Zelensky Archives - The Automatic Earth

President Trump took to Truth Social on Thursday to rage against US media coverage of the Iran war (not for the first time), following Treasury Scott Bessent giving similar scathing remarks earlier this week. Trump particularly singled out recent and ongoing reports of US missile and interceptor shortages, which he has slammed as false. He called out the “treasonous SCUM” in the media for issuing supposedly inaccurate reports on “our Military Operation in Iran” – claiming that the US has “virtually unlimited amounts of Mid to High Grade Ammunition”.

But also notably, and in a seeming implicit contradiction, he said the USA is not at the moment “selling them to others” but is producing and stockpiling at “levels never seen before.” This is amid an ongoing scramble for Europe to find an avenue to transfer more Patriots to Ukraine, as Zelensky is essentially betting for more missiles.

Trump once again further blamed the prior Biden administration for handing “hundreds of Billions of Dollars” to Ukraine and NATO “free of charge” in connection with the war with Russia. From think tanks to NY Times to Wall Street Journal to independent media, pundits, journalists and officials have been raising the alarm on the issue. This also comes after Trump told journalists in the Oval Office on Monday that the “older stuff” can always be used, when he was pressed over whether the United States is running out of standoff munitions:
Q: Several military leaders have reportedly told Hegseth that a prolonged, large-scale operation in Iran weakens our ability to confront threats elsewhere, including the homeland. Have you heard that?
TRUMP: We’re very respected. Nobody else would be crazy enough to do it… We have unlimited amounts of… older stuff.
And then on Wednesday in formal remarks Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent blasted the media for its recent coverage. He went so far as to scold the media for being the best allies that the Iranians have. Pentagon chief Pete Hegseth has over the past months made similar remarks, invoking themes of ‘treason’. “One of the best allies that the Iranians have on this is the media because the media immediately publishes all the lies that they say,” Bessent had proclaimed at the G20 meeting in Asheville. “Everyone in this audience and every news outlet should be ashamed for publishing that, taking a lying regime at face value,” Bessent added.

Bessent on Iran:

One of the best allies Iran has is the media.

The media immediately publishes all the lies that Iran says.

There are no mines in the strait. Two ships did not hit mines. pic.twitter.com/SdhyOOye1B
— Clash Report (@clashreport) September 1, 2026

Bessent has given other statements this week advancing Bush-style “you are either with us or against us” talking points related to the Iran war. The Iran war this week reached the six-month mark, after White House officials initially repeatedly sought to ‘assure’ Americans it would be a four to six week operation.
All the way back in May, Trump rebuked a well-known NY Times reporter for a line of questioning that the president framed as “treasonous” coverage of the “victory” accomplished by the United States. “I had a total military victory. But the fake news, guys like you, write incorrectly. You’re a fake guy. We had a total military victory. I actually think it’s sort of treasonous what you write. You should be ashamed of yourself. I actually think it’s treason,” Trump had told David Sanger at the time aboard Air Force One.

“Never before has there been a case of the head of one state threatening civilian aircraft in the skies of another.”

• Russian Experts Respond To Zelensky’s Threats To Attack Civil Aviation (RT)

On the first day of September, Vladimir Zelensky declared that Russian civil aviation is under threat because of Ukrainian drone attacks.

Russian authorities and diplomats saw clear signs of terrorism in this barely concealed threat and stressed that this is not the first time Ukraine has demonstrated its commitment to the cruelest and most inhumane methods of warfare. Former president and current deputy chairman of Russia’s Security Council Dmitry Medvedev called for retribution and even hinted at strikes against the sponsors of this terrorism – the leaders of Western countries.
This article presents comments by leading Russian military and aviation experts, analysts, and publicists reacting to this latest escalation by Kiev.
Roman Gusarov, aviation expert, Editor-in-Chief of aviaru.net
Any sane person can interpret this only as a direct threat to civil aviation, to aircraft in the sky, and to ground infrastructure. This is simply beyond the pale. Never before has there been a case of the head of one state threatening civilian aircraft in the skies of another.
And here, unfortunately, what depresses me even more is the silence of Western public organizations and human rights groups. I am not even talking about aviation organizations like the International Civil Aviation Organization. Zelensky’s threat is a violation of all international conventions. There should have been an immediate reaction. These are threats to the safety of civilian flights. What more is needed? Yet there is no reaction at all. And in essence, this is silent consent. Or perhaps even approval. It is simply very sad.
The world has been turned upside down. Until recently, we could not even imagine that something like this could be said – and then met with silence. Still, behind such a statement I see not so much a real threat as a certain act of desperation. I believe that after a week of massive strikes on Ukraine’s infrastructure – its ports, energy facilities, storage depots, warehouses, and everything else – Zelensky is looking for at least some way to stop all of this, but can find no other means than to resort to direct threats and intimidation.
The purpose of this statement is not so much actual strikes and the possibility of carrying them out, as intimidation in the hope that foreign jurisdictions and airlines will be frightened and stop flying to Russia. In other words, the main target was not really Russia, but our partners, in order to provoke fear and a reaction from them.
Because if we look at the practical possibility of carrying out these plans, I do not see it. We have had massive raids, for example against the Moscow region, with more than a thousand drones in a single day. And here it does not matter whether they are flying to strike a particular airport or simply in the direction of Moscow. Our air defense system and our security system work preemptively, cleanly, and in coordination.
As soon as it becomes clear that drones are moving toward a given region – that is, once there is information from air defense systems – the airspace is immediately closed, all aircraft leave that air zone for alternate airfields. Aircraft do not take off, do not climb, airports are shut down. And during all the years of the Special Military Operation, thankfully, there has not been a single dangerous encounter between a civilian aircraft and a drone. Precisely because this system works. And it will continue to work in exactly the same way. Therefore, I do not see any particular danger here for aircraft in the air.
I do not rule out the possibility of deliberately damaging ground infrastructure, specifically strikes on airports. Theoretically, such a thing may be possible to carry out somehow. But hardly in the Moscow area, because it is completely secured – and that accounts for 80% of flights in the country, the lion’s share. Somewhere in the regions they may try to do something like that. But given that foreign airlines mostly fly to Moscow, I also do not see any reason for them to panic and cancel flights or stop operations.
Viktor Litovkin, retired colonel and military commentator
This can only be viewed as an act of state terrorism. When the towers in New York were struck in 2001, only afterward did we learn who had claimed responsibility. But this underdeveloped clown is announcing in advance that he and his clique will carry out terrorist acts against aviation flying over Russia and around the world. This is a serious statement that should, of course, attract the attention of the international community. I think Western countries will simply turn a deaf ear to all this, because they believe Zelensky and his accomplices are unlikely to dare carry out some strike that would harm Western companies.
But for Russian aircraft and other aircraft over Russia, this threat exists, and it can be countered in only one way – by destroying the criminal terrorist regime that exists in Kiev. There is no other way, because with terrorists the conversation is short: they must be exterminated like cockroaches, there can be no other outcome.
Western authorities aren’t interested in international law in this case – anything that is done against Russia, they will support all of it. They should remember that Russia is a nuclear power. This bear is very patient, very calm for the time being, and then suddenly it swings a paw – and half your head is gone. That is how a bear behaves when it is provoked. So if they continue – they may only have themselves to blame later.
Dmitry Kornev, military expert, founder of the Military Russia project
First of all: Zelensky says that the number of Ukrainian drones striking targets deep inside Russian territory will be so great that civilian air traffic will become impossible. That is, he is not speaking of striking civilian airfields, he is not speaking of striking civilian aircraft; he is speaking of such a high intensity of Ukrainian drone raids that, during such raids, civilian airports would cease operations and civilian air service across the entire European part of the Russian Federation would be shut down.
Question number one: where will Ukraine get so many drones to organize such a large-scale attack? It may well be that they have built up certain reserves. In the coming weeks we will see, we will find out whether that is the case or not. God willing, I may be wrong. The second point is that they may deliberately send drones specifically toward civilian airports so that the mere appearance of a drone would halt airport operations. In that case, for dozens of civilian airports in the European part of the country, Kiev could probably find dozens of drones. Unfortunately, this is possible.
Where do these drones even come from, given the systematic strikes by the Russian Aerospace Forces and missile troops against facilities on Ukrainian territory, including those linked to drone production? This can be explained in only one way: they have succeeded in creating such a distributed drone production system that knocking out individual or even dozens of facilities does not lead to the cessation of output. Theoretically this is possible – if they have learned to scale production across hundreds of production sites, then yes, it is expensive, yes, it entails additional costs, but it ensures the uninterrupted assembly of drones even if some links in that production chain are taken out.
It is quite likely that, if over several years we have not been able to destroy and stop drone production in Ukraine, then even massive strikes over several days or even weeks will not produce such a result. And one must understand that Kiev has been preparing for this; Kiev has been preparing for distributed production capable of withstanding prolonged Russian missile raids. Whether it works or not, we will find out in the coming weeks.

