. But there is also a build-up many of us can tell. That is why Americans and Europeans are getting very nervous, threatening Russians with a direct confrontation unless they back off.”
John Helmer thinks that the Russian response to the ever-widening war that Putin has conducted will be the Oreshnik missile, which means good-bye to several European capitals, if not all of them. https://johnhelmer.net/when-tomahawk-meets-bear-the-hazel-tree-oreshnik-wins/
Washington giving missiles to Ukraine that can reach Moscow and St. Petersburg does not “normalize relations.” This is the path to war, not to peace. Such a gift of missiles would clearly indicate that the US military/security complex has taken policy away from President Trump and is continuing the war instead of peace negotiations, From John Helmer’s report, I conclude that Putin, Lavrov, and the Russian media are too naive, too unaware, too gullible, too unrealistic and too idealistic in the way they think about the West to comprehend the danger. I find it extraordinarily that Russian Foreign Minister Lavrov is so lost to reality that he actually said: “We operate on the premise that everything we have heard from our US colleagues at the top and other levels tells us that they want to help us end this conflict by addressing and eliminating its root causes.”
If the Russian government operates on this basis, Russia is definitely doomed. The “root causes” are NATO on Russia’s borders which causes Russian insecurity. To remove the root cause means to remove the source of Russian insecurity. For many years the combined West has refused Russia’s request to join NATO and Russia’s pleadings for a mutual defense agreement. Yet the Kremlin is still hopeful??!! Russia has experienced this feeling of insecurity since American President Clinton violated the word of the US government, thus making the US government untrustworthy to the world since the last years of the 20th century. Clinton violated the word of the George H.W. Bush administration that in exchange for the Soviet Union’s agreement to permit the reunification of Germany, NATO would not move one inch toward the Soviet borders. Clinton, little doubt well paid, moved NATO to Russia’s borders, and by doing so made the word of the US Government completely worthless. Yet Putin and Lavrov rely on Washington’s word !
For Putin and the Russian military command to permit a limited territorial conflict with Ukraine to continue for so long that it now approaches four years was a fantastic strategic blunder that is widening into World War 3. Putin is not responsible for the conflict. It was forced on him, but his response to the conflict–permitting it to endure and widen–was a massive mistake in judgment. I don’t know if anything can bring the Kremlin out of its stupor. Perhaps it might help if the Russians read this article: https://www.paulcraigroberts.org/2025/09/28/presidents-have-little-control-over-their-governments/
We are approaching the point where to avoid a world destroying nuclear war, Putin will have to surrender Russia. Putin, unlike the ruthless American Zionist neoconservatives, is capable of surrendering his country to save the world from nuclear war. But would the Russian nationalists permit him to do so? Are the Russian people willing to be the sacrificial lamb that saves the world from nuclear war by going into subservience to the Satanic West?
Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent appears on CNBC to discuss the second full day of the government shutdown and the potential ramifications therein.Office of Management and Budget Director Russ Vought is meeting with President Trump today to discuss the facets of the government that will be closed and for the duration therein. Secretary Bessent is asked if the furloughs will be a long-term feature of the backfire created by the Democrat strategy.Bessent reemphasizes he personally joined the Trump administration to shrink the scale of government spending, and the administration is not going to flinch on any CR agreement that backtracks on existing spending reductions.
18 years ago: At his Nobel Peace Prize speech in December 2007, Al Gore warns the Arctic could be ice free as soon as 2014.
Reality: The Arctic ice cap had 500,000 square kilometers of ice more in September 2025 than when Al Gore made this call in 2007. pic.twitter.com/xB6dYBsjN5
The @bankofengland, allegedly in public ownership, wants to hide from the public its plans for Digital ID and Central Bank Dystopian Control (CBDC), aka "Digital Pound".
This leaves us no option but to assume the worst of this technocrat digital Gulag system. https://t.co/Y8kFVZ1Zfv
New: Scott Adams predicts the collapse of the Democrats. They no money, leaders, ideas, or momentum.@ScottAdamsSays “But then you add on top of that, the emotions and the feelings that people got because of Charlie Kirk’s death.
BREAKING: Sen. Chuck Grassley announces a whistleblower has exposed the program “Arctic Frost” for targeting 92 Republican groups, Charlie Kirk’s TPUSA among them.
“..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..”
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.
“Investigators are now pressed with the job of sorting out which of these messages were bluster and which could represent credible coordination or foreknowledge.”
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.
Another account posted on August 6—more than a month before the shooting—that "september 10th will be a very interesting day." After Kirk’s assassination, the account followed up: "I plead the fifth." pic.twitter.com/EBjQj6RRMo
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.
“..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.”
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.”
If you live in Springfield, Illinois, please stop watching this ABC station that apparently punished a young broadcast journalist for her heartfelt reporting of the assassination of Charlie Kirk.
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.
“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.’
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:
DISGUSTING: ABC’s Matt Gutman says he’s not sure “if we have seen an alleged murder with such specific text messages” that were “very touching, in a way, that I think many of us didn’t expect — a very intimate portrait into this relationship between the suspect’s roommate and the… pic.twitter.com/ulPcxoOwM3
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.”
“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.”
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.
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.
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.’
“..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.”
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.
“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 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.
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.
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.
“..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.”
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.
“.. 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.”
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.
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.
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.
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.
“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.”
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.
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.
London
https://twitter.com/VetaChain/status/1967676147136930028
https://twitter.com/TRobinsonNewEra/status/1967884271126974985
Scott
Scott Adams explores possible reasons why the climate change hysteria has suddenly vanished.
• It was funded by billionaires for profit, but funding dried up • AI industry's energy needs overshadow climate concerns • Greta Thunberg's shift to other causes undermines her… pic.twitter.com/G4WLdX6B3Z
"Heavenly sources confirmed that, after 31 years of graciously allowing everyone on Earth to benefit from his life, God deemed the world unworthy of Charlie Kirk and brought him into eternal glory where he belonged." pic.twitter.com/km5jhvOBOV
I'm SO glad someone kept this clip and shared it again.
Charlie Kirk had a lot of good clips, but this one by far will always be my favorite because there was a handful of us that were trying to get this information pushed out, and we were getting our ASSES kicked for it by the… pic.twitter.com/30z9hklg1n
Ive been going back and watching videos of Charlie debating with students. This particular debate left me in awe. What an incredibly knowledgeable man.
Charlie Kirk’s widow, Erika, made a brave and stunning decision to address the nation that is mourning her husband on Friday night. Standing next to Charlie’s chair in his studio at the Turning Point USA headquarters in Phoenix, Ariz., Erika spoke from a podium with a sign attached that read: “May Charlie be received into the merciful arms of Jesus, our loving Savior.” Through tears, she thanked the first responders and law enforcement officials that helped in the aftermath of his murder, including those who worked tirelessly to catch the suspect. She also thanked Vice President JD Vance and his wife, Usha, as well as President Donald Trump and the entire Trump family and talked of how much her late husband loved the president.
Erika eulogized the private side of Charlie — his love of nature and sports, including the Chicago Cubs and Oregon Ducks. She talked of how much he loved his children and how much he loved her, saying that every single day he made sure she knew it and asked how he could serve her better. She also spoke of his unwavering faith: “Two days ago, my husband, Charlie went to see the face of his savior, and his God. Charlie always said that when he was gone, he, he wanted to be remembered for his courage and for his faith. In one of the final conversations that he had on this earth, my husband witnessed for his Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. Now and for all eternity, he will stand at his savior’s side wearing the glorious crown of a martyr.”
Erika Kirk: "Two days ago, my husband went to see the face of his Savior and his God… Now, and for all eternity, he will stand at his Savior's side wearing the glorious crown of a martyr." ❤️ pic.twitter.com/BhPDEPcK4I
And then she spoke defiantly and with determination to those who have Charlie’s blood on their hands. “The evildoers responsible for my husband’s assassination have no idea what they have done,” she said, adding, “They killed Charlie because he preached a message of patriotism, faith, and of God’s merciful love.” Erika followed that with a warning:
“They should all know this: If you thought that my husband’s mission was powerful before, you have no idea. You have no idea what you just have unleashed across this entire country and this world. You have no idea. You have no idea the fire that you have ignited within this wife. To everyone listening tonight across America, the movement my husband built will not die. It won’t. I refuse to let that happen. It will not die. All of us will refuse to let that happen. No one will ever forget my husband’s name, and I will make sure of it. It will become stronger, bolder, louder, and greater than ever. ”
She vowed that his campus tour will continue, that his radio show and podcast will go on and that Charlie’s voice will “ring out louder and more clearly than ever, and his wisdom will endure.” She also spoke of her life in recent days, the lack of sleep, and her young daughter asking her, “Where’s Daddy?” Erika said she explained to the little girl that “Baby, daddy loves you so much. Don’t you worry, he’s on a, he’s on a work trip with Jesus so he can afford your blueberry budget.” She added that she couldn’t wait to see Charlie again one day
She ended her speech by thanking Charlie’s fans and supporters: “Thank you all again who love my husband, who supported him, who wrote him an email every single day during his radio show. He read all of them, all of them. God bless you all and may God bless America.” You can watch Erika’s entire speech here. Warning: You will need some tissues.
A while ago, probably in 2017, I appeared on Tucker Carlson’s Fox show to talk about God knows what. Afterwards a name I barely knew sent me a DM on twitter and told me I did a great job. It was Charlie Kirk, and that moment of kindness began a friendship that lasted until today. Charlie was fascinated by ideas and always willing to learn and change his mind. Like me, he was skeptical of Donald Trump in 2016. Like me, he came to see President Trump as the only figure capable of moving American politics away from the globalism that had dominated for our entire lives. When others were right, he learned from them. When he was right–as he usually was–he was generous. With Charlie, the attitude was never, “I told you so.” But: “welcome.”
Charlie was one of the first people I called when I thought about running for senate in early 2021. I was interested but skeptical there was a pathway. We talked through everything, from the strategy to the fundraising to the grassroots of the movement he knew so well. He introduced me to some of the people who would run my campaign and also to Donald Trump Jr. “Like his dad, he’s misunderstood. He’s extremely smart, and very much on our wavelength.” Don took a call from me because Charlie asked him too. Long before I ever committed (even in my mind) to running, Charlie had me speak to his donors at a TPUSA event. He walked me around the room and introduced me. He gave me honest feedback on my remarks. He had no reason to do this, no expectation that I’d go anywhere. I was polling, at that point, well below 5 percent. He did it because we were friends, and because he was a good man.
When I became the VP nominee–something Charlie advocated for both in public and private–Charlie was there for me. I was so glad to be part of the president’s team, but candidly surprised by the effect it had on our family. Our kids, especially our oldest, struggled with the attention and the constant presence of the protective detail. I felt this acute sense of guilt, that I had conscripted my kids into this life without getting their permission. And Charlie was constantly calling and texting, checking on our family and offering guidance and prayers. Some of our most successful events were organized not by the campaign, but by TPUSA. He wasn’t just a thinker, he was a doer, turning big ideas into bigger events with thousands of activists. And after every event, he would give me a big hug, tell me he was praying for me, and ask me what he could do. “You focus on Wisconsin,” he’d tell me. “Arizona is in the bag.” And it was.
Charlie genuinely believed in and loved Jesus Christ. He had a profound faith. We used to argue about Catholicism and Protestantism and who was right about minor doctrinal questions. Because he loved God, he wanted to understand him. Someone else pointed out that Charlie died doing what he loved: discussing ideas. He would go into these hostile crowds and answer their questions. If it was a friendly crowd, and a progressive asked a question to jeers from the audience, he’d encourage his fans to calm down and let everyone speak. He exemplified a foundational virtue of our Republic: the willingness to speak openly and debate ideas.
Charlie had an uncanny ability to know when to push the envelope and when to be more conventional. I’ve seen people attack him for years for being wrong on this or that issue publicly, never realizing that privately he was working to broaden the scope of acceptable debate. He was a great family man. I was talking to President Trump in the Oval Office today, and he said, “I know he was a very good friend of yours.” I nodded silently, and President Trump observed that Charlie really loved his family. The president was right. Charlie was so proud of Erika and the two kids. He was so happy to be a father. And he felt such gratitude for having found a woman of God with whom he could build a family.
Charlie Kirk was a true friend. The kind of guy you could say something to and know it would always stay with him. I am on more than a few group chats with Charlie and people he introduced me to over the years. We celebrate weddings and babies, bust each other’s chops, and mourn the loss of loved ones. We talk about politics and policy and sports and life. These group chats include people at the very highest level of our government. They trusted him, loved him, and knew he’d always have their backs. And because he was a true friend ,you could instinctively trust the people Charlie introduced you to. So much of the success we’ve had in this administration traces directly to Charlie’s ability to organize and convene. He didn’t just help us win in 2024, he helped us staff the entire government.
I was in a meeting in the West Wing when those group chats started lighting up with people telling Charlie they were praying for him. And that’s how I learned the news that my friend had been shot. I prayed a lot over the next hour, as first good news and then bad trickled in. God didn’t answer those prayers, and that’s OK. He had other plans. And now that Charlie is in heaven, I’ll ask him to talk to big man directly on behalf of his family, his friends, and the country he loved so dearly.
“The point I was trying to make is how peaceful the left was. . . right before he got shot.” —Hunter Kozak, Question-Asker at Charlie Kirk Utah Event, Sept 10
It’s been a tough week for our demon-haunted nation. First, video surfaces of the young Ukrainian woman, 23-year-old Iryna Zarutska, slaughtered by a homeless psychopath, one Decarlos Brown, Jr., on the Charlotte, NC, light rail — weeks after the crime happened, because Charlotte police suppressed the CC video and the legacy news media barely reported the story. Suddenly, the country is shocked by what they see: wanton murder witnessed at the scene by a half-dozen other transit riders, who don’t even react to the woman spurting blood as she topples to the floor and bleeds out.
“Progressives” hasten to cover for the psycho. He was mentally unwell and did not get the treatment he needed. Uh-huh. . . . Yet anyone with functioning brain knew the score at once. Decarlos Brown, Jr., was “justice involved” (arrested and convicted of crimes) more than a dozen times in recent years, including a five-year stretch for armed robbery. He was on-the-loose because of how the Democratic Party manages public safety, which is not at all. It allows the criminally insane to run free, but especially if they can be sorted into the “marginalized” minority basket to be presented as sob stories (George Floyd).
The Democratic Party has this affinity for the criminally insane because the party as a whole is insane. It peddles insane policies and ideas, such as cashless bail and defunding the police. It can’t tell the truth about anything. For instance, that black people account for 37-percent of violent felonies committed in the USA, according the FBI Uniform Crime Reporting, though they comprise about 13-percent of the population. And that only includes the “solved” cases, for which the “clearance rate” is a low 50- 60-percent of violent crimes — that is, more than half of violent crimes discovered go unsolved.
The Iryna Zarutska slaying set off a fury that ranged from intimations of race-war to declaring the Democratic Party a “domestic terrorist organization.” Of course, this was only days after disgruntled transgenderite Robert Westman — another product of Democratic Party ideology — shot up a catholic school in Minneapolis. Westman declared in his diaries that he’d learned to his disappointment that it is not really possible to change sexes and pretending was not good enough. That was perhaps the sole sane expression among his otherwise violently deranged writings. Westman was but one in a growing line of transgenders shooting up places, but his deed marked the end of the Democratic sex hustle, inflicting LGBTQ ideology on the schools and coercing the public to play along.
And then, Wednesday, a marksman as yet unidentified murdered Charlie Kirk, 31-year-old rising conservative media star, whose main activity was traveling to college campuses to discuss and debate the great public issues of our time with students. Charlie Kirk was an exemplary young man, on a mission to rescue our country from bad ideas and help young adults beset by the depraved Jacobin faculty discern the difference between good ideas and bad ideas. He’d barely got going in life. I won’t belabor the encomiums to Charlie’s excellence that you can read elsewhere all over the web. He was the real deal, a man in full. The Left has its martyr, the degenerate George Floyd, and now the right has its martyr, the righteous Charlie Kirk. Choose your hero.
The murder sickened at least half the nation to a degree we haven’t seen since the Kennedys and MLK were gunned down half a century ago, but the country is much more fragile now than it was then. Nobody knows what comes next, but you can sense it is going to be harsh. All that’s known about the shooter so far is that he might be the scraggly figure captured in a CC camera in a stairway on the Utah campus, that he might have used the Mauser 30.06 rifle found ditched in the woods nearby, that he was a darn good shot, and that the brass cartridges in the rifle’s chamber and magazine were engraved with “transgender and Antifa” slogans. Uh-oh. . . . (I wouldn’t want to be them on that dreadful day.)
“..von der Leyen dismissed her critics as “conspiracy theorists” and claimed they acted on behalf of Russian President Vladimir Putin, saying there was “ample proof that many are supported by our enemies and by their puppet masters in Russia or elsewhere..”
European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen is facing two new motions of no confidence following her State of the Union address to the European Parliament this week. The Left faction filed its censure proposal on Thursday, a day after the right-wing Patriots for Europe group submitted a separate bid. Von der Leyen survived a previous no-confidence vote in July. Renewed efforts to remove the EU chief came after she urged stronger military support for Ukraine and proposed allowing foreign policy decisions without unanimous member-state approval – which dissenting member states, such as Hungary, view as a ploy to dismiss their objections.
Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban, who backs the no-confidence motion, views von der Leyen’s remarks as “hardcore pro-war,” according to governmental spokesman Zoltan Kovacs. In her address, “the word ‘Ukraine’ was mentioned 35 times, and threats were made to cut EU funds from anyone refusing to follow Brussels’ line,” he said on social media. The Patriots’ motion argued the president “has failed on trade, abandoned transparency, and rejected accountability,” while the Left – joined by some Greens/EFA MEPs – accused her of having “sold out workers and farmers, funneled billions into arms and war, shredded climate and social protection” and being “complicit in genocide” in Gaza.
“There is a tendency within the European Commission to push things through by force” at the EU’s expense, Left co-leader Manon Aubry told Euronews. She cited a recent deal with the United States that she said “will literally reduce the EU to a Donald Trump vassal.” During the previous attempt to unseat her, von der Leyen dismissed her critics as “conspiracy theorists” and claimed they acted on behalf of Russian President Vladimir Putin, saying there was “ample proof that many are supported by our enemies and by their puppet masters in Russia or elsewhere.”The current commission is trying to launch a multibillion-euro military expansion program across member states, arguing the EU should fund it through loans to counter the threat from Russia – an assessment Moscow calls baseless.
The US will press its G7 allies to establish a legal framework for seizing frozen Russian state assets and channeling them to Ukraine, Bloomberg has reported, citing sources. Western nations froze an estimated $300 billion in Russian assets following the escalation of the Ukraine conflict in 2022, some €200 billion of which are held by Brussels-based clearinghouse Euroclear. The funds have generated billions in interest, and the West has been exploring ways to use the revenue to finance Ukraine. While refraining from outright seizure, 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. According to a proposal seen by the outlet, Washington will urge the G7 to back measures enabling the outright confiscation of the frozen reserves for transfer to Kiev.
Separately, people familiar with the matter told Bloomberg that senior US officials have discussed the idea with their European counterparts. Some EU leaders and experts have cautioned against outright seizure, warning it could violate international law, undermine investor confidence, and destabilize financial markets. Moscow has condemned the asset freeze and warned that seizure would amount to “robbery” and violate international law, while also backfiring on the West. The US plan extends beyond asset seizures, proposing 50% to 100% tariffs on China and India aimed at restricting Russian energy sales and blocking dual-use technology transfers, Bloomberg wrote.
It also seeks sanctions on the so-called Russian ‘shadow fleet’ of oil tankers, energy giant Rosneft, and maritime insurance, along with measures against regional banks, firms linked to the defense sector, and curbs on AI and fintech services in Russian Special Economic Zones. US President Donald Trump, who has been pushing for a direct meeting between Russian President Vladimir Putin and Ukraine’s Vladimir Zelensky, has threatened new sanctions on Moscow. “It’ll be hitting very hard with sanctions to banks and having to do with oil and tariffs also,” he told Fox News on Friday. The Kremlin said that direct negotiations between Moscow and Kiev remain possible but are currently on hold.
The European Union could sanction foreign banks that use Russia’s domestic alternative to the SWIFT interbank messaging system, as the bloc weighs another batch of measures targeting countries it claims are helping Moscow bypass restrictions, Euractiv has reported. Russia has been promoting its own payment system as a reliable alternative to SWIFT since many of the country’s financial institutions were cut off from the Western network in 2022. The System for Transfer of Financial Messages (SPFS) ensures the secure transfer of financial messages between banks both inside and outside the country.
France and Germany are spearheading the proposal to hit Russia’s trading partners as part of the bloc’s 19th sanctions package against Moscow, the outlet said on Tuesday. Paris and Berlin argue the measures should strike at what they describe as the “deeper structures” of Russia’s financial and logistics networks. The SPFS system has become a key workaround for Russian and non-Russian banks seeking to maintain trade flows despite Western efforts to isolate Moscow. In June 2024, Brussels banned EU banks operating outside Russia from connecting to SPFS or carrying out transactions via the system, threatening violators with exclusion from Europe’s own financial networks.
As of early 2025, 177 foreign entities across 24 countries were connected to SPFS, according to the Russian central bank. Moscow has accelerated efforts to move away from SWIFT by trading with international partners in their national currencies – a trend increasingly supported by BRICS members, which have shifted from using the dollar and euro in trade settlements. Russia has long denounced Western sanctions as illegal, repeatedly noting that they have failed to achieve their ultimate goal of destabilizing the economy and isolating the country from the global financial system. Instead, Moscow argues, they have backfired on the states that imposed them.
Russia and China are working to set up a securities depository to rival Belgium-based Euroclear and Clearstream, Finance Minister Anton Siluanov has said. In an interview with Izvestia published on Thursday, Siluanov said it is important to build “an independent payment infrastructure” in response to Western sanctions. Russian investors previously held funds at European clearing houses through Russia’s National Settlement Depository (NSD). Euroclear and Clearstream stopped transactions with NSD and froze its accounts after sanctions were imposed against it in mid-2022, preventing investors from accessing their assets.
The Bank of Russia has estimated that around 5.7 trillion rubles ($66.8 billion) remains blocked. Siluanov said the role of a new depository would be assumed by a planned Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) Development Bank, which would enable Russians to invest in foreign assets and foreign investors to finance projects in Russia. “We would like this bank – perhaps on its basis, or by itself – to create opportunities for our investors in our countries to freely buy and sell securities in any countries. In other words, to perform such an independent depository function,” the finance minister explained.
Analysts say the SCO bank could provide a real alternative to Western depositories, though challenges remain, including the high returns on ruble assets and the risk of asset freezes. Still, the SCO could allow seamless securities trading among member states that join the agreement. Russian investors are also pursuing legal action at home. In August, the Moscow Arbitration Court accepted a lawsuit brought by a group of private investors against Belgium’s Treasury and Euroclear. The investors are seeking licenses from the Belgian authorities to unlock their assets, arguing that the actions of the Belgian Treasury and Euroclear are unlawful and discriminatory.
U.S. President Donald Trump has said that he is losing patience with Russian President Vladimir Putin and could issue new tariffs and sanctions to compel the Russian leader to enter cease-fire negotiations with Ukraine. Trump said that his patience with Putin’s refusal to participate in peace talks with Ukraine was “running out and running out fast,” during an interview with Fox News’ “Fox and Friends” on Sep. 12.As Andrew Thornebrooke reports for The Epoch Times, the president added that “it does take two to tango,” saying that Putin’s recalcitrance on committing to peace talks was in part due to the Russian leader’s mutual animosity with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy. “There’s tremendous hatred between him and Zelenskyy,” Trump said.
Trump has made ending the war in Ukraine and other international conflicts a key part of his presidential agenda, but has struggled at times to convince Putin and Zelenskyy to meaningfully negotiate on ending the conflict. The comments follow a high-profile summit between Trump and Putin in Alaska in August, which aimed to bring Russia back to the negotiating table but ultimately did not result in the resumption of cease-fire talks. “There’s no deal until there’s a deal,” Trump said at the time. That meeting itself was the result of a threat by Trump to impose new sanctions on the Russian oil sector, including secondary tariffs on nations such as India and China that purchase oil from Russian entities. Trump renewed those threats during Friday’s interview, saying the United States would have to “come down very, very strong” on Russia if Putin did not commit to peace talks with Ukraine.
When asked what coming down on Russia would look like, Trump said that it would involve “hitting [Russia] very hard with sanctions to banks and having to do with oil and tariffs also.” Trump also reached out to U.S. allies in Europe earlier this week in the hopes of building international support for secondary tariffs of up to 100 percent on China and India. The move demonstrates how much Trump and his administration have shifted in handling the war in Ukraine since first coming to office, moving from pausing all support of Ukraine early in the year to renewing weapon sales to Kyiv and threatening sanctions against Moscow.
The difficulty lies in getting either Kyiv or Moscow to relent on any of several key war aims, with Zelenskyy refusing to consider the giving up of any territory to Russia and Putin demanding that it be given territory it has failed to conquer. For now, Moscow appears undeterred. This week alone, Russia launched its largest aerial assault against Ukraine and sent drones into NATO member Poland’s airspace. NATO leadership has not yet verified whether the drones entered Polish airspace deliberately or as part of an operation in Ukraine that went wrong. Trump said during Friday’s interview that Russian assets “shouldn’t be close to Poland.”
The Kremlin confirmed Friday what most observers should consider obvious at this point – Ukraine peace talks are not happening. Putin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told a Friday press briefing that talks to end the war in Ukraine are on “pause”. “Negotiators remain in contact, but for now it is probably more accurate to speak of a pause,” Peskov said, after the sides met twice so far this year, which resulted from President Trump’s efforts to mediate. “You shouldn’t wear rose-tinted glasses and expect lightning-fast results,” Peskov added, which seemed an indirect criticism of Trump’s earlier claims of being able to achieve peace quickly. Interestingly, Peskov took a swipe at European leaders, describing the so-called ‘coalition of the willing’ as actively “impeding” negotiations. He sill emphasized that Moscow is committed to the “path of peaceful dialogue.”
The Western allies have been pushing ‘security guarantees’ which include troops from NATO countries which are to make up a ‘reassurance force’ – a prospect which Russia has condemned as an impossibility. As for President Trump’s assessment of where things stand, he offered this in a Friday Fox News appearance:
Meanwhile, Ukrainian President Zelensky has again ruled out giving up “the east”, saying it cannot be a “bargaining chip” – in fresh comments. This stance is nothing new, but territorial concessions will be key in any future permanent peace deal. Despite slow but steady Russian gains on the ground, Zelensky is still holding out hope of gaining the military momentum, despite being outgunned and outmanned.
Politico writes, “Vladimir Putin told Donald Trump and U.S. special envoy to Ukraine Steve Witkoff that he intends to occupy Ukraine’s eastern Donbas region in a few months, Volodymyr Zelenskyy said in an interview published Tuesday.” Zelensky told ABC News, “That is, he [Putin] says that in three to four months, and this is what he told the Americans, the White House, and President Trump’s representative Witkoff, he said that he would take Donbas in two to three months, maximum four months.” Ukraine war headlines have largely receded to the background this week, in wake of the horrific assassination of Turning Point USA founder Charlie Kirk. Yet fighting and the intensified cross-border attacks, particularly targeting each’s energy sites, continue on with no end in sight.
US Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth has held his first phone call with China’s minister of national defense, Admiral Dong Jun, telling him that Washington does not seek conflict, the Pentagon announced on Wednesday. The conversation comes amid strained ties as Washington has described Beijing as its main geopolitical rival. In May, Hegseth claimed that “the threat China poses is real, and it could be imminent,” and urged countries in the Asia-Pacific to boost military spending. In Tuesday’s call, Hegseth stressed the US is not pursuing confrontation, regime change, or “strangulation” of China. At the same time, he emphasized that Washington has “vital interests in the Asia-Pacific, the priority theater, and will resolutely protect those interests,” according to a readout of the conversation. The Pentagon described the exchange as “candid.”
China’s Xinhua news agency reported that the call was held at Hegseth’s request and that Dong urged continued communication and an open attitude to foster stable and positive military ties based on “equal respect, peaceful coexistence, and mutual respect.” Xinhua also cited Dong as saying China seeks peace and stability in the South China Sea and opposes “infringement and provocation” by non-regional countries. Last month, Washington and Beijing extended a 90-day tariff truce, keeping planned increases on hold until November 10. At the same time, several media outlets reported earlier this week that the US has allegedly been urging the EU to impose steep tariffs on imports from China and India, potentially up to 100%, over the Ukraine conflict and their ties with Russia. Washington is reportedly prepared to mirror the measures if adopted.
China and India have pushed back on tariff pressure. Chinese officials said they will ensure the country’s energy supply “in line with national interests” and warned that “tariff wars have no winners,” while India called the new US tariffs “unfair, unjustified, and unreasonable.” Russian President Vladimir Putin has also cautioned the West against using a “colonial tone” toward Beijing and New Delhi, suggesting that such actions are aimed at slowing their economic rise.
US President Donald Trump has said that his administration will be probing George Soros over his alleged funding of mass “riots” in the US. The Hungarian-American billionaire investor and NGOs funded by his Open Society Foundations (OSF) have long been linked to various protest movements, both in the US and abroad. “They have professional agitators… They get paid for their profession from Soros and other people,” Trump said in an interview with Fox & Friends on Friday. “We’re going to look into Soros because I think it’s a RICO case against him and other people,” he added. “This is more than protests: This is real agitation. This is riots on the street, and we’re gonna look into that,” Trump said.
The US federal RICO (Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act 1970) law has historically targeted organized crime, and is used to prosecute offenses committed as part of a criminal enterprise, though more recently it has seen broader use. Last month, the US president called for the Hungarian-American investor and his son to face charges under the statute, accusing them of supporting “violent protests, and much more, all throughout the United States.” “We’re not going to allow these lunatics to rip apart America any more,” he said in a Truth Social post.
In the months prior, anti-immigration protests shook the US, with the most violent cases in Los Angeles escalating into clashes with the police, looting, and arson. Soros was also linked to the 2016 Russiagate hoax, according to declassified documents published by the Senate Judiciary Committee in July. The documents alleged the investor’s OSF network had ties to the Hillary Clinton campaign’s debunked attempts to accuse Trump of collusion with Russia in order to undermine his 2016 election victory – accusations Moscow has long dismissed.
“The EU, however, is also operating a large-scale influence operation outside of the EU, of course under the benign sounding propaganda words of “framed as support for media freedom and pluralism”..”
The EU uses its citizens’ money not for their own good, but to buy other countries’ citizens.
The unelected leadership of the evidently corrupt European Union (EU) is now paying mainstream media to promote the agendas of its EU “elites.” The EU appears to have spent as much as 1 billion euros during the past decade alone in the process, according to a recent report, “Brussels’s media machine: European media funding and the shaping of public discourse,” by Thomas Fazi, from the European think tank MCC Brussels. Framing the projects as “fighting disinformation” and “promoting European integration” the EU has been throwing taxpayer money, conservatively estimated at €80 million annually, to “media projects” — not including indirect funding, such as advertising contracts. The report also shows that the EU runs a highly sophisticated “EU media complex” through which it gets to shape media narratives about itself and its agendas.According to Fazi’s report:
“The European Commission – through its Journalism Partnerships programme alone, with a cumulative budget approaching € 50 million to date – oversees a vast ecosystem of EU media ‘collaborations.’ Over the years, these have included hundreds of projects, ranging from pro-EU promotional campaigns to questionable ‘investigative journalism’ initiatives and sweeping ‘anti-fake news’ efforts. And that’s on top of the advertorial campaigns funded through the Information Measures for the EU Cohesion policy (IMREG) programme, to the tune of € 40 million so far… “Even more concerning is the central role played by major European public broadcasters in this process. These projects show that this is not a matter of one-off collaborations, but rather an evolving semi-structural relationship between EU institutions and public media networks.”
The European Commission has, it seems, has literally paid off almost everything and everyone in the media world — meaning that everyone, from news agencies to media outlets, public broadcasters and other media organizations, sits in the pocket of the European Commission to greater or smaller degrees. Some examples: Among news agencies — upon which practically all news outlets depend for their reporting — the European Commission has poured money into the following, among others: Agence France-Presse has received €7 million from the EU, ANSA (Italy) €5.6 million, Deutsche Presse-Agentur, (Germany) €3.2 million, Agencia EFE (Spain) €2 million, Associated Press (AP) €1 million, Lusa News Agency (Portugal) €200,000 Polish Press Agency €500,000, and Athens News Agency €600,000.
A selection of news outlets also appear to be being paid off by the European Commission: Euronews (pan-European) €230 million, ARTE (France) €26 million, Euractiv (pan-European) €6 million, Gazeta Wyborcza (Poland) €105,000, 444.hu (Hungary) €1.1 million, France TV (France) €400,000, GEDI Gruppo Editoriale (Italy) €190,000, ZDF (Germany) €500,000, and Bayerischer Rundfunk (Germany) €600,000.Public broadcasters have received the following: Deutsche Welle (Germany) €35 million, France Médias Monde €16.5 million, France Télévisions €1 million, RAI Radiotelevisione italiana (Italy) €2 million, RTBF (Belgium) €675,000, RTP (Portugal) €1.5 million, Estonian Public Broadcasting, ERR €1 million, RTVE (Spain) €770,000 ERR (Estonia) €1 million and TV2 (Denmark) €900,000.
Media organizations such as Reporters Without Borders (France) and Journalismfund Europe (Belgium) have received €5.7 million and €2.6 million respectively. A Dutch organization that calls itself independent, Bellingcat, has received €440,000. These abundant examples of media and news organizations are just those within the EU. The EU, however, is also operating a large-scale influence operation outside of the EU, of course under the benign sounding propaganda words of “framed as support for media freedom and pluralism” as if the EU knows the first thing about freedom and pluralism. The projects have centered especially on media in Ukraine, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Georgia, Moldova, Russia, Belarus and the western Balkans.
There is nothing transparent about any of this funding. According to the report, it is opaque and difficult to uncover. It makes sense, however, that the EU would seek to cover up its own influence peddling as much as possible. The report concludes: “[T]he EU’s ever-expanding system of media financing… creates financial dependencies, incentivises narrative conformity and fosters an ecosystem in which dissenting voices are marginalised – all under the virtuous banners of ‘fighting disinformation’, ‘promoting European values’ and ‘building a European public sphere.’
“The extent of institutional entanglement between EU bodies and major media actors – from public broadcasters to news agencies to online outlets – cannot be brushed aside as harmless or incidental. It constitutes a systemic conflict of interest that compromises the media’s ability to function as an independent pillar of democracy. Even absent direct editorial interference, the structural dependency on EU grants and contracts is enough to exert a chilling effect on critical reporting and encourage a reflexive alignment with official EU positions.”The EU appears, sadly, to be a deeply corrupt and undemocratic regime, which desperately clings to power through influence-peddling and the imposition of heavy-handed censorship. Hundreds of millions of Europeans continue to put up with these tactics. When will they please wake up?
“I don’t care if people are saying wars come next year and that there is going to be a nuclear conflict. They are all going to be 1,000% wrong because the Biblical cycle ends at the end of September and beginning of October.”
At the beginning of this year on USAWatchdog, Biblical cycle timing expert, geopolitical and financial analyst Bo Polny said, “Get ready for a wild ride in 2025 and beyond.” We have had the so-called Biden autopen scandal, huge deportation numbers by ICE, huge fraud with 911,000 fake jobs that hid a recession since July of 2024 and, now, the assassination of top conservative political figure Charlie Kirk. The world is going mad. Polny has a new warning that September 2025 is going to bring a huge market event that will end the financial system as we know it. Polny explains, “Silver, this time around, is not just going to go through $50 per ounce, it’s going to go through it like a hot knife through butter.
It’s going to go to $60 then $70, and then it’s going to three digits very shortly. What is about to happen are incredible price moves. This is the end of the Babylonian financial system. . .. They used the money to build Babylon. What is Babylon? It’s a control system. . .. We are about to see an explosion that is going to blow people’s minds on what is about to happen. Silver is going to go to numbers unthinkable. Silver has been prophesized to be the metal, the thing that is going to change people’s financial position forever.”
Polny also predicts, “The war cycle ends on September 21. The wars are about to come to an end. I don’t care if people are saying wars come next year and that there is going to be a nuclear conflict. They are all going to be 1,000% wrong because the Biblical cycle ends at the end of September and beginning of October. The September date is in my book. You can’t stop what is coming. You can only prepare for what is coming. When this move in gold and silver happens, they will finally break free of generations of price manipulation and suppression. This will be the destruction of the banking cartel.”
Polny points to the Bible and Haggai 2: 6-22. Polny reads, “I will shake the heavens and the earth and the sea and the dry land. 7 And I will shake all nations, so that the treasures of all nations shall come in, and I will fill this house with glory, says the Lord of hosts. 8 The silver is mine, and the gold is mine, declares the Lord of hosts. . .. Consider from this day onward, from the twenty-fourth day of the ninth month.”
Polny goes on to say, “This is Haggai, and it says September 24th . . . God is going to step in, and it’s going to be a 180 of what they did five years ago. . .. Five is the number of Grace. . .. It’s going to be the shaking of a lifetime on this world. It’s going to be a 9/11 worldwide on steroids. No one is going to miss it. What is going to happen is the greatest move of the spirit of God in human history. . .. All the Glory goes to God. This is a battle for souls. . .. Good news not bad news coming.”
The infamous autopen-pardoned Dr. Anthony Fauci lied under oath while testifying before Congress, and Rand Paul just dropped the receipts. “Emails obtained by the Committee appear to contradict your testimony,” wrote Paul – referring to Fauci declaring under oath that he never ‘engaged in attempts to obstruct the Freedom of Information Act and the release of public documents.’ “In an email dated February 2, 2020, you directed then-NIH Director Dr. Francis Collins to “Please delete this e-mail after you read it.” Paul’s letter continues; I have reason to believe that you may be in possession of additional records related to the Committee’s ongoing investigation. These records are necessary for the Committee to fully understand the federal government’s actions to identify the origins of COVID-19, and the extent to which taxpayer dollars were used to conduct risky virological research, as well as to weigh potential legislative reforms.
For this reason, I request that you provide the following, in complete, original, and unredacted form, no later than 5:00 PM on September 23, 2025:
1. A list of all email addresses, phone numbers, and messaging application usernames you used at any point between January 1, 2018, and January 1, 2023.
2. All email communications, including attachments, sent or received by you between January 1, 2018, and January 1, 2023, whether on government-issued or personal accounts/devices, that refer or relate in any way to:
NIH, HHS, CIA, FBI, DOD, COVID-19
The “Proximal Origins” paper, The Wellcome Trust, Jeremy Farrar, The P3CO Review Group, Gain-of-function research, Dual-use research of concern, EcoHealth Alliance, Peter Daszak, The Wuhan Institute of Virology, Ian Lipkin, Ralph Baric, Zhengli Shi, The DEFUSE proposal, DARPA, DTRA, USAID PREDICT, The Rocky Mountain Laboratory, Vincent Munster, Fort Detrick, The Integrated Research Facility, The U.S. Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases (USAMRIID), The National Biodefense Analysis and Countermeasures Center (NBACC)
3. All email communications, including attachments, created, sent, received, copied, or otherwise transmitted between January 1, 2018, and January 1, 2023, whether on government-issued or personal accounts/devices, between or among you and:
Jeremy Farrar, Francis Collins, Hugh Auchincloss, Ian Lipkin, Ralph Baric, Vincent Munster, Kristian Andersen, Andrew Rambaut, Edward Holmes, Robert Garry.
Including communications in which you appear in any field (to, from, cc, bcc) or in forwarded chains.
4. All records of calls and voicemails, whether on government-issued or personal devices/accounts, between January 1, 2018, and January 1, 2023, between you and:
Jeremy Farrar, Francis Collins, Hugh Auchincloss, Ian Lipkin, Ralph Baric, Vincent Munster, Kristian Andersen, Andrew Rambaut, Edward Holmes, Robert Garry, Samantha Power, Including call logs, voicemail transcripts, and audio recordings.
5. All text messages, iMessages, and communications conducted through encrypted or third-party messaging applications, including but not limited to Signal, WhatsApp, Telegram, and WeChat, sent or received by you between January 1, 2018, and January 1, 2023, whether on government-issued or personal accounts/devices, that refer or relate in any way to: NIH, HHS, CIA, FBI, DOD, COVID-19, The “Proximal Origins” paper, The Wellcome Trust, Jeremy Farrar, The P3CO Review Group, Gain-of-function research, Dual-use research of concern, EcoHealth Alliance, Peter Daszak, The Wuhan Institute of Virology, Ian Lipkin, Ralph Baric, Zhengli Shi, The DEFUSE proposal, DARPA, DTRA, USAID PREDICT, The Rocky Mountain Laboratory, Vincent Munster, Fort Detrick, The Integrated Research Facility, The U.S. Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases (USAMRIID)
Where are we on the validity of autopen pardons?
And there it is. Incontrovertible proof that Fauci lied under oath, well within the statute of limitations. He explicitly ordered people to delete emails. And yet nothing will happen, not only because the autopen gave Fauci a pardon but because the system will never allow it. https://t.co/GsyzNetBccpic.twitter.com/I1gxgpGLOl
America’s power grid is straining under the weight of a fast-changing energy landscape. Beyond the usual summer hum of air conditioners, power demand is surging from electric vehicle chargers and sprawling new data centers. At the same time, the infrastructure built to deliver reliable electricity is aging and showing its limits. From Texas heatwaves to California blackouts, the warning signs are impossible to ignore.mThis isn’t a technical challenge—it’s an economic and political reckoning. If the grid fails, it won’t be because we lacked solutions. It will be because we didn’t act quickly enough. For nearly two decades, U.S. electricity demand was flat. Now, consumption is climbing, driven by technologies that arrived faster than planners expected.
Artificial intelligence has unleashed a wave of data center construction. These facilities, dense with high-performance servers and cooling systems, are among the most power-hungry assets in the country. In 2023, AI data centers consumed about 4.4% of U.S. electricity, and that share could triple by 2028, according to Penn State’s Institute of Energy and the Environment. Northern Virginia—“Data Center Alley”—now handles 70% of global internet traffic, pushing utilities like Dominion Energy to scramble for capacity. Meanwhile, Microsoft and Google warn that a shortage of skilled electricians could delay expansion, with estimates that the U.S. will need 500,000 more electricians in the next decade. Electric vehicles, heat pumps, and electrified industry are adding further strain.
The Pacific Northwest Utilities Conference Committee projects growth equivalent to seven Seattle-sized cities within ten years. The Energy Information Administration (EIA) expects U.S. electricity sales to rise from 4,097 billion kWh in 2024 to 4,193 billion kWh in 2025, with similar gains to follow.And finally, there’s climate. As extreme heat events multiply, cooling demand in places like Texas and Arizona is surging—driving peak loads to new records. Just as demand is accelerating, the U.S. is retiring some of its most dependable sources of power.
The EIA projects 12.3 gigawatts (GW) of capacity will retire in 2025, a 65% jump over 2024. That includes 8.1 GW of coal, such as the 1,800-MW Intermountain Power Project in Utah, plus another 2.6 GW of natural gas. These plants provide round-the-clock power that intermittent sources cannot yet replace.Wind and solar capacity continue to grow, but not fast enough. The Department of Energy’s July 2025 Resource Adequacy Report warns that only 22 GW of firm generation is expected by 2030—well short of the 104 GW needed for peak demand. Transmission bottlenecks, permitting delays, and slow adoption of long-duration storage compound the problem. Grid operators from PJM, MISO, ERCOT, and others told Congress bluntly in March 2025: “Demand is accelerating, supply is lagging, and current tools may not be enough to bridge the gap.”
Scott Adams: The Democrat Party needs to be ripped out by the roots⁰⁰@ScottAdamsSays “Two days ago I would have said the healthiest thing for the country is that there are two strong political parties battling it out, in a war of ideas. But you know who else thought that?… pic.twitter.com/gftStZkR7j
Not that long ago, guys like Doug Macgregor and Scott Ritter said 8x more Ukrainians were being killed than Russians. That was an estimate, not propaganda. But it was never mentioned in the press, where numbers, if there were any, would be about 1:1. . Now, Trump is apparently being told 12x as many Russsians are killed. That is obvious propaganda. Are we to think he doesn’t know this?
This 12:1 kill ratio is utterly ridiculous. Has the Donald learned nothing yet—-the Deep State is sabotaging him again, because it wants the Ukraine proxy war on Russia to go on and on, so the MIC can sell more, more, more and still more weapons to the Pentagon. Wake up POTUS! pic.twitter.com/ixqtJtOsoC
"The deal was that the Europeans are going to buy lots of weapons from us to give to the Ukrainians. There are only three problems: We don’t have the weapons, the Europeans don’t have the money, and the Ukrainians don’t have the manpower"@JimJatras noted that while the US tries… pic.twitter.com/fFZdoR1QkR
The real way to bring interest rates down is to prevent the Federal Reserve from sending trillions of taxpayer dollars to big banks, both domestic and foreign. My End the Fed’s Big Bank Bailout Act does just that. pic.twitter.com/B7egGkigbn
cIA
https://twitter.com/TRUMP_ARMY_/status/1951952936785084724
Ritter
Orban: “Peace will come when Europeans and Ukrainians alike accept the fact that Russia will never allow NATO to establish a presence on its western border in Ukraine..”
Trump wants nominees confirmed, mostly standard procedure. But now Schumer demands a billion or so to pay for Democrat pet projects.
“..billion with a b—in unrelated funding as a ransom for a handful of consensus nominees who had already made it through bipartisan committee votes.”
Saying that President Donald Trump wasn’t happy when Senate Democrats tried to extort his administration for a billion-dollar payout in exchange for doing their constitutionally mandated job would be an understatement. Over the weekend, what should have been a routine confirmation process for highly qualified Trump nominees turned into a hostage negotiation orchestrated by Sen. Chuck Schumer and his band of obstructionists. Make no mistake, Schumer wasn’t bargaining in good faith. He and his allies demanded over a billion dollars—yes, I meant billion with a b—in unrelated funding as a ransom for a handful of consensus nominees who had already made it through bipartisan committee votes. That’s not negotiation; that’s the Democrats shamelessly weaponizing the Senate to advance their own radical agenda.
Trump cut through the charade with a blunt, unmistakable message to Schumer on Truth Social, calling his demand nothing less than “political extortion.” Trump called the demand “egregious and unprecedented,” warning Republicans that accepting it “would be embarrassing to the Republican Party.” He urged GOP lawmakers to reject the offer, “go home and explain to your constituents what bad people the Democrats are,” and told Schumer—whom he said is under pressure from the “Radical Left Lunatics”—to “GO TO HELL!” Trump’s decision wasn’t just about protecting his nominees; it was about sending a message that the days of Republican leaders folding in the face of Democrat brinkmanship are over. The president gave Senate Republicans his marching orders: Walk away. Refuse to reward such brazen extortion. Let Democrats explain to the American people why vital appointments are stalled and government remains hobbled.
If the GOP ever hopes to reverse the damage inflicted by years of feckless Republican capitulation, this kind of stand is long overdue. Senate Majority Leader John Thune described the failed talks as a nonstop loop of shifting demands—“lots of offers” nearly agreed to, only for Democrats to move the goalposts, which sounds about right. Schumer’s team kept pushing for more: billions in aid, protection for bloated spending, and perks for their political machine. In return, they offered only the safest nominees, like it was a mob shakedown. Senator Markwayne Mullin saw it firsthand. “We’ve had three different deals since last night, and every time it’s been…‘I want more.’” The game was rigged from the start. Democrats wanted the illusion of compromise, expecting the GOP to fold. This time, they didn’t.
Democrats cried foul, accusing the GOP of padding the nominee list with “controversial” picks—classic projection from a party that’s mastered political blackmail. But the days of Republican surrender are over. Under Trump’s leadership, the GOP shut it down. Just seven nominees were confirmed before the August recess—not ideal, but better than caving to Schumer’s demands. The White House is ready to push through the rest in September, even if it means changing the rules Democrats have long abused to obstruct. This breakdown makes two things clear: Republicans are done playing by the left’s rigged rules, and if key posts stay vacant, the blame lies with Schumer and his “resistance” gang. Let them explain the dysfunction. Trump’s bold stand should fire up Republicans. After years of retreat, the party is drawing lines, rejecting ransom politics, and putting America first. It’s the kind of fight the country’s been waiting for.
European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen agreed to a lopsided US trade deal without resistance out of fear that Washington might reduce military support for Ukraine or even withdraw American forces from Europe, the Sunday Times reported this weekend. The paper described von der Leyen’s recent visit to President Donald Trump’s golf course in Scotland – where she accepted a 15% tariff on most EU exports – as a “surrender.” According to the report, officials inside the Commission initially prepared a strong countermeasure package in response to Trump’s proposed 20% tariffs announced in April. But when Trump threatened to raise the tariffs to 30%, von der Leyen pulled back.
Behind her reversal was “the fear that Trump might use a dispute as a pretext to cut US military support for Ukraine or otherwise damage European security,” the Sunday Times wrote. Brussels was reportedly particularly concerned about the outcome of a pending American “posture review” that may result in the withdrawal of some of the roughly 80,000 US troops stationed across Europe. The trade agreement finalized last week includes not only the 15% tariff on EU goods, but also commitments by Brussels to invest $600 billion in the US economy and purchase $750 billion worth of American energy over the next three years. In contrast, the UK – negotiating independently – secured a lower 10% tariff on its exports.
Amid mounting internal backlash in Brussels, French President Emmanuel Macron reportedly criticized the outcome, saying the EU is “not feared enough.” Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban remarked that Trump “ate her for breakfast,” and accused von der Leyen of exceeding her authority by allegedly pledging to purchase large quantities of US arms. Von der Leyen has also faced growing political resistance at home, as she pushes to redirect a significant portion of the EU’s next €1.8 trillion seven-year budget from agriculture and regional development toward militarization. She narrowly survived a vote of confidence in the European Parliament last month amid criticism of her leadership style and controversies over her Covid-19 vaccine procurement deals. Some MEPs now view her current term as her “last chance,” according to lawmakers quoted by the Times.
Swiss President Karin Keller-Sutter is facing backlash after trade talks with Washington collapsed following a “disastrous” phone call with US President Donald Trump, Financial Times has reported, citing sources familiar with the matter. Trump announced a 39% levy – one of the highest globally – on Swiss goods on Friday, coinciding with Switzerland’s national day. According to the FT report published on Sunday, Swiss negotiators believed they had secured a provisional deal for a 10% tariff, similar to the UK’s arrangement. In exchange, Bern pledged nearly $150 billion in US-bound investment and remained in regular contact with US Trade Representative Jamieson Greer. The offer was approved in early July, with Swiss officials convinced it only awaited Trump’s signature.
Keller-Sutter, who also serves as finance minister under the country’s rotating presidency, had publicly stated last month that she had gained rare “access to Trump.” However, during a 30-minute call on Thursday – described by sources as “disastrous” – the US leader reportedly rejected the offer and instead focused on Switzerland’s $39 billion trade surplus.“The call did not go well, in the sense that from the very first minute Trump made it clear 10 per cent was not enough, and all he could focus on was Switzerland stealing money from the US. There was nothing Keller-Sutter could say,” one source told FT. Trump reportedly asked what more the “very wealthy” Alpine country could offer.
Swiss media called the outcome Keller-Sutter’s “biggest fiasco,” with tabloid Blick likening it to the country’s worst defeat since 1515, when Swiss troops lost to France at the Battle of Marignano. Greer later denied that a final deal had been secured, telling Bloomberg: “Nothing is agreed until everything is agreed.” The tariff hike followed Trump’s ‘Liberation Day’ speech announcing a global trade overhaul on April 2. After multiple delays and a series of negotiations, a revised executive order signed last week adjusted rates based on “trade imbalances,” with the tariffs now set to enter into force on August 7.
The foundational pillars of the American middle class have been crumbling for decades, crushed under the weight of unaffordable housing, runaway education costs, and the rising price of just about everything. This full-blown affordability crisis is hollowing out the middle class from within. Add years of mass migration of millions of illegal aliens, and the wealth and opportunities once available to the native population have eroded even further. It’s becoming impossible to ignore that many policymakers in Washington, seemingly aligned with the globalist billionaires, have deliberately waged economic war on America’s middle class. This is precisely why President Trump rose to power.
Two of the core bedrocks of the middle class include homeownership and family formation. These two pillars provide economic stability, social cohesion, and long-term investment that sustain a prosperous and resilient society. Alarm bells have been sounded, and the Trump administration had better be paying attention, because a new chart that shows the estimated percentage of 30-year-olds in the U.S. who are both married and homeowners, spanning from 1950 to a projected 2025, has completely collapsed.
The chart was first posted on X by Nathan Halberstadt of New Founding, who stated this is a “critical civilizational problem.” Halberstadt is correct: Young Americans can’t afford homes, can’t start families, and increasingly see the American Dream as just a dream. This has given rise to socialism and Marxism, spreading across the nation like cancer. It’s as if the globalist elite in Washington deliberately sabotaged the middle class over the years, hollowing it out with decades of destructive policies designed to break those key pillars. This chart was enough for Elon Musk to respond with “!!” as he, too, understands there needs to be a drastic and sharp course correction or risk losing the country to socialists and Marxists.
The reason Communism failed to take hold in the U.S. in the 1960s post-WWII is that the economic expansion had stable jobs, rising wages, access to homeownership, and upward mobility. The revolution didn’t die, it just changed tactics with all things woke re-emerging in the current unaffordability crisis that has taken decades to play out.
So the hoax is finally officially acknowledged. “Russiagate” – the mainstream narrative, that is – is now described by American intelligence chiefs as a fabrication that was concocted to overturn the results of the 2016 U.S. presidential elections. Tulsi Gabbard, the current Director of National Intelligence (DNI), and CIA director John Ratcliffe have both accused former President Barack Obama of engaging in a “treasonous conspiracy” to subvert the constitutional process. It’s not just Obama who is implicated in this high crime. Other former senior officials in his 2013-17 administration, including former DNI James Clapper, CIA director John Brennan, and head of the FBI James Comey, are also implicated. If justice is permitted, the political repercussions are truly earth-shattering.
The potential impact is not confined solely to the violation of U.S. laws and the democratic process – bad enough that is. The Russiagate scandal that began in 2016 has had a lasting, damaging effect on U.S. and European relations with Russia. The frightfully dangerous NATO proxy war incited in Ukraine, which threatens to escalate into a full-scale world war, was fueled in large part by the hostility generated from the false claims of Russian interference in the U.S. elections. The allegations that Russian President Vladimir Putin oversaw a subversion campaign against the 2016 U.S. election and colluded with Donald Trump to get him elected were always specious. The scandal was based on shoddy intel claims to purportedly explain how Trump defeated his Democrat rival, Hillary Clinton. Subsequently, the scandal was hyped into a seemingly credible narrative by U.S. intelligence chiefs at the direction of then-President Barack Obama as a way to delegitimize Trump’s incoming first-term presidency.
Years before the recent intelligence disclosures, many independent journalists, including Aaron Maté, and former intelligence analysts like Ray MacGovern and William Binney, had cogently disproven the official Russiagate claims. Not only were these claims false, they were knowingly false. That is, lies and deliberate distortions. Russia did not hack emails belonging to the Democratic National Committee to discredit Clinton. Clinton’s corruption was exposed by a DNC internal leak to Julian Assange’s Wikileaks whistleblower site. That was partly why Assange was persecuted with years-long incarceration. A large enough number of voters simply despised Clinton and her warmongering psychopathy, as well as her sell-out of working-class Americans for Wall Street largesse.
Furthermore, Moscow consistently denied any involvement in trying to influence the 2016 U.S. election or attempts to favor Trump. Putin has said more than once that Russia has no preference about who becomes U.S. president, implying that they’re all the same and controlled by deeper state forces. Laughably, too, while Washington accused Moscow of election interference, the actual record shows that the United States has habitually interfered in scores of foreign elections over many decades, including those of Russia. No other nation comes close to the U.S. – the self-declared “leader of the free world” – in sabotaging foreign elections.
In any case, it is instructive to compare the Russiagate farce with the Watergate scandal. Watergate involved spying by the White House of President Richard Nixon against a Democrat rival in the 1972 election. The political crisis that ensued led to Nixon’s resignation in disgrace in 1974. The U.S. nation was shocked by the dirty tricks. Several senior White House officials were later convicted and served time in jail for crimes related to the affair. Nixon was later pardoned by his successor, Gerald Ford, and avoided prosecution. Nevertheless, Watergate indelibly disgraced U.S. politics and, at the time, was described as “the worst political scandal of the 20th century.” Subsequent cases of corruption and malfeasance are often dubbed with the suffix “gate” in a nod to Watergate as a momentous political downfall. Hence, “Russiagate.”
There are hugely important differences, however. While Watergate was a scandal based on factual crimes and wrongdoing, Russiagate was always a contrived propaganda deception. The real scandal behind Russiagate was not Trump’s alleged misdeeds or those of Russia, but the criminal conspiracy by Obama and his administration to sabotage the 2016 election and subsequently to overthrow the Trump presidency and the democratic will of the American people. Tulsi Gabbard, the nation’s most senior intelligence chief, has said that this amounts to “treason,” and she has called for the prosecution of Obama and other former senior aides.
Arguably, the real Russiagate scandal is far more criminal and devastating in its political implications than Watergate. The latter involved illegal spying and dirty tricks. Whereas, Russiagate involved a president and his intelligence chiefs trying to subvert the entire democratic process. Not only that, but the U.S. mainstream media are also now exposed for perpetrating a propaganda heist on the American public. All of the major U.S. media outlets amplified the politicised intelligence orchestrated by the Obama administration, claiming that Russia interfered in the election and that Trump was a “Kremlin stooge.” The hoax became an obsession in the U.S. media for years and piled up severe damage in international relations, a nefarious legacy that we are living with today.
The New York Times and Washington Post, reputedly two of the finest exponents of American journalism, jointly won the Pulitzer Prize in 2018 for their reporting on Russiagate, the official version, that is, which lent credibility to the hoax. In light of what we know now, these newspapers should be hanging their heads in shame for running a Goebbels-like Big Lie campaign to not only deceive the U.S. public but to subvert the democratic process and poison international relations. Their reputations are shredded, as well as those of other major media outlets, including ABC, CBS, CNN, and NBC.
Ironically, The Washington Post won the Pulitzer Prize in 1973 for its reporting on the Watergate scandal. The story was made into a best-selling book, All The President’s Men, and a hit Hollywood movie starring Robert Redford and Dustin Hoffman, playing the roles of intrepid reporters Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein. Woodward and Bernstein and The Washington Post were acclaimed as the finest in U.S. journalism for exposing Watergate and bringing a crooked president to book. How shameful and absurd that an even greater assault on American democracy and international relations in the form of Russiagate is ignored and buried by “America’s finest”. That the scandal is ignored and buried should be of no surprise because to properly reveal it would shatter the foundations of the U.S. political establishment and the sinister role of the deep state and its mainstream media propaganda system.
In the past few days I have listen to John Helmer say on Nima’s show that President Trump’s latest irresponsible outburst signals Putin that Russia is facing war. Scott Ritter also on Nima’s show said the same. I share the concern. My position since the “Maidan Revolution” in Kiev in 2014, that is, since Washington’s overthrow of the democratically elected Ukrainian government and installed a Russiaphobic puppet, has been that Putin’s unwillingness to deal decisively with the situation, first by permitting the overthrow, second by refusing the Donbas Russians’ 2014 request to be reincorporated into Russia like Crimea, and third by foolishly trusting to the Minsk Agreement and giving Washington and NATO eight years to build a Ukrainian army, guaranteed a conflict that would widen into a catastrophic event.
Helmer and Ritter say that is what we now face with Trump’s latest recklessness being the icing on the cake that Putin’s toleration of endless provocations has baked. Scott Ritter is worth listening to. Ritter was the chief arms inspector sent to Iraq to confirm that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction justifying Washington’s invasion. But Ritter was too honest for the job and reported back that there were no weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. The Zionist George W. Bush Regime simply ignored the report, sent US Secretary of State Colin Powell to the UN to lie through his teeth, and invaded and destroyed an Arab country for Israel. George W., the son of a former US president and CIA Director, sent American soldiers to die for Israel and asserted he was fighting a “war on terror.” He was fighting with American lives and money a war for Greater Israel.
Fighting wars for Israel has been US policy for the entirety of the 21st century. American parents, brothers, sisters, daughters, sons, uncles, cousins, and friends have been fighting and dying for Israel and paying for their own deaths by financing the war with their own pocket books for three presidencies during which Washington has sacrificed Americans for Israel. All of this has to be kept hidden from Americans and is by lies, censorship, charges of anti-semitism, and criminalization of criticism of Israel. If truth be known, Israel rules the West. There are only two members in the US house of Representatives with the courage to stand up to Israel. In the US Senate I think there is only one. The bully Trump is afraid of the Israel Lobby and illegally bombed Iran–an act of war–on orders from Netanyahu. Trump is building Greater Israel, not America. When MAGA-Americans elected Trump, they elected Netanyahu.
To move on to the wider point. Everywhere we look no government can face reality, not the Trump and predecessor regimes, not Putin and Lavrov, not the UK, France, Germany, China, Iran. Not even those threatened can face the reality. I am currently rereading A.J.P. Taylor’s The Origins of the Second World War. World War II happened because everyone refused to recognize reality, except Hitler who recognized it about half the time. The rest created the conditions for war that Hitler did not need or want. Hitler did not conquer Austria. The dumbshit Austrian government handed the country to him. Hitler did not invade Czechoslovakia, the dumbshit Czech President Benes handed it to him. The British and French, like Putin today, wanted peace and thus created the conditions for war.
The British government’s intense determination to avoid war caused it. The foolish British government issued a military guarantee to the Polish military dictatorship just as it was about to sign an agreement for Germany to reincorporate German territory assigned to Poland by the Treaty of Versailles. Consequently, the Poles walked away from settling the issue of Germans ruled by Poland. The result was the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact portioning Poland between Germany and the Soviet Union. It was the British and French, neither capable of fighting, who recklessly declared war on Germany. France was instantly conquered, and the British escaped at Dunkirk with Hitler’s permission. Hitler misread Churchill. Hitler thought that if he let the defeated British army escape, it wouldn’t wound the British pride, and they would accept his extraordinarily peace terms that committed Germany to the defense of the British Empire.
In his day A.J.P. Taylor was hated because he told the truth, whereas the court historians insured their success by regurgitating war propaganda. Most historians you read are court historians insuring their own success.Tell the truth and the universities dismiss you from your position, as happened to A.J.P. Taylor. The inability or unwillingness to recognize reality today is worst than in the late 1930s. Today every country’s myths blind it to reality and compel it toward war. When leaders, if that is what they are, are incapable of acknowledging reality, only luck can save us.
NATO is mulling deploying a German-Dutch corps in the Estonian city of Parnu, the ERR broadcaster reported on Sunday, citing Estonian Defense Minister Hanno Pevkur. “This specific plan is tied to a broader NATO initiative, which involves the German-Dutch corps responsible for our area of operations and their forward command post. It would involve both our allies who fulfill leadership roles at the corps level and, of course, our own defense forces — including conscripts. From the perspective of the Estonian Defense Forces (EDF), it’s a fairly significant development,” Pevkur was quoted as saying by the broadcaster. However, the final decision is going to be taken later this year, the broadcaster said.
The deployment will require creation of the infrastructure for 100-200 people, including administrative buildings, technical buildings and other facilities. The Estonian Defense Ministry is reportedly planning to allocate 17 million euros ($19.7 million) for that. In recent years, Russia has been flagging up NATO’s unprecedented activity near its western borders. NATO is expanding its initiatives and calling it “containing Russian aggression.” Moscow has repeatedly expressed concern about the buildup of NATO forces in Europe. Russian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Maria Zakharova has also said that the Baltic states’ governments were destroying the remnants of security and stability in the region.
“And they will have to bear most of the costs of the war in Ukraine wanted by the United States. In short, a disaster. The equivalent of losing a war. Again.”
Sometimes the scales lose their balance, and so someone or something is needed to restore that balance. Something similar happened during the visit of Ursula von der Leyen, President of the European Commission, and Donald Trump. It must be acknowledged that, despite his extreme contradictions in his statements and actions, he is very consistent in one thing. Trump strongly pushes his country’s economic interests. As Dmitry Medvedev noted: “The current ‘agreement’ with the European Union: 1) is completely humiliating for Europeans, as it is only beneficial to the US – it eliminates European market protection, eliminating tariffs on American products; 2) creates huge additional costs for industry and agriculture in many EU countries for the payment of expensive American energy fuels; 3) redirects a powerful flow of investment from Europe to the US.”
We have witnessed yet another ridiculous spectacle. Nothing more than what has already happened in the past, nothing less than what could be expected. Ursula said she agreed with all of Trump’s proposals: 15% tariffs, purchasing $750 billion worth of oil and LNG, and investing $600 billion in the US economy. In other words, it will be the citizens of the European Union who will lose out once again: we repeat, the citizens of the European Union will have to give many billions of dollars to the United States because of tariffs; they will have to give many billions of dollars to the United States for the purchase of gas; they will have to give many billions of dollars to the United States for the purchase of weapons; they will have to give many billions of dollars to the United States in the form of investments on American territory.
And they will have to bear most of the costs of the war in Ukraine wanted by the United States. In short, a disaster. The equivalent of losing a war. Again. Ursula is complicit in the destruction of Europe, with the aggravating circumstance of holding the highest institutional office. In ancient usage, the use of “von” in surnames is a noble preposition that literally means ‘of’ or “from,” and indicates geographical origin or dependence on a lord. Nothing could be more apt: Ursula belongs more to the American lord than to Europe. The European people have not been consulted on this devastating prospect, while it is becoming increasingly clear that European politicians, raised, educated, and elected, do not respond in the slightest to the needs of the population.
The political significance of events such as this must be taken seriously, because they are clear signs of a shift in the order of things, in favor of another, and they have a short-, medium-, and long-term impact, in this case on the entire European continent and the collective West. Until a few days ago, the EU was pushing for war and funding and adopting a partially anti-American rhetoric in order to fulfill its obedience to NATO; today, it finds itself having to kiss the shoes of the occupant of Washington. The US president called the agreement “the greatest ever.” Von der Leyen said the agreement would bring stability and predictability. Trump ate Ursula for breakfast, but it is Europe that will suffer from indigestion.
If there is one thing we can take away from this U.S. tariff attack, it is the confirmation that being an “ally” or “friend” of this nation is, in fact, extremely dangerous. Beyond the utterly self-destructive commitments its allies are bound to—which can range from declaring war on powers like the Russian Federation, to accepting and normalizing genocide, or imposing suicidal sanctions and tariffs against economic blocs like China, not to mention “sharing” the best business deals and most advanced technologies—even in customs relations, the dynamic is lethally perilous. It’s as if the U.S. is telling its vassals: “Vassalage is no longer enough”; “All the commercial, military, economic, and political advantages that vassalage grants us are no longer sufficient”; “Now you must pay for the right to be our vassals”; “A tribute for the right to pay tribute.”
The price of the “right to vassalage,” the “right” to witness one’s own economic decline, the transformation of advanced economies into mere economic substitutes, is paid through asymmetric tariffs. “To sell here, you must pay high tariffs, and beyond the tariffs that cripple your economy, you must also transfer the economic results of that trade and all its indirect economic potential to us”—in other words, “It’s all ours.” To this predatory pact, this act of economic bombardment and sabotage, the European Commission referred to it as a “balanced agreement.” And everyone watched, some more stoically, others less calmly, but they accepted it like docile cattle in a compliant herd. Is this how it is? Despite everything I’ve said, I still have doubts about whether we can interpret Ursula von der Leyen’s submissive attitude toward Trump as an effective capitulation of the European economy to the White House’s will.
Not that this isn’t her intention, or that it isn’t precisely for such behavior that the ex-Minister of Defense under Merkel and Stanford graduate holds the position of President of the European Commission. However, it seems to me that this “comprehensive agreement,” given the track record of this European Commission and its lack of the necessary competencies to negotiate everything that was announced, serves other purposes. There should be no doubt about the role this European Commission plays in the capture of the European economy by the U.S., reducing it to little more than a mercantile extension dependent on the strategies of the metropolis. There are countless instances where von der Leyen’s actions as a broker for U.S. interests and a promoter of American agendas in Europe—particularly those involving direct competition with the Russian Federation, aiming at its economic weakening and eventual destruction—have been evident. This is nothing we haven’t discussed before.
In response to the dominance of Russian energy in the European Union and the critical role that easy, quick, and cheap access to vast amounts of gas played in economies like Germany’s, von der Leyen offered the apologetic silence of Nord Stream’s destruction, the sanctioning of payment mechanisms to hinder the purchase of Russian energy, and the effusive promotion of U.S. LNG and oil—as she recently did again, falsely referring to “better and cheaper” U.S. energy. To wound the Russian Federation’s economy, von der Leyen didn’t hesitate to annihilate the European economy—a fact that, given her husband Heiko von der Leyen’s family history and the von der Leyen family’s ties to the Third Reich and Galicia, should unsettle us greatly, no matter how much they try to mask these ancestral connections with supposed confusion between different branches of the family.
India and Brazil are interested in Russian energy imports and will not give in to US President Donald Trump’s threats, the Global Times newspaper writes, citing Chinese experts. “Trump’s tariffs have inflicted heavy blows on various nations; rather than awaiting doom passively, it is better to stand firm to mitigate losses,” Lu Xiang, research fellow at the Chinese Academy of Social Science, told the paper. According to him, every country has the right to safeguard its legitimate interests, and Brazil and India are acting on this principle, which reflects their pursuit of an independent foreign policy. Lu believes that the Trump administration treats tariffs as a ‘panacea’ for all the difficulties it confronts, yet reality tells a different story.
Qian Feng, director of the research department at the National Strategy Institute at Tsinghua University, said that India would not abandon Russian oil purchases despite US pressure. He pointed out that India was an oil-deficient nation, and Russian oil offered New Delhi the advantages of being cost-effective and high-quality, and safeguards for its economic development. Qian added that Washington’s attempts to put pressure on New Delhi might prompt India to further revert to a policy of balancing among major powers. Trump earlier announced plans to take measures against the countries importing Russian oil, including India and Brazil.
Former Democratic Party presidential hopeful and current Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard is giving the CIA an enema, and she’s putting the hose where it is most needed: in the sketchy, unofficial offices of Operation Mockingbird, the CIA’s not-so-secret department dedicated to propaganda. FACT-O-RAMA! Operation Mockingbird was created in the late 1940s to spread anti-Soviet propaganda through news outlets. It was later weaponized for use against Americans. Operation Mockingbird is the grandfather of “fake news.” The CIA has been bribing/threatening/installing journalists to do their bidding since the beginning of the Cold War. It is believed they had/have roughly 400 journalists, news reporters, and publishers throughout the world, writing what the CIA tells them to write.
In the mid-1970s, Operation Mockingbird was exposed by the Church Committee, led by Senator Frank Church (D-Idaho). The committee found that the CIA, the FBI, the NSA, and various other alphabet agencies were illegally bugging, wiretapping, and harassing people, even Americans, the most notable of whom was Martin Luther King, Jr. The Church Committee slapped the CIA on the wrist and told them to end Operation Mockingbird, but, exasperatingly, the committee didn’t provide any oversight to make sure that Mockingbird was dead. According to the Church Committee Report on Foreign and Military Intelligence of 1976 (page 455), Mockingbird thrives to this day. COINCIDENCE-O-RAMA! Operation Mockingbird was first exposed by journalist Carl Bernstein in Rolling Stone. Today, RFK, Jr. believes the CIA has control over the very same apocryphal rag mag.
So that leads us to where we are now. Tulsi Gabbard believes Operation Mockingbird isn’t merely still alive and kicking, but that it’s being used to slander President Trump. 9In my opinion, it is also being used to spread globalist codswallop.) Even better, Gabbard is dedicated to tearing it down. Operation Mockingbird has also taken over various television shows, like the soon-to-be kaput Late Show with Stephen Colbert. What you’re about to see is not comedy. It’s tragically cringeworthy propaganda being progenerated by a globalist shill who needs to be drummed out of the comedy community forever. Welcome to late-night brainwashing, courtesy of, I believe, Operation Mockingbird:
SCARY: Tulsi Gabbard CONFIRMS That ‘Operation Mockingbird’ is STILL Ongoing inside the CIA and she is actively trying to Shut it Down.
Tulsi says Deep State intel agents are still actively colluding with left-wing media outlets to attack President Trump from within:
DNI Gabbard claims she is dedicated to ending the unofficial “Operation Mockingbird.” I can’t be more giddy. I suspect there are no hallway signs at the Pentagon stating “Operation Mockingbird Offices This Way,” and thus stabbing the problem in its heart may prove difficult. Operation Mockingbird is likely why your hirsute thing-in-law believes Trump said to take “horse pills” to beat COVID, which came from a bat salad, and so many other lies we’ve seen pushed by the media. I believe the darker threat isn’t fake news, but the seemingly unquenchable thirst for more of the same. Killing Operation Mockingbird is integral, but teaching leftoids they’ve been lied to for decades is the true challenge.
“Get this: according to Rolling Stone, the evidence showing the Russian collusion scandal was itself a hoax is actually… wait for it… Russian disinformation!”
There comes a point where even the most seasoned observers of media bias have to pause and marvel at just how far the mainstream press will go to insulate Democrats from their own deceptions. This latest saga, surrounding the Russian collusion hoax, hasn’t merely reached a new level of absurdity—it’s obliterated every pretense of honest reporting in spectacular fashion. We’re now witnessing a full-scale meltdown in the legacy media, triggered by the slow release of bombshell documents tied to the infamous Russian collusion narrative. DNI Tulsi Gabbard’s calculated drip of these disclosures has left the press dazed; before they can spin their way out of one revelation, another lands with even greater force, blowing apart their talking points. The impact? Panic, denial, and a frenetic scramble to rewrite reality.
At the center of it all is the “Durham Annex”—a trove of evidence so deeply troubling that the mainstream media can’t afford to look at it objectively. Instead of confronting the contents, Rolling Stone—never shy about running cover for the left—truly jumped the shark with a theory so far-fetched it would make a conspiracy theorist blush. Get this: according to Rolling Stone, the evidence showing the Russian collusion scandal was itself a hoax is actually… wait for it… Russian disinformation! It’s almost poetic, in a perverse and cynical way. According to the magazine, “the previously classified documents seem to suggest that some of the supposed ‘evidence’ Patel and others are touting as proof of their conspiracies was actually fabricated by Russian intelligence.” This plot twist isn’t arriving in a vacuum.
The left’s playbook here is obvious: muddy inconvenient waters with frantic claims and hope the facts get lost in the haze. We’ve seen it before, and you can bet we’ll see it again. This is desperation. Let’s break down their thesis. According to Rolling Stone, two emails (dated July 25 and 27, 2016) linking a top Soros operative to a Clinton campaign advisor—found in the Durham Annex—should be dismissed as likely Russian disinformation. Where’s the proof this is Russian disinformation? And how exactly could the Kremlin have predicted—months before the Steele dossier went public—that Democrats would need cover for a bogus collusion narrative? The timeline alone shatters the narrative.
These emails surfaced before the Russia hoax fully took shape and even hinted at the FBI preparing to legitimize the Steele dossier—perfectly aligning with other suppressed evidence of Obama-era interference. But instead of confronting any of it, the media memory-holes the facts to keep the story alive. Rolling Stone and its allies won’t touch the glaring contradictions because doing so would blow up their entire premise. To buy their version, you’d have to believe Russia infiltrated the Obama administration and U.S. intelligence agencies in advance—planting evidence for a scandal that didn’t even exist yet. It’s a plot so far-fetched, even Hollywood would pass.
For years, Democrats and their media allies leaned on “Russia, Russia, Russia” as the catch-all justification for their attacks on Trump. Now that the narrative is collapsing, they can’t stop. Instead, they double down—layering new conspiracies onto old ones, hoping confusion and fatigue will do what the facts won’t. But no matter how much gaslighting they deploy, the truth is still the truth—and it’s catching up to them. The American people deserve better than this endless charade, and the reckoning for years of media-driven deception is only just beginning.
“..an education system that creates a population that cannot think and solve problems is not as serious as the feminist attack on women and on marriage..”
“Instead of liberating women, feminism has destroyed them. The concept of female has radically changed.”
Americans and the Western World face many threats that receive little, if any, attention because they are long term and slow acting. They are not immediate in our face like Trump increasing tensions with Russia with his ultimatums and placement of nuclear armed submarines, or like the Democrats’ weaponization of law and media, or the West’s moral insouciance to Israel’s genocide of the Palestinians. There are even worst things underway that are slowly destroying the West’s ability to continue its existence even if nuclear war can be avoided. The West is being undermined by the destruction of its belief system. The destruction of belief cuts across vast areas of life. At this time I will mention two of our losses that are sufficient in themselves to destroy us without Russia unleashing its arsenal of hypersonic nuclear weapons.
One is the replacement of an educated population by the emergence of an indoctrinated and uneducated generation that has not been imbued with an appreciation of their culture, which leaves the United States, Canada, and Europe without a population supportive of the “racist, exploitative countries” in which they have been taught they live. The journalist Rachel Marsden explains that merit-based personal achievement is non-inclusive and its abandonment has resulted in the destruction of education in the Western World. As bad as it is, an education system that creates a population that cannot think and solve problems is not as serious as the feminist attack on women and on marriage and its commitments such as “for better or worse.”
Kay Hymowitz, writing in the City Journal, Summer 2025, reports on how divorce has become the thing to do for middle aged women to achieve self-realization in loving themselves rather than their husbands. In the new books, magazine articles, and movies divorce is the way middle-aged women achieve self-realization in self-love. Women have joined men in philandering. Women want liberation from husbands and children. They want sex. Lots of it. Being a middle aged harlot is liberating. It is called “self-exploration” and “radical self-love.” The women love themselves more than they love their husbands and children.
The feminist destruction of marriage is pushed by those who control Hollywood and TV movies, publishing houses, magazines and media, and is part of the ongoing attack on dispossessing Western gentiles of family, the basis of social cohesion. Hymowitz describes our time as one of female joy produced by proud female self-sovereignty. Men no longer have the option of a loving mutually supportive life-long relationship with a wife. Instead of liberating women, feminism has destroyed them. The concept of female has radically changed.
“..the head of EU diplomacy, Kaja Kallas – also present in Beijing – has accused China of fueling the war in Ukraine and waging hybrid operations against Europe.”
The China-EU summit held in Beijing late last month could have been a celebration of 50 years of diplomatic relations between two of the world’s largest economic powers. Instead, it served as a sobering reminder of the EU’s growing strategic confusion, and its inability to capitalize on the immense opportunities offered by cooperation with China. The summit came at a sensitive moment in global politics. What was once hailed as a mutually beneficial partnership has now become entangled in geopolitics, internal divisions within the EU, and the enduring shadow of Washington’s influence. The global turbulence of recent years – the pandemic, and the war in Ukraine – has not only strained relations but also reinforced the EU’s dependence on the United States.
Rather than renewing a partnership that once stood as a pillar of global economic integration, the EU leaders arrived in Beijing with a familiar agenda: accusations over trade practices, warnings about “security threats,” and renewed calls for China to “rein in” Russia. Predictably, no breakthrough was achieved. The deterioration of China-EU relations cannot be understood without revisiting the European Commission’s strategic shift in 2019. Under Ursula von der Leyen, Brussels officially categorized China as not just a partner but also a “systemic rival” – a move that introduced suspicion into virtually every area of engagement. Since then, an ideological lens has increasingly shaped EU policy, replacing the pragmatism that once underpinned economic cooperation.
The consequences have been stark. Brussels has launched measures to restrict Chinese investment, imposed high tariffs on Chinese electric vehicles, and – most recently – barred Chinese firms from public tenders worth over €5 million. Further escalation came when the EU included two Chinese banks in its latest sanctions package against Russia, signaling that Europe is willing to weaponize economic tools for political purposes. These steps are justified by the EU as “de-risking.” By pushing for reduced interdependence in strategic sectors – raw materials, high-tech supply chains, and digital infrastructure – Brussels has aligned itself with Washington’s containment playbook, even as European leaders publicly insist on independence. In Beijing, von der Leyen struck a conciliatory tone, declaring the EU’s openness to Chinese investment and cooperation.
But such statements ring hollow when juxtaposed with her recent warnings at the G7 summit about a looming “China shock” and accusations of Beijing “weaponizing trade.” Similarly, the head of EU diplomacy, Kaja Kallas – also present in Beijing – has accused China of fueling the war in Ukraine and waging hybrid operations against Europe. These mixed signals undermine credibility and reinforce perceptions in Beijing that the EU lacks a coherent, autonomous China strategy. More fundamentally, Brussels’ approach is internally contradictory. The EU dreams of “strategic autonomy,” yet ties its foreign policy to transatlantic priorities. It seeks economic resilience, yet undermines its own competitiveness by disrupting supply chains and limiting market access. It aspires to global leadership, yet isolates itself from the rest of the world by clinging to zero-sum geopolitics.
A major catastrophe has developed in Gaza as UN aid convoys face systematic delays and worsening restrictions, UN spokeswoman Olga Cherevko has told RT. Israeli forces are obstructing food deliveries while malnutrition and starvation intensify across the Palestinian enclave, she explained in an interview which aired on Saturday. Cherevko, who represents the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), described how aid convoys are being held up for hours at Israeli checkpoints. “One convoy takes 18 hours to run from Deir al-Balah to Kerem Shalom – a distance of just 24 kilometers,” she said. “We are given routes that are dangerous, routes we cannot pass, routes that are congested.”
She explained that, during the last ceasefire, the UN had “unfettered access” and was able to deliver aid rapidly. “We could run multiple convoys a day. There were no holding points, no green lights, no waiting for authorizations to move,” Cherevko told RT. “Now all of this is in place and it constrains us severely.” She also claimed that over 1,300 people have been reported killed either at militarized distribution sites or while waiting along convoy routes. The spokeswoman warned that Gaza is experiencing a full-blown starvation crisis and that “the lives of over 2 million people are at stake.” “A catastrophe of unthinkable proportions has developed and is developing even further,” Cherevko cautioned.
The UN has confirmed that two out of three famine thresholds have been met in Gaza. Since April, 20,000 children have been treated for acute malnutrition, and 16 have died from hunger-related causes. The war in Gaza began in October 2023 when Hamas led an attack on Israel, killing approximately 1,250 people and taking 250 hostages. The IDF has since killed more than 60,000 people in the besieged enclave, according to recent UN estimates. Israeli media reported earlier this week, citing US special envoy Steve Witkoff, that Hamas had allegedly expressed a willingness to disarm. However, on Saturday, the militant group denied the claims, insisting on its right to resist Israeli occupation.
The ongoing armed conflict in Gaza, along with the intensification of Israeli military operations against Palestinians – including in the West Bank – has provoked growing concern and condemnation from the international community. The deepening humanitarian catastrophe, marked by destroyed infrastructure, acute shortages of food, water, and medical aid, has pushed millions to the brink of survival. The increasing scale of destruction, the mass displacement of civilians, and violations of fundamental norms of international humanitarian law are increasingly being interpreted as elements of ethnic cleansing against Palestinians. Numerous international organizations, human rights groups, and independent observers have expressed alarm over the disproportionate use of force and the systematic pressure exerted on the civilian population.
In the face of inaction by leading international institutions – which continue to call for an immediate ceasefire and unfettered humanitarian access – criticism of double standards has intensified, and public trust in the global community’s ability to stop the violence and uphold the rights of conflict victims is rapidly eroding. Even among Israel’s Western allies, discontent with the actions of the Israeli authorities is becoming more pronounced. Large-scale military operations resulting in widespread destruction and civilian casualties have triggered sharp reactions not only from international organizations but also within Western societies themselves. Regular mass protests in major cities across Europe and North America are increasing pressure on political leaders, compelling them to reassess their stance and respond to the demands of their citizens.
Under the influence of mounting public pressure, some countries have already taken concrete diplomatic steps. On May 28, 2024, Norway, Spain, and Ireland formally recognized Palestine as an independent state – an act that resonated widely and set a precedent for other nations in the region. At this juncture, calls are growing louder for similar steps to be taken by two key European powers: France and the United Kingdom. Both countries are facing escalating domestic and international pressure, which may hasten the process of Palestinian recognition and shift the balance on the diplomatic front of the Middle East conflict.
This agreement explains why Trump’s hostility to Russia is increasing.
In reality, Trump’s unchanging confrontation with Russia over Ukraine is the price Washington eagerly pays for European capitulation to Trump’s trade demands.
World-renowned economist Richard Werner on where money comes from: banks just create it out of thin air, and keep a pile for themselves.