“The Russian Foreign Ministry emphasized that the quality of relations is already at an all-time low due to London’s conduct..”

• Moscow Has Stopped Calling Britain ‘Great.’ Here’s why (Alexander Bobrov)

Recently, Russian officials and state media have been deliberately using the toponym ‘Britain’ instead of ‘Great Britain’ and ‘United Kingdom’ to refer to the nation that, just a few decades ago, was known as ‘the empire on which the sun never sets’. Speaking at a press conference dedicated to reviewing the results of Russian diplomacy in 2025, Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov commented on this rhetorical innovation. “No offense meant, but I think that this is what it should be called, because Great Britain is the only example when a country calls itself great. Another example was the Great Libyan Jamahiriya, but that country is no more,” Lavrov said.

Although the prefix ‘great’ was not originally intended as a symbol of significance, but was adopted for geographical reasons – to distinguish the nation of Britain from the French region of Brittany – it is clear that the choice of wording is not simply a diplomatic ploy reflecting the subjective opinion of the Russian Foreign Ministry, but a paradigmatic shift in Russia’s perception of the country.
Taking into account the completion of the diplomatic mission of Russian Ambassador to the UK Andrei Kelin and the lack of an immediate successor, the Times has spread rumors about a possible downgrade in diplomatic relations between Moscow and London. The Russian Foreign Ministry emphasized that the quality of relations is already at an all-time low due to London’s conduct, and British Ambassador to Russia Nigel Casey expressed hope for the current status quo to be maintained; however, it is absolutely clear that the dialogue between the two nuclear powers is on the brink of collapse.
A possible downgrade in diplomatic relations doesn’t simply mean recalling the ambassador and entrusting the mission to a lower-ranking diplomat known as ‘chargé d’affaires’; it is a calculated political signal of dissatisfaction with the foreign policy of the other side that reduces relations to a bare minimum. Worse still, this could be followed by a complete rupture of diplomatic relations, which typically occurs at the start of a direct military confrontation.
Therefore, to understand whether a further deterioration of the situation, fraught with the most serious consequences for global politics, should be expected, it seems logical to ask two classic questions found in both British and Russian literature: “Who is to blame?” and “What is to be done?”
“Who is to blame?” Back in the mid-19th century, British Prime Minister and Foreign Secretary Lord Palmerston, attempting to convey the idea that the country’s foreign policy should be based not on personal sympathies but on the cynical defense of its own national interests, formulated London’s subsequent foreign policy doctrine, “We have no eternal allies, and we have no perpetual enemies. Our interests are eternal and perpetual, and those interests it is our duty to follow.” This formula most accurately captures the essence of British policy in regard to Russia.
Despite ad hoc agreements between the two countries in the 16th century (e.g., Richard Chancellor’s expedition in 1553) and a military alliance during the First and Second World Wars (the Northern Convoys are usually considered the apogee of this military brotherhood), relations between the two countries were never truly allied, as the British monarchy viewed Russia (regardless of its political system) as a geopolitical adversary. This sentiment was reflected in the popular Russian saying, “The Englishwoman is up to no good!”
At the time of the Russian Empire, Great Britain was the leading world power, and was responsible for assembling a hostile anti-Russia coalition during the Crimean War (1853-1855) and systematically pursuing a policy of weakening Russian influence in Central Asia (which birthed the geopolitical term ‘The Great Game’). In the period between the Russian revolutions of 1905 and 1917, London did everything in its power to deepen the political crisis in Russia.
First, King George V refused to fulfill the request of his relative, Nicholas II, for political asylum, which resulted in the execution of the Russian royal family; and then he took a direct part in the military intervention during the Russian Civil War. As a result, British forces were present in various corners of Russia: in the north (Murmansk and Arkhangelsk), in the Black Sea region (Odessa, Crimea, and Novorossiysk), in the Caucasus (from Batumi to Baku), and even in Central Asia (in Turkmenistan and along the Central Asian Railway).
Finally, during the Soviet era, then-British Prime Minister Winston Churchill delivered his famous Fulton Speech, marking the beginning of the Cold War following his government’s failure to implement Operation Unthinkable, which envisioned a massive attack on the Soviet armed forces.
It’s hardly surprising that today, London plays a key role in supporting Ukraine in its quest to inflict a so-called ‘strategic defeat’ on Russia. Having signed a critical minerals agreement with Ukraine and acting as the informal leader of the so-called Coalition of the Willing, the British authorities are doing everything they can to prevent reconciliation between Kiev and Moscow. They have the simple goal of ensuring that Ukraine continues to serve as a springboard for attacks on Russia, enabling the UK to rapidly militarize its own economy and rearm in preparation for a future military conflict.
It would suffice to recall how in April 2022, then-British Prime Minister Boris Johnson called on Russia to withdraw its troops from Kiev, giving Ukraine’s Vladimir Zelensky the opportunity to both preserve his shaky power and regroup forces with the goal of transforming the Special Military Operation into a protracted military conflict. Current British Prime Minister Andy Burnham continues his predecessor’s work.
Despite initially promising to focus on resolving the country’s many domestic problems, he is spending his time and money lobbying for more military aid for Kiev and coordinating the illegal detention of the vessels of the so-called ‘shadow fleet’ in international waters.

Trump likes the British Royals.

• President Trump Was Just Asked About Harry and Meghan (Victoria Taft)

President Donald Trump says that he, for one, is “happy” that the boorish Prince Harry and Meghan self-deported from the United States, at least temporarily. The Duke and Duchess of Sussex fled California to put their children in proper British schools where children learn things about Western Civilization — and how to count.