(0:00) How Werner Predicted the Japanese Financial Crisis (14:16) How Banks Create Money From Nothing (24:09) You’re Being Lied to About the… pic.twitter.com/Np4yTpiETZ
MAXWELL FLIPS — TRUMP’S DOJ UNLEASHES MASS ARREST OPERATION!
On July 24, 2025, Ghislaine Maxwell detonated a political bomb that’s still shaking the world. For five straight hours, she named names, confirmed the Epstein blackmail network, and turned over classified intel to… pic.twitter.com/KTgPcu1VV6
Ursula was not elected, but appointed. Her no. 1 priority is not pleasing the voters, it is keeping her job. Still, Trump was undoubtedly not happy that she gave him the whole deal and then some, before he could even lay on his art. Where’s the funn in that?
European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen has attempted to shrug off widespread criticism over the EU’s new trade agreement with the US. The controversial deal subjects most of the bloc’s exports to a 15% tariff while exempting American goods from retaliatory duties. The EU-US agreement was finalized on Sunday during a meeting with US President Donald Trump at one of his Scottish golf-resort hotels. ”15% is not to be underestimated, but it is the best we could get,” von der Leyen said, when asked by reporters whether the agreement offered relief to European carmakers. The compromise averts a looming 30% tariff Trump had threatened to impose on August 1. However, it falls far short of the EU’s original offer of zero tariffs on both imports and exports.
Trump has long accused the EU of exploiting regulatory barriers such as VAT distortions, and legal challenges in trade with the US. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said the threat of tariffs was intended to “light a fire under the EU.” After negotiations stalled earlier this year, Trump escalated his demands, imposing a 25% tariff on cars, 50% on steel and aluminum, and threatening a 30% blanket tariff unless a deal was reached by August. The EU’s deal with the US has triggered a political backlash across the bloc. French Prime Minister Francois Bayrou called it a “dark day” and an act of “submission.” Hungary’s Viktor Orban reportedly quipped that “Donald Trump ate Ursula von der Leyen for breakfast.” Numerous business associations have decried a “capitulation.”
Ursula: LNG from the US is more "affordable and better" than pipeline gas from right next door. Europe is being destroyed, and it is deliberate. pic.twitter.com/WTwIy4LHPP
According to Russian Security Council Deputy Chairman Dmitry Medvedev, “Trump wiped the floor with Europe.” Still, the deal found support in Berlin and Rome. German Chancellor Friedrich Merz and Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni described it as a necessary compromise to prevent a trade war and provide predictability for export-reliant economies. Before Trump’s return to office in January, the average US tariff on EU imports was roughly 1.5% while the bloc’s average imposed tariff was 1.35%, according to Brussels-based think tank Bruegel. Since then, a series of sweeping duties have been introduced.
The new US-EU trade agreement threatens to accelerate “deindustrialization” in Europe by redirecting investment to the US and increasing the bloc’s dependency on American energy exports, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov has said. On Sunday, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen and US President Donald Trump finalized a controversial deal that allowed the EU and US to avert a full-scale trade war. Under the deal, the US has reduced its proposed 30% tariffs to a flat 15% on most European exports. The EU has committed to purchasing $750 billion worth of US energy, primarily liquefied natural gas and nuclear fuel, and agreed to invest around $600 billion into US industries. The bloc has also undertaken to increase imports of US-made weapons.
Speaking at the ‘Territory of Meanings’ forum on Monday, Lavrov described the arrangement as “clearly leading to further deindustrialization of Europe and capital flight.” He added that rising energy prices and investment outflows will strike a “very hard blow” to European industrial and agricultural sectors. According to Lavrov, von der Leyen was apparently “boasting” about the EU’s willingness to carry additional costs. “People like Ursula von der Leyen literally take pride in this path: yes, we will be forced to spend more money, yes, we will probably have fewer resources to address social problems, but we are obliged to defeat Russia.” He stressed that the trade deal is “obviously damaging for the Old Continent – it doesn’t even need to be analyzed.”
Lavrov’s stance was echoed by several EU politicians and the business community. Marine Le Pen, a key figure in France’s right-wing National Rally party, denounced the agreement as a “political, economic, and moral fiasco” detrimental to the EU’s sovereignty. French Prime Minister Francois Bayrou concurred, calling it a “dark day” for the EU. German business leaders also voiced alarm. Wolfgang Niedermark, a member of the executive board of the Federation of German Industries (BDI), said the EU had sent a “fatal signal” by accepting high tariffs. “Even a tariff rate of 15% will have immense negative effects on the export-oriented German industry,” he warned.
Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, one of the closest European allies of US President Donald Trump, has welcomed the EU’s trade deal with Washington despite criticism of the terms at home. After months of talks, the EU has reached a trade agreement with the US that sets a baseline 15% tariff on most exports, including cars, while steel and aluminum remain at 50%. The deal was reached at a meeting between Trump and European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen on Sunday. Both called it a “powerful” and “stabilizing” breakthrough. Speaking to reporters on Sunday, Meloni called the agreement a positive development.
“I think it’s positive that there’s an agreement,” Meloni, who had previously criticized Trump’s tariff drive and pledged to pursue a zero-for-zero deal, said. Italy is one of Europe’s top exporters to the US, with a trade surplus exceeding €40 billion ($46 billion). Opposition leaders, however, slammed Meloni for failing to secure better terms. Five Star Movement leader Giuseppe Conte wrote: “There is a winner – US President Trump – and a loser, or rather two: The EU and Giorgia Meloni.” He warned the tariffs could cost Italy €23 billion in exports and threaten 100,000 jobs.
Democratic MEP Stefano Bonaccini echoed the criticism, saying, “15% tariffs are better than 30% but worse than zero,” and warned of “tens of billions” in losses. Former Labor Minister Andrea Orlando called the deal a “rip-off,” saying Meloni’s friendship with Trump failed, while slamming von der Leyen as “either incompetent or acting in bad faith.” Meloni defended the deal, saying it helped avert a “head-on clash” with the US. She argued that the 15% tariff is “sustainable” as it will not add to previous tariffs, but will bring “stability.” Economists at the Kiel Institute warned of a drop in production and job losses across the EU, with Germany expected to take the biggest hit. The Federation of German Industries (BDI) called the deal an “inadequate compromise,” with the “only positive aspect” being the prevention of further escalation.
The new EU-US trade agreement is an economic and political “fiasco” that undermines the bloc’s sovereignty, veteran right-wing French politician Marine Le Pen has said. The agreement, finalized by European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen and US President Donald Trump on Sunday, averted a full-blown trade war between Washington and Brussels. Under its terms, the EU will commit to increased imports of US energy and military equipment, while the US reduces its proposed 30% tariffs to a flat 15% on most European exports. Le Pen, a key member of France’s National Rally party, the largest opposition group in the National Assembly, condemned the deal, calling it “a political, economic and moral fiasco” for the EU.
”Politically, because the European Union, with 27 member states, obtained worse conditions than the United Kingdom,” she said, referring to the fact that the UK agreed to 10% tariffs – which was widely regarded as a bad deal. Le Pen also accused Brussels of accepting unequal terms on exporting American gas and weapons that she claimed no patriotic French government would have agreed to. “This is an outright surrender for French industry and for our energy and military sovereignty.” She added that the deal sacrifices the interests of French farmers to benefit Germany’s automotive industry, pointing to “clauses forcing us to further open the single market to American agricultural products in exchange for reduced taxes on German automobile exports.”
“This globalization that denies and shatters sovereignty has been outdated for many years… The least that could be done is to acknowledge this stinging failure rather than asking the French, who will be its first victims, to rejoice in it.” Le Pen’s criticism was echoed by former Belgian Prime Minister and MEP Guy Verhofstadt, who called the agreement “scandalous” and “a disaster,” which failed to secure any concessions from the American side. Trump described the agreement as “probably the biggest deal ever reached in any capacity, trade or beyond trade.” Von der Leyen said the deal brings “certainty in uncertain times,” adding that a 15% rate “is the best we could get.”
Following high-stakes talks in Scotland between President Donald Trump and European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, the two sides reached a landmark deal which sets a 15% US tariff on all European Union goods. This new rate is significantly lower than the 30% import tax Trump had previously threatened, with the EU also committing to opening its markets to certain American exports with zero tariffs. Von der Leyen subsequently said, “I want to thank President Trump personally for his personal commitment and leadership to achieve this breakthrough. He is a tough negotiator, but he is also a dealmaker.” The Kremlin has reacted, with former Russian President and current deputy chairman of the country’s security council Dmitry Medvedev in essence mocking the EU for signing a deal he says benefits only the United States, and which leaves Europe behind, looking like a “humiliated” junior partner. He also deemed the deal ‘anti-Russian’.
He highlighted that Brussels agreed to terms that involve significant trade concessions, expanded defense obligations, and energy agreements heavily favoring American exporters. Did anyone think it would be anything different with Trump in the room negotiating it? Trump managed to “crush” Europe without firing a single shot, Medvedev said: “This isn’t diplomacy. It’s surrender dressed in a suit.” The heavily slanted terms of the deal meant Trump had “wiped the floor with Europe,” Medvedev stated further in the Monday social media post. “One can only feel sorry for ordinary Europeans,” Medvedev wrote, nothing that EU leaders are only motivated by their blinding anti-Russian sentiment, given Brussels’ intention to terminate all purchases of Russian oil and gas – which is part of the deal.
Below is the list offered by Medvedev on what the ‘deal’ with the European Union actually represents:
1) totally humiliating for the Europeans as it only serves the United States by leaving the European market unprotected and zeroing out tariffs on US goods;
2) creates huge additional costs for industries and agriculture in many EU countries stemming from the need to pay for expensive US energy; and…
3) diverts a massive investment flow from Europe to the US, Medvedev specified.
But ultimately, Medvedev wrote, “the deal is clearly aimed against Russia, as it bans Russian oil and gas purchases. However, while for Trump, it is largely about business, for the mad old wench Europe, it is part of its neo-Nazi ideas, which is harmful to the well-being of its own citizens.” This has been a constant talking point from Moscow going back years. Ursula, blink repeatedly if Trump just shafted you! Make ‘back door’ gesture if know US gas far dearer than Russian!— RT (@RT_com) July 28, 2025. The Russian Security Council deputy chairman has long been probably the single most outspoken official in the Kremlin, but it’s widely believed he plays ‘bad cop’ to Putin’s ‘good cop’ – in the sense that he often issues the more hawkish or even mocking point of view on any given geopolitical or economic issue. Or rather, he states the quiet part out loud, from Moscow’s viewpoint.
European Commission President Ursula @vonderleyen: "I want to thank President Trump personally for his personal commitment and leadership to achieve this breakthrough. He is a tough negotiator, but he is also a dealmaker." pic.twitter.com/orWfSHyqlu
— Rapid Response 47 (@RapidResponse47) July 27, 2025
Former Russian President Dmitry Medvedev has told US President Donald Trump that Russia is neither Israel nor Iran, and that every one of his threats is another step towards a potential conflict. The US president on Monday issued a more extreme ultimatum to Russia, demanding that Moscow reach a ceasefire with Kiev within “10 or 12 days.” Earlier this month, Trump threatened sweeping secondary sanctions against Russia’s trade partners unless a deal was reached by autumn. Medvedev, who serves as deputy chairman of the Russian Security Council, said that Trump was “playing the ultimatum game with Russia: 50 days or 10…” In a post on X on Monday, he suggested Trump should remember two things: first, that “Russia isn’t Israel or even Iran,” and, second, that every new ultimatum constitutes a threat and a step toward hostilities between Russia and the US. “Don’t go down the Sleepy Joe [Biden] road!” he wrote.
Trump's playing the ultimatum game with Russia: 50 days or 10… He should remember 2 things: 1. Russia isn't Israel or even Iran. 2. Each new ultimatum is a threat and a step towards war. Not between Russia and Ukraine, but with his own country. Don't go down the Sleepy Joe road!
During his election campaign last year, Trump repeatedly criticized his predecessor Joe Biden’s handling of the Ukraine conflict, warning that US policy under the former administration had brought the world to the brink of “World War III.” While Trump has re-engaged Russia diplomatically and pushed for Kiev to enter direct peace talks with Moscow, he has increasingly expressed impatience with the pace of negotiations. Earlier this month, after issuing his initial ultimatum, the president resumed US military aid to Ukraine through NATO.
Russia has long condemned the US-led military bloc’s arms supplies to Ukraine, arguing they make Kiev’s Western sponsors party to the conflict, which Moscow sees as a proxy war. Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov has said that although Russia is essentially fighting a war against the entire West on its own, it will not back down from its key security demand in the conflict. “No dragging Ukraine into NATO, no NATO expansion at all,” the top diplomat said on Monday. “It has already expanded right up to our borders.”
US President Donald Trump has sharply reduced the time frame he set for Russia and Ukraine to agree on a ceasefire, warning that Moscow now has just 10 to 12 days to reach a deal or face sweeping new sanctions. “I’m going to set a new deadline… about 10 or 12 days from today. There’s no reason to wait. I wanted to be generous, but we’re just not seeing any progress,” Trump told reporters on Monday in Scotland. He was sitting with British Prime Minister Keir Starmer. The US president had originally given the two sides 50 days to negotiate an end to the conflict, threatening to impose 100% tariffs on Russian imports and secondary sanctions on countries and companies that continue to trade with Russia. That initial deadline was due to expire in early September.
Trump said he was “very disappointed” with Russian President Vladimir Putin and claimed he had come close to brokering a ceasefire on five separate occasions. “I’ve spoken to President Putin a lot – I’ve gotten along with him very well,” he added. The ultimatum, first issued on July 14, also included a warning that the US would resume arms deliveries to Ukraine, funded in part by NATO members, if no truce was achieved within the time frame. Moscow has responded by reaffirming its willingness to negotiate but said any talks must take into account the realities on the ground and the root causes of the conflict. Russian officials have dismissed Trump’s sanctions threats as counterproductive. “These signals serve only to prolong the war,” the Russian Foreign Ministry said earlier this month, urging Washington to pressure Kiev instead.
Deputy Foreign Minister Sergey Ryabkov has stated that even new sanctions would not alter Russia’s course, insisting the country will “continue to move along our independent, sovereign, and sustained path.” Meanwhile, direct negotiations between Moscow and Kiev resumed in Istanbul in May, following a nearly three-year freeze. The latest round of talks took place last week, with modest progress on humanitarian issues, including agreements on the exchange of prisoners of war and civilians. However, no breakthrough on a ceasefire was achieved. Trump had previously not ruled out imposing sanctions before his deadline, saying last week that action could come “at any time.”
Russia is fighting the West alone for the first time in history and must rely solely on its own strength, Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov has said. Speaking at the ‘Territory of Meanings’ forum on Monday, Lavrov highlighted the unprecedented geopolitical landscape Russia found itself in following the escalation of the Ukraine conflict in 2022, which led to a heated stand-off with the West. ”The main task is to defeat the enemy. For the first time in history, Russia is fighting alone against the entire West. In World War I and World War II, we had allies. Now we have no allies on the battlefield. So we must rely on ourselves and not allow any weakness,” he said.
Lavrov stressed that Russia will not back down from its core security demands which led to the Ukraine conflict. “We insist on what is our legitimate demand… no dragging Ukraine into NATO, no NATO expansion at all. It has already expanded right up to our borders, contrary to all promises and documents that were adopted,” he said, adding that a settlement of the conflict should also recognize the new territorial reality on the ground.
Lavrov also likened the West’s behavior to that of childhood bullies. “When you’re a kid messing around with other boys in the yard, sometimes a big kid, three or four years older, shows up and starts chasing the little ones,” he said. “That’s roughly what the West is doing to everyone else right now.” Moscow has stated on a number of occasions that NATO expansion and Ukraine’s aspirations to join the US-led military bloc were among the key reasons for the conflict. It has also warned that Western weapons deliveries to Ukraine only serve to prolong the hostilities without changing the outcome, while making NATO a direct party to the conflict.
US President Donald Trump has expressed his “love” for Russians and called them a “great people.” At the same time, he threatened Moscow with more sanctions and set a new deadline for settling the Ukraine conflict. Trump maintained he had “always gotten along with [Russian] President [Vladimir] Putin” during a Q&A session with British Prime Minister Keir Starmer in Turnberry, Scotland on Monday. He praised Russia as a “rich” nation that could be “thriving like practically no other country” and spoke about the massive trade potential between Russia and the US. “I don’t want to do that to Russia, I love the Russian people,” he said when asked about potential new sanctions against Moscow.
He expressed his disappointment over the slow pace of the peace process between Moscow and Kiev and accused Russia of striking Ukrainian cities. Trump said he was “not interested in talking anymore” as his numerous “respectful and nice conversations” with Putin led to nothing. Trump’s words came as he set a new deadline for a Ukraine peace deal, which he said should be reached in “10 or 12 days” from Monday. Otherwise, Washington would impose new sanctions on Moscow. The previous deadline was expected to expire in early September. The new sanctions would include secondary restrictions and tariffs on countries and entities doing business with Russia.
Moscow has repeatedly stated throughout the conflict that it is open for dialogue and could start negotiations without any preconditions as long as the situation on the ground is taken into account and the root causes of the conflict are addressed. Earlier this month, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said that the Ukraine conflict was a “difficult” one to resolve and cannot be settled “instantly.” Russia also warned that Trump’s new sanctions threats serve primarily “as signals to continue the war” for Kiev and called on Washington to exert pressure on Ukraine instead. Russia and Ukraine renewed direct talks in Istanbul in May and have since held three rounds of negotiations but have not reached an agreement on a ceasefire yet.
President Donald Trump dropped a truth bomb on Monday that Democrats desperately trying to weaponize the Jeffrey Epstein files won’t like: Nothing is incriminating about him in those records. And his explanation isn’t just compelling; it’s rock solid. Trump argued that if such evidence were real, the Biden administration would have already made it public. Speaking candidly during a visit to Turnberry, Scotland, Trump called out the handling of these files under the previous administration as a manufactured “hoax” designed to manipulate political outcomes, particularly the 2024 election. When a reporter pressed Trump on whether he’d been briefed on his alleged inclusion in the Epstein files, he didn’t hold back. He slammed former FBI Director James Comey, Attorney General Merrick Garland, and Joe Biden himself as “the worst scum on Earth” responsible for running the files.
“Those files were run for four years by those people,” he emphasized. “If they had anything, I assume they would’ve released it. Those files were run by these people; they were run by my enemy. If there was anything in there, they would’ve used them for the election.” Trump made clear that the files were handled by partisan operatives out to get him. “Those files were run by the worst scum on earth. They were run by Comey. They were run by Garland. They were run by Biden, and all of the people that actually ran the government, including the autopen,” he said. “If they had anything, I assume they would have released it.” Pointing to the 2024 election as proof, Trump noted, “I was running against somebody that ran the files. If they had something, they would have released it.”
The Biden administration has already weaponized the federal government to go after Trump. If there were anything incriminating about Trump in the Epstein files, the Biden campaign would’ve dropped that info during the campaign to destroy his chances. Trump went on to warn about the potential for manipulated evidence, drawing a parallel to the now-debunked Steele dossier: “They can easily put something in the files that’s a phony—like, as an example, Christopher Steele… wrote a… dossier. We call it the fake news dossier. And the whole thing was a fake.” Trump blasted the DOJ and other officials who controlled the Epstein records, calling them “bad, sick people,” and questioned why, if damaging material existed, no one used it earlier.
“Why didn’t they use it when I was killing Joe? And then he gave out because he was 25 points down.” Trump’s logic here is bulletproof. The Biden administration stooped to unprecedented levels to take him down: unleashing the FBI, pushing bogus indictments, and even raiding his home. If it had even a shred of real evidence from the Epstein files tying Trump to any wrongdoing, it would have plastered that information across every headline in America before voters cast a single ballot. The fact that nothing has emerged, despite full control of the files by his political enemies, isn’t just telling; it’s definitive.
You must suspect there’s some game afoot in this Epstein business. Only days ago, it was “fuggeddabowdit . . . nuthin’ there . . . get over it.” But then, only days later, the second-in-command at DOJ, Todd Blanche, formerly the president’s personal lawyer, was down in Tallahassee deposing Jeffrey Epstein’s second-in-command, Ghislaine Maxwell. (Note: a deposition is testimony outside of court, recorded under oath.) The Deputy Attorney General deposed her for two days, Friday and Saturday, a total of nine hours. You can do a lot of talking in nine hours. And were you shocked to learn — as has been broadly reported — that through all these years of EpsteinEpsteinEpstein, Ms. Maxwell has never been interviewed by any state or federal law enforcement official or government lawyer? How was that possible?
By the way, no government official has interviewed billionaire Les Wexner, Epstein’s chief benefactor, over all these years, either? How is that possible? (Follow the money, as they say.) Meanwhile, down in Florida, as reported by Brian O’Shea of The Daily Clout, it turns out that the federal district judge, Robin Rosenberg, who just ruled against Mr. Trump’s request to unseal the 2005 — 2007 Florida Epstein grand jury transcripts, is married to one Michael McCauliffe, former Palm Beach County State’s Attorney (equivalent of district attorney, DA), who helped negotiate the special 2008 “sweetheart” plea deal that allowed Epstein significant freedoms, such as frequent travel, including to his Little St. James Island, despite being under house arrest. Are you going, “Hmmmmmm. . . ? Any conflict of interest in that ruling? (Note: Current US AG Pam Bondi did not become Florida AG until 2011.)
So, it appears that there will now be two sets of “Epstein files” to sort out: 1) the DOJ’s file curated under AG Merrick Garland, and 2) whatever follows from never-before asked questions put to Ghislaine Maxwell in late July 2025. One thing you might infer: if the Merrick Garland files contained any defamatory “kompromat” about Donald Trump, wouldn’t it have been used during the election of 2024? Mr. Garland went along with every other ploy used to defame and convict Mr. Trump under color of law. But not that? Ergo, fuggeddabowdit.
Where the Epstein business goes now is anybody’s guess, but you have to doubt that it will go nowhere. Ms. Maxwell’s attorney, David O. Markus, stated to reporters that she “answered every single question asked of her” over the two days, emphasizing that she responded “honestly, truthfully, and to the best of her ability” without invoking any privileges or declining to answer. There is chatter on the Internet that Ms. Maxwell’s testimony affords an opportunity for the FBI / DOJ to open an entirely fresh Epstein investigation, untainted by whatever Merrick Garland was sitting on.
Okay, I reckon that’s enough for you to chew on about EpsteinEpsteinEpstein for today. Let’s turn to the other giant stinking dead carp wafting its miasma over Washington DC: RussiaRussiaRussia. CIA chief John Ratcliffe promised on Sunday to disclose the so-called “annex” files to John Durham’s special counsel report. Mr. Ratcliffe implied that the material is rather serious. He also emphasized that the statute of limitations will not apply in any forthcoming RussiaGate cases because the matter represents an ongoing (until even now) conspiracy. Mr. Ratcliffe, you may recall, before getting elected to Congress, was a US Attorney for the eastern district of Texas (as Chief of Anti-Terrorism and National Security), so he knows quite a bit about prosecuting federal cases.
Dunno about you, but I would like to know a little bit more about Christopher Wray’s activities regarding both Epstein and RussiaGate during his long tenure, seven years and five months (2017 – 2025) as FBI Director. In previous testimony before various committees of Congress, Mr. Wray, uniformly invoked “ongoing investigations” as the reason for not answering any germane questions about, well, anything and everything. Does he not deserve a session or two of interrogation with Kash Patel’s FBI agents, or depositions under oath with lawyers from the DOJ now, without the shield of protecting investigations of an agency he no longer runs? He has a lot to answer for, including the J-6 business and associated pipe-bomb matter — both of which might be construed as part of an ongoing conspiracy against a sitting president (and three-time candidate).
Is all this some “conspiracy theory”? No, an actual conspiracy as spelled out in the federal statutes: Conspiracy under Title 18, United States Code, Section 371, Conspiracy to defraud the United States. . . 18 U.S. Code § 241, Conspiracy against rights. . . and 18 U.S. Code § 242, Deprivation of Rights Under Color of Law. Add to that: perjury under oath, obstruction of justice, lying to the FBI. It’s a pretty rich menu. Someone, maybe more than a few someones, will be going to jail.
Earlier this morning President Donald Trump welcomed British Prime Minister Keir Starmer to Turnberry, Scotland where the two leaders will hold bilateral discussions on trade and foreign affairs. The video is prompted to 16:20. The bagpipes stop eventually in the video at 19:30. President Trump and Prime Minister Starmer take questions from the assembled press pool. President Trump calls out the British government for rampant illegal immigration, as Starmer tries to say his govt is deporting illegal migrants back to their home country. Questions centered heavily around the Israeli conflict with Hamas in Gaza. The plight of the Palestinians is a key focus point for the British people; an outcome of the mass Islamic migration that has taken place for the past two-decades in Great Britain. The population of Islamists in the U.K now drives the political priorities.
Toward the end of the video 28:00, President Trump notes the Russia/Ukraine conflict has led to a “disappointment in Vladimir Putin,” and a possibility that President Trump will reduce the 50-day deadline he gave to Russia. The majority of politicians within Great Britain want to expand the conflict with Russia as much as possible and bring the full NATO contingent into the war against Russia. President Trump has been reluctant to support expanded war as requested by the British, French and German group who formed a “coalition of the willing.” In addition to London being the Jihad capital of the region, Great Britain is also the home of the Fabian Socialists.
A new BMJ Global Health study has confirmed that the World Health Organization’s (WHO) private fundraising arm—the WHO Foundation—has received tens of millions of dollars from pharmaceutical giants, Big Tech companies, and anonymous sources, with nearly half the funding now untraceable. The study findings come after U.S. Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. announced the United States will reject the WHO’s sweeping emergency powers treaty, warning that the same unelected body now seeking “global medical surveillance of every human being.” The BMJ Global Health study, published Wednesday, reads: “From its launch until the end of 2023, the foundation disclosed total donation receipts of US$82 783 930 overall, of which US$39 757 326 (48.0%) was from anonymous donations over US$100 000. In total, US$51 554 203 (62.3%) in anonymous donations were reported.”
The top-named donor was the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, long considered one of WHO’s most influential funders: “Donations varied by sector, with the largest named donations coming from the private philanthropic sector, including the Gates foundation and other family foundations, followed by social media companies, medical device companies and the banking/finance and pharmaceutical sectors.” Secretary Kennedy recently cut off U.S. funding to Bill Gates’ vaccine syndicate Gavi, citing peer-reviewed evidence that the DTP shot it promotes “may kill more children from other causes than it saves,” and condemning the alliance for treating vaccine safety as a PR problem instead of a public health priority. Moreover, a Gates Foundation–funded trial injected South African children with live tuberculosis-causing bacteria, infecting 260 kids and causing serious harm—all while excluding early post-vaccine infections from analysis and following a prior Gates-funded gain-of-function experiment that engineered TB to grow unchecked.
The WHO Foundation (WHOF), launched in 2020 to accept donations from entities the WHO cannot receive money from directly, now also counts Meta (Facebook), TikTok, Maybelline, Sanofi, Boehringer Ingelheim, and Novo Nordisk among its known funders: “This included the announcement of a US$50 million commitment from the WHOF via contributions from Sanofi, Boehringer Ingelheim, Novo Nordisk, TikTok, Maybelline and a range of other partners.” A majority of funds aren’t even going to WHO programs—they’re going to the WHO Foundation’s own operational costs: “The largest overall category, by amount donated, was ‘WHO Foundation Operational Support’, which received just under US$40 million over the entire reporting period, representing a majority (approximately 56%) of all funding received by the Foundation to date.”
Even more concerning is the Foundation’s sharp drop in transparency, with its public reporting now rated as poor as controversial “dark money” think tanks. “In the first year of its operation… the WHOF would be rated ‘B’ for transparency… However, in the next two reporting periods, the WHOF would be assessed a ‘D’ for transparency…” “Nearly 80% of funds donated in January–December 2023 were from anonymous sources and in amounts of over US$100 000.” “Results show low and declining levels of transparency over time, potentially raising concerns about the level of outside influence and role of commercial interests in setting WHO priorities.” Though the Foundation claims to avoid tobacco and firearms money, the same is not true for fossil fuel, alcohol, sugar, or vaping interests:
“The current version of the WHOF gift policy sets out specific donor exclusions, yet only for tobacco and firearms manufacturers, while fossil fuel companies, alcohol producers, sugar sweetened beverage manufacturers and vaping companies, for example, are not mentioned in any form.” The Foundation even publicly advertises insider access to WHO: “Through its unparalleled access to WHO, the Foundation advances health equity by connecting and collaborating with visionary corporate partners to co-create solutions that have the highest impact.”The authors of the BMJ Global Health study—affiliated with the U.K.’s London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine and University of Edinburgh—warn:
“This analysis of WHOF donor disclosures indicates levels of donor transparency akin to oft-criticised free market think tanks, with attendant risks for both undue influence and/or reputational damage for the WHOF, and by extension the WHO.” In the end, the WHO’s private fundraising arm isn’t just taking cash from Big Pharma and Big Tech—it’s running on a flood of untraceable money, shielding its true backers behind a wall of anonymity while claiming “unparalleled access” to global health power. How can the WHO claim neutrality when it’s bankrolled by pharmaceutical giants, Big Tech firms under scrutiny for censorship, and tens of millions in dark money from anonymous sources?
“..this administration really is committed to systematically throwing out the suffocating groupthink and stagnation that have ruled in D.C. for decades.
On Sunday, the second Trump administration turned six months old. President Trump’s first four years in the White House were already a big success, which is why I fought so hard to bring him back for a second go-round. Yet I think Trump’s second has already surpassed it in just one-eighth the time. Completely and instantly securing the U.S.-Mexico border after the four-year Biden invasion is one of the most important and impressive accomplishments in American presidential history. TV news said the president’s tough trade talk would crash the economy in days; instead the stock market hit record highs this very week and blue-collar wages are rising faster than they have in 60 years.
Under any other recent president, I am convinced the June Iran crisis would have ballooned into a full regime-change war, with far more money spent and many American lives lost. But under President Trump’s measured hand, America managed to strike a crippling blow to Iran’s nuclear program while suffering zero casualties and even bringing a ceasefire between Iran and Israel as part of the bargain. Yet when I think about the events of the past six months, it’s not the big wins I think about the most, but actually the small ones. They’re the triumphs that don’t necessarily grab the largest headlines that show this administration really is committed to systematically throwing out the suffocating groupthink and stagnation that have ruled in D.C. for decades.
Over and over, this administration is doing things that past Republicans could and should have done, yet inexplicably never did. For instance, all the way back in 1981, the outgoing Carter administration engineered a court ruling that abolished the federal government’s hugely successful hiring aptitude test on the grounds that it was (you already knew this was coming) racist. Presidents Reagan, Bush 41, or Bush 43 could have fought to undo that and restore merit-based hiring. Yet they never did, and over 45 years our government went rotten as DEI replaced merit. Now, this administration is finally acting to bring back merit in government. Imagine that! From Harvard to Hennepin County, this administration has begun toppling the race and sex-based discrimination that had taken root all over America in flagrant defiance of both our Constitution and historic American values.
It is purging DEI commissars from federal agencies, imposing uniform standards on the military, and sending out warnings to the private sector as well. This isn’t superficial – it’s the destruction in detail of a rotten, anti-American ideology. It would have been easy for Donald Trump to make a few speeches and sign a couple symbolic orders about “protecting women’s sports” – past Republican administrations would have settled for exactly that. But this administration has genuinely done the work to protect American children from the transgender mania, one of the great evils of our time.
Across America, health care providers are ending their involvement in child mutilation and similar treatments because of the dramatic increase in regulatory hostility from this administration. Children’s National Hospital in D.C., Children’s Hospital Los Angeles, Lurie Children’s Hospital of Chicago, Stanford Medicine, and more have all stopped providing surgeries or puberty blockers to minors in the face of this administration. Where it matters most, the Trump administration has stepped up to save children from predators calling themselves “doctors.” For my entire life, Republicans loved to make a show of complaining about America sending billions in aid to foreign countries. But they never stopped it – until Trump, who actually delivered by cutting USAID down to size and keeping more of America’s money in America. The same goes for defunding NPR, PBS, and Planned Parenthood: long years of talk, until the Trump administration fought to make it actually happen.
It was obvious for almost 20 years that the TSA’s policy requiring passengers to remove their shoes before boarding a flight was a pointless bit of security theater, yet Presidents Bush, Obama, and Biden all kept the policy around anyway. This administration finally got rid of it. While the Biden administration treated the cryptocurrency industry as a borderline criminal enterprise, Trump signed the GENIUS Act, which positions America to be at the lead of this innovative industry. The administration hasn’t just said the right things. It has done the right things, in detail, to make sure its promises are delivered at the micro level. The administration even made showerheads great again. And it’s that commitment to the small things and common sense that will pay dividends over the next three and a half years. Because an administration that cares about the details of governing will make all of America great, too.
Artificial intelligence pioneer and Nobel Peace Prize laureate Geoffrey Hinton has urged governments worldwide to collaborate in training AI systems not to harm humanity, warning that the rapidly advancing technology will soon likely surpass human intelligence. Speaking at the World Artificial Intelligence Conference (WAIC) in Shanghai on Saturday, Hinton said that despite divergent national interests, no country wants AI to dominate humanity. He noted that international cooperation is unlikely on offensive AI use – such as “cyberattacks, lethal autonomous weapons or fake videos for manipulating public opinion.” However, nations could form a “network of institutions” to guide the development of a highly intelligent AI “that doesn’t want to get rid of people,” Hinton added.
He compared this proposed cooperation to Soviet-US collaboration on nuclear non-proliferation during the Cold War. Hinton, often referred to as the “Godfather of AI,” likened AI development to “raising a tiger cub” that could become dangerous once it matures. “There’s only two options if you have a tiger cub as a pet. Figure out if you can train it so it never wants to kill you, or get rid of it,” the scientist said. He explained that AI is likely to increasingly seek more control in order to achieve its assigned tasks as it grows more intelligent, and simply “turning it off” when it outpaces humanity will not be an option. “We will be like three-year-olds and they will be like adults,” Hinton said.
Speaking to the press later in the day, he noted that it should be relatively easy for “rational” nations to cooperate on the subject, but said it may be “difficult” for the US under “its current administration.” On Wednesday, the White House announced its “action plan” to achieve “global dominance” in AI through investments, subsidies, and the removal of legal restrictions on the technology’s development. Beijing has announced its intention to establish an organization to coordinate international cooperation on AI. “We should strengthen coordination to form a global AI governance framework,” Chinese Premier Li Qiang said at the WAIC on Saturday.
Matt Smith: All right, good morning, Doug. I think the biggest thing in the news is that Obama is a traitor. I mean, we know this officially now. Although a lot of this information had been uncovered in years past—about RussiaGate and all of that—the connections weren’t as clear as they are now, based on Tulsi’s release of information and what she’s told Trump. So much so that Trump felt quite confident recently, in an open forum at a press conference, to just outright call him a traitor. He said, “I’d like to say let’s give it time and just see, but we know he was a traitor.”
Doug Casey: I can’t wait to find out. Although I never thought of him in such an overt role. I’d only credited the fact that he was a homosexual rental boy in Chicago’s bathhouses. Too bad that’s been pretty well swept under the rug.
Matt Smith: I was always fixated on the citizenship or birth certificate thing personally. But you know, bathhouses, birth certificate, Columbia University—no one knew him when he went there. There are a lot of weird things in his past.
Doug Casey: That’s true. There are a lot of indications that he’s a genuine Manchurian Candidate. They don’t just come out of nowhere. But anybody can be elected president—or installed as president today. We almost had Kamala Harris, a total nothing-nobody who can’t even string together words into a coherent sentence.
Matt Smith: And we had Biden, who was unfit—incapable mentally.
Doug Casey: Yes, and they almost ran him instead of Kamala. This is all crazy. I guess the question is: Are they going to be able to prove that Obama was conducting a coup in the US? I’m not surprised, because coups occur—different types—all the time in all kinds of countries around the world. So why not the US? Although the US used to be unique in that it was formed to defend the average citizen against the government, that’s ancient history. That’s what the Bill of Rights is all about, which is unique, actually. But it’s a dead letter at this point. Another question is: Will Trump pursue this thing right to the end? Can they mount evidence? Can they find a fair venue to try Obama? And even if they find that he’s criminally liable for treason, will they prosecute him right to the end? Major scandal. Much bigger than Benedict Arnold.
Matt Smith: Yeah, and it’s weird to make these declarations without—you’d assume there would be cases. Like, the declaration wouldn’t be made before there are actually cases filed.
Doug Casey: I agree. And Tulsi Gabbard impresses me as a very levelheaded person who wouldn’t just fly off the handle. Of course, she’s a hardcore leftist who believes in all kinds of standard leftist things, but they don’t have a lot to do with her current position running the so-called intelligence community. It’s funny they call it a “community.” That sounds so benign and beneficial. Everybody likes communities. Our intelligence community is full of hardcore killers and sociopaths. I can’t wait to see how this plays out. It serves as a good distraction from the Epstein mess, that’s for sure.
Matt Smith: You’ve got to wonder—do they take this approach and really be aggressive? Because they can. Obviously, there’s a conspiracy there, which means all kinds of people could be swept up by this easily, and arrests could be made. I mean, one of the most aggressive charges they used against the J6 people was conspiracy to overthrow the government, or something like that. Some major thing, and they went after them super hard—morning raids and everything. If they really believe this, they could go after Comey, Clapper, Gina Haspel, and a whole bunch of people right away without even touching the president. Of course, J6 was just little people. That was just the peasants. You can round them up. But it’s hunting big game when you go after these major-league criminals.
Doug Casey: I hope they don’t go after Hillary too hard and heavy. God forbid that Tulsi commits suicide or has an accident. She could be added to a list of—how many here? Forty-five or fifty other possible Arkancides, as they say.
Matt Smith: So what’s your best guess on whether or not this will be something that serves as political theater that motivates the base for the next couple of years—appointing a special counsel, for instance, to investigate it—or will this actually turn into something real?
Doug Casey: I think it’s a coin flip. But it’s possible that this will make the big time. I mean, look at Watergate. Watergate was a big nothing. It was just a break-in for political reasons.
Matt Smith: One could say that was a coup.
Doug Casey: You could say that. And in that coup, it wasn’t the coup itself that was the problem. It was the cover-up that was.
Matt Smith: Well, what I mean is I think a lot of people used it against him and told Nixon—like all the Republicans in the Senate told him, “You don’t have the votes. You’ve got to get out of here,” you know, and he just walked away.
Doug Casey: There is a difference between what’s going on now and what happened in the Nixon days. Of course, nobody liked Nixon. I certainly don’t. He was a creepy guy and a disaster for the country. But the Democrats are really out-and-out communists at this point. I know that sounds inflammatory to say, but when it comes to their philosophical beliefs—yes, they’re all Marxists, ultra-hardcore leftists, socialists, statists, and what-have-you. And we’re on the ragged edge, I still think, of a civil war in the US because the Red and Blue people hate each other. It’s not just a bunch of leftist students like in the ’60s. Nasty attitudes are widely inseminated throughout US society. Yeah, we could have a civil war. And if you do prosecute these horrible people, it’s hard to say what their supporters will do. These things can take on a life of their own.
Operation Grayskull just quietly became one of the most successful child predator takedowns in U.S. history.
Four of the most disturbing child abuse websites on the dark web were completely dismantled. Eighteen offenders were convicted in the U.S. alone. Over 300 years in… pic.twitter.com/mQVWm1b0kF
An explosion of zinc fireworks occurs when a human egg is activated by a sperm enzyme, and the size of these “sparks” is a direct measure of its ability to develop into an embryo.
.@GenFlynn: "They made a conscious decision to weaponize themselves, not only against General Mike Flynn, but also the incoming national security advisor, which is a monumental role in our government…And they made a conscious decision to weaponize components of the government… pic.twitter.com/zSqwIdDZRA
It's official. The UK is now officially a police state. It has become precisely what Orwell warned about. Criticize mass migration and you can expect the police to come to your home. And judges will give longer sentences for wrong think than many violent crimes. pic.twitter.com/GEMs7CvwST
— Michael Shellenberger (@shellenberger) July 26, 2025
Looking through the deal, I think the negotiators, Ursula first of all, were afraid to be stuck with 35% tariffs on Aug 1. So they agreed to trillions in spending. Good for Europe? Doubtful. Trump now takes it all.
The EU has agreed:
• To purchase $750 billion in energy
• Invest $600 billion in the US on top of existing investments
• Open up countries’ markets to trade with US at zero tariffs
• Purchase “vast amounts” of military equipment
President Trump said he reached a trade deal with the European Union late on Sunday, avoiding a trade war with the US’s largest trading partner and marking his biggest deal so far in his attempt to remake the global trading system through higher tariffs for U.S. trading partners. The pact comes less than a week before a Friday deadline for President Donald Trump’s higher tariffs to take effect on August 1. The president in May threatened to impose a 50% duty on nearly all EU goods, adding pressure that accelerated negotiations, before lowering that to 30%. Trump made the announcement at Trump Turnberry, his seaside golf resort in western Scotland, after meeting with European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, who leads the EU’s executive body.
Trump said the U.S. would set a baseline tariff of 15% for European goods, including automobiles. He said steel and aluminum tariffs, which are currently at 50%, would remain unchanged. He added that the EU had agreed as part of the deal to buy $750 billion worth of energy products from the US, and the EU would agree to invest $600 billion more than previously in the US, although similar to the $550BN “investment” promised by Japan, this is unlikely to every materialize. Adding to the list of ludicrously big numbers disclosed (or as the case may be undisclosed) today, Trump also said that the EU would buy “a vast amount” of military equipment, and while he explained that “we don’t know what number is” but added that the US makes “the best military equipment in the world so you have to do that.”
To summarize, the US EU has agreed:
• To purchase $750 billion in energy
• Invest $600 billion in the US on top of existing investments
• Open up countries’ markets to trade with US at zero tariffs
• Purchase “vast amounts” of military equipment
“I think it’s going to be great for both parties, I think your various countries are very happy about this,” Trump said, sitting alongside von der Leyen. The two met for about an hour with their top representatives. “We made it,” von der Leyen said. She said the two sides wanted to rebalance their trade relationship, “and we wanted to do it in a way that trade goes on between the two of us across the Atlantic.” Currently, the EU faces a 10% baseline tariff on most of its goods exports to the U.S., as well as a 25% tariff on its auto industry and a 50% tariff for steel and aluminum. “I think that basically concludes the deal,” Trump told reporters at his golf club in Turnberry, Scotland. “It’s the biggest of all the deals.” The terms disclosed on Sunday suggest that 15% is likely a new minimum tariff level for most American trading partners. Economists and trade analysts say that tariffs at that level will have an impact on companies’ decisions and are expected to contribute to higher prices for Americans, but won’t stop global trade flows.
“They are not at the level where the global economy burns down,” said Dmitry Grozoubinski, senior trade adviser at Aurora Macro Strategies. The deal comes after a flurry of recent trade announcements. Trump said this past week that he had reached a deal with Japan, another top U.S. trading partner, which put baseline tariffs at 15%. Separate agreements set Vietnam’s baseline tariff level at 20% and established a 19% rate for the Philippines and Indonesia, Trump has said. The U.K. has the lowest tariffs Trump has so far agreed to as part of a deal, at 10%. Trump also was expected to iron out final details of the U.K. agreement in meetings with British Prime Minister Keir Starmer on Sunday and Monday.
The EU pact removes a major risk for markets and the global economy, a trade war involving $1.7 trillion worth of cross-border commerce, even though it means European shipments to the US are getting hit with a higher tax at the border. The goals, Trump said, were more production in the US and wider access for American exporters to the European market. Von der Leyen acknowledged that part of the drive behind the talks was a rebalancing of trade, but cast it as beneficial for both sides. “The starting point was an imbalance,” von der Leyen said. “We wanted to rebalance the trade we made, and we wanted to do it in a way that trade goes on between the two of us across the Atlantic, because the two biggest economies should have a good trade flow.”
As Bloomberg notes, US and European negotiators had been zeroing in on an agreement this past week. Officials have discussed terms for a quota system for steel and aluminum imports, which would face a lower import tax below a certain threshold and would be charged the regular 50% rate above it. The EU had also been seeking quotas and a ceiling on future industry-specific tariffs, but it’s unclear if the initial agreement will shield the bloc from potential levies that have yet to be implemented. The announcement capped off months of often tense shuttle diplomacy between Brussels and Washington. The EU had prepared to put levies on about €100 billion ($117 billion), about a third of American exports to the bloc, if a deal wasn’t reached and Trump followed through on his warning.
For weeks, the EU has indicated a willingness to accept an unbalanced pact involving a reduced rate of around 15%, while seeking relief on sectoral tariffs critical to the European economy. The US president has also imposed 25% levies on cars and double that rate on steel and aluminum, as well as copper. The deal comes just days after we learned that in June the US collected a new record in tariff revenue, some $26.6 billion: a number which annualizes to an impressive $320 billion. Several exporters in Asia, including Indonesia, the Philippines and Japan, have negotiated reciprocal rates between 15% to 20%, and the EU saw Japan’s deal for 15% on autos as a breakthrough worth seeking as well. Washington’s talks also continue with Switzerland, South Korea and Taiwan.
In a political era addicted to facades and orchestrated outrage, some moments cut through the noise with a force that startles even seasoned observers. Enter Dan Bongino. The former radio firebrand turned deputy director of the FBI has become a lightning rod within Donald Trump’s second-term administration. In recent weeks, there were rumors he was going to quit the administration over frustration with Pam Bondi over how she’s handled the Epstein files. A source close to the matter said Bongino felt betrayed by what he saw as Bondi’s backpedaling and stonewalling—especially after she downplayed the existence of Epstein’s “client list” and dismissed speculation about blackmail or foul play. Bongino, who took the job hoping to help restore public trust, came to believe that mission was dead in the water unless Bondi stepped aside. “He’s done if she stays,” the source said at the time.
And then nothing happened. But Bongino’s recent statement on X is raising eyebrows. In a powerful and emotional message, Dan Bongino pulled back the curtain on what he described as deeply troubling revelations during his time at the FBI, vowing accountability and transparency in the face of corruption. “During my tenure here as the Deputy Director of the FBI,” Bongino began, “I have repeatedly relayed to you that things are happening that might not be immediately visible, but they are happening.” He emphasized a top-down commitment to justice, writing, “The Director and I are committed to stamping out public corruption and the political weaponization of both law enforcement and intelligence operations. It is a priority for us.”
But what he’s uncovered, Bongino said, has changed him forever. “What I have learned in the course of our properly predicated and necessary investigations into these aforementioned matters, has shocked me down to my core. We cannot run a Republic like this. I’ll never be the same after learning what I’ve learned.” He promised that the investigations will be carried out “by the book and in accordance with the law,” adding, “We are going to get the answers WE ALL DESERVE.” “As with any investigation, I cannot predict where it will land,” Bongino admitted, “but I can promise you an honest and dignified effort at truth. Not ‘my truth,’ or ‘your truth,’ but THE TRUTH.”
During my tenure here as the Deputy Director of the FBI, I have repeatedly relayed to you that things are happening that might not be immediately visible, but they are happening.
The Director and I are committed to stamping out public corruption and the political weaponization…
If that doesn’t sound like a battle cry from inside the halls of federal law enforcement, what does? For years, Americans have watched as justice and intelligence agencies faced allegations of bias, political leaks, and “weaponization” against dissenters from the prevailing establishment narrative. Critics—many of whom once dismissed such talk as conspiracy theory—have realized that these warnings carry real weight. Bongino, who once sat behind a conservative microphone dissecting exactly these threats, now finds himself not only confronting them but, by his own account, being rocked by what he’s uncovered. The message is unmistakable: accountability isn’t optional. Bongino’s cryptic post bears the signature of a man who has glimpsed truths that will shake the nation’s confidence in its governing institutions.
The question is not whether heads will roll, but how deep the rot goes and whether the rot can be cut out before it destroys what those institutions are supposed to protect. Forget the media’s hope for another administration scandal. The real scandal is what Bongino is finding—and what he warns America must soon confront. No matter how much the press wishes otherwise, Bongino’s mission to purge corruption is underway. His refusal to sugarcoat the stakes, and his insistence that “we cannot run a Republic like this,” target the very heart of what’s ailing the country. Whether Bongino ultimately prevails isn’t a footnote; it’s a battle for the soul of the Republic. One thing is certain: Washington can’t ignore Bongino’s warning shot. Nor should anyone else.
The Founding Fathers intended that, in America, no one would have a title and no one would be above the law. Too often in modern times, that no longer seems true of our country. But Donald Trump is starting to call for a change to the double standard of justice. Reviewing potentially illegal payouts from the Democratic Party and apparent bookkeeping errors, Donald Trump understandably wants to get to the bottom of the allegations and wants to see the former vice president in court over them. If you or I committed a federal immigration felony, received massive amounts of money from foreign hostile governments, engaged in money-laundering, committed classified documents felonies, fabricated evidence against a rival, or committed other serious crimes, we would almost certainly be going to jail.
But if you have a title like vice president or congressman or governor now, it seems as if you have the “get out of jail free” card. That is terribly dangerous. We quite simply cannot have a Republic if there is one set of laws for ordinary citizens and a totally different set of standards for rich and powerful people. Trump is at least right to recognize the underlying problem here. Trump posted on Truth Social Saturday, “I’m looking at the large amount of money owed by the Democrats, after the Presidential Election, and the fact that they admit to paying, probably illegally, Eleven Million Dollars to singer Beyoncé for an ENDORSEMENT (she never sang, not one note, and left the stage to a booing and angry audience!), Three Million Dollars for ‘expenses,’ to Oprah, Six Hundred Thousand Dollars to very low rated TV ‘anchor,’ Al Sharpton (a total lightweight!), and others to be named for doing, absolutely NOTHING! These ridiculous fees were incorrectly stated in the books and records.”
It is unclear whether paying large sums to a celebrity for an endorsement definitively violates Federal Election Commission guidelines. However, failing to properly report high-cost endorsement payments is a violation. These allegations would be worth investigating legally and in accordance with election laws and standards.
Trump, though he did not clarify that the violation depends on the amount of the payment for endorsement and the level of coordination with a candidate/campaign, referred to this in his usual emphatic style: “YOU ARE NOT ALLOWED TO PAY FOR AN ENDORSEMENT. IT IS TOTALLY ILLEGAL TO DO SO. Can you imagine what would happen if politicians started paying for people to endorse them. All hell would break out! Kamala, and all of those that received Endorsement money, BROKE THE LAW. They should all be prosecuted! Thank you for your attention to this matter.”
The Federal Election Commission states: Disbursements for endorsements made to the general public are not contributions or expenditures as long as the endorsement is not coordinated with any candidate, candidate committee or its agents. If celebrities were paid huge amounts of money by the Democrat party and Harris’s campaign to endorse Kamala, this would indeed seem to be a violation of the FEC rules.
The Steele Dossier saga isn’t over—not even close. If anything, its rot is more obvious than ever, with each new revelation pointing directly to the highest levels of the Obama administration and even reaching into the early days of the Trump White House. What we now know is already damning: the phony Steele Dossier wasn’t just opposition research—it was weaponized disinformation, deliberately shoved into the 2017 Intelligence Community Assessment under orders from Barack Obama himself. Senior analysts warned it was unverified and unreliable, but those concerns were bulldozed in the name of politics.
Obama ordered the revised ICA not because Russia flipped the election, but because the original findings made it clear they hadn’t. That truth was politically inconvenient. So instead of accepting it, they rewrote reality, stuffing baseless allegations into an official intelligence report and turning it into a blunt instrument to kneecap a duly elected president. At the very least, John Brennan, the Obama-era CIA director, may soon find himself in legal jeopardy over his role in this scandal. But this story just took another turn—as it ensnared John Bolton, former national security adviser to President Trump.
In 2018, Bolton received a classified memorandum directly connected to Brennan’s actions. Astonishingly, he chose to bury it, locking it away in a National Security Council safe instead of bringing it to Trump’s attention. His trust in Brennan’s fabricated intelligence prevailed over his duty to the president he served. According to investigative reporter Paul Sperry, in 2018, Bolton received that classified summary, detailing how Brennan manufactured the Putin-Trump intelligence out of thin air—but Bolton left it untouched, sealed from sight and scrutiny.
BREAKING: Sources tell me in 2018 former Trump Nat'l Security Adviser John Bolton received a classified memo summarizing the explosive report exposing how Brennan cooked up Putin-Trump intel, but Bolton stuck it in an NSC safe and never briefed Trump, believing the Brennan intel.
The list of bad actors goes on. Oleg Smolenkov and Igor Danchenko, once hyped as top-tier Russian sources, turned out to be opportunists with no real intel. But John Brennan needed a show, so Smolenkov was sold as Moscow’s James Bond, just like Comey inflated Steele’s fiction as “Crown material.” It was never about truth—just building a weapon.
Oleg Smolenkov like Igor Danchenko was a greedy opportunist & a drunk w/ no real subsource network in Russia. Brennan dressed him up as a superspy like Comey dressed up Steele ("Crown material") What a farce. The ICA was Brennan's version of the Steele Dossier. #TheBrennanDossier
Now, thanks to declassified intelligence, reality is catching up with fiction. While Vladimir Putin never possessed any compromising material to blackmail Trump, he did have an extensive dossier on Hillary Clinton. Had she won the presidency, she would have entered the White House compromised, vulnerable to blackmail by Moscow, her decisions always shadowed by the possibility of Russian extortion.
Turns out from declassified intelligence that Vladimir Putin had no Kompromat on Donald Trump — no pee tape, no nothing — but he had a massive file on Hillary Clinton which he could use to blackmail her and control her as the president he really preferred
Bottom line: Brennan's CIA suppressed real intelligence and fabricated fake intelligence to frame Trump as a Russian conspirator and destroy his presidency. The ICA was a frame job, pure and simple.
In short, a cabal of partisans weaponized compromised intelligence, invented a Russian conspiracy out of nothing, and employed it to kneecap an incoming president. The deception ran so deep that even those entrusted to defend the presidency—like Bolton—became complicit by omission, not intervention.
CIA Director John Ratcliffe revealed Sunday that explosive new evidence tied to the Russia collusion hoax is about to be declassified—and it points directly at Hillary Clinton and key Obama-era intelligence officials. During an appearance on “Sunday Morning Futures” with Maria Bartiromo on Fox News, Ratcliffe confirmed that the classified annex to Special Counsel John Durham’s report will soon be made public, and what it contains could dramatically shift the narrative on the origins of Crossfire Hurricane. “And what that intelligence shows, Maria, is that part of this was a Hillary Clinton plan, but part of it was an FBI plan to, uh, be an accelerant to that fake Steele dossier, to those fake Russia collusion claims by pouring oil on the fire, by amplifying the lie and burying the truth of … what Hillary Clinton was up to,” Ratcliffe said.
This comes on the heels of fresh scrutiny over former CIA Director John Brennan, Director of National Intelligence James Clapper, and FBI Director James Comey, all of whom, according to Ratcliffe, knowingly pushed a false narrative into official intelligence assessments. “What hasn’t come out yet—and what’s going to come out—is the underlying intelligence that I have spent the last few months making recommendations about for final declassification,” Ratcliffe explained. “That will come out in the John Durham report classified annex.” If accurate, this revelation would confirm what conservatives have long suspected: that the Clinton campaign not only fabricated the Russian collusion story but had help from deep-state operatives inside the federal government.
“And much of that testimony is frankly completely inconsistent with what our underlying intelligence… reflects,” he added, referring to sworn statements given by Brennan, Clinton, and Comey between 2020 and 2022. Ratcliffe emphasized that this was not just a political hit job against Trump—it was a coordinated effort to manipulate both the intelligence community and the public. “You know, Pam Bondi does have a strike force. It is a different Department of Justice, a different FBI, and an opportunity to look at how these people really did conspire to run a hoax, a fraud on the American people, and against Donald Trump’s presidency. ”Despite predictable pushback from Democrats and legacy media dismissing renewed investigations as “revenge” or “retribution,” Ratcliffe said it’s clear why the public supports these efforts.
“They said to everyone, ‘We know what you did to Donald Trump, and we reelected him because we know this was all fake. We know it was a hoax. Now we want to understand how you did it so that it can’t happen again.’” “This declassification process… is so important,” Ratcliffe continued. “There can be accountability and preventability to prevent the same people that did it in 2016 with the Steele dossier, with the Hunter Biden laptop in 2020, from doing it again in the future.” In short, the hoax that consumed years of Trump’s first presidency may finally be fully exposed—and Hillary Clinton’s role in launching it, with FBI help, will no longer be shielded by redactions or media deflection. Investigative reporter Paul Sperry revealed similar news on X Sunday morning:
BREAKING: CIA's been working w DOJ to declassify for release–likely this week–explosive new info from long-class. appendix to Durham Report showing FBI accelerated plan by Hillary to frame Trump as Russian traitor. Underlying intel puts Brennan,Comey,Hillary in perjury jeopardy
“I just continue to be fascinated by the people who are still carrying a security clearance. It’s amazing who are still in these agencies,” Nunes said..”
The chairman of the President’s Intelligence Advisory Board says he believes crimes were committed by intelligence and law enforcement officials who relentlessly pursued President Donald Trump over the last decade, and he also wants to make sure that spies who abused their powers are stripped of their security clearances and their jobs. “Look, it’s really simple. There’s lots of criminals here, and it was a grand conspiracy,” former House Intelligence Committee Chairman and current PIAB chief Devin Nunes told Just the News. “Remember, we made, I don’t know, a dozen criminal referrals when I was chairman of the House Intelligence Committee,” he added during an exclusive interview on the Just the News, No Noise television show Thursday night.
Nunes said whether people are prosecuted now will depend on whether the statute of limitations for crimes have expired, or whether those deadlines get extended by the pursuit of a conspiracy case. He said he’s comfortable leaving those decisions to FBI Director Kash Patel and Attorney General Pam Bondi. The former Republican lawmaker from California said he’s focused in his role as the head of the civilian oversight board for U.S. intelligence on making sure that intelligence officers face discipline and consequences, regardless of whether they are prosecuted eventually.
“I just continue to be fascinated by the people who are still carrying a security clearance. It’s amazing who are still in these agencies,” Nunes said. “And I’m just shaking my head like every time I turn around, like, wait, wait, wait, wasn’t that person in that position a Russia hoax person. “All of those people need to get their security clearances pulled, and they should not be working anywhere near law enforcement or intelligence for that matter,” he added. “So it’s one of the things that our board is tasked with.”
President Donald Trump on Friday said that former President Barack Obama likely has immunity following a U.S. Supreme Court ruling in light of a report that was declassified by Director of National Intelligence (DNI) Tulsi Gabbard earlier this month. Gabbard said the documents showed that Obama and his then-Cabinet members “manufactured and politicized intelligence to lay the groundwork for what was essentially a years-long coup against President Trump,” which Obama denied in a statement earlier this week. Gabbard said in a Sunday interview that she referred some Obama-era officials for criminal prosecution to the Department of Justice (DOJ) and the FBI. Trump on Friday was asked by a reporter during a press gaggle at the White House, “How do you think that the Supreme Court’s ruling that benefited you on presidential immunity would apply to former President Barack Obama and what you’re accusing him of doing?”
The question for Trump was referring to the Supreme Court’s 6–3 ruling in 2024 that stated presidents have prosecutorial immunity for official acts within the executive presidential authority that Congress has no jurisdiction over.
“It probably helps him a lot,” Trump said in response, adding that the ruling “doesn’t help the people around him at all. But it probably helps him a lot.” The president said he believed Obama had committed “criminal acts,” but that “he has Immunity,” which he said “probably helps him a lot.” “Obama owes me big” for the Supreme Court ruling, Trump said. Earlier this week, the president said that Obama officials “tried to rig the election, and they got caught, and there should be very severe consequences for that.” Responding to accusations from Gabbard, a spokesperson for Obama reiterated the assertion that Russia attempted to interfere with the 2016 presidential election.
“Nothing in the document issued last week undercuts the widely accepted conclusion that Russia worked to influence the 2016 presidential election but did not successfully manipulate any votes,” the spokesperson said on July 22.
Obama’s spokesperson also pointed to a 2020 Senate Intelligence Committee report, saying the committee affirmed that Russia worked to influence the election. Earlier this week, Gabbard said, “There is irrefutable evidence that details how President Obama and his national security team directed the creation of an intelligence community assessment that they knew was false.” Among the documents declassified by the DNI is a House Intelligence report dated Sept. 18, 2020, which found that several intelligence reports that suggested Russian President Vladimir Putin aspired to help then-presidential candidate Trump in the months leading up to the 2016 presidential election were “substandard.”
Specifically, three reports published internally by the CIA after the election contained information that was potentially biased, implausible, unclear, or of uncertain origin, the House Intelligence Committee said in the report that was released by Gabbard on Wednesday. “One scant, unclear, and unverifiable fragment of a sentence from one of the substandard reports constitutes the only classified information to suggest Putin ‘aspired’ to help Trump win,” the panel stated. The reports were used as foundational sources for an intelligence community assessment made public in January 2017.
The intelligence community “ignored or selectively quoted reliable intelligence reports that challenged—and in some cases undermined—judgments that Putin sought to elect Trump” and failed to consider plausible alternative explanations, the House report stated. The DOJ on July 23 announced that it was forming a task force following the declassification of the documents. In a statement posted to X, the DOJ said that the task force would “assess the evidence publicized by Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard and investigate potential next legal steps which might stem from DNI Gabbard’s disclosures.”
The release of declassified material has shed new light on the creation of the Russian collusion investigation and many of the names are crushingly familiar. Indeed, Congress is moving to “round up the usual suspects” in light of the new revelations. It is the story of the real Russian conspiracy: how high-ranking officials in the Obama Administration seeded this false claim with the help of an eager, unquestioning press corps. Not surprisingly, the media (which spent years repeating the false Russian collusion claims) is doing a full-court press to kill the story. Yet, many of these key figures are retaining counsel in anticipation of the unfolding investigation. Many previously secured contracts with MSNBC or CNN, or book deals, where they doubled down on the false claims detailed in these new documents. Here are just a few of the usual suspects:
John Brennan, Former Director, Central Intelligence Agency Brennan is arguably the most at risk in the new disclosures, which allegedly contradict his prior testimony before Congress. On May 23, 2017, Brennan testified that the infamous Steele dossier “wasn’t part of the corpus of intelligence information that we had. It was not in any way used as a basis for the Intelligence Community Assessment that was done.” However, the new material shows that Brennan was the key figure insisting on the inclusion of the Steele dossier in an intelligence assessment, suggesting that the Russians did influence the election in favor of Trump.
Brennan not only intervened to include the dossier but overruled the CIA’s two most senior Russia experts, who said it “did not meet even the most basic tradecraft standards.” One analyst recounted how “[Brennan] refused to remove it, and when confronted with the dossier’s main flaws, [Brennan] responded, ‘Yes, but doesn’t it ring true?’” Notably, it was Brennan who briefed Obama in 2016 about Hillary Clinton’s plan to create a Russian conspiracy “to vilify Donald Trump by stirring up a scandal claiming interference by the Russian security service.” Months later, it would be Brennan who would actively incorporate the dossier secretly funded by Clinton’s campaign.
James Clapper, Former Director of National Intelligence James Clapper, former DNI under Obama, is expecting the worst and said that he has “lawyered up.” Clapper was in the briefing in July 2016 when Obama was told that Clinton was planning to create a Russian conspiracy narrative. In November 2016, Clapper received an assessment from the intelligence community that Russia was “probably not trying … to influence the election by using cyber means.” He also received talking points from staff on December 7, 2016, “Foreign adversaries did not use cyberattacks on election infrastructure to alter the US Presidential election outcome.”
On December 9, 2016, another report stated that “Russian and criminal actors did not impact recent US election results by conducting malicious cyber activities against election infrastructure.” That Presidential Daily Brief was scheduled to be published on December 9, 2016, but CDNI Clapper’s office stopped its publication “based on some new guidance.” Clapper later joined Obama with John Brennan, Susan Rice, John Kerry, Loretta Lynch, Andrew McCabe and others, in a meeting where a new assessment was ordered that would detail the “tools Moscow used and actions it took to influence the 2016 election.” Brennan then reportedly handpicked the analysts who seemed to flip the earlier assessments without any credible intelligence.
In a 2018 interview with the Harvard Gazette, Clapper continued to spread the false narrative, referring to the high-confidence judgment that “Putin directly ordered the hacking and election interference.” He added, “I think they [Russians] actually influenced the outcome.” Clapper later added to his tarnished legacy by signing the letter with more than 50 former intelligence officials dismissing the Hunter Biden laptop story before the 2020 presidential election as likely “Russian disinformation.”
James Comey, Former Director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation James Comey would use this contrived intelligence to green-light the investigations that overwhelmed the first Trump term. The FBI was aware early that the Steele dossier was an unreliable political hit job funded by the Clinton campaign. Moreover, the CIA told the FBI that Trump associate Carter Page was a U.S. intelligence asset, not a Russian spy. The FBI ignored such countervailing intelligence, violated protocols, and lied to a federal court to maintain the Russian investigation. In an interview with Fox’s Bret Baier, Comey was asked about the lack of evidence of “Russian collusion.” Comey dismissed the question by saying “collusion’s not a word that I’m familiar with.”
Putting aside the lunacy of that statement, Comey then says the question is whether Americans were “in cahoots with the foreign intelligence activities.” It appears “cahoots” is a word he is familiar with. He then denied knowing, in April 2018, that the Clinton campaign had funded the report. Comey often appears unfamiliar with terms or facts that contradicted his investigation of Trump, even years later. Comey repeatedly testified to a lack of memory on key decisions made in the Russian investigation. However, documents show that it was Comey who pushed back on a planned statement by Clapper, stating that they had not determined the dossier to be reliable.
Andrew McCabe, Former Acting FBI Director Andrew McCabe, now a CNN contributor, was fired after career Justice Department officials found that the former acting FBI director not only lied to investigators but deserved to be fired. That recommendation was reportedly embraced by the career officials in the inspector general’s office. He was accused of lying four times, including twice under oath. Not surprisingly, McCabe makes appearances in the new disclosures. He is not only present at critical meetings, but it also appears that McCabe was allegedly responsible for blocking congressional investigators from interviewing the FBI analysts who supported Brennan and the drafters of the controversial ICA.
Congress alleged that McCabe walled off at least 30 FBI employees associated with the dossier. These and other names are not new. As the media was spreading the false narrative of Russian collusion, many of these figures knew that there was no evidence of such collusion. They said nothing. Instead, after Obama ordered a new assessment, effectively flipping the conclusions of the earlier assessment, anonymous sources leaked the false narrative to the media, which eagerly ran with the story. While leaks of the false narrative were rampant, none of the actual facts were leaked to the media.
In the meantime, figures like Schiff continued to claim, even after the Special Counsel rejected evidence of collusion, that he had secret evidence to the contrary in the House Intelligence Committee. Schiff never revealed that evidence, and the public now knows that the intelligence community rejected the collusion claims from the outset. The public is now learning about the real Russian conspiracy and its key players. It was the most infamous — and successful — political hit job in history. The same media that pushed the false claims are now, again, imposing a news blackout as they did with the Hunter Biden laptop. The problem is that the truth, like water, tends to find a way out. That trickle just turned into a flood for the architects of the Russian collusion hoax.
The unreality that prevails in Russia is puzzling. It is not just Putin’s inability to comprehend that by refusing to win the conflict after 3.5 years, he has allowed the conflict to widen out of control. Now Putin is faced with all of Europe organizing to support the West’s proxy war against Russia by purchasing US weapons and supplying the weapons to Ukraine. Trump and Germany have signaled that the next widening is to attack Moscow with missiles. Apparently Russians still haven’t learned anything. Ivan Timofeev, the program director of the Valdai Club, says that “We’re close to the war nobody wants but everyone’s preparing for.” He is wrong. Israel wants America at war with Iran. Zelensky wants Europe at war with Russia. The Zionist neoconservatives want more color revolutions to set at war with Russia. The CIA wants to weaken BRICS by setting India and China against one another.
Putin himself has done more to guarantee future conflict by refusing to use sufficient force to end the conflict in Ukraine before it widens out of control. Timofeev actually believes, God help him, that Trump has pushed for peace in Ukraine. How can Trump push for peace when the military/security complex needs the Russian enemy, without which its budget and power are reduced? Trump has not repudiated the Wolfowitz Doctrine of US hegemony. Trump has not met with Putin. As the Ukraine conflict is Washington’s proxy war with Russia, only Trump and Putin can resolve the conflict. Trump has made no attempt to resolve it. He has passed it off to Zelensky, who cannot resolve it, because it is Washington’s war.
The Western world has not heard a word that Putin has said. Putin said, repeatedly, that the war cannot be resolved unless it deals with the root cause, which is the absence of a mutual security agreement. The West has made it perfectly clear that it does not want a mutual security agreement with Russia. What else explains Washington’s use of the conflict to expand NATO into Finland and Sweden, to militarize Moldavia, to stir up trouble in Soviet Central Asia against Russia? It is extraordinary that one never sees, with the exception of Sputnik journalist Ekaterina Blinova, any intelligent analysis from a Russian commentator available in English. No doubt there is Russian discussion that is kept from us.
Another example of Kremlin insouciance is the announcement last Friday by Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov: “The only way to resolve the Middle East conflict is through the creation of a Palestinian state alongside Israel.” Here we have again the “two-state solution” that has been the cover since 1947 for Israel’s theft of Palestine. Every year Israel steals a little more of Palestine, and the complicit West says “the two-state solution.” The Kremlin is still saying it when there is not a building standing in Gaza and an Israeli government minister has declared the Israeli parliament has in effect annexed the tiny remnants of the West Bank. Trump has already claimed Gaza, so where is Palestine? It is a county that no longer exists. America and Israel have wiped it off the planet.
The Israeli government declaration reads: “the creation of a Palestinian state poses a Mortal danger to Israel’s existence. The Knesset declares that the State of Israel has the natural, historical, and legal right to all parts of the Land of Israel.” In other words, Palestine doesn’t exist. In the face of this unequivocal statement by the Israeli government the Kremlin says the solution is a two-state solution. What more do you need to see that Russia is disconnected from reality, has no comprehension of what is happening, and by failing to exercise a leadership role has committed the world to Third War Three.
Kiev’s recent crackdown on anti-corruption agencies is yet more proof that Ukrainian leaders are leaning towards authoritarianism and “cannot be trusted,” Steve Cortes, a former advisor to US President Donald Trump, has said. Earlier this month, Ukraine’s Vladimir Zelensky moved to place the National Anti-Corruption Bureau (NABU) and the Special Anti-Corruption Prosecutor’s Office (SAPO) under executive oversight – which would essentially strip them of any independence – while claiming the agencies were under Russian influence. The move, however, prompted mass protests at home and Western criticism, with EU officials warning that they could reconsider further aid to Kiev. In an op-ed for Newsweek on Friday, Cortes, who is now the president of the League of American Workers advocacy group, described the crackdown as “an extra-judicial attack on decency.”
“This raid reeks – and it smells like gangsterism, not democracy.” The move by Zelensky, reportedly backed by his chief of staff, Andrey Yermak – whom Cortes described as “co-president” – shows that they “act in very authoritarian ways themselves – and increasingly reveal to the world that they are not transparent, reliable partners for the United States.” Cortes went on to accuse Kiev of entrenched high-level corruption and argued that continued US aid is unjustified. “It is no wonder that Americans increasingly realize that sending $175 billion of borrowed money to corrupt leaders in Ukraine is just not sound policy,” he wrote. “Sending mountains of borrowed funds to kleptocrats actually harms America’s national security, all while making our country poorer,” he said while urging Americans to stop lionizing Zelensky and comprehend the reality of Ukraine’s corruption.
The American people have been unbelievably generous, but our patience is wearing thin… In this case, given the latest tactics and optics of the Zelensky/Yermak regime, it becomes ever clearer that these counterparts cannot be trusted. Following domestic and international backlash, Zelensky backpedaled on the crackdown, proposing that the independence of Ukraine’s anti-graft institutions be restored. Meanwhile, Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova suggested that neither NABU nor SAPO is really fighting corruption but rather are used by Kiev’s backers as tools “to control the flow of money coming to Ukraine from the West.”
Have we reached the beginning of the end for Zelensky? Does this spell game-over and victory for Putin and Russia? The following is a very rare admission from the hard news pages of The New York Times: “James Wasserstrom, an American anticorruption expert, said in an interview that “the luster is definitely coming off” Mr. Zelensky’s wartime leadership among governments providing financial assistance. He added, “There is exasperation at Zelensky in the donor community.” Early last week, there were unexpected images coming from Kiev of the largest demonstrations against the Ukrainian government since Russia invaded more than three years ago, as more than 2,000 people gathered near the president’s office, shouting “shame” and “veto the law,” after President Zelensky signed a law gutting the country’s anti-corruption agency.
This was enough to get the attention of Kiev’s biggest donors, and days later on Friday the European Union announced it would suspend part of a €4.5 billion fund tied to good governance standards, with the NY Times reporting that the bloc has frozen €1.5 billion (about $1.7 billion) in financial aid to Ukraine over concerns about corruption and delays in key reforms. The decision is said to not be ‘final’ yet, and on Sunday President Zelensky held a crucial call with President of the European Commission Ursula von der Leyen. His office confirmed they discussed Ukraine’s anti-corruption system (…or we should say lack thereof). What is tantamount to EU sanctions being on the table would impact access to the funding, dependent on Ukraine meeting specific reform requirements known as “progress benchmarks.”
One critical unmet benchmark is the appointment of judges to the High Anti-Corruption Court, which is supposed to be an independent judiciary apparatus given the power to spotlight and battle elite corruption. The EU has also raised concerns about a lack of transparency and slow progress in the area of judicial reforms. This rare backlash from close allies with the deepest pocketbooks marks a huge blow to Zelensky – who has also kept himself in power way past his term mandate (citing the war with Russia) – after he pushed legislation through the Verkhovna Rada seen as greatly underminng the independence of two key anti-corruption bodies: the National Anti-Corruption Bureau of Ukraine (NABU) and the Specialized Anti-Corruption Prosecutor’s Office (SAPO).
Critics have increasingly highlighted that these actions have come in unison with other martial law policies during the war, including the silencing of journalists, civil society activists, the suppression of the Russian language, the persecution of the Orthodox Church, as well as the wholesale banning of opposition parties. The New York Times comments as follows: “The two agencies — the National Anticorruption Bureau of Ukraine and the Specialized Anticorruption Prosecutor’s Office — had been investigating top ministers in the Zelensky government. The president’s decision to kneecap them, though reversed, prompted accusations of cronyism that jeopardized backing from civil society groups at home and Western nations bankrolling the war.
The European Union established this aid mechanism, the Ukraine Facility, last year and promised 50 billion euros over three years for repairing war damage and preparing the country for E.U. accession. The European Commission spokesman, Guillaume Mercier, told journalists in Brussels on Friday that Ukraine had requested a disbursement in June despite falling short on three of 16 benchmarks, including failing to make appointments to a specialized anticorruption court.”
Further, the report noted “That court tries cases brought by the two agencies whose independence Mr. Zelensky threatened this week.” Even British prime minister Kier Starmer has reportedly phoned Zelensky’s office this past week to discuss his latest moves regarding corruption investigations. And when you’ve potentially lost the Brits and Europeans, your wartime star power has most definitely faded. President Putin and Kremlin officials are sure to seize on the anti-Zelensky momentum diplomatically, as they engage Trump officials behind the scenes as part of ongoing bilateral talks. Trump has of course never been a close friend of “the world’s greatest salesman” Zelensky – and could be ready to dump him especially if the mood turns drastically in Europe.
We have to decide whether the Epstein story is child rape or Mossad blackmail. If “child” is defined as under the statutory age of female sexual consent, in the US depending on the state, a child is a female under 16 years of age, under 17 years of age, or under 18 years of age. In New York the age of female consent is 17. In Hawaii it is 16. Hawaii has a “close-in-age” exception that allows 14 year olds to consent with those up to 21 years in age. In Hawaii the goal seems to be not to prevent underaged females from sexual intercourse but to prevent overaged males (over 21) from sex with females declared underaged for them but not for younger men. There is an element here of age discrimination. In the Philippines the age of female consent is 12. In Germany the requirement is for a female to be 14 years old in order for a sexual relationship with a male over 18 to be legal.
In Mexico the age of consent is 15. In Russia it is 16. It Japan it is 13 but is being raised to 16. In England it is 16. In Italy and China the age of consent is 14. In Denmark and Poland it is 15. In Saudi Arabia sex is only legal within marriage. The legal age for marriage for males is 18, for females 16. In the 1950s the age of consent in the state of Georgia was 14. In Delaware in the late 19th century it was 7, yes 7, not a typo. During the 1880s the age of consent in many US states varied between 10 and 12. Whatever the varying legislated age, if the information provided me is correct that some mothers have 12 year old daughters on birth control pills, the de facto age of female sexual consent in the US is 12.
Was Virginia Giuffre a child? If she is American it depends on her state of residence. If she is British, Australian or a New York resident, she is not a child. There was no child rape of Virginia Giuffre for which she collected three million pounds according to reports. Normally we think of a child as before puberty. I don’t know if Epstein had such young kids as sex bait for his entrapment scheme. If so, it would seem to involve kidnapping in addition to illegal underage sex. Would the prominent Jewish billionaires, who Ryan Dawson says was Mossad’s way of directing funds to Epstein, put themselves at risk by being complicit in kidnapping and underage sex? Why would they when there are volunteers attracted to influential men just as groupies are attracted to rock stars.
Young women are not what they formerly were. It is a fact that many young women have porn sites on which they proudly demonstrate themselves in sexual activity that not long ago would have been regarded as depraved. Some of them compete in having the largest number of sexual partners in a 24 hour time period. One has a goal of 1,000 sexual partners in 24 hours, which with no breaks for food, water, or toilet, comes to about 80 seconds per partner. It has become a matter of pride to achieve sexual penetration by 1,000 strangers in 24 hours. According to reports, young women in Internet chat brag about having had 150 sexual partners. True or false, it shows they are not shamed by their behavior whether claimed or real. What I have reported are facts, not a brief for pedophilia. Use the facts to decide whether the Epstein Saga is one of child sex-trafficking or one of a Mossad honey-trap for blackmail purposes to ensure US policy in the Middle East conforms to Israel’s.
Sex-trafficking of children in the US is far more extensive than Epstein’s operation. Principally, the sex-trafficking of illegal alien children. Many were separated from their parents, and if reports are correct tens of thousands, or is it hundreds of thousands, of them have been “lost.” US authorities don’t know where they are. Another source was the seizure of children by Child Protective Services, many of whom allegedly ended up in child prostitution. As far as I know, nothing has been done to find and to rescue these children. As a final suggestion, consider whether the purpose of the hullabaloo over Epstein’s sex-trafficking is to focus attention off the Israeli spy operation that has succeeded in destroying an independent American Middle East policy and five Muslim countries regarded as obstacles to Greater Israel.
German police have raided Alternative for Germany (AfD) MEP Petr Bystron’s property for the 22nd time, using the pretext of his connection to the defunct Voice of Europe website, which was run by a man exiled from Ukraine. The house raid came while Bystron was in Washington D.C., meeting with Trump officials, including congressmen and allies of President Donald Trump and Vice President J.D. Vance. On early Tuesday morning, German police searched an older warehouse where Bystron conducted business a decade ago. “This is targeted terror against the opposition,” Bystron said in a press release. “There is no other way to classify the absurd behavior of the authorities.” Bystron was the target of Czech intelligence services last year, who decided to release a variety of allegations surrounding their investigation at a rather opportune time—right before EU parliamentary elections.
The raid against Voice of Europe (VoE) and the accusations against Bystron, which Remix News covered, was widely seen as damaging the AfD’s reputation before voters headed to the polls. Notably, Czech intelligence claimed to have voice recordings that revealed Bystron was involved with a scheme to provide politicians with money in exchange for conducting interviews with the outlet VoE. The Czech authorities have never made the recording of Bystron public despite demands from the AfD to release it. Nobody has ever been charged to date in connection with the allegations, including Bystron himself. Bystron, however, was the only name that was released in connection with the case, although authorities claimed six European politicians received money from VoE.
The raid against Bystron may be seen as especially provocative as it was conducted at a time when Bystron was out of the country and meeting with Trump officials and congressmen. He is seen as the AfD party’s key bridge to American policymakers and is known for his connections to the Republican Party. Bystron himself said that despite his properties being raided 21 times, the police have not turned up any incriminating information against him. He also said that the police have even raided his elderly mother’s room in her retirement home and took testimony from her, despite her having been officially declared by the court as a dementia patient. “Every single one of these 22 searches was illegal. Each one marks a step away from a democratic constitutional state and toward an authoritarian regime that seeks to silence dissent by any means necessary,” Bystron told the Gateway Pundit.
Notably, the house raid of Bystron also occurred on the same day that a top German court in Leipzig rejected a significant AfD’s appeal. The party was working to overturn its current designation as a “suspected extremist” party by the powerful domestic spy agency, the Office for the Protection of the Constitution (BfV). With all appeals now exhausted, this means the BfV can conduct extraordinary surveillance on the AfD, including targeting members with wiretaps, reading their chats and emails, and using informants to infiltrate the party. A number of prominent commentators on the German right have already highlighted the case on X, with Naomi Seibt stating: “They are spitting in the face of J.D. Vance.”
Other news outlets have also met the news of the incredible number of house searches targeting the AfD MEP with concern about Germany’s quickly evolving totalitarian methods for dealing with dissent. “Anyone who expresses critical views on war preparations must apparently expect house searches,” said a reporter from AUF1 in a video post shared by Bystron himself. Pressure has grown on the German government over the incredible growth of the AfD. In the latest Yougov poll, the party is tied for first place with the CDU, with 25 percent of the vote. The CDU lost 3.5 percent of the vote, while the AfD has jumped 4.2 points.
This is so damning. Most of America’s biggest late-night hosts have become nothing more than hyper-partisan activist hacks for the Democrats – a party that’s rarely been more unpopular. No wonder Colbert got canned. More will follow. pic.twitter.com/biHIQBNCxu
Lighting homes in the Philippines without electricity, using plastic bottles filled with water and a small amount of bleach, a method developed by Brazilian mechanic Alfredo Moser in 2002 and adapted by the Liter of Light project.
Legacy media will not report the facts of this case honestly. If they did they will have to remind their viewers that they participated in the spreading of this historic lie. pic.twitter.com/Ftzq2ctonN
The sheer absurdity of Jen Psaki interviewing John Brennan can’t be overstated. She was Obama’s White House comms director at the exact moment Brennan and Obama were orchestrating the Russia collusion hoax against Trump. Now she’s playing journalist and he’s her guest. Shameless. https://t.co/MMZ20rkH0z
This is the most chilling admission I’ve ever seen from inside the FBI…
Deputy Director Dan Bongino says he’ll never be the same and is shocked to his core over the discoveries from their investigations into the Deep State.
Little things. Devin Nunes is the former chairman of the House Intelligence Commitee, head of Trump Media, and now Chair of the President’s Intelligence Advisory Board. Through him, Sundance describes a March 2022 lawsuit filed by Trump vs a large group of individuals and entities. Only, it didn’t look like a lawsuit, lots of details were missing. Sundance figured out that it wasn’t meant as a lawsuit, it was “a legal transfer mechanism”. Trump needed evidence available to lawyers somewhere, things needed to be “on the record”, but ‘because of the construct of the lawfare being deployed against Trump, any lawyer would need a “reason* to review the evidence. The Trump -v- Clinton et al lawsuit becomes that ‘reason.’
Former House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence Chairman Devin Nunes appears on OAN with former Congressman Matt Gaetz to discuss the information released by Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard. As noted by Nunes, why did it take this long for the information to surface? That question showcases how corrupt the DC system -the Intelligence Community- is in its effort to protect itself from accountability. Nunes also points to the raid on Mar-a-Lago as a possible entry point for investigative accountability.
Let me refresh on something that could potentially be a revelation down the road. In 2022 a Florida judge dismissed a lawsuit brought by President Trump against Hillary Clinton. [65-page Ruling Here] The media enjoyed ridiculing Trump using the words of the judge who dismissed the case. As noted by the Washington Times, “Judge Donald M. Middlebrooks, a Clinton appointee, said Mr. Trump’s filing was too lengthy, detailing events that “are implausible because they lack any specific allegations which might provide factual support for the conclusions reached.” When I originally read the 108-page Donald Trump lawsuit filed in March 2022, it took me a few moments, and then I realized this was not a lawsuit; this was a legal transfer mechanism created by lawyers to establish a proprietary information silo.