The two, who quit the royal family, were loaned a Cotswold manse by a British billionaire hedge fund manager who’s been a friend of both Prince William and Harry for years. Ian Wace’s financial help is why Harry and Meghan didn’t have to give up their Montecito manse or their Portugal vacation home when they wanted a house to live in while they came back to Britain.
Of course, Harry and Meghan were gifted a royal house, Frogmore Cottage, by the Queen when they were first married, but they gave it up when they quit working for the royal family. Had they stayed in The Firm, as the royals call the family business, they would have had a house and free schooling, and would have been earning money from a titled property by now, but oh, well.
During an Oval Office gaggle, the president, who might have Iran, the bond market, and more important things on his mind, was asked by a British reporter about the Sussexes leaving the States. Without hesitation, President Trump blurted out, “I’m happy about it! I was NOT a fan.”

President Trump said Wednesday he is "not a fan" of Prince Harry and his wife, Meghan, Duchess of Sussex, and that he's "happy" the pair left the United States to return to the U.K.

"I thought they treated the royal family with great disrespect," Trump said. "I didn't like it.… pic.twitter.com/2dy7q2mYx4
— CBS News (@CBSNews) September 2, 2026

Trump and Harry and Meghan have traded barbs before. In fact, the Sussexes indicated that Trump was one of the reasons they were leaving the U.S., but nobody actually believes that after they chose to jump back into public life in Britain, which they previously found too daunting.
But even people with titles must bow to Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs. A girl’s gotta eat, you know. The president said of the two royal ingrates that “They treated the royal family with great disrespect. I didn’t like it. I didn’t like the way she acted.” He wasn’t done yet, however, because he’s Donald Trump and can’t stop himself. “I have a very good relationship with the Queen. Really good,” he said.
“I have a really good relationship with King Charles — when he was Prince Charles and King Charles,” he continued. “I’ve known him for a very long time. Great guy.” Only Donald Trump can characterize a monarch by talking about what a “great guy” he is. But here was the kill shot, as only Trump could deliver it. “I thought she was terribly disrespectful to the Queen, to King Charles. I don’t know. Maybe I’m different. I wouldn’t have taken them back,” he said.
It’s unclear and probably unlikely that the royal family has “taken them back.” The royals have as little to do with the messy Sussexes as possible. Harry and Meghan have spilled tea about the family — some of it may actually be true — and burned bridges via their Oprah interview and Harry’s memoir. They’ve proven to be untrustworthy and grifting. They’ve been cut off.
In July, however, Harry and Meghan visited King Charles at Highgrove, which is in the Cotswolds, when they were in the neighborhood, staying at their billionaire buddy’s house. It could be their final family trip with the royals. Charles has an unknown form of cancer, and he’s getting his affairs in order. And the guy who will succeed to the throne is completely disgusted by his brother’s antics. I predict the Sussexes will sell their Montecito house in the next year or so, and Meghan will have begun doing her lifestyle brand videos and TV shows from her Cotswolds estate.

No more US-Canada?

• USMCA Termination Announcement Looming? (CTH)

For those waiting patiently for the USMCA termination announcement, this is a potential indication and/or signal of pendency. When President Trump and USTR Jamieson Greer send the official notification, a six-month countdown clock begins running. As of right now there are no official statements that indicate the likely triggering, it’s a guess. However, there are datapoints aligning in that direction.

No one outside our assembly has contemplated the termination of the USMCA (CUSMA) or what would occur in the aftermath; however, the Bank of Canada has gamed out the financial consequences, briefly in their forward guidance. The ramifications are significant, perhaps more significant than any other global trade announcement. […] “it more likely that a new shock or a combination of shocks could cause several vulnerabilities to crystalize at once. If this were to happen, these vulnerabilities could interact and reinforce each other.
A cascading series of events could cause a sharp loss of investor confidence and lead to a spike in demand for liquidity or rapid asset sales. Funding markets could come under pressure, and stress could spread more broadly.” I suggest we keep a close eye on all U.S-Mexico discussions, as well as geopolitical leverage points that might surface in the U.S-Mexico relationship. My best guess is that once the U.S. and Mexico come to renewed terms on the ‘USMCA’ as a potential bilateral free trade agreement, that will be the moment when the planets are aligned for the termination notification.
The financial markets in Canada are tied directly to the independent strength of the Canadian economy. Which is to say, the financial system in Canada is dependent on historic ties to the United States. Pull out all of the dependencies within the economy, a result of a fracturing of the “geopolitical relationship,” and suddenly the Bank of Canada faces a “cascading series of events” they have not previously had to entertain.
A significant number of multinational corporations within Canada are geographically centered due to American proximity and the dependency that has historically been considered a partnership. That relationship has now changed, and despite Mark Carney saying that Canada can be stronger standing alone, there is no economic model for Canada to retain its wealth position without the inherent subsidy that proximity to America provides.
There is no ‘partnership’ with Europe and/or China, or a combination of partnerships, that can replace the one-way nature of the subsidies from the U.S. economy that Canada enjoys. If the Canadian people, workers and companies therein, have to rely on their own domestic economic activity to fund their GDP, their lifestyle will have to modify in very significant ways. Now, I want you to think about the Bank of Canada’s previous statement against the backdrop of this announcement yesterday:
The Dutch central bank (DNB) has transferred approximately 86 metric tons of gold out of the U.S. and Canada to the U.K., seeking to shore up its contingency planning in view of “increasing geopolitical unrest.”Just over one-quarter of the central bank’s gold reserves held in New York and Ottawa had been shifted to London between March and August, DNB said Wednesday.
Prepare your affairs accordingly.

Paul Craig Roberts

• Multiculturalism, Diversity and the Destruction of Western Civilization (PCR)

Multiculturalism’s advocates present their agenda in terms of enhancing diversity. By diversity they mean more variety, not what the DEI advocates mean by the word–replacement of merit by some definition of privilege, such as race, gender, sexual preference.