Here’s a totally different take on the issues surrounding the Trump -v- Clinton lawsuit, which -from the outset- I always believed was going to be dismissed because suing all of those characters under the auspices of a civil RICO case was never the objective. In the aftermath of the filing, the silo created by the lawsuit is grounded upon attorney-client privilege, a legal countermeasure to a predictable DOJ-NSD lawfare maneuver, which unfolded in the FBI Mar-a-Lago raid and the subsequent Jack Smith targeting operation. In March 2022 President Trump filed a civil lawsuit against: Hillary Clinton, Hillary for America Campaign Committee, DNC, DNC Services Corp, Perkins Coie, Michael Sussmann, Marc Elias, Debbie Wasserman Schultz, Charles Dolan, Jake Sullivan, John Podesta, Robby Mook, Phillipe Reines as well as Fusion GPS, Glenn Simpson, Peter Fritsch, Nellie Ohr, Bruce Ohr, Orbis Business Intelligence, Christopher Steele, Igor Danchenko, Neustar Inc., Rodney Joffe, James Comey, Peter Strzok, Lisa Page, Kevin Clinesmith and Andrew McCabe. [108-Page Lawsuit Here]
When I was about one-third of the way through reading the lawsuit, I initially stopped and said to myself this is going to take a lot of documentary evidence to back up the claims in the assertions. Dozens of attachments would be needed and hundreds of citations to the dozens of attachments would be mandatory. Except, they were not there. After reading further, while completely understanding the background material that was being described in the filing, I realized this wasn’t a lawsuit per se’. The 108-pages I was holding in my hands was more akin to legal transfer mechanism from President Trump to lawyers who needed it. The lawsuit filing was contingent upon a series of documents that would be needed to support the claims within it. Whoever wrote the lawsuit had obviously reviewed the evidence to support the filing. However, the attachments and citations were missing. That was weird.
That’s when I realized the purpose of the lawsuit. In hindsight, things became clear when the FBI later raided the home of Donald Trump, and suddenly the motive to confiscate documents, perhaps the missing lawsuit attachments and citations, surfaced. With the manipulative, and I said intentional, “ongoing investigation” angle created by the John Durham probe essentially blocking public release of declassified documents showing the efforts of all the lawsuit participants (Trump-Russia Collusion Hoax), in 2021 President Trump needed a legal way to secure and more importantly share evidence.
Think of it like the people around Trump wanting to show lawyers the evidence in the documents. However,because of the construct of the lawfare being deployed against Trump, any lawyer would need a *reason* to review the evidence. The Trump -v- Clinton et al lawsuit becomes that ‘reason.’ The “documents” (classified or not) were likely reviewed by lawyers in preparation for the lawsuit. This is their legal justification for reviewing the documents. In essence, the lawsuit was a transfer mechanism permitting the Trump legal team to review the evidence on behalf of their client, former President Donald Trump.
Why does Trump go there? “Clinton flew with a known predator, when to his island, and is seen in photographs with Epstein victims… yet the press won’t ask why..”
In a political world where Democrats are scrambling to memory-hole every scrap of the Jeffrey Epstein disaster that is damaging to their own party, and trying to make it a Donald Trump scandal, the media is more than happy to help them rewrite history. And President Trump has had enough. After all the fake news and the bogus accusations, on Friday, Trump decided he’d had enough, and barreled right into the hornet’s nest and started torching it with a flamethrower. Reporters asked about the pervert financier’s infamous sex trafficking operation—and Trump didn’t dodge or deflect. He unloaded, pointing the finger straight at former President Bill Clinton. “You ought to be speaking about [former Treasury Secretary] Larry Summers. You ought to be speaking about some of, uh, his friends that are hedge fund guys. They’re all over the place. You ought to be speaking about Bill Clinton, who went to the island 28 times. I never went to the island.”
When a reporter followed up by asking whether he had written a letter for Epstein’s birthday party, Trump flatly rejected the claim. “I don’t even know what they’re talking about,” he said. “Now, somebody could have written a letter and used my name, but that’s happened a lot. All you have to do is take a look at the dossier, the fake dossier.” He continued attacking Democrats, accusing them of spreading misinformation and fabricating evidence: “Everything’s fake with that administration. Everything’s fake with the Democrats. Take a look at what they just found about, about the dossier.” Repeating the theme, Trump added, “Everything is fake. They’re a bunch of sick people.”
Clinton has spent years denying he ever visited Epstein’s island. In his 2024 memoir, he repeats the same tired line, pretending he barely knew Epstein, however, it’s public record at this point that Bill Clinton hobnobbed with Epstein, jetted off to his notorious island over and over. But the media has turned a blind eye to Bill Clinton’s deep, well-documented relationship with Epstein. Clinton wants America to take his word that he was just there for the sunshine and cocktails. However, Johanna Sjoberg, an Epstein accuser who testified under oath in 2016, says Epstein once told her “Clinton likes them young, referring to girls.” Meanwhile, Clinton’s team refused to answer questions about a birthday letter he reportedly sent to Epstein, and instead recycled the same tired statement that he cut ties with Epstein “more than a decade before” Epstein’s 2019 arrest—and supposedly knew nothing about his crimes.
Trump, meanwhile, has said plainly he never set foot on the island—and there’s no evidence to the contrary. But the press keeps hounding him, while running cover for Democrats. Working-class Americans see the double standard. Clinton flew with a known predator, when to his island, and is seen in photographs with Epstein victims… yet the press won’t ask why. There’s no outrage, no wall-to-wall coverage—just more selective silence, buried like the Hunter Biden laptop. The hypocrisy is obvious. If Trump sneezes, it’s a crisis. But Democrats can cozy up to monsters and never be called out for it. Well, Trump’s calling them out now.
“Acting FBI Director Andrew McCabe obstructed the House Intel Committee by prohibiting interviews with more than 30 FBI employees involved in supporting Brennan’s notorious “fusion cell.”
“Brennan “knowingly used false intelligence” to try to undermine President-elect Trump, a federal offense that constitutes outright fraud against the American government..”
[..the Steele Dossier]: “When senior officers called out its obvious flaws in a Dec. 2016 Langley meeting, Brennan stubbornly insisted, “Yes, but doesn’t it ring true?”
If you thought the Russian collusion hoax couldn’t get any uglier, think again. The circus orchestrated by Obama’s intelligence brass is unraveling in spectacular fashion, and John Brennan finds himself squarely in the crosshairs, not for a political dispute, but for criminal prosecution. This latest chapter, now marked by damning revelations, reeks of a conspiracy to subvert not only a presidency, but the very core of American democracy. Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard’s recent confirmation hit like a thunderbolt: Barack Obama, the architect of this mess, has been named in an official criminal referral to the Justice Department. Brennan, Obama’s CIA chief and a man whose fingerprints are found all over this operation, is most likely staring down an indictment. James Comey isn’t far behind, either; both he and Brennan are already under extreme scrutiny by the FBI. It’s as if each turn yields another layer of deception and abuse of power. Even hardened law professors like Jonathan Turley recognize Brennan as a high-profile trophy for prosecutors—he’s now the “30-point buck out in the open,” primed to fall.
The scope of misconduct here borders on the surreal. The House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence (HPSCI) dropped a 46-page bombshell report that systematically destroyed Brennan’s ICA (Intelligence Community Assessment), which Obama ordered up as a final act of sabotage against Donald Trump. According to Paul Sperry, an investigative reporter for RealClearInvestigations, the findings were so relentlessly damning that the CIA refused to cooperate, went as far as obfuscating evidence, and sabotaged committee investigators: Shockingly, two key developments torpedoed any last defense for Brennan.
DEVELOPING: The 46-page HPSCI report shredding Brennan's dossier-backed ICA ordered by Obama was so devastating, so damning, that the CIA aggressively obstructed committee investigators, even sabotaging their computers and possibly spying on staffers. HPSCI is weighing referrals.
First, Acting FBI Director Andrew McCabe obstructed the House Intel Committee by prohibiting interviews with more than 30 FBI employees involved in supporting Brennan’s notorious “fusion cell.” Not a single FBI analyst connected to the ICA was allowed to testify; they were all silenced. Second, DNI Gabbard revealed that Brennan “knowingly used false intelligence” to try to undermine President-elect Trump, a federal offense that constitutes outright fraud against the American government. But perhaps the most grotesque twist in this saga is the beating heart of the Russian collusion hoax: the Steele Dossier. Long debunked, thoroughly discredited, and condemned by the same CIA Russia analysts Brennan himself supervised, the dossier was forcibly embedded in Obama’s handpicked ICA.
BREAKING: Acting FBI Director Andrew McCabe blocked House Intel Committee investigators from interviewing the FBI analysts who supported Brennan's "fusion cell" and his drafters of the ICA. At least 30 FBI employees associated with the dossier were gagged from speaking to staff.
NEW: DNI Tulsi Gabbard said John Brennan "knowingly used false intelligence" to undermine the legitimacy of President-elect Trump and "subvert the will" of the American electorate. Defrauding the government — in this case the U.S. intelligence services — is a federal crime.
When senior officers called out its obvious flaws in a Dec. 2016 Langley meeting, Brennan stubbornly insisted, “Yes, but doesn’t it ring true?” In other words, narrative trumped evidence for Obama’s CIA. Despite heated objections, the ICA’s drafters, chosen by Brennan himself, followed marching orders to weaponize dubious rumor and produce a document that served political ends, not reality. As we’ve noted before, the original assessments from Obama’s own intelligence community found no evidence that Russia altered the outcome of the 2016 election. But that didn’t suit the narrative Obama wanted. So he ordered the Intelligence Community Assessment (ICA) to be rewritten—pressuring John Brennan and his allies to force their preferred conclusion into the official record.
NEW: When senior CIA officers specializing in Russia analysis confronted Brennan w/ the Steele dossier's many flaws during a Dec 2016 meeting at Langley, Brennan agreed, but wanted to still keep it in the ICA b/c it SOUNDED true. "Yes, but doesn't it ring true?" Brennan responded
It wasn’t about accuracy or national security. It was about sabotage. They leaked their distortions to a compliant media and set out to delegitimize a duly elected president. The damage they caused to the American republic was—and still is—immeasurable. Now, the truth tumbles out into the open. Brennan’s strategy of “just making it ring true” has collapsed. Those responsible must be held accountable—not because of partisanship but because weaponizing U.S. intelligence agencies to undermine the will of the people is one of the gravest threats imaginable. Americans deserve justice, and the reckoning for Brennan and his Obama-era co-conspirators cannot come soon enough.
“The legacy media is once again doing damage control—this time by rolling out anonymous Obama allies to accuse Trump and Gabbard of fabricating “treason” claims to distract from the Epstein scandal..”
Team Obama is panicking. You can see it in every flailing move, every desperate media blitz, and every attempt to deflect from the deep, unresolved questions about the origins of Russiagate. The architects of the infamous hoax—Barack Obama, John Brennan, James Clapper, and James Comey—have all been exposed, thanks to the tenacity of Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard, who recently dropped declassified documents implicating the Obama-era intelligence cabal in concocting and perpetuating the false Russia narrative that hounded President Donald Trump throughout his first term. The stakes are real. Gabbard’s release didn’t just shine a light on the feverish efforts to smear Trump; it laid bare how these intelligence heavyweights cobbled together artificial intel on Trump while deliberately concealing explosive evidence that raised grave concerns about Hillary Clinton’s fitness for office.
Yeah, we’re not forgetting about that. The legacy media is once again doing damage control—this time by rolling out anonymous Obama allies to accuse Trump and Gabbard of fabricating “treason” claims to distract from the Epstein scandal. It’s a transparent attempt to spin the narrative and pressure Republicans into ignoring the growing pile of evidence. I previously wrote about how former State Department spokesperson Ned Price, an Obama White House veteran and ex-CIA analyst, wrote a panicked op-ed for Fox News, lashing out at Tulsi Gabbard, accusing her of pushing revisionist history and dangerously inflating the 2016 Russia collusion narrative. Remarkably absent from his piece is any substantive defense of the narrative he once championed, namely, that Russia tried to influence the election. Of course, he’s not alone.
Obama’s Director of National Intelligence James Clapper has not only hit the media circuit but has also revealed he’s lawyered up. Former CIA Director John Brennan slammed the Trump administration’s findings about the 2016 Russia assessment as “unsurprising, very troubling, and very dangerous.” He called the administration’s defense “ludicrous,” comparing it to “a third-rate lawyer who realizes she has nothing to defend her client and is going to put together an absurd brief that’s laughable on its face.” Brennan claimed the original report was “very carefully worded, meticulously done,” and “stands up to scrutiny,” and continued to lean on the claim it showed Russia acted “at President Putin’s direction” to influence the election in favor of Trump. Susan Miller, a retired CIA officer who helped craft the 2017 intel assessment on Russian election interference, is accusing Gabbard and the Trump White House of “lying” about the intel report’s findings.
Speaking to NBC News, Miller claims the intelligence clearly showed Russia aimed to help Trump win in 2016—though she acknowledged there was no evidence of collusion between Trump’s team and Moscow. Her remarks appear to be a defensive pushback against growing scrutiny of the intel community’s role in shaping the now-discredited Trump-Russia narrative. Team Obama’s panic is nothing short of palpable. The exposure of their manufactured narrative is unraveling before their eyes. Each frantic appearance, each attempt to discredit their critics, only serves to confirm what the American public is starting to see: The hoax was real, and its architects are running out of places to hide. The more they scramble, the more obvious it becomes—Obama’s team is scared, and for the first time, genuinely unsure of what awaits them next.
US President Donald Trump has accused Democrats of mishandling $100 million raised through a FireAid concert for victims of California’s January wildfires, calling the initiative “a total disaster” and alleging the money has not reached those affected. Wildfires broke out in early January across Southern California, killing at least 31 people, destroying more than 18,000 structures, leaving tens of thousands displaced, and causing total property losses between $76 billion and $131 billion. The FireAid concert, held January 30, was said to have raised approximately $100 million for wildfire relief. During the broadcast, host Samuel L. Jackson told viewers that “all the money will go directly to people who need help.”
However, in a Truth Social post published on Friday, Trump slammed FireAid as a “total disaster” and “another Democrat inspired scam.” “100 million dollars is missing. Was supposed to go to the Los Angeles fire victims, fires that, with proper management, would never have even happened,” Trump wrote. His comments come after several investigations found that the FireAid funds never reached the wildfire victims. David Howard, who lost two homes in Pacific Palisades, told Fox News, “I have not seen any benefit from the FireAid money, and I am very involved here and neither have my neighbors.” Another victim, Mark Jones, said he expected help after the concert but was never contacted.
FireAid has since stated that it does not distribute funds directly to individuals and has reported that $75 million has been granted so far to 188 nonprofits, with the remaining $25 million scheduled for release in August for long-term recovery, environmental resilience, and rebuilding. While no evidence of fraud has been disclosed, Trump has said that he would be referring the case of the missing funds to the US attorney general, telling reporters that “I think they are going to act very strongly.” Trump has repeatedly blamed California Governor Gavin Newsom and his policies for the fires, accusing him of restricting access to water in the state. Newsom has repeatedly denied the allegations, calling the claims “pure fiction.”
“He has been completely immune from any criticism in the west, with all allegations dismissed and labelled as Kremlin talking points. Yet, in an instant, that illusion has been shattered.”
Since the start of the war in Ukraine, in February 2022, Volodymyr Zelensky has been elevated to the status of a hero King, pure in thought and deed, interested only in saving humble Ukraine from the onrushing hordes of Russian Orcs. Like Aragorn from Lord of the Rings, but short, thin-skinned and with a gravelly voice. He has been completely immune from any criticism in the west, with all allegations dismissed and labelled as Kremlin talking points. Yet, in an instant, that illusion has been shattered. For the first time since February 2022, Zelensky has been revealed as, in practical terms, no different from other Ukrainian Presidents who have preceded him since the country gained independence in August 1991; corrupt and authoritarian. This comes as no surprise to most realists, but will be a devastating blow to the neo-liberal true-believers who have invested their reputations and cash into defeating Russia.
This week, President Zelensky signed a law that strips two important anti-corruption bodies – the National Anti-Courrption Bureau of Ukraine (NABU) and the Specialised Anti-Corruption Prosecutor’s Office (SAPO) of their independence, making them report to the Prosecutor General, who he appointed. Let’s be clear, corruption is and has been a hugely totemic issue in Ukraine, right back to the onset of the Maidan protests in late 2013. During my visits to Ukraine, while posted to Russia, it was absolutely clear that young people believed tackling corruption to be a top priority for the government. This formed part of their desire for Ukraine to move towards European Union membership, for their country to integrate into a community more clearly governed by democracy and the rule of law.
Whether they might consider the European Union to be democratic today, as unelected Commission President Ursula von der Leyen centralises ever more powers, is another question. But that European and anti-corruption aspiration was very real back in 2013. Yet scant progress has been made in tackling corruption since that time. In February 2015, one year after the heigh of the Maidan protests, the British Guardian newspaper published a long piece entitled ‘Welcome to Ukraine, the most corrupt country in Europe’. The Ukrainian Prime Minister, Arseny Yatseniuk, who had been personally selected by Victoria Nuland at the U.S. State Department, was forced to resign in April 2016 in the face of allegations of widespread corruption within his government.
In 2021, the European Court of Auditors produced a report entitled Reducing Grand Corruption in Ukraine: several EU initiatives, but still insufficient results. It defined Grand Corruption as ‘the abuse of high-level power that benefits the few, and causes serious and widespread harm to individuals and society’. In January 2023, an article in the Hill remarked on the need to defeat corruption as Ukraine’s ‘other enemy’. Shortly after that article, a piece, again in the Guardian, discussed the challenges faced by the Head of Ukraine’s National Agency for Corruption Prevention (NACP), which works closely with the now de-clawed NABU and SAPO.
That report in particular talked about specific examples of corruption in President Zelensky’s inner circle. Occasionally, Zelensky has purged his cabinet, to show his commitment to governmental reform, for example, sacking his former Defence Minister, Oleksii Reznikov, in the face of widespread accusations that the Ukrainian Defence Ministry was siphoning off foreign donations on an industrial scale. But the occasional show trial has never taken the whiff away that Zelensky’s administration is every bit as corrupt as those that preceded it. And President Zelensky was voted into office in 2019 on a platform to eradicate corruption in Ukraine. In truth, he has done nothing to tackle it.
“The Washington Post reported: “Ukrainians protest as Zelensky cracks down on corruption watchdogs.” Ditto, among others, The New York Times, Time, CNN, France 24, The Economist, BBC, and even the usually supportive CIA-run Radio Free Europe. With remarkable uniformity, the Western media were condemning their erstwhile favorite “Churchillian figure”..
Previously, any observer who had pointed out the rampant corruption that is endemic in the Kiev regime was automatically denounced by Western governments and media as a peddler of Russian disinformation. Hilariously, though, this week, the Kiev kleptocracy burst open in such a spectacular way that even the American and European apologists for the regime could no longer maintain the worst-kept secret of their charade. The fiasco exploded after the self-appointed President of Ukraine, Vladimir Zelensky, passed a law that stripped two anti-corruption agencies of their independent powers. Citizens took to the streets of Kiev and other cities in furious protest against what they openly lambasted as an autocratic regime trying to prolong its corrupt racketeering. The demonstrations were the largest seen on the streets of Ukraine despite the country being at war with Russia for over three years.
As the Wall Street Journal reported: “The protests exposed long dormant divisions between the government and society.” Zelensky, whose official presidential mandate expired last year, was stunned by the upsurge in public anger. By the end of the week, he was backtracking on the move to close the anti-graft agencies and was claiming, somewhat unconvincingly, that he was drafting a new bill to return the investigative powers. It was damage-limitation mode and largely prompted by the alarm of his Western backers. It is not clear if the U-turn will appease the Ukrainian public, who appear to have reached a pivotal level of disgust with the Kiev regime, not just over its endemic corruption but also over the grinding war with Russia and forced mobilization of reluctant military recruits.
Significantly, the Western governments and media also reacted with extraordinary contempt towards Zelensky and his ruling circle. Western media headlines highlighted the problem of corruption in Ukraine and Zelensky’s brazen attempt to curb the anti-corruption organizations. The Washington Post reported: “Ukrainians protest as Zelensky cracks down on corruption watchdogs.” Ditto, among others, The New York Times, Time, CNN, France 24, The Economist, BBC, and even the usually supportive CIA-run Radio Free Europe. With remarkable uniformity, the Western media were condemning their erstwhile favorite “Churchillian figure”. Even the slavishly supportive U.S. Senator Lindsey Graham rebuked Zelensky. Were they all of a sudden drinking Russian Kool-Aid?
The Wall Street Journal reported: “Ukrainians ramp up protests as Zelensky tries to find a way out.” Likewise, the BBC headlined: “Zelensky backtracks on law over anticorruption bodies after protests.” There are signs that the scandal has gone too far for Zelensky to now try to put the stench back in the bottle. This is what the staunchest backers of the Kiev regime are really worried about. European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, German Chancellor Friedrich Merz, and British Prime Minister Keir Starmer were among the European leaders who vigorously remonstrated with Zelensky over the corruption debacle. Von der Leyen chided Zelensky that anti-corruption was key to the country’s path towards eventually joining the EU, if it ever does, which, like its aspiration to join NATO, is doubtful.
What worries the NATO sponsors of the proxy war against Russia is that the corruption in Kiev will hasten a disorderly collapse of the regime. And with that, their long-term geopolitical game to confront and weaken Russia is over. The news of corruption is hardly new, and the Western governments know that. Pentagon auditors have long noted the vast amount of money that has disappeared unaccountably under Zelensky.
The racketeering has become even more brazen since Zelensky declared martial law and cancelled elections last year, making him a self-appointed president indefinitely. The Ukrainian people have had it with his crony rule, while thousands of men are killed and maimed every week on the front lines. Adding to the public anger and resistance are the goon squads that the regime dispatches to drag men off the streets to be sent to the front lines and certain death. Videos increasingly show Ukrainian communities standing up to snatch squads who are terrorizing them.
“Over time, it became clear that Ukraine’s anti-corruption bodies served not only their official mission but also the political interests of a specific faction – namely, the US Democratic Party.”
Ukrainians have had plenty of reasons to take to the streets: the cancellation of elections, forced mobilization, the refusal to demobilize soldiers who’ve been on the front lines for over three years, the persecution of the canonical Ukrainian Orthodox Church, corruption in the construction of fortifications, the state’s failure to have the bodies of fallen soldiers returned, and – above all – the complete absence of a plan for ending the conflict with Russia. This list could go on. And yet, none of these issues has triggered large-scale protests. What we’ve seen instead are isolated outbursts: in towns and villages, women block draft officers from entering their neighborhoods; churchgoers physically defend their parishes; the wives and mothers of Ukrainian soldiers stage small rallies to draw attention to their plight.
And yet, even in this atmosphere of fear and suppression, Vladimir Zelensky has managed to ignite a political crisis. The hasty passage of Bill No. 12414 – which stripped the National Anti-Corruption Bureau (NABU) and the Specialized Anti-Corruption Prosecutor’s Office (SAPO) of their independence – sparked a wave of demonstrations that haven’t let up for days. It’s the first major popular protest since the start of Russia’s military operation, and it poses a serious challenge to Zelensky’s grip on power. Rallies have broken out in Kiev, Lviv, Odessa, Dnepropetrovsk, Kharkov, Rovno, and Nikolayev. While officials have tried to frame them as spontaneous, local expressions of concern about anti-corruption institutions, the scope and coordination suggest otherwise. The message to Zelensky is simple: the pressure is just beginning.
To understand why the anti-corruption issue struck such a nerve, we need to go back to the beginning. The National Anti-Corruption Bureau of Ukraine (NABU) and the Specialized Anti-Corruption Prosecutor’s Office (SAPO) were established in 2015 with active backing from the United States – just a year after the coup in Kiev. At the time, Ukraine’s Prosecutor General Viktor Shokin openly stated that the idea for NABU came directly from then–Vice President Joe Biden. From the outset, these agencies functioned as tools of external oversight over the post-Maidan Ukrainian government. President Petro Poroshenko, who was still consolidating power and ideology, did not resist Washington’s involvement. NABU’s early targets included oligarchs like Igor Kolomoysky and Rinat Akhmetov, who controlled major media holdings. This suited Poroshenko, whose own business interests, notably, remained untouched.
Over time, it became clear that Ukraine’s anti-corruption bodies served not only their official mission but also the political interests of a specific faction – namely, the US Democratic Party. A prime example is the Paul Manafort case. In 2016, The New York Times, citing NABU sources, published claims that Manafort – then campaign chairman for Donald Trump – had received undisclosed payments from Ukraine’s Party of Regions under President Viktor Yanukovych. These claims prompted a US investigation into possible Ukrainian interference in the American election. In 2019, the Senate ultimately found no evidence – but the episode left a lasting impression. That same year, NABU played a role in deflecting scrutiny from the Burisma scandal – the energy company whose board included Joe Biden’s son, Hunter.
Over time, the link between these anti-corruption institutions and the US Democratic Party became apparent to many Ukrainians. And with Republicans now back in power in Washington, Zelensky appears to have decided it was time to free himself from external control. Zelensky likely assumed that the new American administration wouldn’t go out of its way to defend the Democratic Party’s proxies in Ukraine. Judging by Washington’s muted response, that calculation may have been correct. What he failed to consider, however, was the level of domestic resistance to his growing concentration of power.
Ukraine today is full of pressure points. Discontent is widespread – but scattered and disorganized. Zelensky’s opponents simply lack the means to unseat him. Moreover, Zelensky remains the centerpiece of the West’s anti-Russian strategy – a leader willing to accept any domestic cost in service of that agenda. Even policies that threaten the foundations of Ukrainian statehood are tolerated, so long as the broader project of an “anti-Russia” continues.
“If there are extraterrestrials somewhere out there, they may not know much about Earth, except for the fact that von der Leyen is obsessed with Russia – a phenomenon easily visible from space.”
Apparently, trying to hold Ursula von der Leyen accountable is now a Russian op, reports Der Spiegel, citing a new NATO-linked think tank report. The study treats elected oversight and European lawmakers whose job, ideally, involves more than clapping like trained seals every time an unelected Eurocrat lights public money on fire, like elements of some kind of Russian infiltration plot. “Massive support for this effort was also found by pro-Kremlin media outlets, bloggers, and online influencers, as the Lithuania-based organization Debunk.org specializes in analyzing disinformation and Russian propaganda, which is seen as part of Russia’s hybrid warfare against the EU,” Spiegel wrote, describing Russian-linked media “fueling” a recent von der Leyen non-confidence vote in the EU Parliament. “Among the larger portals were those of the Russian propaganda channel RT…”
According to the advance copy of this report seen by Spiegel, the study reviewed 284 articles from Russian-linked media. Exactly how many of those articles expressed something like only von der Leyen’s ouster could save Europe? 90%? 75%? Maybe half? Nope, just 35%. Roughly the same percentage of voting EU lawmakers who favored ejecting her (32.7%). So by this logic, the Kremlin is about as supportive of Ursula as Brussels is. Awkward. Spiegel said that was the most common so-called Kremlin-backed narrative that the study found. Others included the suggestion that von der Leyen is part of a corrupt elite that robbed citizens to fill Big Pharma’s pockets. Because apparently, saying that hey, maybe EU contracts shouldn’t be inked via disappearing text messages with the CEO of a company, means that you’re doing Putin’s bidding. Real democracy means that you shut your mouth when you see your overlords doing shady stuff.
Another alleged Kremlin line? That Ursula, despite her presidential title, was never elected. As someone who personally refers to her as “Queen Ursula,” I’m actually surprised that one didn’t rank higher. It’s not like she won a popular vote or anything. She was handpicked in shady backrooms and then subjected to a simple confirmation by EU lawmakers. Her sole opponent in this so-called “election” was literally just “not Ursula.” Only the EU, in all its dystopian delusion, would call that an “election”. Then there was the claim that she’s obsessed with confronting Russia. Which is just, uh, objectively true? I mean, come on. If there are extraterrestrials somewhere out there, they may not know much about Earth, except for the fact that von der Leyen is obsessed with Russia – a phenomenon easily visible from space.
Even right before the vote, she accused the lawmakers subjecting her to democratic accountability of being Kremlin stooges just because they wanted her to explain herself. “There is ample proof that many are supported by our enemies and by their puppet masters in Russia or elsewhere. What we hear from you are movements fueled by conspiracies, from anti-vaxxers, to put in apologists and you only have to look at some of the signatories of this motion to understand what I mean,” she pleaded.
Let’s back up here. Why exactly did she face this no-confidence vote? Because no one who’s elected and accountable at the EU has actually been able to provide concrete details of contract terms for the tens of billions of euros in Covid jabs that she strong-armed European governments into paying for. Jabs that are now so useless they’re being dumped in landfills all over Europe, where one-eyed stuffed animals, soggy pizza boxes, and a moldy futon just got their third booster, courtesy of the EU taxpayer. One of those contracts followed a flurry of text exchanges between Ursula and Pfizer CEO, Robert Bourla, which she bragged about to the New York Times right before they pulled a Houdini.
The courts have so far politely asked her to explain herself. And that’s where we’re stuck right now. So frustrated lawmakers figured that they could at least make her publicly squirm with a non-confidence vote in an attempt to get her to cough up at least some of the answers for taxpayers. The result? Ursula’s interpretive song and tap-dance routine in Parliament: “Putin Did It: Paranoia in Three Acts.” She ultimately survived the vote thanks to some budget crumbs thrown at the lefties who were otherwise saying that they would have voted against her. But even they told Politico that it was her “absolute last chance.”
Hungarian Foreign Minister Peter Szijjarto has slammed the European Commission’s proposed seven-year EU budget as a “budget for Ukraine,” in an interview with RIA Novosti published on Friday. The €2 trillion ($2.17 trillion) 2028–2034 spending plan published by European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, which includes around €100 billion in aid for Ukraine and funds for potential EU accession, is “unacceptable,” according to the top Hungarian diplomat. The budget must be approved unanimously by all 27 member states, giving Hungary the power to block it. “We will not give it support or consent,” Szijjarto told RIA Novosti, adding, “this isn’t even the budget of the European Union – it’s a budget for Ukraine.”
Budapest has also warned that the draft shifts funds from cohesion policies and agricultural subsidies, which are vital to Central Europe. The proposal could undermine EU food security by forcing farmers out of business and increasing import reliance, Hungarian officials have said. Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban has also denounced the draft budget, warning it could “destroy the EU” and claiming its only purpose is “to admit Ukraine to the EU.” He has also cited analysts who estimate up to 25% of the budget could end up being spent on Kiev.
Germany has likewise rejected the plan, calling it “unacceptable” amid efforts by EU members to reduce their national deficits. German Chancellor Friedrich Merz has noted that Ukraine is unlikely to even join the bloc before 2034, when the current budget cycle ends. Ukraine has designated EU accession as a national priority. While Brussels has suggested Kiev could join by 2030, all existing members must approve its entry. Hungary, Slovakia, and Poland remain opposed, citing concerns about Ukraine’s readiness and its potential financial burden on the bloc. While the Kremlin initially said Ukraine had the sovereign right to join the EU, Russian officials have since hardened their stance, accusing the bloc of undergoing “rabid militarization” and becoming an offshoot of NATO.
“He argued that Kiev’s full membership would come with “war risks.” “Ukraine is a buffer state, and we do not wish to share its fate. We understand what that means, having once been on the western periphery of the Soviet Union..”
Ukrainian membership in the European Union would threaten Hungary’s security and raise the risk of war in the region, Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban has said. Ukraine, which was granted EU candidate status in 2022, has made joining the bloc a national priority. While Brussels has floated 2030 as a possible accession date, all current member states must approve the move. Hungary, Slovakia, and Poland remain opposed, citing concerns over the country’s preparedness and the financial strain its membership could place on the EU. Warsaw has additionally insisted that Kiev come to terms with war crimes committed by Ukrainians during WWII. In an interview with Kossuth Radio on Friday,
Orban said that Hungary, which shares a border with Ukraine, would be especially vulnerable to any escalation resulting from the EU’s expansion. He argued that Kiev’s full membership would come with “war risks.” “Ukraine is a buffer state, and we do not wish to share its fate. We understand what that means, having once been on the western periphery of the Soviet Union,” he said. “If Ukraine’s membership is accepted, then we will become the battlefield. The war will geographically affect the neighboring region. This is unacceptable. A lot of young Hungarians would also die. This is not a tactical issue, but an existential one,” Orban added. He proposed a strategic partnership with the EU as an alternative to full accession.
Earlier this week, Orban – a frequent critic of EU leadership – rejected the European Commission’s proposed seven-year budget, warning that it could “destroy the European Union.” He claimed the proposal was designed primarily to finance Ukraine’s membership, citing estimates that up to 25% of the budget could be allocated to Kiev. Budapest has blocked multiple EU military aid packages for Kiev and has repeatedly called for an immediate ceasefire with Russia. Hungary has also warned that the financial and security implications of Ukraine’s integration could outweigh any potential benefits, framing the issue as a matter of national survival rather than political preference.
The European Union is secretly leaning on tech platforms to censor routine political speech and even jokes as a legal obligation under its Digital Services Act, according to an interim staff report Friday by the Republican-led House Judiciary Committee, which has also probed Brazil’s censorship, Biden administration jawboning and ideological advertiser boycotts. Committee Chairman Jim Jordan, R-Ohio, said it was prompted by then-EU Commissioner for Internal Market Thierry Breton’s threat against X last summer, later disavowed by the European Commission, that owner Elon Musk’s scheduled livestream with then-presidential candidate Donald Trump might constitute “illegal content” under the DSA. Though Breton resigned “under pressure from EU President Ursula von der Leyen” after Jordan demanded a briefing from Breton on his threats, his successor, Henna Virkkunen, “remains strongly supportive of the DSA’s censorship provisions and continues to enforce them against American companies,” the report says.
“Camouflaged as a regulation to increase online safety,” the DSA lets European regulators “suppress speech globally” by threatening fines up to 6% of global revenue against platforms, based anywhere, that refuse to censor “humor, satire, and core political speech” that offends bureaucrats and align content moderation with EC preferences, it says. The law empowers them to “temporarily shut down platforms within the EU” if “extraordinary circumstances lead to a serious threat to public security or public health in the Union.” Platforms must allow “certified third-party arbitrators to resolve content moderation disputes,” who “do not need to be independent from the European regulators who certify them, incentivizing arbitrators to heed regulators’ censorship demands,” the report says.
Because “platforms bear the cost when they lose at arbitration,” they are also incentivized to censor flagged content “before arbitration begins.” The DSA has an “arbitrary threshold” of 45 million monthly users to qualify as a strictly regulated “very large online platform,” seemingly chosen to “sweep in major American companies while carving out Europe’s top tech companies,” with only Booking.com and “pornography websites” qualifying, the report says. The EC “invented workarounds” to exempt other European companies from VLOP classification, for example Spotify, which gets to split its products between music and podcasts “for the purpose of counting EU users,” the report says. It cites a critic that alleges a “clear discrepancy” between “self-declared” monthly users and “reality.”
“Absolutely nothing in the DSA requires a platform to remove lawful content,” EC spokesperson Thomas Regnier told Politico EU in response to the staff report, claiming freedom of expression is “a fundamental right in the EU” and “at the heart of our legislations.” Regnier said “content removals based on regulatory authorities’ orders to act against illegal content account for less than 0.001 percent” of the content moderation decisions, with platforms “proactively” deciding the rest based on their own terms and conditions. ‘I’m not racist, but …’ is ‘coded language to express anti-Muslim sentiment’
The committee’s subpoenas revealed content from the EC’s May 7 workshop with DSA stakeholders, which unlike its “contemporaneous” Digital Markets Act workshops was closed to the public and operated under the Chatham House Rule, banning participants from describing “exercise scenarios” or naming or quoting participants without permission. It also obtained emails between EC staff and tech companies on purportedly “voluntary” codes of conduct on hate speech and disinformation, showing “regulators repeatedly and deliberately reached out to pressure reluctant platforms to join” and retaliated against resisters, opening a probe of X for refusing to use purported fact-checkers. “The censorship is largely one-sided, almost uniformly targeting political conservatives,” the report’s press release says.
Notorious sex criminal Ghislaine Maxwell answered questions from Justice Department officials about “100 different people” linked to late pedophile Jeffrey Epstein, an attorney for the disgraced socialite claimed Friday following two days of interrogation led by Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche during which she was reportedly granted limited immunity. David Oscar Markus told reporters that his client, currently serving a 20-year sentence after being convicted in Manhattan of federal sex trafficking and conspiracy charges in December 2021, was “asked about every possible thing you could imagine – everything.” “This was the first opportunity she’s ever been given to answer questions about what happened,” Markus added. “The truth will come out about what happened with Mr. Epstein and she’s the person who’s answering those questions.”
Blanche had “every single question” answered during the sitdown, Maxwell’s attorney also said, with the British-born convict declining to plead the Fifth Amendment. “If she lies they could charge her with lying,” Markus noted. “They did charge her with lying,” a reporter challenged him, referring to two perjury counts that Markus noted were dropped by the feds after her conviction. “No one is above the law — and no lead is off-limits,” Blanche posted on X Tuesday in announcing he would speak with Maxwell. Maxwell, 63, is appealing her conviction and sentencing, and legal observers have speculated her willingness to answer questions is tied to a potential clemency grant by President Trump. Her attorney described the commander in chief Friday as “the ultimate dealmaker” and claimed his client had “been treated unfairly for the past five years” and “didn’t get a fair trial.”
“We hope he exercises that power in a right and just way,” Markus added. Trump, 79, told reporters after landing in Glasgow, Scotland that “I don’t know anything about the conversation” between Blanche and Maxwell because “I haven’t really been following it.” “This is no time to be talking about pardons,” the president added after saying hours earlier while leaving the White House that “I haven’t thought” about the idea. Maxwell reportedly initiated the sitdowns with the DOJ and answered questions for roughly nine hours, according to ABC News. The proffer immunity granted to Maxwell allowed her to answer questions without her responses later being used against her in a criminal case, sources told the outlet. Proffer immunity is typically granted to individuals prosecutors want cooperation from in a criminal case.
In 2022, the Department of Justice expressed doubts that Maxwell could be truthful, writing in court filings that she displayed a “significant pattern of dishonest conduct” and failed to take responsibility for her heinous crimes. Court papers the prior year revealed that prosecutors never seriously entertained the prospect of offering the women dubbed “Epstein’s madam” a plea agreement after the financier was found dead in his Manhattan jail cell while awaiting his own federal trial on Aug. 10, 2019. According to Markus, Epstein’s attorneys had been informed that “no potential co-conspirators would be prosecuted” as part of his talks with government lawyers following his July 2019 arrest on sex trafficking charges. “I don’t think President Trump knows that the Justice Department took the position that that promise should not be upheld,” he claimed.
US President Donald Trump is growing impatient with Russia over resolving the Ukraine conflict, Secretary of State Marco Rubio has said. Moscow maintains it is open to diplomacy, but has said any settlement must take into account its security concerns. Speaking to Fox News on Saturday, Rubio claimed that while Trump is focused on peace and has done his best to bring hostilities to a close, his overtures to Russia appear to be yielding little result so far. “He’s done everything possible to bring it to an end. I think he is growing increasingly frustrated,” he said. According to Rubio, despite “good interactions with [Russian President] Vladimir Putin and phone calls, it never leads to anything.”
“He is losing patience, losing his willingness to continue to wait for the Russian side to do something to bring an end to this war that wasn’t his, but he wants to see it come to an end,” Rubio added, accusing Moscow of using “delaying tactics.” His comments come after Trump imposed a 50-day ceasefire deadline on Moscow, warning of “very severe” new sanctions, including 100% “secondary tariffs” on countries buying Russian oil.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov warned that the sanctions threat would be interpreted by Kiev as a “signal to continue the war” rather than to seek peace. He has also described Trump’s style as “rather harsh,” while confirming that “Moscow intends to continue dialogue with Washington” and follow “a line of repairing the significantly broken bilateral relations.”
Earlier this week, Russia and Ukraine held a third round of direct talks in Istanbul, with Moscow proposing short ceasefires for retrieving wounded and fallen soldiers. Additionally, the Kremlin offered to continue prisoner exchanges and return the remains of fallen soldiers. However, the two sides remain far apart on a potential peace settlement, with Moscow insisting that Ukraine should recognize the loss of five of its former regions that joined Russia in public referendums, withdraw its forces from them, commit to neutrality, and limit its own military capabilities. Kiev has dismissed the terms as an “ultimatum.”
“China is encouraging BRICS nations and partners to use the yuan “for trade settlement, thereby creating a self-sustaining cycle” driven by “real trade demand.” This is the system those clowns want to regime-change.”
[..] On the American ability to maintain the US dollar’s reserve currency status, Miao points to two factors: “whether the United States can continue to lead the technological revolution”; and “whether it can preserve the advantages of its financial system, such as the Federal Reserve’s independence and the self-regulating and corrective capabilities of its financial markets.” Yet what’s accelerating now is rather the “fragmentation of the international monetary system”. So we should expect increased use of yuan in payment settlements and as “a store of value”; that’s already happening all across BRICS. Miao points to the key vector: the yuan is now “a low-interest currency, while the US dollar is high-interest.” Trump 2.0 tariffs “on all countries have contributed to the appreciation” of the yuan.
This high-speed train is now leaving the station: “By leveraging China’s manufacturing strengths in sectors such as machinery, electronics, and new energy equipment”, China is encouraging BRICS nations and partners to use the yuan “for trade settlement, thereby creating a self-sustaining cycle” driven by “real trade demand.” This is the system those clowns want to regime-change. Well, they did not learn anything out of the collective West humiliation in the proxy war in Ukraine. A top old school hand of the Deep State, now retired, and familiar with the glory days of the OSS, sums it all up. Relevant excerpts of our conversation: “The US and Europe are already at war with Russia and they are losing it. The US has 20,000 armed troops in Europe to face Russia. NATO forces are largely a figment of the imagination.
Ukraine is nothing but a front in the US battle for control of the Eurasian land mass a la Mackinder. The US cannot supply both Israel and Europe at the same time. It has overstretched itself. As for Europe, it has no army of any consequence and most of its equipment is antiquated. All of it is pure bluff.” He adds, “the Europeans are waking up to the fact that the US has a moat around it so that it can be reached only by ICBMs and submarine missiles but Europe is in itself indefensible as short range conventional missiles can destroy it. Nukes are not required to destroy Europe in one day but a rain of Russian missiles.” Now compare that with Russia’s top negotiator in the Istanbul kabuki, historian Medinsky, when asked whether Moscow fears new sanctions by the EU and the US:
“This is not a question for us, not for the negotiating group. I can tell you this. After the revolution and civil war in 1920, again, another historical reference, we had not only sanctions, we had an absolute diplomatic and economic blockade of Soviet Russia from everyone. Everyone! It did not prevent us from winning World War II (…) Nothing will prevent Russia from winning now, The only question is the price of victory and the time it takes to achieve it.” This is something that will never sink in amongst Think Tankland in D.C. As much as the technological accomplishments – now visible – of the Made in China 2025 plan will never sink in. Enter bluster, hubris, the regime change obsession – and worse. Because if the US ruling class psycho killers finally conclude they cannot maintain their unilateral world hegemony even via war, they will abandon their cherished Think Tankland “reports” for good and even resort, in despair, to a Samson option.
Dr. Patrick Soon-Shiong Exposes the Harsh Truth About Chemotherapy: A Legacy of Profit Over Progress
For decades, chemotherapy has been the cornerstone of cancer treatment, hailed as a life-saving intervention. Yet beneath the surface lies a troubling reality—one rooted in… pic.twitter.com/ceK2pBOasG
Bill Gates, through his backing of Flagship Pioneering, has been given the green light to secretly spray synthetic RNA on America’s food products, with their new venture, Terrana Biosciences, designed to infiltrate crops and rewrite their biological functions, raising chilling… pic.twitter.com/gSr2GpsssM
— “Sudden And Unexpected” (@toobaffled) July 26, 2025
vibrate
Nikola Tesla was trying to tell us:
“If you wish to understand the universe, think of energy, frequency, and vibration. pic.twitter.com/6nu4deLzqg
What do we make of these Yellowstone videos?
https://twitter.com/777katemt/status/1945531246571835631
Colorado. The animals exhibit the same behavior as those in Yellowstone, so the advice is to follow the animals. Follow the animals. pic.twitter.com/OJObZ934DU
BREAKING: Johnson & Johnson Lead Scientist Confesses J&J COVID-19 Vaccine Was 'Not Safe and Effective,' Reveals “Lack of Research” From Rushing to Release Vaccine: “People Wanted It, We Gave It to Them”
US President Donald Trump has finally issued his much-anticipated “important statement” on Russia. For days, speculation swirled, particularly among pro-Ukrainian circles, that the long-awaited U-turn was coming. Trump, they hoped, would finally get tough – perhaps inspired by the increasingly hawkish rhetoric of Senator Lindsey Graham (who, incidentally, is designated a terrorist and extremist in Russia). Even skeptics began to believe that Trump was gearing up to show Moscow “Kuzka’s mother,” a famous idiomatic expression of aggression used by Nikita Khrushchev during the Cold War. But in classic Trump fashion, expectations were dashed. The supposedly “extremely tough ultimatum” turned out to be something else entirely. Trump threatened tariff sanctions against Russia and its trading partners – but scrapped Graham’s extreme proposal of 500% duties.
Instead, he floated the idea of 100% tariffs that would only take effect after 50 days, if he chooses to enforce them, and if Russia fails to strike a deal. Trump also announced new arms deliveries to Ukraine. But these aren’t gifts – they’ll be sold, not given, and passed through European intermediaries. Supposedly, Ukraine will receive 17 Patriot systems. Yet we soon learned the first of these deliveries won’t arrive for at least two months – again, 50 days. And even now, basic questions remain unanswered. What exactly did Trump mean by “17 Patriots”? Seventeen batteries? Launchers? Missiles? If he meant 17 batteries, that’s simply not plausible. The US itself only operates around 30 active batteries. Germany and Israel combined don’t have anywhere near that many available systems. Such a figure would significantly boost Ukraine’s air defenses – but it’s almost certainly exaggerated.
Seventeen missiles? That would be laughable – but not unthinkable. Washington recently sent just 10 Patriot missiles in a “military aid” package so modest it wouldn’t suffice for a single battle. Seventeen launchers? That seems more realistic. A typical battery consists of six to eight launchers, so this would amount to two or three batteries – more than what Germany and Norway have promised to purchase for Ukraine. Yet even the Pentagon can’t confirm the details. And one suspects Trump himself may be fuzzy on the specifics. His role, after all, is to make the pronouncements; others are left to clean up the mess. The so-called “14 July ultimatum” has already become a textbook example of Trump’s diplomatic approach. In fact, a new phrase has emerged in American political slang: “Trump Always Chickens Out” or TACO.
The acronym speaks for itself. It refers to the president’s habit in trade and security talks of making grandiose threats, only to backtrack or delay implementation.This appears to be another case in point. The negotiations are at an impasse. Trump still craves a Nobel Peace Prize. And he’s reluctant to become too entangled in the Ukrainian conflict. So he’s reached for the oldest trick in his playbook: the non-ultimatum ultimatum. This allows him to sound tough while giving Moscow space – and perhaps even time – to act. It also offers cover with his MAGA base, many of whom are frustrated by distractions like Iran or the Epstein scandal and aren’t eager to see America dragged further into Ukraine. The genius of it, from Trump’s perspective, is that it promises everything and nothing at once.
No clear strategy. No detailed demands. Just an open-ended threat backed by ambiguous timelines. It’s pressure without posture. Leverage without leadership. What’s striking is that the White House didn’t even ask Russia to de-escalate. There were no appeals to halt the almost daily strikes on Ukraine or curb battlefield activity. In effect, Russia has been handed a 50-day window – intentionally or not – to do as it sees fit. A quiet concession to the Kremlin? Perhaps. A careless side effect? Possibly. Either way, Moscow gains. America, too, comes out ahead – at least financially. Under the new arrangement, Western Europe picks up the tab for Ukraine’s defense, while US companies get paid to offload ageing equipment.
Trump’s famed “art of the deal” may amount to little more than selling junk with a smile. But if so, he’s done it masterfully. Still, as a political maneuver, the outcome is more uncertain. Trump may believe he’s found the sweet spot between hawks and doves, between NATO allies and nationalist critics. But trying to be all things to all people rarely ends well. Appeasement disguised as firmness satisfies no one for long. And while Trump plays for time, Russia holds the initiative. That’s the real story here.
One year after he undertook to end the Ukraine war in one day, and just past six months into his Presidency, Donald Trump has kicked the peace can down the road by fifty days. The ultimatum to President Putin to make peace or face sanctions has practically no chance to changing Russian aims in Ukraine. Backed into a corner, Trump may finally be forced to address Russia’s underlying concerns. In televised remarks on 14 July during his meeting with NATO Secretary General, Mark Rutte, President Trump said, ‘if we don’t have a [peace] deal in fifty days, we’re going to be doing very severe tariffs, tariffs at about a hundred percent, you’d call them secondary tariffs.’ As he was in 2017, Trump also now finds himself hemmed in by beltway politics and unable to deliver a reset in U.S.-Russia relations that he instinctively seems to want.
The Sanctioning Russia Act of 2025 would put in place so-called secondary sanctions on Russia by imposing stiff tariffs of up to 500% against countries such as China and India that inter alia import Russian energy. U.S. lawmakers want to strong arm Trump into forcing President Putin to back down in Ukraine via the back door. But there is a yawn-inducing sense of déjà vu here. The 2017 Countering American Adversaries Through Sanctions Act, signed into law on 2 August 2017, had no impact on Russian policy towards Ukraine, but led to a huge collapse in U.S.-Russia relations. This was illustrated most clearly by the decision to cut U.S. diplomatic staffing in Russia by 755 personnel, meaning among other things, that today it is practically impossible for a Russian citizen to apply for a U.S. visa inside of Russia itself; the U.S. Embassy simply doesn’t have enough staff.
To avoid a repeat of 2017, Trump now appears to be buying himself fifty days in DC to reach peace in Ukraine before he is forced by the Senate to impose secondary sanctions on Russia. The 14 July announcement was therefore about domestic U.S. politics more than about foreign policy. But what Trump has in fact done is to set a clear ultimatum on Russia to reach a peace deal with Ukraine, with no clear commitment to meeting Russia’s specific demands, the key demand being Ukraine’s neutrality and revocation of its NATO aspiration. As an ultimatum, this won’t work, because the additional military support that the U.S. is now offering to Ukraine, paid for by European NATO allies, won’t be sufficient to tip the military balance in Ukraine’s favour.
Additional Patriot missiles and interceptors may well reduce the overall impact of Russian drone and missile strikes on Ukrainian cities. But the military facts on the ground are that Russia continues to gain ground. At several points along the front line, around Pokrovsk, and Kupiansk, towards Konstiantynivka and Siversk, there have been significant recent Russian gains, by the slow attritional standards of this war. As reported by the Guardian in the UK, even some Ukrainian politicians and bloggers have come out to say that fifty days will simply allow Russia to occupy further Ukrainian land. The most interesting point about that report is the revelation that a British mainstream media outlet is reporting oppositionist views from Ukraine, rather than the narrative from Zelensky’s propaganda machine. So, fifty days favours Russia more than Ukraine, militarily.
“In just the first half of this year, Ukraine recorded over 107,000 criminal cases for desertion – 20% more than in all of 2024, and nearly half of the total since the war began.”
In our previous pieces, we examined Donald Trump’s half-hearted attempts to cast himself as a deus ex machina, descending to end the conflict between Russia and Ukraine. Peace did not follow. Trump, boxed in by political inertia, continued Biden’s policy of disengagement while trying to dump the Ukrainian problem on Western Europe – just as we predicted back in January. Its leaders weren’t prepared. While Macron and Starmer formed coalitions of the willing and delivered lofty speeches, Germany quietly picked up the tab. Berlin, under its new chancellor, has shown more flexibility, but the broader Western European strategy remains unchanged: keep Washington bankrolling Ukraine at all costs. That plan is now crumbling. Trump is slipping away, and without a dramatic turn of events, no new major aid packages should be expected from the US.
This is not hard to understand. Other global crises are emerging, and the depleted American arsenal cannot serve everyone at once. In both Ukraine and across Western Europe, people are adjusting to what once seemed unthinkable: a slow but steady US withdrawal. These European leaders must now decide whether to carry the burden alone or accept a settlement on Moscow’s terms – conceding Ukraine from their sphere of influence. But neither Kiev nor its immediate sponsors is ready for serious negotiations. Why would they be? Ukraine believes it can hold without American backing. Russian oil revenues have dipped, the ruble is under pressure, and Moscow has taken hits in the Middle East and Caucasus. Perhaps, they reason, Putin will come begging in another year or two. Let’s fight, then.
Amid this political theater, the war itself has faded into the background. For many observers, the front lines seem frozen in time – village names flicker in and out of headlines, lines shift, but the broader picture holds. It’s a difficult situation for military analysts. They are forced to generate drama from attritional warfare. One day, headlines declare the Lugansk Peoples Republic fully liberated (a few villages remain contested). The next, we hear of Russian forces entering the Dnepropetrovsk region (true in a narrow sense – they crossed a small corner in a broader encirclement maneuver around Pokrovsk). None of this, however, alters the core dynamic. Both sides are largely following the same strategies as a year ago. For Russia, the aim remains clear: exhaust Ukrainian forces until they can no longer defend. The goal isn’t to seize a specific line, but to break the enemy’s army.
Russia has pursued this with steady, grinding pressure. Last winter, Moscow shifted from large mechanized thrusts to small, flexible assault groups. Instead of smashing through defenses, these units infiltrate after prolonged bombardment from artillery, drones, and air power. The results aren’t flashy, but the goal is cumulative. The summer campaign began in May; we’ll see its full effect by late summer or even winter. This mirrors the pattern of 2024, when Russian forces made their biggest gains in October and November, capturing several cities in Donetsk with minimal resistance – Novogrodovka, Ugledar, Selidovo, Kurakhovo. The key question now is scale: can Russia turn these tactical wins into a full collapse of Ukrainian lines?
The answer depends in part on the weakened state of Ukraine’s forces. By spring, Kiev had fewer armored vehicles, fewer Western shipments, and fewer elite units. The best troops were spent in the failed Kursk push and are now stuck holding Sumy. But the gravest issue is manpower. The supply of volunteers has dried up. Ukraine’s army now relies on forced conscription – the so-called “busified.” And the results are telling. In just the first half of this year, Ukraine recorded over 107,000 criminal cases for desertion – 20% more than in all of 2024, and nearly half of the total since the war began. That’s only the official count; the real number is undoubtedly higher. Desertion is now the Ukrainian army’s leading cause of losses. Draft officers are hated, and civilians fear being dragged into vans and thrown to the front. Power outages have lessened, and life behind the lines is almost normal. But the threat of forced mobilization looms. In a telling detail, real soldiers now mark their cars with “not TCR” to avoid attacks from angry civilians.
“..the abundance of cases–desperate mothers, women committing suicide, daughters protesting–began to suggest that, deep down, the Ukrainian soul may still belong to a peaceful people who never wanted any of this..”
For a regime that presents itself to Western nations as “the shield of democracies,” it is ironic, if not tragic, that its own people do not feel aligned with such a “noble” mission. Indeed, there are signs that Ukrainians neither consider it noble nor desire such a mission, despite the enthusiasm of Western journalists and politicians. When we watch news about the war in Ukraine and encounter journalists who, forgetting their role as informants, immediately shift to “counterarguments“–which is not their function–to challenge any more independent commentator, we are far from understanding the levels of suffering, despair, and immorality to which the Ukrainian people have been subjected over these hellish three years. During this time, the US, EU, NATO, and G7 decided to assign them an impossible mission: “to defend Western democracies against Putin’s autocracy.”
One might expect Ukrainians to feel flattered, even praised, for being chosen for such a lofty mission, especially when the assigners were none other than the self-proclaimed champions of transparency, civility, democracy, and respect for human rights. Over the three years of war, there was no shortage of street interviews in which carefully selected passersby declared their readiness for anything; nor was there a shortage of so-called journalists who praised the courage, fervor, and antagonism toward Russia, and especially toward Putin. Everything was shown to make it seem as though everyone was happy and committed. Europeans and Americans funded the war, other people’s children fought it, and the children of those aspiring to join the Western garden were sent to the front under the auspices of von der Leyen’s victory, the infantile Trumpist Mark Rutte, Baerbock, now Kallas, and formerly Borrell.
Until the news of forced conscription could no longer be contained, even outlets like The New York Times or The Guardian could not suppress it. After all, some were not so enchanted with the mission of defending others’ freedom at the cost of their own tyranny. Images began to emerge of fathers, sons, brothers, young men, and adults resisting–heroically, madly, desperately–being sent to their deaths. The images could no longer lie: men running over recruitment officers–at the risk of arrest and worse–others screaming while clinging to trees, traffic signs, or anything they could hold onto, desperate workers running through the streets shouting… In the end, one of two things must be true: either the promise of eternal freedom is not so thrilling, or the promise of eternal tyranny in case of military defeat is not so credible.
The truth is that the abundance of cases–desperate mothers, women committing suicide, daughters protesting–began to suggest that, deep down, the Ukrainian soul may still belong to a peaceful people who never wanted any of this. For Western media, nothing had changed, except that they stopped contradicting those who openly declared that Ukrainian men were no longer masters of their own lives. Not a single word, report, or statement. After all, what is happening to the Ukrainian people is not so different from what is happening elsewhere in the world.
If in Gaza and the West Bank a people is martyred, eliminated, in the name of defending Israel at the hands of a Zionist minority; in Ukraine, a people is martyred, forced to fight those they considered their brothers, with whom they lived and prospered (Soviet Ukraine was once the 10th-largest economy in the world), tyrannized by a Nazi-fascist minority, used and nurtured to defend “the democratic West.” It all comes down to pure optics, to those who consider themselves superior and, by that superiority, believe they can instrumentalize the worst evils to achieve a supreme good that only a select few enjoy. Just as Zionists consider themselves superior to all other peoples, so too do Western globalists, imperialists, Atlanticists, and liberal-fascists consider themselves superior to the peoples of the Global South, Russians included.
The one who did not fail to identify this profound contradiction was the Russian Federation and its highest military ranks. And then the unexpected happened. After all that was said about the Russian Federation, after the charges brought against Vladimir Putin for genocide and crimes against humanity, after accusations of “imperialist” ambitions, the Ukrainian people began to look at the Russian Federation not as an invader, not as a destroyer, but as an ally–if not a savior, as in the case of Russian-speaking Ukrainians. The decision to bomb “recruitment” centers–read “detention” centers–thus became a form of soft power in itself. With each destroyed center, Ukrainian voices rose in jubilation, as if turning despair into courage to say to their ally, “Yes, it is in you that I must place my hope.” Social media was flooded with messages of gratitude to Russian forces, of sympathy for this unexpected “solidarity.” It was as if, with each destroyed center, Ukrainians gained days of life, extending the hope that the war would truly end, and with it would come peace and the condemnation of the real culprits.
The big issue emerging from the U.S.’ 22 June strike on Iran – second only to ‘wither Iran?’ – is whether in Trump’s calculus he can ‘rhetorically impose’ the having “obliterated” Iran’s nuclear programme claim long enough to both restrain Israel from hitting Iran again, yet still allow Trump to pursue his show-stopper headline, ‘WE WON: I’m in charge now and everybody is going to do what I tell them’. These were the key conflicting issues that were to be hammered out with Netanyahu during his White House visit this week. Netanyahu’s interests essentially are for ‘more hot war’, and thus differ from the Trump ceasefire general stratagem.
Implicit in his ‘In-Boom-Out & Ceasefire’ Iran approach is that Trump may imagine he has created the space to resume his primary objective – that of instituting a broader Israeli-centric order across the Middle East, devolving upon trade deals, economic ties, investment and connectivity, to create a business-led West Asia, centred on Tel Aviv (with Trump as its de facto ‘President’). And, via this ‘Business Super Highway’, to strike further beyond – with the Gulf States penetrating into BRICS’ south Asian heartland to disrupt BRICS connectivity and corridors. The sine qua non for any jumpstart to a putative ‘Abraham Accords 2.0 of course – as Trump clearly understands – is an end to the Gaza War; the withdrawal of Israeli forces from Gaza; and the Strip’s re-construction (none of which seems to be in realistic reach).
What emerges rather, is that Trump continues to be seized by the delusional view that his Israeli-centred vision could all be accomplished merely by ending the genocide in Gaza, but with the world watching aghast as Israel continues on a hegemonic military rampage across the region. The most obvious flaw to the Trump premise is that a chastened Iran somehow has been achieved by Israeli and American strikes. It is the opposite. Iran has arisen more unified, resolute and defiant. Far from being relegated to watching passively from the sidelines, Iran now – in the wake of recent events – resumes its place as a leading regional power. One that is readying a possibly game-changing military riposte to any further strikes by either Israel or the U.S.
What is ignored in all these western claims of Israeli success, is that Israel chose to bet all on a surprise ‘shock and awe’ strike. One that would overturn the Islamic Republic at a stroke. It didn’t work: the strategic objective failed, and it produced the opposite outcome. But the more fundamental point is that the techniques used by Israel – that required months, if not years of preparation – cannot just be repeated again now that their stratagems have been fully exposed. This White House misreading of the Iran reality signals that the Trump Team allowed themselves to be deceived by Israeli hubris in insisting that Iran was a house-of-cards, primed to collapse completely into paralysis upon the first taste of the Israeli sneak decapitation ‘muscle’ on 13 June.
This was a fundamental error – in a pattern of similar errors: That China would capitulate to the threat of imposed tariffs; that Russia could be coerced into a ceasefire against its interests; and that Iran would be ready to sign an unconditional surrender document in the face of Trump’s threats post-22 June. What these U.S. blunders speak to – apart from a consistent divorce from geo-political realities – is western weakness masked behind hubris and bluster. The U.S. Establishment clings to its fading primacy; but in doing it so ineffectually, it has instead accelerated the formation of a potent geo-strategic alliance intent on defying the U.S.
The consequence has been the wake up call to other States occasioned by the western slide towards stratagems of outright lies and deceit: The ‘Spider Web’ operation against the Russian strategic bomber fleet on the eve of the Istanbul talks and the U.S.-Israeli sneak attack on Iran two days before the expected next round of U.S.-Iranian nuclear talks, have increased the will-to-resist by China, Russian and Iran particularly, but more generally it is felt across the Global South. The entire complexion of this war to retain America’s dollar primacy has been irreversibly altered.
I -used to- like John Helmer. But he’s lost me now. If you want to claim that Trump is too demented to tie his shoe laces, you need more than a few quotes from a niece who hates his guts.
About President Donald Trump, certifiable maniac isn’t an expletive – it’s a clinical diagnosis. In the neurological and psychiatric evidence that has been accumulating about Trump over many years, there is the medical history of Alzheimer’s Disease which runs in his family: his father was first diagnosed at age 86 and died at 93; his older sister died of it, aged 86; and at least one cousin died of the same, aged 84. Since the President has just turned 79, there is reason to anticipate similar onset of symptoms and cause of death for him. Trump thinks this himself, according to Mary Trump, a clinical psychologist and the President’s niece. She has published a case history of the President in 2020 which Trump’s lawyers failed to suppress in court.
Last week, she published a new symptom of what she calls the acceleration in Trump’s cognitive decline: he cannot tie his own shoe laces. This claim has already been pursued by online investigators who have been reporting Trump’s lace-ups which appear from the photographs to be tied permanently and a mysterious right shoe several sizes too large. The evidence of Trump’s incapacity to understand the Russian end-of-war terms, as he expressed himself in the July 14 press session with NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte, was reported here. [..] When Trump and Rutte accuse President Vladimir Putin of failing to negotiate seriously, the record reveals the opposite. Negotiating on the Ukraine war with Trump is proving to be impossible because Trump isn’t serious. That’s not his political decision; it’s his neuro-psychiatric handicap.
“You really gave him [Putin] a chance to be serious to get to the table to start negotiations,” Rutte said to Trump on Monday. “Steve Witkoff, Marco Rubio, we all try to help you. But you’ve now come to a point where you say, well, hey, you know, you have to — you have to get serious.” Trump agreed, replying: “We actually thought we had probably four times [agreed] the deal.” Five times over, Rutte repeated that the Russians aren’t serious. Trump repeated himself: “We’re going to go for a period of time. Maybe he’ll start negotiating. I think we felt, I felt, I don’t know about you Mark, but I felt that we had a deal about four times and here we are still talking about making a deal.”
Trump’s recall was that the terms of his deal had been accepted by Putin; he didn’t recall what Putin’s terms were. He is revealing he cannot comprehend the difference between the US and Russian negotiating positions; he hasn’t so much rejected the “new idea, new concept” from the Kremlin as not to have understood it. This isn’t Trump’s negotiating tactic – it’s cognitive incapacity camouflaged by the threat of force to compel Putin’s capitulation. The first test of Trump’s rationality is the Mary Trump test – an Oval Office press conference in which Trump demonstrates how he ties his shoe laces. The second test requires Russian counter force. This is the Oreshnik decision-making point for Putin, when there is no longer any point to negotiating because the US side aims at escalating its arms supplies to the Ukraine battlefield and encouraging the Germans to join in long-range missile attacks on the Russian hinterland, including Moscow and St. Petersburg.
In the Russian decision-making now under way, there is an attempt to find the rational calculations in what Trump is meaning; that is to say, what Trump’s advisors, constituents, and officials are calculating when he himself is incapacitated. The first of these, Russian sources believe, is that the Trump escalation is a pitch to prevent Trump’s domestic voter base, the MAGA enthusiasts in the battleground states which won the presidency for Trump last November, from deserting him.
The second calculation is that Russia is militarily and economically vulnerable to a combination of escalation of attacks inside Russia and sanctions on the oil trade outside. This is the strategy of the “bigger bear”, announced on CNN this week by former Trump and Biden Administration warfighter, Brett McGurk: “the Russians approach diplomacy as a bear approaches a dance. The bear knows it will determine when and how the dance ends, unless the other dance partner proves itself to be a bigger bear. Sometimes, it helps to be the bigger bear. In the context of Ukraine, like Syria, while the United States is a far more powerful country than Russia, Putin believes that he has the upper hand in such localized conflicts due to Moscow’s determination and consistency contrasted with Washington’s perceived lack of focus, stamina and shifting politics through election cycles. Correcting that perception is a first principle for effective diplomacy with Moscow, and the approach outlined by Trump yesterday offers the chance to do exactly that.”
The third rational calculation, Russian sources believe — as do some US analysts — is that by supplying the Ukraine battlefield through Germany, the UK and Norway with a combination of Patriot anti-aircraft defence batteries and long-range offence missile systems like the Typhon, the Trump Administration will escape having to face a US taxpayer revolt in Congress over the multi-billion dollar cost of direct US arms supplies to Kiev regime. According to this scheme too, Trump would have an alibi if the Oreshnik decision is taken by Putin, and if the US weapons are defeated in the collapse of the Zelensky regime. Trump would blame the Germans, repeating his line: “don’t forget, I’ve just really been involved in this for not very long and it wasn’t initial focus. Again, this is a Biden war. This is a Democrat war, not a Republican or Trump war. This is a war that would have never happened.”
“..the 80th anniversary of the Potsdam Conference, which began on July 17, 1945. The conference was the last wartime meeting between leaders of the Soviet Union, the United States, and the United Kingdom. It laid the groundwork for postwar Europe..”
Ukraine bears similarities to the Nazi state at the end of World War II and should undergo “demilitarization,” “denazification,” and “democratization” in a manner similar to postwar Germany, former Russian President Dmitry Medvedev has told TASS. He spoke to the Russian news agency on Thursday, the 80th anniversary of the Potsdam Conference, which began on July 17, 1945. The conference was the last wartime meeting between leaders of the Soviet Union, the United States, and the United Kingdom. It laid the groundwork for postwar Europe, including plans for Germany’s demilitarization and denazification. Medvedev, who currently serves as deputy chairman of Russia’s Security Council, explained that the concept of the “three D’s” had originally been formulated for Nazi Germany, which he described as an aggressor state that had disrupted the international order, according to TASS.
“The 1945 Reich and modern Ukraine are, of course, very different – in scale, global role, and even (formally) in state ideology. But there is also obvious similarity.” Medvedev said Ukraine shares its “crisis of identity” with Hitler’s Germany and engages in the “open use of Nazi symbols,” while showing signs of dictatorship and economic degradation. “All this makes the idea of applying the three D’s relevant,” he stated. He added that demilitarization for Ukraine should not be seen as punishment, but rather as “a chance to stop being a pawn in someone else’s bloody geopolitical games.”
He described denazification or “debanderization” as a long-term effort involving public consciousness and historical memory. Democratization, he said, involved not only elections but also the restoration of legal institutions, free media, political competition, and the separation of powers. Many historic ultranationalist leaders, including Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists (OUN) Stepan Bandera, a notorious Nazi collaborator, are widely revered by Ukrainians today. Russia has repeatedly condemned Kiev’s elevation of these collaborators to national hero status and has demanded the “denazification” of the country as part of a negotiated peace agreement. Russia has accused Western governments of deliberately ignoring continued neo-Nazi activity in Ukrainian ranks.
The Ukrainian military is trying to provoke a major ecological disaster close to the front line and blame it on Russia, the Defense Ministry in Moscow warned on Thursday. The accusation came from Maj. Gen. Aleksey Rtishchev, the commander of Russia’s Nuclear, Biological and Chemical Protection Troops, who briefed the public about alleged Ukrainian violations of an international treaty prohibiting the use of chemical weapons. Rtishchev disclosed a document obtained by the Russian military, in which the deputy director of Ukrainian state-owned company Ukrkhimtransammiak informed a regional official appointed by Kiev that in late June Ukrainian troops had illegally accessed a site operated by the firm.
The Ukrkhimtransammiak executive stressed his concern that the location could be damaged due to the military’s involvement, potentially causing the release of up to 566 tons of highly toxic liquified ammonia. The site, an above-ground element of a Soviet-built underground ammonia pipeline operated by Ukrkhimtransammiak, is located roughly 2.5 km north of the village of Novotroitskoye, in the Kiev-controlled portion of Russia’s Donetsk People’s Republic. Rtishchev claimed the Ukrainian military had placed communication equipment at the location as part of “barbaric tactics used by the Kiev regime” which involves “placing toxic chemicals in the areas where Russian troops operate and their subsequent detonation.”
“The intention is to accuse our nation of intentionally causing a technological disaster and damage its reputation,” the general stated. “The use of hazardous objects for military purposes violates the international humanitarian law.” Rtishchev also reiterated Russian accusations against the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW). Moscow says the international watchdog ignores Russian reports about Ukrainian violations of the Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC) while taking Kiev’s allegations against Russia at face value.
US President Donald Trump has promised to release more information after criticism of his administration’s handling of the sex trafficking case involving the late financier Jeffrey Epstein reached a tipping point. After months of pledges to disclose the full case files, the Department of Justice said in a memo last week that no further documents would be made public – triggering a backlash even among some of Trump’s closest supporters. “Based on the ridiculous amount of publicity given to Jeffrey Epstein, I have asked Attorney General Pam Bondi to produce any and all pertinent grand jury testimony, subject to court approval,” Trump wrote on Truth Social on Thursday.
President Trump—we are ready to move the court tomorrow to unseal the grand jury transcripts. pic.twitter.com/hOXzdTcYYB
— Attorney General Pamela Bondi (@AGPamBondi) July 18, 2025
Bondi confirmed that her office is “ready to move the court tomorrow to unseal the grand jury transcripts,” though it remains unclear which documents would be released or when. Epstein was arrested in 2019 and charged with trafficking minors for sex. He allegedly hanged himself in his New York jail cell before he could stand trial. His longtime associate, Ghislaine Maxwell, was later convicted of conspiring to sexually abuse underage girls and is now serving a 20-year sentence. Although Epstein’s death was officially ruled a suicide, it has long fueled public skepticism. The DOJ’s controversial review concluded that no “client list” of Epstein’s sex-trafficking ring ever existed and found no evidence of blackmail. There were no grounds to investigate uncharged third parties, the memo stated.
These findings appeared to contradict Bondi’s earlier comments that the client list was “sitting on [her] desk,” and that the FBI had turned over a “truckload” of materials that would “make you sick.” Bondi appeared to walk back those remarks, clarifying on Tuesday that she was referring to case files on her desk in general. She also dismissed concerns about a one-minute gap in the 11-hour surveillance video recorded near Epstein’s jail cell. Earlier this week, Trump claimed only “stupid people” believe the sex offender’s alleged “client list” wasn’t yet another Democrat hoax. Trump ordered the release of additional documents after the Wall Street Journal accused him of sending a lewd birthday greeting to Epstein in 2003. The president has threatened to sue Rupert Murdoch and his “third-rate newspaper” for defamation.
“The Wall Street Journal, and Rupert Murdoch, personally, were warned directly by President Donald J. Trump that the supposed letter… was a FAKE and, if they print it, they will be sued,..
President Donald Trump has threatened legal action against the Wall Street Journal, its parent company News Corp., and media mogul Rupert Murdoch after the newspaper claimed that he authored a lewd letter to Jeffrey Epstein for his 50th birthday. The alleged letter was reportedly part of a leather-bound album compiled by Ghislaine Maxwell in 2003 and included a crude drawing of a nude woman, according to the Journal’s exclusive report on Thursday. “A pair of small arcs denotes the woman’s breasts, and the future president’s signature is a squiggly Donald below her waist, mimicking pubic hair,” the report described, without explaining how the outlet obtained what it claimed was a previously unreleased Department of Justice file.
The paper acknowledged that Trump strongly denied the allegation, but went ahead with publication. “I never wrote a picture in my life. I don’t draw pictures of women… It’s not my language. It’s not my words,” the Journal quoted Trump as saying. Several hours after the story broke, Trump accused Murdoch and WSJ Editor Emma Tucker of deliberately spreading “defamatory lies.” “The Wall Street Journal, and Rupert Murdoch, personally, were warned directly by President Donald J. Trump that the supposed letter… was a FAKE and, if they print it, they will be sued,” Trump wrote in a post on his Truth Social platform. He described the “once great” paper as a “disgusting and filthy rag” that was desperately trying to “stay relevant.” Trump vowed to sue the WSJ, News Corp., and Murdoch “shortly,” citing his history of successful lawsuits against major media outlets.
Epstein was arrested in 2019 and charged with trafficking minors for sex. He allegedly hanged himself in his New York jail cell before standing trial. His longtime associate, Ghislaine Maxwell, was later convicted of conspiring to sexually abuse underage girls and is now serving a 20-year sentence. Although Epstein’s death was officially ruled a suicide, it has long been the subject of public skepticism. Earlier this week, Trump responded to growing criticism over his administration’s handling of the Epstein case, claiming that only “stupid people” still demand access to the sex offender’s alleged “client list.”
President Donald Trump on Wednesday announced that he had convinced Coca-Cola to use authentic cane sugar in their American products, marking a subtle cultural victory over Mexico. “I have been speaking to Coca-Cola about using REAL Cane Sugar in Coke in the United States, and they have agreed to do so. I’d like to thank all of those in authority at Coca-Cola. This will be a very good move by them — You’ll see. It’s just better!” Trump announced on Truth Social.
“Mexican coke” uses natural cane sugar as a sweetener while American coke has relied on high-fructose corn syrup since the 1980s. The cane sugar coke often appears in stores contained within glass bottles. Trump did not speak to any planned changes in the American containers. The announcement came somewhat out of left field as Trump has spent much of the week fending off criticisms over his handling of the Epstein case and there was little coverage of any talks with the iconic soda company.
"I have been speaking to @CocaCola about using REAL Cane Sugar in Coke in the United States, and they have agreed to do so. I’d like to thank all of those in authority at Coca-Cola. This will be a very good move by them — You’ll see. It’s just better!" –President Donald J. Trump pic.twitter.com/9L27oxlYUj
Maurene Comey, the daughter of former FBI Director James Comey, was fired Wednesday from the powerful Manhattan US Attorney’s Office — where she prosecuted Jeffrey Epstein, his accomplice Ghislaine Maxwell and, most recently, Sean “Diddy” Combs, sources told The Post. The reason for Comey’s firing, which law enforcement and Department of Justice sources confirmed, was not immediately clear. She was informed that she was being axed under Article II of the Constitution, which describes the powers of the president, the sources added. President Trump has a long history of conflicts with the elder Comey and fired him as FBI director in 2017 during Trump’s first term.
Maurene Comey, who served as an assistant US attorney in the Southern District of New York since 2015, worked on the prosecutions of disgraced financier pedophile Epstein and Maxwell, who was found guilty of multiple sex crimes at trial and sentenced to 20 years in prison. Comey most recently worked on the high-profile sex-trafficking case against Combs. The nearly month-long trial ended with the jury acquitting the disgraced hip-hop mogul of the most serious charges against him — racketeering conspiracy and sex trafficking — that could have landed him life in prison. He was only found guilty of two counts of transportation to engage in prostitution.
[..] “This firing is an effort by the DOJ to distract from its failures on Epstein, the J6 pipe bomb, Butler assassination plot and ongoing whistleblower retaliation,” former FBI agent-turned-whistleblower Steve Friend said. “Removing Maureen Comey six months into the administration is like a fire department hiring an arsonist and expecting applause when they fire him after he’s already burned down a city block. Too little, too late. “They are desperate for a win and distraction. The Comey-Brennan case is a distraction. They’ll never get charged. It’s a way for congressmen to have hearings,” Friend added, referring to the FBI investigation of former CIA Director John Brennan and James Comey for potential criminal conduct related to the 2016 Trump-Russia collusion probe.
BREAKING: Pam Bondi has fired Maurene Comey, daughter of James Comey, from her job as a prosecutor in the Manhattan U.S. attorney's office, per Politico. She worked on the prosecutions of Ghislaine Maxwell, Jeffrey Epstein, and Sean "Diddy" Combs. pic.twitter.com/vimxtCvN9z
The Epstein firestorm was revived last week after the Justice Department and FBI concluded in a memo that the convicted pedophile, 66, killed himself in his Manhattan jail cell in August 2019 — and did not keep a list of wealthy and powerful “clients” to whom he trafficked underage teens. That conclusion sparked a storm of backlash from top MAGA personalities, who suspected that the Trump administration wasn’t being fully upfront about Epstein, despite the 47th president’s promise on the campaign trail to release the files on the convicted pedophile. Comey’s ouster also follows renewed attacks from Trump’s base, including conservative firebrand Laura Loomer, who publicly urged Attorney General Pam Bondi to fire Comey and her husband, SDNY Assistant US Attorney Lucas Issacharoff, back in May.
“Today, the DOJ fired Maurene Comey from the United States Attorney’s office for the Southern District of New York,” Loomer posted on X after the news broke. “This comes 2 months after my pressure campaign on Pam Bondi to fire Comey’s daughter and Comey’s son in law from the DOJ.” Loomer has claimed that Issacharoff, who has worked in the SDNY’s Civil Division since 2019, has “a long history of being a Trump hater.” “No word yet on whether or not he was also fired today, but he should be. +1 for Blondi today!” Loomer cheered. Trump has since spent days dismissing Epstein’s case as a “big hoax” concocted by the Democrats for political gain — and blasting suspicious GOP members for being “duped” by their colleagues on the other side of the political aisle. The prez has also lashed out, pressing the country and news reporters to stop focusing on the notorious predator.
“They haven’t learned their lesson, and probably never will, even after being conned by the Lunatic Left for 8 long years,” Trump railed on Truth Social Wednesday. “I have had more success in 6 months than perhaps any President in our Country’s history, and all these people want to talk about, with strong prodding by the Fake News and the success starved Dems, is the Jeffrey Epstein Hoax.” The Trump administration is investigating James Comey for potential criminal conduct during the FBI’s Trump-Russia collusion probe in 2016. The Secret Service also interviewed the ex-bureau director in May for a cryptic “86 47” Instagram post that led to accusations from Trump that Comey was calling for another assassination attempt against him.
The irony is thick enough to choke on. The New York Times, that bastion of so-called journalistic integrity, churned out yet another hit piece on President Donald Trump, painting him as some vengeful tyrant hell-bent on crushing his political foes. According to the paper, Trump supposedly views his opponents as downright evil, promising a campaign of retribution that sends shivers down the spines of the elite media class. Last week, he denounced a reporter as a “very evil person” for asking a question he did not like. This week, he declared that Democrats are “an evil group of people.”“Evil” is a word getting a lot of airtime in the second Trump term. It is not enough anymore to dislike a journalistic inquiry or disagree with an opposing philosophy.
Anyone viewed as critical of the president or insufficiently deferential is wicked. The Trump administration’s efforts to achieve its policy goals are not just an exercise in governance but a holy mission against forces of darkness. The characterization seeds the ground to justify all sorts of actions that would normally be considered extreme or out of bounds. If Mr. Trump’s adversaries are not just rivals but villains, then he can rationalize going further than any president has in modern times. This isn’t journalism; it’s selective outrage at its finest. The Times acts like Trump’s tough talk is some unprecedented assault on democracy, conveniently forgetting or willfully ignoring the years of venomous rhetoric that the left spewed against Trump and conservatives everywhere.
It has the gall to portray Trump as the villain while pretending that its side hasn’t been fanning the flames of division for nearly a decade. If the Times is so concerned about demonizing political enemies, maybe it should look in the mirror, or better yet, revisit one of the most egregious examples from its own camp: from Barack Obama’s spying on Trump to frame him for colluding with Russia to Joe Biden’s lawfare campaign that literally tried to put Trump in prison. Actions may speak louder than words, but Joe Biden spoke rather loudly during his infamous speech at Independence Hall back in 2022, where he didn’t even hide the fact that he saw his political allies as evil. Remember that spectacle? There was Biden, standing in front of the birthplace of American liberty, bathed in dramatic red lighting that appropriately gave off a fascistic vibe. He wasn’t there to unite the nation; he was there to declare war on half of it.
“Donald Trump and the MAGA Republicans represent an extremism that threatens the very foundations of our republic,” he thundered, as if conservatives were some invading horde rather than fellow Americans exercising their right to disagree. He didn’t stop there. He literally called Trump and his supporters a “clear and present danger” to the country. Biden’s words weren’t just heated; they were incendiary. It was pure demagoguery, designed to otherize and vilify millions of Americans who simply wanted secure borders, economic strength, and a government that puts America first. And where was The New York Times during all this? Cheering it on, of course. The paper didn’t call out Biden for his divisive rant; it amplified it, framing it as a noble defense of democracy against the supposed fascist threat of Trump.
“Biden Warns That American Values Are Under Assault by Trump-Led Extremism,” read the headline of one article reacting to the speech. Another article detailing four takeaways from the speech lacked any outrage at all at Biden’s rhetoric. Fast-forward to today, and leftists are clutching their pearls over Trump’s promises to hold corrupt officials accountable, like the ones who weaponized the DOJ against him. Trump’s talk of retribution isn’t about personal vendettas; it’s about restoring justice after years of witch hunts, from the Mueller probe to the sham impeachments. Yet the Times ignores how the left’s rhetoric has real-world consequences. We’ve seen assassination attempts on Trump, violent protests egged on by Democrat leaders, and a media ecosystem that normalizes calling conservatives Nazis or threats to humanity.
And the Times is crying over Trump for saying mean things about his political adversaries? This double standard is the real threat to our republic. The Times’ piece reeks of desperation, a last gasp from a dying media empire that’s lost all credibility. Leftists whine about sources going silent, as if that’s proof of some authoritarian chill, but maybe those experts are just tired of being props in the left’s endless anti-Trump crusade. If the paper truly cared about toning down the rhetoric, it should start by acknowledging its own role in escalating it. Biden’s speech wasn’t a one-off; it was the blueprint for the left’s strategy — demonize, divide, and conquer.
“..an estimated 215 million doses, worth close to €4 billion, subsequently being discarded..”
“Many of the key decisions are no longer taken by elected governments or national parliaments, but by EU bodies often guided by a technocratic logic and by interests dominant within the EU system.”
The perception of the European Union is changing in some sections of public opinion: from a project of cooperation between sovereign states, the EU is increasingly seen as a centralized bureaucratic machine, which is what it really represents, and this view is fueled by the growing control exercised over information spaces, political dynamics, and the very interpretation of democratic principles. If the failure of the euro as a common currency was already telling, even more so were the isolationist policies of sanctions against the Russian Federation, followed by those against China and, in general, against any political entity that was not in the good graces of the UK-US axis. In this context, the role of the President of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, is worrying.
While proclaiming herself a champion of democratic values, she is contributing to the construction of a system in which truth, dissent, and public debate are suppressed or marginalized. There is no doubt that no one has ever pursued policies as totally anti-democratic, liberticidal, and homicidal as hers (as in the cases of Ukraine and Palestine).These concerns have been fueled by discussions on a motion of no confidence against von der Leyen. In June 2025, Romanian MEP George Piperea proposed a vote to question her leadership. The necessary signatures were collected from various MEPs to put the issue to a vote in the plenary. The main reason given is the alleged violation of transparency rules during the management of contracts for COVID-19 vaccines in 2020-2021.