The goal of multiculturalism is miscegenation. The result is the disappearance of diversity into a mixture born naked of a history, mores, a language, and a religion. The abstract universalism of multiculturalism is at odds with the multifaceted reality of different cultures. A people are rooted in an original genus. There is a common soul that endures, and whatever the adaption through time, there is continuity. A common history, beliefs, language unites them. Many peoples means much diversity. Miscegenation destroys diversity. In its place are new people without a history.
The agenda of miscegenation has been institutionalized in corporate advertising, in entertainment, and in literature. White women are shown with black men. White men are shown with Asian and Hispanic women. What are the children?
Continuity, a sense of connectedness, is essential to society and to human happiness. Americans have expressed unease, sadness, and a sense of violation when returning to hometowns to find them occupied territories, inhabited by people of whom they know nothing. The same sense of loss is felt when returning to grandparents’ farm where one spent summers playing in creeks and picking blackberries, scuppernongs and muscadines and finding in its place a subdivision.
The same kinds of sadness and sense of loss has been brought to us by the white liberals’ social engineering schemes. Congressional authority has been eroded by being turned over to regulatory agencies who in turn are in the hands of the corporate interests they are supposed to regulate. Constitutional protections have been lost in pursuit of liberal “good intentioned” agendas and “national security.” American sovereignty has been compromised by international agreements serving utopian or misguided agendas or simply serving monied interests.
Moral character has been lowered by the acceptance of pornography, sexual perversion, coarse language replete with the F-word even among young girls. Older women report that one consequence of feminism is that today dating and marriage is not what it used to be, but about finding a sexual partner who delivers orgasms. People no longer have any pride in their appearance and appear in public dressed in ways that would have embarrassed their forebears. Over my life I have seen America’s goodness shrivel. What is claimed as progress is often at the expense of the Constitution. Child Protective Services, which did not exist during my earlier decades, has substituted itself for parental authority. Twelve-year old American girls are on contraceptive pills.
We can say that technology has brought degeneracy, which would be an admission that technology is the enemy of moral conscience, which in some ways it is. Today’s AI technology is eliminating human interaction. Imagine the sense of loss of connectivity and alienation that comes from having to converse with robotic voices with whom no empathy and no understanding can be established.
As a longtime friend of libertarianism because of its defense of liberty, and a longtime defender of capitalism because of its former efficiency in allocating resources, I acknowledge that the pursuit of profit has produced an anti-human technology that will aid and abet Multicultural severance of peoples from their roots and leave a rootless undefined mass in place of human societies. The AI technology is alien to human society. It is being imposed on us by fools who believe that their profits will rise by eliminating human labor. The fools need to ask themselves who among the unemployed whose labor is not needed is going to buy the products of their machines?
This question is not being asked, just as the question where are the better jobs that allegedly took the place of US manufacturing jobs. Academic economists are too occupied debating the properties of abstract models to even notice. The important question is: Who is looking at the cost of an anti-human technology, of the cost of humans living in a world in which they have no purpose? Another question: How did short-term greed–the next quarter’s profits–take over the economic organization of the American economy? What an enormous failure this indicates of our leaders’ inability to think beyond the next quarter’s profits.
The same failure permeates our political theorists, sociologists, philosophers. Why is American society content to be dominated by an anti-human technology such as AI? Anyone inclined to investigate such a question would not be able to get funding. Just as the US government is unable to extricate itself from its illegal, immoral assistance to Israel’s war against Iran and the Muslim Middle East, it is unable to contain an anti-human technology that is substituting robotic for human contact. Several years ago we already had Japanese men marrying their robotic sex dolls.
Today history is taught as white ethnicities oppressing peoples of color. It was once taught as the formation of a people, their development, the evolution of their language and beliefs that made them a people, their successes and failures, their rise and fall, their contributions to the continuing rise of humanity out of barbarism. Today the Western world descends into a barbarism ever more honored by Trump, the NY Times, CNN, NPR, and morally corrupt political parties throughout the once civilized Western world. Formerly “civilized” had a large meaning. Today it means nothing but a high technology society, regardless of whether it is civilized.
As I watch the totality of Western Civilization’s collapse, I am thankful that at my age I will not have to experience the final collapse as did, in The Camp of the Saints, the elderly French professor Calgues, as he watched the arrival of one million Indians in decrepit ships approach the undefended Mediterranean coast of France. Collapse can come from within as well as from outside. Western civilization is undergoing both kinds of collapse. To discuss it is considered racist.

“Congressional Democrats blocked an effort to introduce a constitutional amendment to bar the Court’s expansion, with many members reiterating their demand to pack the Court to create an instant liberal majority.”

• Democrats Seek to Reform Institution More Popular Than They Are (Turley)

Supreme Irony: The Democrats insisted the Court is broken and no longer legitimate because of partisan rulings they want reversed by a packed Court. Ironically, the vote came with the release of the latest Harvard-Harris polling showing that Congress itself is still the least respected institution, while the Supreme Court holds higher approval than either the White House or Congress. Congress is still wallowing at 34 percent approval among the American people. Both parties are equally disliked, with 55% disapproval of the GOP and 53% disapproval of the Democratic Party.

Conversely, the Supreme Court continues to enjoy far greater approval from the public, currently at 49% at “very favorable” or “favorable.” So which institution is being targeted for elimination or radical reform? Of course, it is the more popular Supreme Court. Packing the court and other measures are unpopular with the public. Instead, Democrats hope to achieve these reforms through legislation. However, it must then pass judicial review.
Liberal professors and pundits have identified a court takeover as essential to, as one law professor put it, guaranteeing that the Democrats never lose another national election. As former Attorney General Eric Holder and Democratic strategist James Carville have made clear, it is about power and guaranteeing its retention.
There are now calls for a litmus test for Democratic candidates to pack the Court or get the sack. Rep. James Clyburn (D-SC) wants to take over the Court to reverse rulings against racial gerrymandering while other Democrats have demanded packing the Court to reverse immigration rulings. They join a growing list of figures demanding the hostile takeover of the Court from Kamala Harris to Pete Buttigieg.
At its base is a fundamental misunderstanding of the Court’s role. Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) not only renewed her previous call to pack the court but said the court was illegitimate for rendering decisions against “widely held public opinion.” However, the court was meant to be counter-majoritarian to protect minority groups and viewpoints from the majority will. Notably, this effort is not even popular with the majority. It is a power play to force major institutional changes through Congress, including radically changing a Court that is more popular than Congress itself.

“The democratic socialist approach relies on one central idea: tearing down all the nation’s existing institutions and replacing them with a system that eliminates inequality by redistributing wealth and status.”

• Democratic Socialism: A Limited Appeal to Voters (Karnick)

The defeat of Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) member Francesca Hong in Wisconsin’s Democratic primary arrives as good news for the vast majority of Americans who are not among the DSA’s 120,000 members. It was, however, a very close race. Milwaukee County Executive David Crowley, who was endorsed by Gov. Tony Evers (a fellow Democrat), received 39.8 percent of the vote, to Hong’s 39.3 percent. Hong was a weak candidate and a poor standard-bearer for the DSA agenda, possessing none of the charisma and political talent of DSA superstar New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani.