Following those agreements, the EU purchased huge quantities of doses, many of which proved to be surplus to requirements, with an estimated 215 million doses, worth close to €4 billion, subsequently being discarded. When citizens and the media asked for clarity on those contracts, the European Commission refused to make the communications public, a decision that the Court of Justice of the European Union later ruled contrary to the rules. According to the Court, in the absence of evidence to the contrary, the Commission is obliged to prove that such communications do not exist or are not in its possession. Despite this, the Commission has never provided a clear explanation as to why the messages between von der Leyen and Pfizer’s CEO were not disclosed.
It has not been clarified whether the messages were deleted voluntarily or whether they were lost, for example, due to a change of device by the president. Finally, on July 10, during a plenary session in Strasbourg, the European Parliament rejected the motion of no confidence against Ursula von der Leyen. To pass, it would have required a qualified majority of two-thirds, supported by an absolute majority of MEPs. The result was 360 votes against, 175 in favor, and 18 abstentions. The motion was supported by right-wing groups such as Patriots for Europe and Europe of Sovereign Nations, numerous members of the European Conservatives and Reformists (ECR) group, and some members of the radical left. Von der Leyen was not present at the time of the vote.
Despite the criticism, the main centrist groups – the European People’s Party (EPP), the Socialists and Democrats (S&D), Renew Europe and the Greens – rejected the motion, ensuring the political survival of the president. However, if the no-confidence motion had passed, the entire European Commission would have fallen, opening a complicated process for the appointment of 27 new commissioners. This decision is perhaps more strategic than tactical: keeping a president who has already lost confidence and is therefore politically manageable and has limited room for maneuver is more convenient than having a new president who may be worse than the previous one and has the full confidence of the European Parliament.
Elections in the European Union, as in many other democratic contexts, should express the will of the people. They should, I emphasize. In practice, however, they are increasingly seen as an institutional ritual with no real impact on fundamental political choices and, above all, they are not an expression of the real will of the people, as they lack representation. Many of the key decisions are no longer taken by elected governments or national parliaments, but by EU bodies often guided by a technocratic logic and by interests dominant within the EU system. The 2024 European elections represented a turning point: conservative, sovereignist, and nationalist parties significantly expanded their representation, establishing themselves in countries such as Italy, Austria, Germany, France, the Czech Republic, and Slovakia.
These parties have strongly opposed the EU’s migration policies, environmental measures deemed excessive, and its confrontational foreign policy towards Russia. However, instead of encouraging constructive debate and giving space to critical voices – as the European Parliament claims to want to do – these forces have been systematically branded as “anti-democratic” and publicly discredited. A central role in this strategy has been played by Ursula von der Leyen, in office since 2019, who has repeatedly portrayed right-wing parties as a “threat to European unity,” without ever providing concrete evidence to support this claim, but often referring to alleged Russian interference or generic “threats to sovereignty.”
Shocking: Pediatricians Get $200–$600 Per Child for Vaccines, Some Earn $1M+ Yearly
In a bombshell discussion, Senator Ron Johnson, Polly Tommey, and Dr. Brian Hooker exposed how pediatricians are financially incentivized to push vaccines—at the expense of parental choice and… pic.twitter.com/LMIm6icjJK
I honestly believe this is one of the biggest mysteries there is, Orcas are the most efficient predators on earth, yet they have never attacked us in the wild. They know something we don’t. pic.twitter.com/qItHMtqj9Y
— Nature is Amazing ☘️ (@AMAZlNGNATURE) July 16, 2025
Jeffrey Epstein victim attorney Sigrid McCawley drops a bombshell accusing Pam Bondi’s DOJ of withholding a treasure trove of evidence including names of co-conspirators, financial records, and multiple computers.
Benz
https://twitter.com/jayplemons/status/1943353450101878963
Scott
If you trust Trump, you have to also trust him to lie to you when it's in your best interest.@ScottAdamsSays “If you know the CIA exists and haven’t demanded its end, then you've accepted that your government can lie to you.”
“This isn’t just about how Epstein died; it’s about whether the deep state inside the Department of Justice can finally be exposed and held to account.”
FBI Deputy Director Dan Bongino is on the verge of walking away from the bureau over what insiders are calling a full-blown crisis of confidence. According to a source close to Bongino who spoke with The Daily Wire, he’s issued an ultimatum: either Attorney General Pam Bondi goes or he does. The standoff stems from Bongino’s growing frustration with Bondi’s handling of the Jeffrey Epstein files, which he sees as a betrayal of the public’s right to the truth. The source says Bongino is “furious” and feels that he can’t in good conscience continue working alongside Bondi. After taking the job in February, he had hoped to help restore trust in the FBI, but Bondi’s alleged stonewalling has made that mission impossible. “He’s done if she stays,” the source said bluntly. “He’s not backing down.”
As PJ Media previously reported, Bongino’s frustration with Bondi has reached a breaking point over her handling of the Epstein investigation. Once promising a bombshell about Epstein’s so-called “client list,” Bondi has since backpedaled, claiming she was misunderstood and that the “file” on her desk was just routine paperwork. The DOJ, under her leadership, now insists there’s no evidence of a client list, no sign of blackmail, and no indication Epstein was murdered. For those demanding answers, this reversal isn’t just disappointing; it’s infuriating. But the story has gotten even bigger. According to independent journalist Nick Sortor, FBI Director Kash Patel is also considering resigning if Bondi stays on and Bongino leaves.
Axios previously reported that both Bongino and FBI Director Kash Patel are “furious” with Bondi over the blowback her handling of the Epstein files has caused them. Bongino reportedly did not come into work on Friday. This isn’t some petty bureaucratic spat; it’s a crisis of trust. Bongino’s absence from the FBI after a heated exchange with Bondi signals how serious things have become. His once-busy social media has gone silent. One source close to him summed it up: “He ain’t coming back.” Officially, the administration claims he’s still on the job, but the writing is on the wall.
The DOJ’s memo concluding there was no client list was a slap in the face to anyone who’s paid attention. No client list? No blackmail? No reason to investigate further? That’s not a conclusion; it’s a cover-up. Epstein’s entire operation was built on compromising the elite. To suggest that he acted alone defies logic and insults the intelligence of the American people. What this country needs right now isn’t more spin or bureaucratic buck-passing — we need the truth. Real answers. Real accountability. Not some carefully worded memo designed to dodge the most damning questions. Bongino and Patel understand exactly what’s at stake. This isn’t just about how Epstein died; it’s about whether the deep state inside the Department of Justice can finally be exposed and held to account.
It looks very bad on Trump if he loses Patel and Bongino, just like it looked good when he brought them in. Bondi has a much more chequered past. But he won’t want to let her go either.
Speculation is mounting that FBI Deputy Director Dan Bongino is furious over the Department of Justice’s explosive memo concerning Jeffrey Epstein, with anonymous sources claiming he has issued a stark ultimatum to the White House: dismiss Attorney General Pam Bondi or he will resign from his position. Axios, citing four sources familiar with the matter, reported Friday morning that FBI Deputy Director Dan Bongino was absent from work following a heated confrontation with Attorney General Pam Bondi over the handling of the Jeffrey Epstein files. The Washington insider outlet noted that Bongino’s absence sparked speculation about whether he had resigned, though a White House source quickly clarified that he remains in his role at the FBI.
This week, federal law enforcement released a memo asserting that an “exhaustive review” of evidence from Jeffrey Epstein’s death at the Metropolitan Correctional Center in New York City conclusively ruled out murder. “Following a comprehensive investigation, FBI investigators determined that Jeffrey Epstein died by suicide in his cell on August 10, 2019,” the memo stated. The agencies also firmly denied the existence of a “client list” linked to Epstein, directly contradicting earlier statements by Attorney General Pam Bondi. Bondi had previously claimed on Fox News that such a list was “sitting on my desk” for review, fueling speculation about Epstein’s alleged blackmail of global elites.
By Friday afternoon, reports indicated that tensions between FBI Deputy Director Dan Bongino and Bondi were escalating, with the FBI official reportedly contemplating resignation if Bondi remains in her role. “Source close to Dan Bongino tells me it’s either him or Pam Bondi, and that he won’t stay at FBI if she stays at DOJ,” The Daily Wire’s White House correspondent Mary Margaret Olohan posted on X. Independent journalist Julie Kelly corroborated Olohan’s reporting, writing on X: “Sources confirm to me the blow up between Dan Bongino and Pam Bondi is very real. This has been brewing for four months and came to a head at the White House on Wednesday.”
“He has not been in the office since. Most of the frustration at [the] FBI relates to her handling of Epstein disclosures and disputes between [the] FBI and Bondi about how to proceed,” Kelly continued. “Bongino appears ready to resign imminently if Bondi remains in office,” she added.Fox News sought comment from the White House on whether President Donald Trump was satisfied with Bondi, to which Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt responded that the president is “proud” of his attorney general. “The President is proud of the attorney general’s efforts to execute his Make America Safe Again agenda, restore the integrity of the DOJ, and bring justice to the victims of crime,” Leavitt said.
“The continued fixation on sowing division in President Trump’s cabinet is baseless and unfounded in reality.” On Tuesday, Trump dismissed questions about Epstein during a press exchange. “Are you still talking about Jeffrey Epstein? This guy’s been talked about for years,” Trump said, while taking questions during a Cabinet meeting. “You’re asking – we have Texas, we have this, we have all of the things, and are people still talking about this guy? This creep? That is unbelievable. I mean, I can’t believe you’re asking a question on Epstein at a time like this, where we’re having some of the greatest success and also tragedy with what happened in Texas. It just seems like a desecration.”
Every time the topic of Jeffrey Epstein’s infamous client list surfaces, the American public is treated to a familiar dance: officials dodge, the media obfuscate, and the powerful breathe a sigh of relief. After years of waiting for the Epstein client list to see the light of day, the Trump administration says the list doesn’t exist. On Thursday, Alan Dershowitz came out and said that’s not true and that he saw it when he had to defend himself from false accusations of being an Epstein client. If the list does exist, what happened to it? Rep. Tim Burchett (R-Tenn.) has a theory. In a recent interview with NewsNation, Burchett told host Leland Vittert that he believes that the Biden administration intentionally destroyed the Epstein client files to protect powerful individuals.
“I think the files existed at one time,” Burchett said. “I think they were destroyed in the previous administration… and if they’d ever had anything on Trump, it would have been out day one under the Biden administration.” When Vittert agreed, Burchett continued, suggesting that the real reason the files remain hidden is because of who they might implicate. “I think there’s some very prominent people. There’s Hollywood people, but I think there’s world leaders too. And would it have caused economic disruption around the globe? Maybe. But I don’t really care.” Vittert asked if the hesitation to release names might be due to fear of unjustly tarnishing people who may have interacted with Epstein but did nothing wrong. Burchett rejected the idea and instead pointed to Ghislaine Maxwell’s conviction:
“What’s Ms. Maxwell doing in jail? What did she do? Where is that… you know, who did she provide whatever she did? Why is she in jail? That’s gotta be a question that should be asked at some point.” He was blunt about the finality of the situation: “Dead men tell no tales. He’s dead.” Vittert pressed him to clarify: Was he saying that the Trump administration destroyed the files? “No, I think they destroyed everything,” Burchett replied, referring to the Biden administration. When Vittert asked former special prosecutor Pam Bondi wouldn’t say that directly, Burchett speculated, “Because she doesn’t have any proof of it. I’m just telling you what I think.” He went on to criticize Bondi’s handling of the situation. “I think she’s got over her skis pretty much, saying all this stuff — ‘The files are on my desk. I’m gonna release it.’ — and then she releases stuff that I knew.”
Burchett said he based his belief on his own instincts and experience in Washington. “I’ve been around this town enough. I just don’t think they exist. I think they did at one time.” He tied it back to the Hunter Biden laptop scandal: “You got an administration that lied and said Hunter Biden’s laptop didn’t exist… You had 30 of the top so-called intelligence people in the country say that, and they didn’t get chastised by anybody but y’all and a couple of others.” Burchett doesn’t trust the official story and doesn’t believe that the truth about Epstein will ever come out.
No one in America — not even the most deranged, spike-faced, pink-haired transtifas — believes the latest Epstein story as played out by Mr. Trump and AG Bondi in this week’s cabinet parlay: nuthin to see, just a bunch of pointless child porn, fuggeddabowdit. . . But stay! Much is moving, flowing unseen. The world is yugely in flux, large events in human affairs are in motion, many things are breaking, rotating, dissolving and re-forming, while others wind into giant hairballs. . . so many players acting as though they live in one great hall of mirrors, and treachery abides at every turn. Nobody seems to be actually managing any of it, though there is plenty of pretense, jockeying, staging. The public’s anger and anxiety rise in tandem.
One thing about Epstein is likely certain: it was an intel operation. And one thing is probable: it was a joint operation between the CIA, Israel’s Mossad, and the UK’s MI6. The object: to get as many political poohbahs on-the-hook for disgraceful behavior of the lowest kind and blackmail-able. Under the thumb. Theories and suppositions abound. If Mr. Trump was in on the Epstein sex shenanigans, as Elon blurted this week, why did the Democratic Party not go after him for it in three election campaigns (and all the many months in between)? Well, not to put too fine a point on it, Elon appears to be losing his shit. His CEO at “X” bailed on him this week. His A-I app, Grok, started spouting Hitler gags, and his empire of world-beating genius is tottering on a broken business model.
You can write all that Elon stuff off as a sideshow for now — wildly grotesque as it may be. But what is actually going on in the three rings of this circus? Flux in the Middle East is one. Whatever else the “Twelve Day War” was about, it’s the end of Israel threatening to bomb Iran’s nuke program out of existence. We’ve done that favor for them, or pretended to, as some are saying, kabukied it out. So, Israel, shut up about that for now . . . is the policy. One story is that the actual Epstein material, whatever still exists, that is, which might reside in multiple locations, is so destructive to the architecture of global leadership that it must be squelched for the sake of majorly realigning forces, tensions, and polities across the Middle East, namely, the Abraham Accords. Getting all that lined up is more important to Mr. Trump for the moment than defenestrating the various perverts-in-office around Western Civ. It just is. . . so. . . gotta lump it.
Let’s surmise that the president has learned a lot about the intel hall of mirrors over the past decade, but especially lately, in his second term, from DNI Tulsi Gabbard, who has access to every document in the bottomless pit of the intel archives. The President knows he is not exactly in control of his intel “community.” And he aims to do something about it. You could make the case that the so-called “community” is just a giant criminal syndicate engaged in the most nefarious activities ongoing in this world of sin: human trafficking, drugs, money-laundering, weapons, every off-the-book turpitude you could imagine. Nor is John Ratcliffe exactly in control of his own agency, though he can utilize some of its services. . . but more about that later.
Forget about Bondi’s gaffe. She is just following orders, as are Messrs. Patel and Bongino, standing down, good soldiers, and only on the Epstein business. You can’t even rule out the possibility that Jeffrey Epstein is not dead. Was it suicide? Or an escape? Shall we say, a rendition to parts unknown? I would not assert that, just proffer it as a possibility, since the events of that night in the Manhattan federal lockup were so astoundingly sketchy — the sleepy guards, the broken CC cameras, the missing minute in the one camera recording that worked, the suicide-proofed jail cell. . . . But, then, the autopsy reports. . . performed upon. . . whom, exactly. . . ?
There is parallel matter of Ukraine to consider. Mr. Trump is yugely frustrated by his inability to put a quick end to it, to make that golden deal with Russia. The Ukraine War is the globalists desperate final project, its last stand. By saying which, let’s assume that the Globalists are “a thing,” a combo of the UK’s remaining potent assets (MI6 and the City of London financial octopus), the megalomaniacal EU bureaucratic leadership (von der Leyen & Co.), and the WEF-Davos gang. Ukraine was their instrument to break up Russia. The project has failed. Yet the war goes on. Mr. Trump says he was not even informed about Ukraine’s recent long-range drone attack deep into Russia, to take out its strategic bombers. Wasn’t informed? WTF???
Was it because the CIA has gone rogue over in Ukraine? Running the war their way — and not even Mr. Ratcliffe has a handle on all that? Consequently, Mr. Trump is yugely embarrassed in his many skull sessions with Mr. Putin. And thus, Mr. Putin seeks to bring about an end to this enormous pain-in-the-ass situation by simply winning the war. Which he is doing. His terms have been simple, plain, and straightforward from the get-go: a disarmed, neutralized Ukraine that must surrender the Donbas provinces, end-of-story, and don’t even mention Crimea because there’s nuthin to talk about there. And, of course, regime change in Kiev. . . eighty-six on Nazis, thank you.
Everyone can see the play by President Trump. Essentially, the “coalition of the willing” (U.K, Germany, France) are not willing to go to war against Russia without the United States in front of them. Giving the coalition the weapons puts the consequences of their use on the heads of NATO allies. Despite the majority of Washington DC, specifically the Senate thirsting, pleading and demanding an expanded NATO war, President Trump does not want to go to war against Russia. However, simultaneously Trump has to try and steer the war machine controlled by DC, the Senate, USIC and NATO. The INERTIA for expanded war is evident. President Trump is now trying to split the baby regarding Russia, by sending patriot missiles and weapons to NATO as opposed to sending them directly to Ukraine.
In February Marco Rubio earnestly and honestly said, “The Ukraine conflict is a proxy war for the United States against Russia.” President Trump has concurred with that statement and through his prior comments he attempted to extricate the U.S. from this dynamic. The shipment of missiles to NATO instead of Ukraine is simply a way of trying to stop direct support, yet Trump is forced by the inertia toward war to maintain a footing of expanded conflict with Russia. To be very clear, Russian President Vladimir Putin is clear-eyed on this situation with NATO, and he has been all along. Putin has said repeatedly that NATO was/is in direct conflict against Russia despite Ukraine not being a NATO member. This conflict with NATO well precedes Putin’s decision to conduct a ‘special military operation’ within Ukraine.
Now, we see through Trump’s approach the dropping of pretenses. Putin was correct. With NATO directly providing the war weapons to Ukraine there is no pretense, no doubt. NATO countries are funding an offensive war against Russia using a non NATO proxy state, Ukraine. As I have said, this western triggering has always been the inertia for war, and that war is now likely to expand as a result of NATO and even, unfortunately, President Trump’s approach. The only thing that works in his/our favor is the cowardice of the U.K, France and Germany to fight Russia without the USA. President Trump may try and distance himself and by extension the USA from this consequence of expanded conflict. But the consequence exists regardless of the obfuscation. We are parsing terms.
The US is going to fund expansion of the conflict directly with arms to Ukraine or indirectly by sending arms to NATO to give to Ukraine. The destination and intent of the weapons is the same regardless of the procedural process. I came to Russia this time to understand the nature of how western inertia to war can exist, despite the people of the west demanding the opposite. I wanted to see for myself exactly what Russia was preparing for, and exactly how the people of Russia were reacting to that preparation. Russia is well prepared, both physically and psychologically to go to war against any adversary. Russian President Vladimir Putin’s approval rating is between 70 to 80%, and despite what you might have heard in western propaganda media, the economy inside Russia is doing very well.
In addition to the two-year service requirement (18-20 years old), all men aged 25 to 35 have been refresher trained in preparation. The psyche of the Russian military is ready to get rid of the Nazis. Also, the sentiment of Europeans dislike of Ukrainian Nazi’s is easy to spot, albeit not well known outside the region. Despite decades of Brussels and USA provocation and political manipulation (perhaps because of it), there’s not a lot of pro-NATO support for the west here. I am not a big fan of Russia; nor do I agree with the way the government constructs societal life within it. There are a lot of negatives to daily life in Russia. However, I do have a complete understanding of the govt positions and reasons for them.
Western media have pretended that Ukraine was not a U.S/NATO proxy war against Russia. Now, those pretenses are dropped. Conversely, Vladimir Putin never pretended. Putin always accepted that Ukraine was, and long has been, a NATO proxy state for conflict against Russia; which is exactly the reason he ‘invaded‘ Ukraine in the first place. President Trump may be trying to split the baby amid the retention of pretense, but it’s a pretense Russian President Vladimir Putin never held, he could not afford to. Thus, the inertia of war and people asking “how did this happen?” If I am accurate in his exit strategy, President Trump hopes to extricate himself from the Russia-Ukraine problem by putting the conflict directly into the lap of NATO, more specifically into the lap of British Prime Minister Keir Starmer, French President Emmanuel Macron and German Chancellor Friedrich Merz; the so called “coalition of the willing.”
President Trump is giving the weapons to NATO, again Starmer, Macron and Merz, for transfer to their buddy in Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskyy. President Trump then stands back and draws distance from the consequence of what they do with them. However, this is also a massive provocation because NATO is now essentially operating on behalf of a non-NATO state, Ukraine, against another non-NATO power, Russia. President Trump cannot remove the fact that the USA is the lead in all things NATO. As soon as France, Germany and the U.K start bombing Russia albeit from the geography of Ukraine, the conflict will expand.
NATO -thanks to President Trump- would then be baiting Vladimir Putin to attack France, Germany or the UK in retaliation, which would trigger Article 5; subsequently the USA is drawn into the conflict by agreement, and voilà a full expanded war between NATO and Russia commences. But why? If neither Russia or Ukraine are NATO members, why is NATO involved at all? Good question. Perhaps President Trump will answer that question on Monday. President Trump told NBC News, “I think I’ll have a major statement to make on Russia on Monday.” Live your very best life, but prepare for war. Like a fat kid playing dodgeball, I’m out of here tomorrow (hopefully), and will hold an AMA on the topic of all things Russia next week.
“Has it ever occurred to Trump and his government that they are seen as nothing but the two-bit punk puppets of Israel led around by Netanyahu with an Israeli ring in their nose?”
Donald Trump attracted massive political support–the most we have seen any candidate attract in many years–because he said his aim was to restore America on its traditional values, the values that had made the United States a successful country. Instead of foreign wars, Trump promised restoration at home. But everywhere we look Trump is enmeshed in foreign, not domestic, affairs. Netanyahu is leading Trump into war with Iran. Trump sends Zelensky, not himself, to meet with Putin despite the fact that Zelensky cannot deliver the mutual security agreement that Putin wants from the West. And now Trump is interfering in Brazilian domestic politics threatening a 50 percent tariff on imports from Brazil unless the current government drops charges against former president Bolsonaro.
I have no knowledge whether the charges against Bolsonaro are legitimate, any more than I know if the former charges against the current President Lula da Silva that resulted in his imprisonment were legitimate. The question is: what business is it of Trump’s? Does it ever occur to Trump and his government that it is incongruous to protect Bolsonaro but not the Palestinians, whose oppressor Trump has hosted in the White House three times in six months and plied with money, weapons, and diplomatic cover for a genocide? One would think that it is Putin, Xi, and Ayatollah Ali Khamenei that Trump would have at the white house, and Netanyahu the one under US sanctions and threats for Israel’s genocide of Palestine and war-mongering in the Middle East.
Has it ever occurred to Trump and his government that they are seen as nothing but the two-bit punk puppets of Israel led around by Netanyahu with an Israeli ring in their nose? How are we supposed to be proud Americans when we are ruled by Zionist Israel? Will ever again Americans have a president who represents America?
In a display of his trademark wit and candor, Sen. John Kennedy delivered a scathing rebuke of former FBI Director James Comey and former CIA Director John Brennan, labeling both men as fundamentally unethical and unfit for public trust. Appearing on Fox News with Harris Faulkner, Kennedy wasted no time in making his feelings known, blending his signature biting humor with pointed criticism in a way only he can. Kennedy began by drawing on personal knowledge of both men. “Well, I know Mr. Comey, and I know Mr. Brennan. Neither one of them, in my opinion, should attempt more than six of the Ten Commandments. They’re, they’re, they’re not very nice people. They’re not ethical people.” He added, “I know people who have worked with them closely, and if you talk to people who’ve worked with them closely, those people will tell you that, um, they’re about as, as popular as male pattern baldness.”
The senator’s critique wasn’t just about personality. He questioned their competence, remarking, “What’s scary about both of them is that they think that they’re competent. They’re not.” Kennedy’s signature Southern charm came through as he continued, “I would hire the guy who salts the fries at McDonald’s before I would hire either one of them, but they think they’re competent. They think they’re smarter and more virtuous than the rest of us, and they have… they acted on their political beliefs.”Kennedy then turned his attention to Brennan’s role in the Hunter Biden laptop controversy, saying, “Brennan, for example, Mr. Brennan was one of the ones who told the American people that the Hunter Biden laptop wasn’t real… that it was Russian disinformation. They’re, they’re just not honest people and if they broke the law, they should be held accountable.”
He didn’t let up on their arrogance. “They’re also just… they’re like so many in Washington, Harris. They’re so arrogant. Um, Lyndon Johnson used to have an expression. He’d say, ‘That guy’s so arrogant. He could, he could strut sitting down.’ Well, that’s the way Mr. Comey and Mr. Brennan are.” For Kennedy, the damage Comey and Brennan did went beyond personal failings: “Those two have done more to destroy the American people’s confidence in the FBI and national intelligence than any two people I can think of.”
Kennedy then really drove his point home: “No, they really haven’t. And, and I wouldn’t say that about all of the people in President Biden’s administration, but, but these two are—they’re just especially bad, and they were so political. They’re just political hacks who tried to pretend that they had the American people’s best interests at heart, and they, and they, and they, uh, and they don’t.” He closed with a final jab, “And I love McDonald’s french fries by the way, and the people who salt ’em.”
Salt the fries
I’d hire the guy who salts the fries at McDonald’s before I’d hire either James Comey or John Brennan.
They’re not ethical people—and if they broke the law, they should be held accountable. pic.twitter.com/MV83bq3EJQ
President Donald Trump on Thursday sent Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney a letter notifying him that he would impose a 35% tariff on Canadian goods next month if the country doesn’t step up in battling fentanyl. Trump has been sending tariff rate cards out to countries this week that have not reached a trade deal with the United States. The letters have largely been going out to seven countries at a time. The president argued that Canada has not done enough to help with the illegal flow of fentanyl that has been smuggled into the U.S. through the northern border. The U.S. is facing an opioid epidemic, and fentanyl is considered one of the most dangerous opioids in the country.
“If Canada works with me to stop the flow of Fentanyl, we will, perhaps, consider an adjustment to this letter,” Trump wrote to Carney. “These Tariffs may be modified, upward or downward, depending on our relationship with your Country.” The U.S. previously imposed a 25% tariff on Canada, but delayed the tariffs while trying to reach a trade agreement. However, the new tariffs will go into effect on Aug. 1. It is not clear if products covered under the 2020 trade agreement between the U.S., Canada and Mexico will be excluded from the tariffs or not.
Republican Wisconsin Sen. Ron Johnson approved a subpoena to be sent to the Justice Department (DOJ) and FBI regarding more information on the first assassination attempt against President Donald Trump in Butler, Pennsylvania last year. The subpoenas will be sent near the anniversary of the shooting, which occurred on July 13. Johnson was part of the Senate’s Homeland Security investigation into the assassination attempt last year, but now leads a separate investigation as chairman of the Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations. Johnson told Fox News on Thursday that he approved a subpoena on Wednesday to get more information from the two agencies, but has described the investigative process overall as “maddening,” because of the red tape he’s experienced so far.
“I’d like our report to be bipartisan, but everybody else seems to have been moving on here and not particularly interested in an investigation. I am,” Johnson said. “Whether I have the other officers involved or not, I’m moving forward, which is why I approved a subpoena.” Johnson claimed his investigation is still getting “stonewalled” nearly a year after the incident, and that he needs more documentation and information to move his investigation forward. It is not clear when the subpoenas will go out. The accusation comes despite FBI Director Kash Patel’s promise to provide full transparency in the bureau’s investigation into the assassination attempt.
Republicans have largely criticized the federal government for not holding people accountable for the errors that led to the failed attempt. A 180-page House report last year found “preexisting issues in leadership and training created an environment” in which security failures could occur. The Secret Service also recently revealed that six agents were suspended without pay or benefits after the shooting, and were placed in restricted duties or given roles with less operational responsibility when they returned. No Secret Service agents were fired over the assassination attempt but former Secret Service Director Kimberly Cheatle resigned after facing heavy backlash.
Western Europe is “losing” the economic competition with its main rivals, China and the US, and is struggling with a shortage of globally competitive companies, JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon has said. Since 2022, when the EU imposed sweeping sanctions on Russian energy over the Ukraine conflict, growth across the bloc has stagnated. Germany, once its economic powerhouse, is now experiencing its third year of economic downturn. Moscow has argued that EU restrictions are self-defeating, causing surging energy prices and weakening the bloc’s economy. Dimon, CEO of one of the world’s largest banks, cautioned EU leaders at an event in Dublin hosted by the Irish Foreign Ministry on Thursday that Europe has lost its competitive edge compared to the US and is facing a growing crisis in economic competitiveness.
“You’re losing,” he said. “Europe has gone from 90% [of] US GDP to 65% over 10 or 15 years.” “We’ve got this huge strong market and our companies are big and successful, have huge kinds of scale that are global. You have that, but less and less.” The JP Morgan boss has repeatedly expressed concerns about the state of Europe’s economy. Earlier this year, Dimon told Financial Times that Europe needed to “do more” to remain competitive, noting that GDP per person had dropped from around 70% of America’s to 50%, which he deemed “not sustainable.”
Dimon’s warning comes as European NATO members say they need to ramp up their military budgets to deter an alleged threat from Russia. NATO countries have recently pledged to raise defense spending to 5% of GDP over the next decade, more than double the longstanding target of 2%. Moscow denies posing any danger to these nations, accusing Western officials of exploiting fear to rationalize budget increases and cover a decline in living standards.
The inconvenient truth for Democrats is that there is still no bottom in sight, as the party of leftist radicals doubles, triples, and quadruples down on diversity, equity, inclusion, all things woke, and most alarmingly, a rapid descent into embracing Marxist ideas. That’s why rational people have been jumping ship from the imploding party. Just look at the tech bros who voted for President Trump and how the right side of the political spectrum reformatted itself with a relatable message: ‘America First’… On Thursday, JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon spoke at a foreign ministry event in Dublin, blasting the Democratic Party for going off the deep end with DEI, gender politics, and a series of failed policies that he said have harmed the country. “I have a lot of friends who are Democrats, and they’re idiots,” Dimon said at the event.
Holy. Shit.
Jamie Dimon on Democrats today:
“I have a lot of friends who are Democrats today, and they’re idiots. I always say they have big hearts and little brains. They do not understand how the real world works. Almost every single policy they rolled out has failed.” pic.twitter.com/AUG74vKaBG
“I always say they have big hearts and little brains. They do not understand how the real world works. Almost every single policy rolled out failed.” Dimon continued, “They overdid DEI …. We all were devoted to reaching out to the Black community, Hispanic, the LGBT community, the disabled — we do all of that. But to the extent, they gotta stop it. And they gotta go back to being more practical. They’re very ideological.” He described himself as “barely a Democrat” since the party of woke has fallen into the abyss. His criticism of the Democratic Party also extended to politics in New York City — particularly Manhattan, where the bank is headquartered — which now faces the possibility of a Marxist becoming mayor later this year. “Barely a Democrat”? Please. Dimon was a full-blown kneeler not long ago…
— Rudy Havenstein, Senior Markets Commentator. (@RudyHavenstein) June 5, 2020
“This guy [Zohran Mamdani] just got elected — he’s more of a Marxist than a socialist, and now you see these Democrats falling all over themselves saying, ‘Well, he’s pointing out some real problems, affordable housing and grocery prices.’ OK, maybe,” Dimon said. “There’s the same ideological mush that means nothing in the real world.” Dimon’s criticism of the Democratic Party is nothing new. In late May, the CEO blasted Democrats for the border invasion they facilitated over the Biden-Harris regime’s first term. “If you do not control the borders, you are going to destroy our country … Now that they are sending migrants into New York … all my super liberal friends realize what the problem is,” Dimon told CNBC last year. Dimon’s criticism signals that the party of leftist radicals is nowhere near a reset. In fact, it has gone further off course — doubling, even tripling down on failed policies that are driving more of its own supporters to jump ship and align with the America First movement.
Jason Curtis Anderson from One City Rising highlights just how far off course Zohran and the Democratic Party have gone (and spoiler alert: it’s bad): “Zohran’s worldview is shaped by his father, who has dedicated his life to promoting anti-Western values and decolonization—a field in which he is regarded as a thought leader. Marxism has become the philosophy of the “death to America” class, spanning from the permanent-protest and NGO movements to activist-teachers and into the Democratic Party through the Democratic Socialists of America—the political organization Mamdani calls home. Unfortunately, many Democrats remain slow to recognize that this philosophy breeds only misery and is incapable of improving society. In the 1960s, Frances Fox Piven outlined the revolutionary “Cloward-Piven strategy” to deliberately overload social service and welfare systems until they collapse, creating an opening for the far-left to demand a new system and “prove” that capitalism doesn’t work. It should come as no surprise that she is now an honorary chair of the DSA.”
The progressive vision for America — green new deal cronyism, open borders, DEI, and even outright Marxism , among other disasters— has objectively FAILED. Their agenda is unraveling, just look at Gavin Newsom defending illegal cannabis growers bringing unaccompanied minors to… https://t.co/ujskHhQmk6
From hating America to preaching Marxism and fueling chaos in city streets with dark money-funded NGOs, people are fed up with the radical left. And so is Dimon. It’ll be a long time before Dimon takes a knee again — of that, we’e certain.
“While Europe cannot climb out of its own economic, social and security crisis, Brussels would continue to finance the war – weapons instead of peace, new debt instead of a competitive Europe..”
The EU is placing Ukraine’s military needs above the priorities of the bloc’s member states, Hungarian government adviser Balazs Orban has said. He accused EU leaders of always finding money for “war” but not other causes. Leaders of EU nations are considering the creation of a new €100 billion ($117 billion) fund under the bloc’s upcoming seven-year budget to cover expenses for the Ukrainian government, Bloomberg reported this week, citing people familiar with the discussions. Budapest, however, has been a vocal critic of the bloc’s approach to the Russia-Ukraine conflict since its onset. “Europe has run out of money – except when it comes to war. There is always 100 billion euros for that,” Orban wrote on Wednesday on social media. He warned that such an allocation of funds would likely lead to further proposals to spend EU taxpayers’ money on Ukraine.
Orban pointed to Kiev’s estimate that it would require $1 trillion over 14 years for reconstruction and modernization, a figure shared by Prime Minister Denis Shmigal during a donors conference in Rome this week. “While Europe cannot climb out of its own economic, social and security crisis, Brussels would continue to finance the war – weapons instead of peace, new debt instead of a competitive Europe,” Orban said. Last week, Bloomberg reported that US investment firm BlackRock had abandoned efforts to attract private investors for a Ukraine reconstruction program. The fund was expected to be launched at the Rome conference, but potential participants reportedly expressed “a lack of interest amid increased uncertainty” over the country’s future.
Ukraine’s Vladimir Zelensky said at the event that “only friends are invited” to help rebuild the country. He reiterated his call to confiscate Russian state assets frozen by Western nations and transfer them to Kiev. Moscow has warned that such actions would constitute international theft. EU members have voiced concern that expropriating Russian assets could significantly erode global confidence in their financial systems. As an alternative, Ukraine’s backers have been imposing a “windfall tax” on profits from the immobilized Russian funds and channeling the money to Kiev – an approach Moscow has described as another form of criminality. Hungary has accused the EU leadership of inflicting major economic harm on member states through sanctions on Russia, and of wasting resources on a war effort that it argues cannot deliver a military victory over Moscow.
“..German Chancellor Friedrich Merz, who said Germany must once again become Europe’s leading military power. “He didn’t even choke on the word ‘again,’” Lavrov noted..”
Western European leaders have forgotten the lessons of history and are once again steering the continent toward direct military confrontation with Russia, Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov has warned. During a press conference following ASEAN events on Friday, he pointed to recent actions and rhetoric coming from Berlin, Paris, and London as evidence that European leaders are taking an increasingly aggressive stance toward Moscow. Lavrov pointed to a public exchange in which French Foreign Minister Jean-Noel Barrot was asked why Paris continues to support the Nazi regime in Kiev. The Russian diplomat questioned the sincerity of Barrot’s “hysterical” response, in which he insisted France was defending “the territorial integrity of Ukraine.”
“They have forgotten the conclusions that all of humanity once drew from those lessons. And, essentially, they are once again trying to prepare Europe for war – not some hybrid war, but a real war against Russia,” Lavrov stated. Kiev’s push for territorial control serves only to “suppress the rights of the Russian and Russian-speaking population and to physically eliminate those who oppose” the post-coup regime, according to Russia’s top diplomat. Claims that territorial integrity is the sole motive amount to “self-incrimination,” he added. Moscow has sounded the alarm over the resurgence of Nazi ideology and suppression of Russian culture in Ukraine for years, listing ‘denazification’ as one of the key goals in the conflict.
Lavrov also addressed remarks by German Chancellor Friedrich Merz, who said Germany must once again become Europe’s leading military power. “He didn’t even choke on the word ‘again,’” Lavrov noted. If Merz now believes peaceful solutions are exhausted, he has effectively dedicated himself to the militarization of Germany at the expense of its own people, Lavrov argued, calling such a stance “complete nonsense.” Moscow has warned that Berlin’s stance could lead to a new armed conflict with Moscow decades after the end of World War II. The Kremlin maintains that Russia prefers a peaceful solution to the conflict but warned that conditions on the ground are rapidly evolving while Kiev balks at a third round of direct negotiations.
Moscow has condemned the EU’s growing militarization, which has stirred divisions within the bloc, while describing its weapons deliveries to Kiev as part of a NATO-led proxy war. Lavrov said Moscow will take Europe’s militarization “into account in all areas of our strategic planning.”
Relations with the US may never return to what they used to be, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen has said, citing tensions with Washington over increased tariffs on European goods. US President Donald Trump introduced 20% tariffs on European imports in February. The EU responded with its own set of trade penalties. Trump later lowered duties to 10%, pending negotiations. That pause has now been extended until early August. ”We believe that tariffs are a loss for everyone. But we are not naive either: we know that the relationship with the US may never go back to what it used to be,” the EU chief stated at an economic-industrial forum in Rome on Thursday. The EU’s priority is to stabilize the situation with the US, von der Leyen said. “We are working tirelessly to find an initial understanding,” she added.
The EU chief called Washington “the most important trading and investment partner” of Brussels. In 2024, the US was the largest exporter of goods to the EU and the second-ranking destination for EU imports after China, according to Eurostat. Trump’s global tariff campaign has grown to include 211 countries. The American leader says his objective is to reduce the US trade deficit and stimulate domestic production. Since his first term, Trump has been pushing European NATO members to spend more on their own defense. While the bloc’s members agreed to a 2% threshold in February, the US president suggested that NATO countries consider spending as much as 5% of GDP, warning: “if they don’t pay, I’m not going to defend them.” NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte has said Trump was right to demand that European members step up military spending.
The bloc subsequently agreed to a 5% minimum in June. NATO leaders insisted that the hike in expenditure was aimed at deterring Russia amid the Ukraine conflict. Some officials suggested that Moscow could launch a full-scale attack on the US-led bloc within a few years. Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez, however, called the NATO spending increase “unreasonable and counterproductive,” which Trump responded to by saying he would “make them pay twice” through trade measures. Russian officials have repeatedly emphasized that Moscow has never had any plans to attack NATO. Russian President Vladimir Putin rejected the allegations as “nonsense” and “utter rubbish,” stating that Western politicians make such claims to deceive their constituents and justify increased spending on defense and aid to Kiev. “In Ukraine, we are just protecting ourselves,” Putin insisted.
A ceasefire between Russia and Ukraine must be reached by the end of the year, the head of Ukraine’s military intelligence, Kirill Budanov, said in an interview with Bloomberg published on Friday. He made his remarks as Ukrainian troops have been steadily losing ground along different sections of the front line, and after the 2024 incursion into Russia’s Kursk Region ended in costly failure. The Ukrainian army has also been struggling to bring in new conscripts. According to Bloomberg, Budanov argued that “a ceasefire must be reached as soon as possible and well before the end of this year.” “Is it realistic to do so? Yes. Is it difficult? No,” he told Bloomberg. “It takes at least three sides – Ukraine, Russia, and the US. And we will get to this position.”
Moscow has rejected the proposal for an immediate and unconditional truce, insisting that Kiev and its Western backers must first agree to several demands, including the withdrawal of troops from Russian territory claimed by Ukraine, an end to Ukraine’s mobilization campaign, and a halt to foreign military aid. Russian President Vladimir Putin also accused Ukraine of wanting to use any pause in fighting to rearm and regroup its forces. Moscow has further warned that it will not accept the presence of NATO troops in Ukraine, even if they are deployed under the guise of peacekeepers. Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said this week that the sides are working to arrange a third round of direct talks in Türkiye. Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky, however, said during a summit in Rome on Thursday that the countries must first complete the prisoner swaps agreed during negotiations in Istanbul on June 2.
“Militants from the Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA) and the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists (OUN) slaughtered up to 100,000 Poles between 1943 and 1945..”
Ukraine’s Vladimir Zelensky claimed he had no idea about the atrocities committed by Ukrainian Nazi collaborators during World War II until confronted about the issue by Polish President Andrzej Duda, the latter has told the media outlet RMF24. According to the president, Zelensky’s claim underscores that Ukrainians are kept in the dark about their nation’s troubled past. “He said to me: ‘Andrzej, I’ve never heard of the murders, the killing of Poles in western Ukraine, in Volhynia. They didn’t teach us about it in school’,” Duda said, recounting one of his meetings with the Ukrainian leader. The president was referring to the infamous Volyn massacre, which has long been a flashpoint in bilateral relations between the two countries.
Militants from the Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA) and the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists (OUN) slaughtered up to 100,000 Poles between 1943 and 1945 in the regions of Volhynia and Eastern Galicia, which were later incorporated into Ukraine. Both the UPA and the OUN collaborated with Nazi Germany during WWII. Many historic ultranationalist leaders, including OUN leader Stepan Bandera, a notorious Nazi collaborator, are widely revered by Ukrainians today. According to Duda, they are ignorant about the crimes of the past. The widespread belief that they are aware of their own “difficult history” is wrong, according to the Polish president. It is not the first time Duda has expressed his concerns about Ukraine’s approach to its past. In September 2024, he told Polsat News that “Ukrainians have many problems with their history,” including “the Volyn massacre … service in SS units, collaboration with the authorities of the Third Reich, and participation in the Holocaust.”