Hong’s charisma shortage limited her appeal to voters and led to the refusal of prominent DSA favorites Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) to endorse her. The missing endorsements were probably dispositive in such a close race. I think Hong’s failure to get past the post in the Democrat primary illustrates a greater problem for the collectivist “democratic socialist” movement. The democratic socialist approach relies on one central idea: tearing down all the nation’s existing institutions and replacing them with a system that eliminates inequality by redistributing wealth and status to those who have allegedly been unfairly denied these things.
The movement necessarily relies on coercion, which it justifies through the fomenting of grievances against anyone who can be characterized as having done well for themselves under what the democratic socialists characterize as a fundamentally corrupt society built on racism, sexism, classism, imperialism, and other cruel isms that toxically masculine Euro-trash imposed on stolen land originally occupied by noble, ecologically conscious people of peace and universal benevolence who were cruelly eliminated by massacres, deliberately infected smallpox blankets, and truly awful real estate swindles.
Armed with the premise that freedom is the root cause of people’s suffering today and always, and intent on imposing universal equality (except for themselves, the pigs who are always more equal than others), the democratic socialists’ progressive predecessors (whom the media laughably call moderates) imposed collectivist remedies that inevitably backfired, making conditions steadily worse for decades.
High crime rates, mass homelessness, unaffordable housing, single-parent households, education decline, increasing economic inequality, and the like have all been caused by government policies ostensibly intended to help the needy. The proponents of these disastrous measures then use the increasingly dire resulting conditions to call for more power for themselves to solve the problems they created.
To deflect attention from their own culpability for these evils, the politicians and the media place the blame on people not on their team, such as “the wealthy.” They isolate and demonize these alleged enemies of all that is good and right, to delegitimize their unpleasant, embarrassing questions about causes and effects. That is how leftist politicians thrive even though their proposed solutions make things much worse. The greater the decline in economic and social conditions, the more blame and hatred they can heap on the out groups.
There is, however, an obvious problem with this type of scapegoating. If the out groups you are demonizing are too big, you won’t be able to gain a political majority, even with the help of a lot of cheating. Clearly, that is the real reason the DSA bigwigs refused to support Hong’s candidacy. In addition to calling for eliminating all police and prisons and claiming that “Police exist to uphold white supremacy,” Hong has a long history of Twitter/X statements targeting white people and “whiteness,” especially “old white dudes.”
Most notoriously, Hong wrote in 2019 of leaving a beloved Wisconsin fast-food restaurant because she was “on the verge of a [sic] anxiety attack” due to the presence of “to [sic] many old white people who didn’t think we spoke English.”
Four out of five people living in Wisconsin are white. The median age in the state is 40, above the national average, and 18.5 percent of Wisconsinites are 65 or older. Sixty-one percent self-identify as Christians. Donald Trump won the state’s presidential race with 49.6 percent of the vote in 2024. Just under half of Wisconsin’s population is male, of course. That is a lot of people to eliminate from your potential election coalition.
Hong’s defeat thus indicates a fundamental weakness of the DSA’s strategy and of collectivism in general. The necessary demonization of opponents eliminates ever-greater numbers of potential supporters. The party’s tent shrinks steadily as the list of scapegoated out-groups lengthens. This can work in places such as New York City and Chicago, at least for a while, as there are enough self-described victims (many of them very wealthy) to create majorities. In less-cosmopolitan locales like Wisconsin, aspiring autocrats must be much more careful about which voting groups they are willing to put publicly on the chopping block.
If DSA-affiliated candidates in those places speak too openly about their obsessions, their excessive zeal and candor could reduce the movement’s appeal significantly below its outlier status.It seems undeniable that the DSA and its political sympathizers agree with Hong on the issues. Where they evidently differ deeply is on the political viability of their agenda when its innate hostility to the great majority of Americans is honestly presented.
Clearly, leaders on the left believe concealment of the movement’s real foundations and extensive hatreds is far more important than the very small policy distance between Hong and Crowley. Similarly, suppression of the truth about democratic socialism is the obvious reason behind Ocasio-Cortez’s recent attempt to pretend she now believes “Woke One was crazy.” It’s all part of a strategy of hiding the full extent of the democratic socialists’ enemies list, not any change of policy, ideology, or the targets of their ire.

“..we are in a modern medieval world.”

• The Left Is Dragging America Back to the Dark Ages (Victor Davis Hanson)

The more you look around us today, I think a good description of 2026, culturally, economically, socially, politically, is that we are in a modern medieval world.

Maybe we’re progressive regressives, and I don’t mean that just in the sense that progressives are regressive, and they are, but that one part of our society is advancing at lightning speed to the future and progressing. But the other part is regressing, and regressing at a phenomenal pace back to what I would call the medieval period.
Remember, the medieval period was roughly that area in time after the fall of the Roman Empire in the West, roughly AD 500 to around AD 1300 to 1400, the beginning of the Italian Renaissance. In medievalism, we often talk about primitivism after the destruction of the classical world during the Dark Ages, the early medieval period, and it’s characterized by epidemics, bubonic plague, typhus, typhoid, smallpox, terrible sanitation in urban centers. They had forgotten the Roman use of sewage and aqueducts.

There were open borders. National states popped up that couldn’t defend themselves, so you saw castles and walls pop up all over the European countryside in a way you had not during the Roman period. In cities, they were walled, towns even, and the gates closed at dusk to prevent gratuitous crime.
But at the same time that this was happening, you had some of the greatest works of literature in the Western world. You had Chaucer’s “Canterbury Tales,” Dante’s “Inferno,” St. Thomas Aquinas’ “Summa Theologica.” And if you look at the architectural expertise and scientific knowledge of architecture, it was progressing at a geometric rate when you look at the huge cathedrals at Seville or Cologne.
I should remind everybody that around 536, Santa Sofia was created, the Church of the Holy Wisdom in Constantinople. It would be the largest church in Christendom for a thousand years. And everything from the mass production of crossbows to eyeglasses was a product of the medieval period, even if, as I said, the daily lives of most people were wretched.
Now let’s switch to the modern period. All of us now can call anywhere in the world in seconds on our iPhones. Anything you want to know, past, present, future, you can just get on a cheap computer and ask an artificial intelligence program from the many free platforms. You can watch movies, you can watch entertainment on satellites. Anything you want is at your fingertips.
The nation itself is exploring space. We’re getting close to conquering cancer. I can attest to that. Computers allow you to write without even speaking. You can, unfortunately, compose a whole term paper or a book with AI. You can make a movie with AI.
Yet at the same time that’s happening, look at what’s going on in Berkeley here in California or Los Angeles. We’re seeing outbreaks of medieval diseases that we thought had been conquered years ago, given our sophisticated knowledge of sewage and water treatment. We had a typhus breakout in Los Angeles. We had leptospirosis, a rat disease, in Berkeley. You look at the homeless camps all over our major cities. People are just out in the open fornicating, urinating, defecating, injecting drugs. There’s tons of feces that has to be removed, and it’s so strange in this modern medievalism.
We have sophisticated researchers who go into a hospital in Chicago or go to a cancer center in San Francisco and have to check the bottoms of their shoes to make sure they don’t have feces as they go into their space-age laboratories. It’s really funny. In the medieval period, public hangings and beheadings were sort of public events that people flocked out to see. Is that any different than our glorification of murderers?
And there is a difference. Luigi Mangione, they named an opera after him in California. The killer of Charlie Kirk brought people jubilation. I won’t even get into Lindsay Clancy, who strangled her three children and became every woman to the feminist left. At least in the medieval period, they knew that the murderer had done something wrong and was being punished. In the post-medieval period, we are glorifying that murderer, and that’s really striking.
And so, what I’m getting at is we are the most regulated, the most advanced, the most modern, the most scientific society in history, even as we can’t solve problems that were solvable, and the medieval period would have died to know the solutions that we have in our hands to make sure we have clean water, to make sure there is no crime, to make sure there is no disease, to make sure that people don’t defecate on the street. But we don’t do it. We willingly don’t do it.
Now, the question to finish is why? We have an elite that has embraced a very toxic ideology throughout history, and that is mandated, government-sanctioned equality of result. And they have divided, therefore, to further that ideology, the world into victims and victimizers, an arbitrary classification, sometimes based on class, but increasingly on race.
And once they identify someone as a victim who’s not responsible for his plight, then it’s the duty of the society to allow him to express himself. If you have a lot of teenagers who want to loot a jewelry store, then you say they were hungry and they needed food. If you see homeless people living on the street, then it was because of something the majority culture did to them. And the result of that is when people engage in very dangerous antisocial behavior, an elite will tell the rest of us that they’re not subject to law enforcement or they’re not subject to the laws that apply to the rest of us. But there are two really pernicious addenda here.
No. 1, the people who do this on the left, who believe in this mandated equality and a binary of victim and victimizer, are never subject to the consequences of their own ideology. Nancy Pelosi‘s home is not surrounded by homeless people. Jane Fonda doesn’t have to trip over people injecting drugs when she walks outside her door. The Hollywood stars in Malibu who champion the homeless have very clear security. You can’t get near their homes.
In other words, we, the lab rats, are those upon whom they experiment. And there’s another reason as well. It’s not just that they experiment on us. and this ideology is not applicable to itself, but more importantly, they believe that they are morally superior because most of them are agnostics or atheists. They have lost their God, but they have found it in a post-Enlightenment caring, abstract though it may be, for victims.
And when you put this religious element to it, because it makes no sense to allow medieval diseases and medievalism to dominate your cities in crime, filth and homelessness, but they do it. They feel morally superior, and it gives them meaning in their life in a way that we, the majority, find not morally superior, but morally repugnant.

Why Cybercab is always spotless, fresh… and never smells like a typical Uber?
pic.twitter.com/LRaN2wmhfW
— X Freeze (@XFreeze) September 3, 2026

I am not exaggerating, there are Unsupervised Cybercabs without steering wheels or pedals all over Austin, TX right now at almost every corner.

It is SO BEAUTIFUL on the road. The glossy gold (first time seeing it) is stunning in the sun. I also LOVE how massive the wheels… pic.twitter.com/qlaZKT7m9M
— Nic Cruz Patane (@niccruzpatane) September 2, 2026

Elon Musk runs Tesla, SpaceX and xAI. He says work is becoming optional and money is becoming irrelevant, both inside twenty years.

In a clip aired on CBN, he laid out 6 predictions about what comes next:

1) Long term means 10 to 20 years https://t.co/dOhCmOoyCH pic.twitter.com/eQ88mmBId3
— Genius Thinking (@GeniusGTX) September 3, 2026

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

Debt Rattle August 27 2026

Aug 272026

August 27, 2026 Posted by Raúl Ilargi Meijer at 9:00 am Finance Tagged with: Canada, data center, Dolly Parton, Groundhog Day, Meta, Ratcliffe, Ukraine, Zelensky 46 Responses »

Pablo Picasso Self portrait with palette 1906

• Hormuz And The Law Of Diminishing Returns: When Leverage Burns (ET)

• Talk of Ukrainian Victory Like ‘Groundhog Day’ – ex-US Official (RT)

• Ukraine Is Definitely Losing In Conflict — Kremlin (TASS)

• EU Buries Plan To Steal Russian Assets For Ukraine – EurActiv (RT)

• Ukraine a Western-Backed ‘Zelensky Concentration Camp’ – Moscow (RT)

• Zelensky Continues To Oppose Wartime Democracy (Weeks)

• CIA Director John Ratcliffe Visited Moscow (CTH)

• White House Press Release: “Ending Canada’s Free Ride” (CTH)

• Canada Trade Minister LeBlanc Makes Mark Carney Look Like an Idiot (CTH)

• China’s Data Center Psyop and the 100,000% Rounding Error (Stephen Green)

• Remembering Dolly Through the Song I Loved First (Chris Queen)

• Meta’s $18bn Reckoning For Social Media On Child Safety (BBC)

• James Carville Releases His Signature Uncut Product (Turley)

https://twitter.com/AdamMoczar/status/2092357395536359572?s=20 https://twitter.com/BasilTheGreat/status/2092526537526374759?s=20 https://twitter.com/NaomiSeibt/status/2092292533137101071?s=20

'Europeans now pay 8.6 (!) times more for natural gas than Americans' https://t.co/8l0k7OWh6i
— Willem Middelkoop (@wmiddelkoop) August 26, 2026

President Trump Says He would Sign an Act to BAN Sharia Law in America.

"I would absolutely prohibit the Sharia law thing and it is happening in this country a little bit and when we see it, we take it out and you have to take it out."

Sharia law is not compatible with… pic.twitter.com/VG4b7TEyc8
— Benny Johnson (@bennyjohnson) August 26, 2026

“The story of Iranian success and American failure fit expectations many already held. Contradictory evidence produced cognitive dissonance.”

• Hormuz And The Law Of Diminishing Returns: When Leverage Burns (ET)

For months, the assumption that the Strait of Hormuz was Tehran’s ultimate card dominated commentary on the war.

As a narrow waterway through which roughly one-fifth of the world’s oil and a substantial share of liquefied natural gas had historically passed, it appeared to be a chokepoint Iran could close or severely disrupt at will. It did not need to destroy every tanker. Hitting a small percentage with drones, cruise missiles, speedboats, or mines would spike insurance rates, deter crews and companies, and effectively shut the strait without continuous physical control.
This idea was not new for 2026. It had long been a feature of the Iranian strategic posture, treated as both a military instrument and a political myth-proof that even under pressure Tehran retained a decisive lever over the global energy system. Parts of the Western media and independent analysts amplified the same narrative.Relying on incomplete open-source shipping data, especially once vessels began sailing dark, many concluded that the United States had been caught unprepared and lacked a realistic path to reopen the waterway. Hormuz, they argued, was effectively closed or closable at Iran’s discretion. That framing was powerful, but also incomplete.
How the Threat Has Been Eroded
The assumption that Iran’s detection and targeting system could not be dismantled without dramatic escalation proved wrong. Under the U.S. Central Command, also known as CENTCOM, and with significant involvement from the Fifth Fleet and Air Force components, the United States ran a sustained effort to degrade the sensors Iran needed to find and hit ships. Iran relied on mobile truck-mounted radars, drones, cruise missiles, Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) speedboats, and naval mines. Inside the narrow strait, ships move in relatively predictable lanes. Iran combined active radars with passive electro-optical and infrared cameras on elevated terrain and islands such as Qeshm, Larak, and Abu Musa.
Mobile radars would radiate briefly to locate shipping, then shut down and move before anti-radiation missiles could arrive. Once a ship’s approximate position was known, strike systems could be sent to search. The vulnerability was that every radar emission could be detected. American aircraft responded systematically with anti-radiation missiles while visual and intelligence efforts located the passive sensors. This was the core of what some involved called “draining the swamp.” Iran had redundancy, but the number of sensors was finite. Hundreds of precision strikes gradually reduced Iran’s ability to see traffic in the strait. As the detection layer thinned, the effectiveness of the strike systems declined with it.
Parallel efforts neutralized mines with unmanned vessels and declared the southern lane near Oman largely clear. Convoys moved under escort, often at night with the automated information system (AIS) off. Arleigh Burke-class destroyers with Aegis radars and standard missile (SM)-family interceptors formed the backbone; drones and Apache helicopters armed with laser-guided rockets provided additional cover. American ships also engaged IRGC speedboats that closed on the convoys.
On the commercial side, the United States addressed insurance barriers. In early March, President Donald Trump directed the U.S. International Development Finance Corporation (DFC) to provide political risk insurance and guarantees for maritime trade. The DFC, working with the Treasury and CENTCOM, established a revolving reinsurance facility of roughly $20 billion-later expanded with private partners including Chubb-focused on hull, machinery, and cargo cover. Early uptake was limited. As Iranian success rates fell, more vessels joined.
Results have been significant. CENTCOM has reported assisting well over a thousand commercial vessels and moving hundreds of millions of barrels since the spring. Independent trackers often showed lower numbers because much of the traffic sailed dark. Pre-war throughput was 20 million to 21 million barrels per day. Flows through Hormuz remain below that, but combined with the Abu Dhabi-Fujairah pipeline and Saudi Arabia’s pipeline to Yanbu in the Red Sea, volumes recovered enough to keep oil prices in the $85 to $95 range-elevated, but far from the predicted catastrophe.
Not Seeing the True Picture
Public data lagged for both technical and psychological reasons. Ships that went dark during transit normally turned their AIS trackers back on afterward, so theoretically they could have been tracked and counted, yet matching was imperfect amid overlapping night movements, incomplete satellite reception, intermittent signals, and ship-to-ship transfers. Commercial trackers attempt corrections using imagery and other data, but confidence thresholds still produce undercounts relative to what escorting forces could see.
There was also a narrative reason. The story of Iranian success and American failure fit expectations many already held. Contradictory evidence produced cognitive dissonance. The common response was to protect the original frame-by applying greater skepticism to inconvenient details and treating quieter progress as temporary. In a contested information environment, narratives that confirm prior expectations often outlast those that require revision.