The Ukrainian Foreign Ministry released a statement on Thursday, saying that historical events should be studied and discussed “without politicization.” “On the eve of the day when the Republic of Poland commemorates the victims of the Volyn tragedy, Ukraine shares the pain and grief of the Polish people. At the same time, we do not forget about the numerous Ukrainians who became innocent victims of interethnic violence, political repression and deportation on the territory of Poland,” the statement continued. Warsaw has been one of Kiev’s strongest supporters since the escalation of the conflict with Russia in 2022. Poland also provided a key logistics hub which was used to transport between 80-90% of NATO-supplied military equipment and ammunition to Ukraine.
Ukrainian authorities continue to glorify Nazi collaborators despite concerns expressed by Kiev’s Western backers. In February, the city of Rovno celebrated the 120th birthday of Nazi collaborator and prominent anti-Semitic propagandist Ulas Samchuk, who called for the mass killing of Jews and Poles during WWII. Less than a month later, Ukrainian nationalists commemorated the 75th anniversary of the death of UPA leader Roman Shukhevich with a torchlit march, and unveiled a museum dedicated to him. Shukhevich is considered by many historians to have been one of the architects and commanders responsible for the massacre of Poles in Volhynia and Eastern Galicia.
The idea of a multipolar world has long been used in two distinct contexts. One is when global hegemony is solid and unchallenged, as it was for the decade and a half following the Cold War. In that case, ‘multipolarity’ serves as little more than a slogan – a symbolic protest against US dominance, with no practical strategy behind it. The other is when that hegemony has fully collapsed, and international relations revert to their historical norm: a fluid, unpredictable interplay of states with differing levels of power. Then, multipolarity becomes a fact, and actions are guided by immediate context. Today’s world fits neither condition. The old unipolar order is fading, but its structures and reflexes remain. That is why the current moment is so peculiar – and why BRICS has become such an important indicator of the transition underway.
This group of nations, for all its diversity and contradictions, reflects the emerging outlines of a world less shaped by Western control. The latest BRICS summit in Rio de Janeiro prompted disappointment in some quarters. Several key leaders were absent, and the headlines lacked drama. Compared to last year’s bold meeting in Kazan, it seemed muted. But this calmer tone is not a setback – it reflects the changing environment BRICS now operates in. Three trends help explain the summit’s tone. First, global tensions are rising. The recent clashes between India and Pakistan, and between Israel and Iran, directly involve BRICS members. While not full-blown conflicts within the group, they underscore a lack of unity. As BRICS expands, internal diversity increases, making it harder to maintain a single voice. The natural result is cautious language and vague formulations. That may frustrate observers, but it reflects realism.
Second, the United States under Donald Trump has adopted a more explicitly anti-BRICS stance. Washington has issued direct threats and imposed new duties on countries perceived to be aligned with the bloc. These efforts have a clear goal: to deter deeper cooperation between BRICS members. So far, they have not provoked open defiance. Most BRICS countries remain wary of direct confrontation with the West. Yet US pressure is steadily fueling resentment, and a firmer response may come if that pressure intensifies.
Third, the rotation of the BRICS presidency from Russia to Brazil altered the rhythm of the group’s activities. For Russia, BRICS is both a practical tool for economic coordination and a political platform that bypasses Western gatekeeping. Moscow invests heavily in its BRICS role. Brazil’s focus is different. Tied more closely to the West, it has other strategic priorities. That doesn’t mean Brasilia is uninterested in BRICS – only that it doesn’t treat it with the same urgency. Still, something important has happened. The 2023 and 2024 summits in South Africa and Russia changed BRICS. The group has matured, acquiring a new identity. That development will take time to digest. India’s upcoming presidency may continue the current more restrained phase, but that should not be mistaken for stagnation. It is a necessary period of consolidation.
This is why the Rio meeting should be seen as a success. The early phases of BRICS expansion, when the group was seen as vague and aspirational, were relatively easy. No one expected much. Now, the stakes are higher. America and its allies, once dismissive, are paying close attention. They are actively probing for weaknesses. This alone shows that BRICS is starting to matter. The group’s appeal lies in its alignment with real global trends. Today’s international environment demands flexibility, minimal obligations, and openness to difference. BRICS embodies these features. It avoids binding structures, embraces diversity, and operates on the basis of shared (though loosely defined) interests. We are living in a time of disorder.
There is no clear international balance, and no blueprint for restoring one. This transitional era will last, perhaps for decades. In the meantime, the world will increasingly look for platforms that reflect the new reality. BRICS is one of them. The perception of the group is shifting. It is no longer treated as a rhetorical device or a curiosity. It is becoming part of the emerging architecture of a multipolar world. That evolution will be slow and uneven, but it is underway. Following the summits in Johannesburg, Kazan, and now Rio, BRICS has entered a new phase. The challenge now is to recognize that change – and to adapt to it.
France has opened a criminal investigation into whether algorithms on Elon Musk’s X platform were used to interfere in domestic politics. The probe stems from two complaints filed in January, Paris prosecutor Laure Beccuau said on Friday. Without naming Musk directly, she stated that investigators will examine the company and its executives for allegedly manipulating algorithms “for purposes of foreign interference.” The first complaint came from Eric Bothorel, a legislator from President Emmanuel Macron’s centrist Ensemble party. He alleged that a “reduction in the diversity of voices and options” on X has created a dangerous environment.
Bothorel also criticized the platform’s moderation model as lacking clarity and accused Musk of personally intervening in its management, according to France 24. The complaint described X’s activities as posing a “real danger and a threat to our democracies.” The second complaint reportedly originated from a government cybersecurity official who claimed that changes to the algorithm promote racist and homophobic content, aiming to “skew democratic debate in France.” On Thursday, Socialist Party politicians Thierry Sother and Pierre Jouvet filed a separate complaint against Musk’s chatbot Grok, which recently generated antisemitic and otherwise offensive comments on X, including praise of Adolf Hitler.
The Grok team said on Wednesday that they had updated the model to remove hate speech. Musk commented that the chatbot was “too compliant to user prompts” and “too eager to please and be manipulated” into producing hateful rhetoric. European politicians have increasingly called for greater oversight of X and similar platforms, warning of potential abuse by bad actors. Musk caused controversy in Berlin when he openly endorsed the anti-immigration Alternative for Germany (AfD) party during the parliamentary elections in February. AfD significantly increased its vote share, becoming the second-largest faction in the Bundestag.
Dr. Sucharit Bhakdi: Because Of mRNA Vaccines, The Brains Of Billions Of People Are Not Working Anymore.
"The mRNA vaccines cause the destruction of brain cells. Obviously. And that is what we are now experiencing. We're seeing — I'm afraid to say BILLIONS OF PEOPLE — whose… pic.twitter.com/pvgpBRjsj7
Naomi Wolf Sounds the Alarm on Global Birth Rate Collapse: "A Million Missing Babies in Western Europe"
In a sobering analysis, Dr. Naomi Wolf highlights a disturbing trend unfolding across the Western world: a dramatic decline in live births, with drops ranging from 13% to 20%… pic.twitter.com/fMT8VNKXl6
Alex Jones claims the Trump administration holds explosive blackmail material on key Deep State figures — and has struck a secret deal to keep it quiet.
According to Jones, the agreement allows Trump to pursue his America First agenda without interference.
— Ignorance, the root and stem of all evil (@ivan_8848) July 10, 2025
Bird flu
A group of government-backed, globalist-funded Dutch scientists is celebrating after developing a mutant strain of “bird flu” that spreads rapidly through humans and causes agonizing death in every single mammal that becomes infected with the deadly virus.
US President Donald Trump will for the first time use his authority to send weapons drawn from Pentagon stockpiles directly to Ukraine, Reuters reported on Thursday, citing two people familiar with the decision. While the Trump administration has so far only delivered weapons approved under his predecessor, former President Joe Biden, the Presidential Drawdown Authority (PDA) allows Trump to supply arms to Ukraine in an emergency. The new shipment could reportedly be worth around $300 million and may include Patriot surface-to-air missiles as well as medium-range rockets. The move would mark a reversal of the Pentagon’s recent decision to halt some deliveries over concerns about depleting domestic stockpiles.
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, a longtime skeptic of expanded aid to Kiev, reportedly ordered the pause without consulting Trump. The president confirmed earlier this week that he would send additional arms to Ukraine, while Secretary of State Marco Rubio later told reporters that the pause “unfortunately was mischaracterized.” During his election campaign, Trump criticized Biden’s unconditional aid to Kiev and called Ukrainian leader Vladimir Zelensky “the greatest salesman on Earth” for persuading Democrats to keep weapons flowing.
Weapons supplies remain critical, as Ukrainian forces continue to lose ground to Russia and face increasing difficulties replenishing their ranks with new conscripts. Moscow has maintained that foreign arms will not prevent it from achieving its objectives. Last month, President Vladimir Putin reiterated that Russia considers Western countries supplying weapons to Ukraine as “de facto direct participants in the conflict.”
US President Donald Trump said NATO, whose member Washington is, will pay for American weapons that the alliance will subsequently supply to Ukraine. “We’re sending weapons to NATO, and NATO is paying for those weapons, 100%. So what we’re doing is the weapons that are going out are going to NATO, and then NATO is going to be giving those weapons [to Ukraine], and NATO is paying for those weapons,” Trump told NBC News. He said the agreement was reached at a NATO summit in June. German Chancellor Friedrich Merz previously announced his readiness to purchase Patriot missile systems from the United States for their transfer to Ukraine. He discussed it with Trump, but there is no final decision yet.
The US will not significantly increase arms supplies or financing to Ukraine, because American society, including voters of US President Donald Trump, are not interested in this war, Jeffrey Sachs, director of the Center for Sustainable Development at Columbia University, told Sputnik. “Still I do not believe that the US will significantly expand its role in supplying arms or financing Ukraine. The American people, including Trump’s voter base, have no interest in this war. This was, and remains, a Deep State project,” a well-known American economist said.
Trump announced his intention to supply the Kiev regime with “some more weapons” on Monday, but did not clarify the specific types of military aid his administration plans to send or whether Patriot missiles demanded by Ukraine would be included. Axios reported earlier on Tuesday that Trump had promised to immediately send 10 Patriot interceptor missiles to Kiev and provide assistance in finding other means of military supplies.
“..there will come a bitter moment when European leaders – apart from us and the Slovaks – will have to admit that they followed a mistaken strategy and were therefore defeated in this war.”
Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban said both Ukraine and the EU have already lost the conflict with Russia in an interview with the YouTube channel Patriota, which was posted on Wednesday. He argued that the war cannot be won on the battlefield and should be resolved through diplomacy. The Hungarian leader suggested that “there will come a bitter moment when European leaders – apart from us and the Slovaks – will have to admit that they followed a mistaken strategy and were therefore defeated in this war.” “I believe the EU has already lost the war. Ukraine is holding on – although it’s retreating – but I think Ukraine has also lost,” Orban said. The Hungarian leader did not specify what specific strategy he was referring to, but his government has consistently opposed EU sanctions targeting Russia and refused to send weapons to Kiev.
Budapest has instead called for negotiations to find a diplomatic resolution to the conflict. Orban stressed that resolving the Ukraine conflict on the battlefield is “impossible” and insisted that it can only be ended through diplomacy, which would also help reduce, or completely prevent, further casualties. He added that the EU should never have entered this path and that it is now crucial to “slow down, stop, thank the generals for their service, bring back the diplomats and foreign ministers, and begin working toward peace.” Orban’s comments come as key EU powers have continued to advocate continued military support for Ukraine. German Chancellor Friedrich Merz suggested on Wednesday that diplomacy has been “exhausted” and vowed to keep sending arms to Kiev.
France’s defense minister has also called the demilitarization of Ukraine – one of Russia’s key demands – a “red line,” arguing that Kiev must retain a standing army if it ends up being denied NATO membership. However, other leaders have voiced skepticism. Czech President Petr Pavel, a pro-Russia hardliner, recently said the EU must reconsider its Russia strategy, warning that fighting Moscow “endlessly” would lead to massive casualties and economic damage to both Ukraine and the EU. Russia has repeatedly denounced Western military backing for Ukraine, saying it only prolongs the war. President Vladimir Putin have also described Europe’s sanctions and attempts to phase out Russian energy as “economic suicide.”
Two days after the FBI leaked a memo to Axios revealing that the Epstein case is effectively ‘closed’ (he killed himself and there’s no ‘list’ of clients) – former Epstein attorney and associate Alan Dershowitz says he knows exactly who’s on the ‘Epstein list,’ and why it’s being suppressed from the public. “I have seen – remember I was accused falsely,” Dershowitz said on the Sean Spicer show. “Let me tell you, I know for a fact documents are being suppressed. And they’re being suppressed to protect the individuals. I know the names of the individuals. I know why they’re being suppressed. I know who’s suppressing them. But I’m bound by confidentiality from a judge and cases, and I can’t disclose what I know. But I – hand to God, I know the names of people whose files are being suppressed in order to protect them, and that’s wrong.”
SPICER: Just out of curiosity without names, are these poiticians, business leaders, both?
DERSHOWITZ: They’re everything, and look – let me tell you… a lot of them are – at least one of them is somebody who was accused. Others are accusers, and the judges have said – if somebody calls themselves a victim, we’re not going to give any information about them – but they may not be victims, they may be perpetrators. So we don’t have information about false accusers. We know there have been many false accusers who have accused innocent people for money, and those records are being deliberately, willfully suppressed – and they shouldn’t be suppressed. If the accusation is allowed out, so should the material that diminishes the credibility of the accuser. We want total transparency on this. Every single document. No redactions. That’s what I’ve said from day one… I waive any of my rights to privacy, anything there is about me, I’m happy because it will be exculpatory.”
On Wednesday, President Trump and AG Pam Bondi completely botched a reporter’s question over Epstein – with Trump lashing out, saying “Are you still talking about Jeffrey Epstein?” Then Bondi jumped in – saying “First, to back up on that. In February, I did an interview on Fox and it’s been getting a lot of attention because I was asked a question about the client list. And my response was ‘it’s sitting on my desk to be reviewed,’ meaning the file – along with the JFK, MLK files as well. That’s what I meant by that. Also to the tens of thousands of video – they turned out to be child porn downloaded by that disgusting Jeffrey Epstein. Child porn is what they were. Never gonna be released. Never gonna see the light of day. To him being an agent; I have no knowledge of that. We can get back to you on that.”
Is Pam Bondi’s tenure as President Trump’s attorney general hanging by a thread? Megyn Kelly thinks so. According to her, the Epstein debacle has exposed a level of incompetence and political tone-deafness that even the most loyal Trump supporters can’t ignore. In her recent analysis, Kelly didn’t pull any punches about Bondi’s handling of the Epstein files. She called out Bondi’s performance as not just a misstep, but a full-blown embarrassment — one that may have sealed her fate in the Trump administration. Bondi, she argues, either “willingly humiliated some of the president’s most loyal supporters” or is simply “lazy and incompetent.” There’s no sugarcoating here. Kelly points to Bondi’s much-hyped promise to deliver the Epstein “client list,” only for Bondi to produce a pile of nothing: recycled, publicly available documents masquerading as bombshells.
For a base hungry for accountability and truth, this was a slap in the face. Kelly’s words cut to the heart of the matter: “If you’re going to make a spectacle out of finally revealing the Epstein files, you’d better have the goods. Pam Bondi didn’t.” Instead, Bondi delivered nothing new, just a parade of letdowns that left Trump supporters feeling duped and insulted. Kelly’s assessment is that Bondi’s actions were not just a failure; they were a betrayal of trust. And when Bondi tried to shift the blame, Kelly wasn’t buying it. Bondi’s excuse that the FBI gave her the wrong documents only made things worse. Kelly zeroed in on the lack of follow-through: promises of further revelations that never materialized and wild, unsubstantiated claims about “tens of thousands of kiddy porn or child pornography material” that only muddied the waters.
Kelly harshly criticized Bondi for briefing pro-Trump influencers with a binder full of what turned out to be old, recycled information. She accused Bondi of either being too lazy to vet the material or deliberately setting up the president’s allies — like Kash Patel and the vice president — for embarrassment. Either way, she argued, it reflects badly on Bondi. “So she’s either lazy and incompetent, or she willingly humiliated some of the president’s most loyal supporters. Neither one of those is good,” Kelly said. “And that’s why, I’m sorry, but I’m going to predict her days are numbered as a member of the Trump administration. You know, Trump, he’s not dumb. But I just don’t think, I don’t think Trump created this.”
Perhaps even more telling was the way that Trump, always quick to reward loyalty and results, conspicuously left Bondi out of his praise in a recent post on Truth Social: The FBI, under the direction of Director Kash Patel and Deputy Director Dan Bongino, is back to the basics: Locking up criminals, and cleaning up America’s streets. We have the Greatest Law Enforcement professionals in the World, but “Politics” and Corrupt Leadership often prevented them from doing their job. That is no longer the case, and now, they have been unleashed to do their jobs, and they are doing just that. Keep it up — MAKE AMERICA SAFE AGAIN! In Trump’s world, omission is often the loudest condemnation. As Kelly sees it, unless Bondi can pull off a miracle, she’s finished. And she may have a point.
A power struggle is underway at the US Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), The Wall Street Journal has claimed. Allies of Elon Musk are reportedly trying to retain influence as the White House moves to scale back the agency’s power. Current and former officials told the outlet that DOGE staffers are being questioned in closed-door meetings about whether they support President Donald Trump or Musk, the tech billionaire who led the department until last month. Musk quit as the head of DOGE amid disagreements with Trump over a sweeping tax and spending package called the Big Beautiful Bill, which included a $5 trillion debt ceiling hike. He criticized the legislation as undercutting DOGE’s mission to reduce federal spending.
Tension and paranoia have reportedly taken hold inside DOGE’s shrinking ranks. White House officials are now said to be working to limit the department’s influence. Despite resigning, Musk’s influence reportedly persists through Steve Davis, a longtime aide who left his government post in May. Davis has continued to interact with DOGE staff, and according to some insiders, still issues guidance. In private conversations, he has supposedly even claimed his departure was “fake news.” A DOGE official close to Musk, however, said Davis’ contact with staff is informal. Some in DOGE say Musk loyalists are pushing for a reboot under as DOGE 2.0, with a focus on modernizing government websites and IT systems rather than downsizing staff.
Others, including White House officials, suspect Musk and Davis are leveraging government ties for private business interests. WSJ noted that the struggle poses political risks for Musk, whose companies Tesla and SpaceX rely on federal contracts and are currently facing financial pressure. Last week, Trump escalated the feud, telling reporters: “We might have to put DOGE on Elon… DOGE is the monster that might have to go back and eat Elon.” On July 5, Musk announced the launch of the America Party, which he says will break the two-party system and win enough Congressional seats to gain leverage.
“That, he says, is EXACTLY what Epstein was to intelligence agencies: someone with access (like the copy machine repairman) who quietly delivered leverage on the world’s elite.”
You’ll see how this connects to Epstein. John Kiriakou reveals his superior got a promotion and a medal when he recruited a copy machine repairman. At first, Kiriakou laughed, but then he realized the brilliance of the plan when he learned that the repairman secretly sent every document from a prime minister’s office straight to the CIA. How did he do it? By planting a tiny device on the copy machine. “He [my trainer] said, all of us want to recruit the prime minister. We’re not going to recruit the prime minister. We’re not even going to have access to the prime minister. But the prime minister’s got a copy machine in his office. “And every once in a while, that machine is going to need to be cleaned and serviced.
So you recruit the copy machine repairman. And when he goes in there to make his repair or to clean the drums or whatever, he installs a little device that we give him so that every time somebody makes a copy, it transmits a copy back to the CIA.” What happened next? He said, “I got a promotion. I got a medal. I got a photo op with the director. It made my career…” Because this flow of information was pure leverage for the CIA:
“You know what they’re thinking. You know their next move. You know who their enemies are and who their allies are. Maybe it’s their position on trade negotiations. Maybe the prime minister has a health problem you need to plan for. You never know what might come through,” Kiriakou explained.“That ONE critical nugget is all it takes.” That, he says, is EXACTLY what Epstein was to intelligence agencies: someone with access (like the copy machine repairman) who quietly delivered leverage on the world’s elite.
European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen suspects certain “external forces” are trying to divide the EU, but her narrow escape in today’s no confidence vote shows that the problems may be internal. “As external forces seek to destabilize and divide us, it is our duty to respond in line with our values. Thank you, and long live Europe,” von der Leyen wrote on X. The European Union “needs strength, vision, and the capacity to act,” she argued. Earlier, a diplomat in Brussels told TASS that the results of the no-confidence vote on the EU chief “sent shockwaves through Brussels.” Even supporters of the motion expected some 15% to 20% of members to support the move, and “the share of those dissatisfied with the work of the European Commission exceeded these expectations,” he said.
The diplomat also opined that the vote “will not affect the political course being pursued by the European Commission.” According to him, next, the EC “will probably launch a large-scale media campaign for damage control, one that is likely to attribute the discontent with how the European Commission runs things to external forces,” he explained. Von der Leyen survived a no-confidence vote in the European Parliament at a plenary session in Strasbourg on Thursday. The vote followed allegations of corruption and misconduct in the EU’s procurement of COVID-19 vaccines. Out of 553 MEPs who showed up to cast a ballot, 360 voted to reject the motion, with 175 in favor and 18 abstaining.
European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen is leading the EU down a path of self-destruction by attempting to sever energy ties with Russia, Slovak MEP Milan Uhrik has said. In May, von der Leyen unveiled a plan to phase out all Russian oil and gas imports by the end of 2027, as part of the EU’s REPowerEU roadmap, which aims to eliminate the bloc’s dependence on Russian fossil fuels and shift to renewable sources. ”[Von der Leyen], you will destroy the EU, and I am convinced that the EU will soon collapse because you are doing everything to make it happen,” Uhrik said in a speech in the European Parliament on Wednesday. Moscow has argued that EU restrictions are self-defeating, causing surging energy prices and weakening the bloc’s economy. Since 2022, Germany has fallen into recession, while growth across the EU has stagnated.
Brussels is also discussing an 18th sanctions package targeting Russia’s energy and financial sectors. The proposal stalled after Slovakia vetoed it last week. Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico argued that Slovakia was “fighting for our households and businesses” against “harmful ideological decisions” from Brussels. Neighboring Hungary also blocked the measure, warning it would cripple its energy security and spike prices. Uhrik stressed that Russian hydrocarbons remain vital for Slovakia’s industrial base. “Without them, our industry would either not function or would not be competitive,” he said. He urged fellow Slovak politician Maros Sefcovic, currently the EU’s commissioner for trade and economic security, to “stand up for Slovakia” on the issue.
Uhrik also took aim at NATO’s proposal to raise member states’ defense spending to 5% of GDP by 2035. “No, thank you – that’s enough. We just don’t want this,” he said, adding that Slovaks did not envision such a future when they joined the EU.Von der Leyen survived a no-confidence vote in the European Parliament on Thursday over her handling of COVID-19 vaccine procurement. The politician previously dismissed her critics as “conspiracy theorists” acting in the interests of Russian President Vladimir Putin.
“In a recent interview with Tucker Carlson, Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. said that “I never was very, let’s say, approving of Marco because he was kind of a neocon war hawk and now he’s had this incredible transformation.”
Marco Rubio may just be the most popular guy in Donald Trump’s Cabinet right now. It’s not just me saying that; the rest of the administration seems to think so, too. White House chief of staff Susie Wiles appeared on the “Pod Force Once” podcast with Miranda Devine on Wednesday, and she had what the New York Post called a “glowing endorsement” for the Secretary of State. Wiles said she often sits in Cabinet meetings and marvels at the “energetic” team Trump has put together: “But I was sitting in a Cabinet meeting one day, and they do tend to go on a while , and so I was jotting down in my notebook the, you know, how I saw the Cabinet — and these numbers are wrong, but order of magnitude correct — five published authors, seven billionaires, 11 lawyers, a couple of minorities, a Democrat or two. It is an amazing group of people that he put together.”
She singled out several people, but she seemed especially proud of Rubio. “Marco Rubio was born for this,” she said, adding that he had “quickly assimilated… in his NSC position.” She’s not the only person I’ve noticed praising the man who, once upon a time, wasn’t all that beloved by Trump and his MAGA base. In a recent interview with Tucker Carlson, Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. said that “I never was very, let’s say, approving of Marco because he was kind of a neocon war hawk and now he’s had this incredible transformation.” Today, the Health and Human Services secretary says he and Rubio are aligned on most things. He also pointed out that Rubio may be the funniest man in the Cabinet. “He says things that make people belly laugh every cabinet meeting,” he told Carlson.
Vice President JD Vance told Fox News last month that Rubio was probably his “best friend in the administration” and said they hang out all the time (to be a fly on the wall for those conversations). The president himself has even said he sees Rubio as the next potential leader of the MAGA movement. Back in May, when Trump appeared on “Meet the Press,” host Kristen Welker asked him, “When you look to the future, Mr. President, do you think the MAGA movement can survive without you as its leader?” “I think we have a tremendous group of people,” the president responded. “We talked about a number of them. You look at Marco, you look at JD Vance, who’s fantastic.”
I always thought it was interesting that he mentioned Rubio first in that interview. But, as the Post points out, numerous polls show that Vance has a strong lead over Rubio, and, in some cases, even Ron DeSantis beats him when people are asked who they’d like to have as president in 2028. Trump also gave the Secretary a nice compliment during the NATO Summit a couple of weeks ago. After Rubio fired off at the media, setting the record straight on whether or not Iran’s nuclear capabilities had been set back significantly, the president said, “You know what Marco reminded me — he did such a nice job there — it was nine years ago I had to debate this guy. It was not easy. I think he even got better. But when you were into your little thing, I said this is what I had to debate this guy.”
I’d also like to mention that anytime I write about Rubio — and I do often — I get a pretty big stream of feedback from y’all suggesting that he would make a great contender for 2028 for president or vice president for Vance. I see it on X, too. For what it’s worth, earlier today, I was going through my own X/Twitter archives looking for something completely unrelated and realized I was pushing for a Rubio for president long before it was cool. I have receipts that go as far back as 2010.
Of course, a lot can change between now and then, and I hate when we get too ahead of ourselves in politics — it’s like putting out Christmas decorations in stores in August — but there is no denying that Rubio is Trump and the GOP’s star at the moment. He’s won over the hearts and minds of much of Trump’s base, and he knows how to work the swamp. He’s great on domestic policy, and he’s even better on foreign policy. With few exceptions, leaders around the world respect him and consider him a friend. They want to work with him. And assuming nothing changes, he’ll have Trump’s backing.
There’s a new reality unfolding across America, and it should give every law-abiding citizen a reason to breathe a little easier: police officers are safer on the job today than they were in recent years, and the Donald Trump presidency deserves the credit. Under Joe Biden (and Barack Obama), the men and women who wear the badge have been under siege—not just by criminals, but by a relentless anti-police movement fueled by the radical Left and amplified by their allies in the media and the Democratic Party. The “Defund the Police” crowd, with progressive politicians and activists cheering it on, did everything in its power to demonize law enforcement and turn public sentiment against those who risk their lives to keep our communities safe.
The deaths of Michael Brown and George Floyd were weaponized to push a narrative that painted every cop as a racist villain and every police department as a threat. But Americans had had enough. They saw the chaos, the rising crime, the lawlessness that swept through cities where leftist policies were given free rein. They understood that a society without respect for law enforcement is a society teetering on the brink. That’s why, when the time came, voters sent a message: they wanted law and order restored, and they wanted a president who would stand with the police, not against them.
Since President Trump’s return to the White House, the numbers speak for themselves. A new report from the National Law Enforcement Officers Memorial Fund reveals a staggering 53% drop in officer fatalities compared to the previous year. Traffic-related deaths have been cut in half. Deaths from assaults, stabbings, and other causes have plummeted. For the first time in more than half a century, the nation is on pace for fewer than 100 line-of-duty deaths by year’s end.
This isn’t a coincidence. It’s the direct result of a cultural shift away from the anti-police hysteria that defined the Left’s agenda. Under Trump, the message from the top is that our police are heroes, not villains. They deserve respect, support, and the resources they need to do their jobs. The days of the White House turning its back on law enforcement are over. The days of criminals being emboldened by soft-on-crime policies are ending. “We as an organization never like to use the words ’good news’ when we’re talking about or reporting on even a single police officer’s death, but I would call this a very welcome and encouraging trend line,” Bill Alexander, the CEO of the National Law Enforcement Officers Memorial Fund, told The Washington Times.
Mr. Alexander said the nation is on pace to see fewer than 100 line-of-duty deaths by the end of this year, which would be a first for the country in the more than 50 years officer deaths have been tracked.The executive credited better law enforcement training for giving officers the tools to defuse tense situations both gracefully and safely. Mr. Alexander also said Mr. Trump’s election last fall marked a culture shift away from the anti-police fervor that was so prominent in the previous five years. “The profession writ large was targeted and demonized to, I might argue, an unfair degree,” the CEO said.
“Across almost every line of communication, whether that was popular media, social media, mainstream media, maybe even to a worrying degree from too many of our elected officials, again, targeting the profession,” Mr. Alexander said. “I think that that was having a really detrimental impact on a number of interactions between the public and law enforcement.” The radical Left won’t admit it, but its anti-cop crusade was a disaster. It endangered officers, emboldened criminals, and left communities less safe. Now, with Trump at the helm, that dangerous experiment is being reversed. The numbers prove it. The streets prove it. And the families of America’s law enforcement officers know it better than anyone. The Trump presidency is saving the lives of law enforcement. That’s a fact the Left can’t spin, and it’s a victory every American should celebrate.
“Now, you tell me how is America a superpower instead of an emperor without any clothes? Why should anyone be afraid of a country that pays its bills by printing debt instruments?”
For many years I reported monthly on the jobs reports from the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Over the years the new jobs were consistently in health and social assistance, waitresses and bartenders, and government employment. Manufacturing jobs making things that could be exported to pay for imports simply were not present. I emphasized that the jobs offshoring policy associated with globalism was de-industrializing the United States and destroying the middle class and the ladders of upward mobility that had made America an opportunity society. I held accountable the economic professors at Harvard and Dartmouth who promised that the lost of US manufacturing jobs, which they derided as “dirty fingernail jobs,” would be replaced by higher paid clean fingernail tech jobs. No such jobs ever appeared for the displaced manufacturing work force which has ceased to exist.
Fortunately, the US dollar being the world reserve currency allows the US to pay its bills by printing Treasury bonds. As Treasury bonds are the reserves of most foreign central banks, there has been a constant demand for more reserves. Thus, financing the US debt has been no problem. When US debt grows, so do the reserves of the world’s central banks. No problem. David Stockman in 45 years has been unable to learn this. The problem is internal. Manufacturing jobs are high productivity, high value added. Therefore the wage is high. The replacement jobs–stocking big box store shelves are low productivity. Consequently, the growth of income from wages stagnated and declined. Today American living standards are based more on credit than on productivity. Engineering and design follow manufacturing. When manufacturing leaves, so do engineering and design.
America was the loser. China was the winner. Wall Street forced American manufacturers to offshore their production to China in order to raise profits from lower labor and compliance costs. Wall Street ordered US manufacturers to “meet the Chinese price” or Wall Street would finance takeovers of the companies and move their production offshore. Clearly, Wall Street is an anti-American entity. I remember when Washington’s strategic thinkers said it would be 50 years before China would be a problem for American hegemony. The offshoring of US manufacturing, technology, and business knowhow reduced the time to 5 years. Today on a purchasing parity comparison, the Chinese economy exceeds that of the US. This is what globalism did for America. It made the American economy subordinate to China.
American economists were too well paid by globalists for me to draw them into a debate. Instead, they stayed with their propaganda, and America lost the ladders of upward mobility. To worsen the situation, the Democrats and Republican business interests left the borders open to millions of immigrant invaders who have overwhelmed educational, health, and housing services and driven down wages in the low productivity jobs. Today the profits of fruit and vegetable growers and meat slaughter houses depend on cheap immigrant-invader wages. But this is only the beginning. According to Bloomberg News, Artificial Intelligence will soon eliminate 20-40% of the jobs in America’s largest cities. Robotics are eliminating other low skilled wage jobs. What will America do with a population displaced by the digital revolution and AI?
Civilizational collapse stares us in the face, and not a single media source mentions the fact. Let’s look at June’s jobs report. It is the same as those I reported over many years. Where are the 147,000 jobs? Health care and social assistance provide 58,600 jobs. Leisure and hospitality provide 20,000 jobs. State and local education provide 63,500 jobs. That accounts for June’s new jobs.Clearly this is not a robust economy. Except for the 20,000 leisure and hospitality jobs, most of the rest are financed by government budget. Now, you tell me how is America a superpower instead of an emperor without any clothes? Why should anyone be afraid of a country that pays its bills by printing debt instruments? The reason is that the US has nuclear weapons and is under Israel’s direction. That is sufficient to terrify the world.
Two thirds of all federal law enforcement funding in the United States for fiscal year 2025 is going to immigration and border enforcement, according to a CATO Institute analysis of data from the Congressional Budget Office (CBO). Together, immigration and border enforcement will receive more than $33 billion. This includes funding for U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) at $19 billion, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) at $10 billion, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) at $281 million, the Department of Homeland Security’s general offices at $3.2 billion and 20 percent of the Coast Guard’s budget – approximately $2.2 billion. However, as Statista’s Anna Fleck reports, CATO notes that the actual value is even higher, as the Trump administration is “diverting thousands of agents from other federal law enforcement agencies and much of the military to enforcing immigration and border law.”
According to CATO analysts, the amount spent on immigration and border enforcement agencies is 36 times higher than spending on tax and financial crimes enforcement (IRS-Treasury), 21 times higher than funding for firearms enforcement (ATF), 13 times higher than on drug enforcement (DEA), 10 times higher than spending on the Secret Service and 8 times higher than the FBI budget. These figures are based on current calculations and do not yet reflect the additional increases expected under H.R. 1 – the so-called One Big Beautiful Bill Act. The CBP projects that this will direct an extra $168 billion over the coming years to immigration and border enforcement agencies, along with more funding for agencies that indirectly support immigration law enforcement. Unlike normal fiscal year appropriations, H.R. 1 makes these funds available over five years, though they can be accessed for up to 10 years, so long as they are committed by 2029.
HIPAA, the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996, is a US federal law that establishes national standards for protecting sensitive patient health information.
In a move that should obliterate whatever remains of the myth of transparency in Washington, Joe Biden’s longtime physician, Dr. Kevin O’Connor, finally showed up for a closed-door interview with the House Oversight Committee—and proceeded to not answer a single question.n But while O’Connor may have refused to talk, his silence said plenty. According to Committee Chairman James Comer (R-Ky.), O’Connor was asked two simple but devastating questions: “Were you ever told to lie about the president’s health?” and “Did you ever believe President Biden was unfit to execute his duties?” O’Connor didn’t say “No,” he pleaded the Fifth both times—choosing constitutional protection over basic accountability.
“This is unprecedented,” Comer said. “And I think that this adds more fuel to the fire that there was a cover-up.” He’s right. When a sitting president’s personal doctor refuses to answer whether he was told to lie to the American people, it’s not just troubling—it’s damning. This isn’t some minor bureaucratic hiccup or a routine legal maneuver—this is the doctor who, for years, stood between the American people and the truth about Joe Biden’s fitness for office. Now, when given the chance to clear the air, he chooses silence. Although O’Connor had previously refused to cooperate, somehow, pleading the Fifth now instead of answering those two questions looks worse. Let’s not pretend this is normal. O’Connor’s refusal to answer even basic questions about Biden’s condition raises the obvious question: What, exactly, is he trying to hide?
Of course, we all know the answer. For years, the Biden White House dismissed legitimate concerns about the president’s health as partisan attacks, hiding behind carefully worded reports from O’Connor. Those glowing annual assessments were the backbone of the cover-up, reassuring the public while Biden visibly declined. Let’s be clear: O’Connor’s refusal to answer questions isn’t about medical ethics—it’s about political damage control. This is the same doctor who repeatedly vouched for Biden’s fitness while the public watched a very different reality unfold. If there’s nothing to hide, why not answer questions? Why invoke your right not to incriminate yourself? Comer said it is “clear there was a conspiracy to cover up” Biden’s cognitive decline.
New York Post: “The only question O’Connor did answer before the deposition concluded was confirming his name, according to an Oversight spokesperson, who pointed out that doctor-patient privilege would have allowed the witness to answer at least some questions. Dr. Jeffrey Kuhlman, who served as physician to the president during Barack Obama’s first term, agreed with that interpretation. “In my opinion, [the first question] doesn’t involve HIPAA,” Kuhlman told The Post. As for the second question, Kuhlman advised, “I don’t think that’s covered by HIPAA,” because it “doesn’t sound like that’s specific health information that they’re seeking.”
When asked whether he would answer questions under oath that don’t directly relate to a patient’s health, Kuhlman said: “In my role as a physician caring for a patient, I probably would.” Dr. O’Connor’s refusal to answer questions about Biden’s health isn’t just a legal tactic—it’s an admission that there’s something worth hiding. The American people have every right to demand answers. The time for stonewalling is over.
Is it starting again? Western Crete Coast Guard: 9,000 arrivals so far this year. “..963 arrivals were recorded last Sunday alone, marking a 380% increase in migrant flows compared to the same period last year.”
Greece has suspended the processing of asylum applications from people coming to the country from North Africa for three months, Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis has announced, warning that those arriving illegally by boat will be arrested and detained. The temporary measure will allow the government to effectively address the surge in migrant arrivals, the Greek official said in a post on X on Wednesday. “The Greek Government sends a message of determination that the passage from North Africa to Greece is closing… [and] to all traffickers and all their potential customers that the money they spend may be completely wasted, because it will be difficult to reach Greece by sea,” he declared.
The move comes just a day after Libya’s eastern-based government in Benghazi blocked the entry of an EU delegation, including Greek Minister for Migration and Asylum Thanos Plevris, who had visited the country for talks on curbing illegal migration. Libya became a key transit point for human trafficking and migration to Europe via the Mediterranean following a NATO-backed uprising in 2011 that led to the overthrow and assassination of longtime ruler Muammar Gaddafi.
Greek officials have reported a sharp rise in migrant arrivals on the southern islands of Crete and Gavdos in recent months, with more than 9,000 people landing there since the beginning of 2025. According to the Greek City Times, Vasilis Katsikandarakis, president of the Western Crete Coast Guard Personnel Union, has stated that 963 arrivals were recorded last Sunday alone, marking a 380% increase in migrant flows compared to the same period last year. “The migration issue is suffocating us,” Katsikandarakis said, claiming that “thousands more are waiting in North Africa.” On Tuesday, EU Commissioner for Internal Affairs and Migration Magnus Brunner, Greek Migration Minister Thanos Plevris, Italian Interior Minister Matteo Piantedosi, and Maltese Minister for Home Affairs Byron Camilleri met with Libya’s UN-recognized government in Tripoli to discuss efforts to combat illegal migration along the Central Mediterranean route.
Following the meeting, the Tripoli-based administration’s prime minister, Abdul Hamid Dbeibah, said he had tasked the Interior Ministry with drafting a national migration plan rooted in practical cooperation and a commitment to lasting solutions. The EU officials had been scheduled to hold talks with the rival administration in Benghazi but were declared unwelcome for allegedly violating Libyan laws. The EU has struggled to manage the migration crisis since 2015, with Greece, Italy, and Spain receiving the highest number of arrivals across the Mediterranean. The bloc plans to tie its development aid and trade relations with African nations to their cooperation in curbing small boat departures to Europe, Politico reported Wednesday, citing an internal draft document.
“..the liberal model of globalization is losing viability as the center of economic and political activity shifts decisively toward the Global South – developing countries with rising demographic, resource, and technological potential.”
A few days ago, the city of Rio de Janeiro hosted the 17th BRICS summit, marking a significant step forward for the organization amid the accelerating transformation of the global political and economic landscape. Represented by Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, Russia played an active role in the summit’s proceedings, while President Vladimir Putin addressed the plenary session via video link. In his remarks, the Russian leader offered a comprehensive analysis of current global trends, emphasizing that the liberal model of globalization is losing viability as the center of economic and political activity shifts decisively toward the Global South – developing countries with rising demographic, resource, and technological potential.
The Rio summit reaffirmed BRICS’ growing political weight and its ambition to become a key force in shaping the emerging multipolar order. High-level meetings drew global attention not only because of their scale but also due to the substantive outcomes they produced. A total of 126 joint commitments were adopted, spanning critical areas such as global governance reform, the restructuring of international financial institutions, healthcare, climate initiatives, artificial intelligence, and sustainable development.
The declaration adopted at the summit, titled ‘Strengthening Global South Cooperation for More Inclusive and Sustainable Governance’, underscored BRICS’ commitment to multilateralism, respect for international law, and the promotion of a fair and equitable world order. But beyond the formal language, the summit revealed a deeper shift: BRICS is no longer limiting itself to cautious technocratic dialogue. The bloc is increasingly positioning itself as a cohesive international actor – capable of proposing new frameworks for economic integration, political solidarity, and global coordination.
Crucially, this political reorientation did not begin in Rio. It builds directly on the strategic groundwork laid during the 2024 summit in Kazan, Russia – the largest BRICS gathering to date – which brought together not only member states but also dozens of partners under the BRICS+ umbrella. The Kazan summit established a new level of cooperation and ambition, and Rio served as a continuation of that trajectory. It became the arena where aspirations evolved into policy, and where the Global South began to more clearly articulate its place in the world.
Among the most consequential developments at the Rio summit was the firm commitment to advancing financial sovereignty among member states. Particular emphasis was placed on transitioning to transactions in national currencies – a long-standing initiative championed by Russia and several other BRICS countries. The leaders endorsed this direction, recognizing the need to reduce dependence on dominant reserve currencies. President Putin underscored that this was not merely an economic measure, but a geopolitical move aimed at strengthening the sovereignty of participating nations and insulating them from external pressure.
In support of this goal, the summit produced agreements to boost mutual investment volumes and accelerate the development of independent payment and settlement mechanisms. These initiatives are designed to lay the groundwork for a more resilient financial architecture – one that bypasses traditional Western-controlled institutions and empowers countries to determine the terms of their own economic cooperation. Increasingly, BRICS views economic autonomy as a precondition for long-term political independence in a world marked by volatility and polarization.
Interestingly, our brains construct an incredibly complex jigsaw puzzles using any pieces it can get access to. These are provided by the context in which we see them and by our memories