“..Fyodorov stated in particular, “it seems that we are gradually, slowly, losing [in the conflict].”

• Ukraine Is Definitely Losing In Conflict — Kremlin (TASS)

Dmitry Peskov

The dynamics at the frontline clearly show that Ukraine is losing the conflict, Russian Presidential Spokesman Dmitry Peskov said on Wednesday. “The fact that Ukraine is losing the conflict is unequivocal and the dynamics in all frontline areas clearly demonstrate this,” Peskov said at a press briefing. His statement comes after Ukrainian ex-Defense Minister Mikhail Fyodorov’s interview with Reuters on Tuesday. Fyodorov stated in particular, “it seems that we are gradually, slowly, losing [in the conflict].”.

“.. it is the same cycle of promise and despair, promise and failure that, again, has done nothing but cost the lives of both Russian and Ukrainian men and increasingly women,”

• Talk of Ukrainian Victory Like ‘Groundhog Day’ – ex-US Official (RT)

Steve Gill

Repeated claims that Ukraine is about to turn the tide against Russia and achieve a military victory are like being trapped in a time loop, a former White House official has told RT. The latest wave of media reports predicting a breakthrough in Kiev’s military campaign came on the heels of an escalation in Ukrainian long-range drone strikes on Russian oil refineries, retail warehouses, and cargo ships. Ukrainian officials claimed the attacks would pressure Moscow into accepting Kiev’s terms for a peace settlement.

Russia instead intensified its own strikes, virtually paralyzing crucial Ukrainian trade through Black Sea ports and inflicting other damage. On Sunday, President Vladimir Putin said Kiev was the one that “opened Pandora’s box.” “I feel like the old American movie ‘Groundhog Day’,” conservative media host Steve Gill, who served in the office of the US Trade Representative under Presidents George H. W. Bush and Bill Clinton, told RT.
“How many times do we have to hear, ‘oh, it’s the spring offensive, the fall offensive, the summer offensive, the winter offensive that is going to win things for Ukraine? And it is the same cycle of promise and despair, promise and failure that, again, has done nothing but cost the lives of both Russian and Ukrainian men and increasingly women,” he added. Gill also suggested that Ukrainians who want to end the hostilities are in no position to do so because the country does not determine its own foreign policy.
“The ones who are making the decisions in Western Europe – and some in the United States, some who have the ear of President [Donald] Trump – are feeding misinformation and disinformation both through media and through the policymakers that is continuing the violence, continuing the death, and continuing this folly of Ukraine thinking that they’re somehow winning on the battlefield when nothing could be further from the truth,” he explained.

“Obstacles to Brussels’ plan – including Belgium’s fierce opposition – remain the same ..”

• EU Buries Plan To Steal Russian Assets For Ukraine – EurActiv (RT)

The EU is highly reluctant to revive plans to steal more than $200 billion in frozen Russian sovereign reserves and hand them over to cash-strapped Ukraine, EurActiv reported on Tuesday, citing sources.

On Monday, European leaders flocked to Kiev in a show of solidarity for Ukraine, which marked its 35th Independence Day, but the talks quickly turned to the country’s numerous issues, including a substantial budgetary deficit. Ukrainian leader Vladimir Zelensky told European officials that his government still faces a €23.5 billion ($27.4 billion) shortfall on top of EU funding already promised and urged Brussels to accelerate the next instalment of its €90 billion support loan.
According to EurActiv, while the EU’s attention once again pivoted to the idea of confiscating around €210 billion of Russian funds immobilized in EU institutions, mostly in the Belgian-based Euroclear, “there is little sign the issue is about to return to the table in Brussels.” “The obstacles and the reservations by a number of member states haven’t changed,” a senior EU official told the outlet.
Last year, EU officials proposed a scheme to leverage the frozen Russian assets as collateral to issue a loan to Kiev, which it would repay only after receiving reparations from Moscow. Separately, the EU had already agreed to redirect net windfall profits generated by the immobilized assets to Ukraine.Russia has condemned the asset freeze as “theft,” ruled out paying any reparations to Ukraine, and has warned the EU of harsh retaliation if it confiscates the funds one way or another.
However, the scheme – which was championed by European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen – met fierce opposition from a number of EU members, most notably Belgium. Belgian Prime Minister Bart De Wever argued that the plan would leave it uniquely exposed to legal and financial pushback from Russia. “
Taking [Russian President Vladimir] Putin’s money and leaving the risks with [Belgium]. That’s not going to happen,” he said last year. Euroclear also vehemently opposed the seizure plot, at one point warning that it could sue the EU if the bloc tries to confiscate the assets. Several other EU leaders also raised concerns that confiscating Russian assets would erode international law and tarnish the bloc’s reputation and standing among investors.

Kiev has descended into complete repression at home and “outright terror” against Russian civilians, the UN envoy has said ..

• Ukraine a Western-Backed ‘Zelensky Concentration Camp’ – Moscow (RT)

Ukraine has been transformed into a “Zelensky concentration camp” with Western assistance, Russia’s envoy to the UN, Vassily Nebenzia, has said, accusing Kiev of suppressing dissent at home and increasingly resorting to attacks on civilians in Russia.

Nebenzia made the remarks at a UN Security Council meeting on Monday marking the 35th anniversary of Ukraine’s declaration of independence. The session was requested by the council’s five European members – Denmark, France, Greece, Latvia, and the UK – which reiterated their full support for Kiev. The Russian diplomat questioned whether Ukraine has anything to celebrate, arguing that successive governments have run the country “into the ground” and that Ukrainian leader Vladimir Zelensky accelerated the process.
“With the most active involvement of the countries of the collective West, which claim to be ‘civilized’ and ‘democratic,’ Ukraine has morphed into a ‘Zelensky concentration camp,’ where any dissent or opposition is completely prohibited and those who find the courage to voice an alternative point of view are thrown behind bars without trial or due process, or physically eliminated,” he said.
Nebenzia described the persecution of the canonical Ukrainian Orthodox Church, the glorification of Nazi collaborators, and the suppression of shared history and the Russian language – including a ban on a popular Russian cartoon – as a “vivid illustration of the sheer wretchedness of Kiev’s rulers.”Amid a growing crackdown on dissent and a deteriorating battlefield situation, Kiev has now slipped into “outright terror against Russia’s civilian population,” Nebenzia said.
“Terror has become the last resort for Kiev in its attempt to reverse the situation that is not currently in its favor,” he added. “At the same time, Zelensky continues to beg his Western patrons for new shipments of weapons and ammunition, which are then used to hit Russian cities, residential areas, and civilian infrastructure.”The envoy said at least 475 Russian civilians were killed or injured in Ukrainian attacks from August 10 to 16 alone, with 69 fatalities, including children. He highlighted a strike on Nizhnekamsk that killed 13 people and wounded 78, as well as attacks in Novorossiysk, Rostov Region, and a number of towns in Donbass, which Kiev claims as its territory.
“It appears that Ukraine’s Western patrons, not to mention Zelensky himself, still harbor the dangerous illusion that further escalation, strikes deep inside our territory and terror against civilians will somehow force us to accept an ultimatum that is being pushed under the guise of peace.” Nebenzia said Russia retains the battlefield initiative and rejected calls for a temporary ceasefire that would give Kiev time to regroup and its Western sponsors time to rearm it. He warned that there would be no meaningful diplomatic process as long as Russia is confronted with ultimatums and threats while the reality on the ground is ignored.

The nazis have total control now, including financially. they won’t give that up voluntarily.

• Zelensky Continues To Oppose Wartime Democracy (Weeks)

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky is facing mounting pressure to hold elections. The Ukrainian leader was elected to a five-year term in 2019, which expired in May 2024. Last week, Ukraine’s former defense minister Mykhailo Fedorov publicly called for elections, breaking what has been characterized as a “wartime taboo” within the nation’s elite. He continued to demand elections over the weekend and also directly accused the Defense Ministry of corruption.

Fedorov is not the first high-profile Ukrainian figure to call for elections. Back in 2024, Kiev Mayor Vitali Klitschko denounced Zelensky and called him an “autocrat” for refusing to hold elections. But Fedorov is the first figure to have served within the upper echelons of the national government to publicly endorse the restoration of democracy. On Sunday, Zelensky released comments slamming Fedorov’s recommendation as a threat to Ukrainian national security. “I believe that if we want to destroy the country, then during such a war we can move in the selection of elections,” Zelensky said.
While Zelensky has portrayed wartime elections as an existential threat to all of Ukraine, he also said he would be open to elections if the nation’s allies secured “specific conditions” that would allow all military personnel and displaced civilians, millions of people, to participate. This pledge undid the myth that Ukraine is forbidden to hold wartime elections by its own constitution under material law. It is also such an unlikely scenario; Zelensky appears open to democracy while safely shielded from it. If elections were held, he would lose.
The challenge from Fedorov is significant because the 35-year-old was the youngest minister of defense in Ukraine’s history, and his firing last month triggered protests throughout the country. Despite having no military experience, the former tech entrepreneur was viewed as revolutionizing Ukraine’s drone warfare. He only served for a few months before a rift with Gen. Oleksandr Syrskyi, commander of Ukraine’s armed forces at the time, prompted Zelensky to fire him.
After protests broke out following Fedorov’s sacking, Zelensky tried to placate the people by firing Syrskyi as well. This has not turned down the temperature, as protestors want Fedorov reinstated. The anger is understandable. Zelensky and his administration are keeping the nation at war, and there is no end in sight. The war has been the justification for martial law, and the martial law has been the justification for the temporary, indefinite suspension of democracy.

“.. the direction points to intelligence sharing or notification.”

• CIA Director John Ratcliffe Visited Moscow (CTH)

CIA Director John Ratcliffe made an unexpected visit to Moscow, Russia, today. According to flight data and new media reporting Director Ratcliffe flew into Latvia and from Latvia into Russia on a C-17 military transport plane.

VIA CBS – CIA Director John Ratcliffe is in Moscow, Russia, for meetings, sources familiar with the situation told CBS News on Tuesday. News of his trip comes after a U.S. Air Force Boeing C-17A Globemaster III transport plane was spotted at a Moscow airport, along with a U.S. diplomatic motorcade. Neither the U.S. nor Russian governments has commented on the identity of the U.S. official in Russia or the purpose of the visit. The CIA did not immediately comment. It appears to be Ratcliffe’s first known trip to Russia as CIA director, though he has maintained contact with Russian intelligence counterparts. (more)
VIA AXIOS – CIA director John Ratcliffe is visiting Moscow on Tuesday for talks with Russian officials, two U.S. officials said. Why it matters: This is Ratcliffe’s first trip to Moscow since he took office and the highest-level visit by a Trump administration official to Russia since January. Ahead of Ratcliffe’s trip, the U.S. told Ukraine that a senior delegation was traveling to Moscow and asked it to suspend strikes until it leaves, according to a source with knowledge of the matter. (link) We shall not speculate too much on the purpose and intent of the visit; however, overall, the direction points to intelligence sharing or notification.
Recently the British announced they would be sharing “storm shadow missile” technology with Ukraine in order for Ukraine to build them for themselves. The Storm Shadow (also known as SCALP-EG in France) is a Franco-British, long-range, air-launched cruise missile used for precision deep-strike attacks against high-value targets. Essentially, the Storm Shadow missile is the U.K version of the Tomahawk cruise missile.
Ukraine would be building those missiles with money provided by the EU from the confiscated Russian sovereign wealth fund. Russian Federation President Vladimir Putin likely doesn’t appreciate that very much. According to Visegrad, “President Putin had a major event scheduled for today, with hundreds of people preparing for it. The event was canceled due to the visit of the CIA director, according to Kremlin pool journalists.” CIA Director John Ratcliffe is now returning home from Moscow.

Trudeau and Carney are girls dressed as guys. Trump has no time for that. If they were just normal people, he’d be very nice to them.

• White House Press Release: “Ending Canada’s Free Ride” (CTH)

Hopefully CTH readers have followed this story close enough to be able to predict where it ends. The White House has released an official and scathing press release outlining the lengthy and long-term issues with Canada and trade disputes.

WHITE HOUSE – Canada has been ripping off the United States for decades — and President Donald J. Trump is done letting them get away with it. Last week, the U.S. offered Canada the most preferential market access of any country on Earth, with deep cuts on steel, aluminum, autos, lumber, and more. Instead of partnership, Canada chose unreasonable demands, walk-backs, and flat-out rejection.
The record of Canadian abuse is clear and deliberate:
• FACT: Canada is joined only by the People’s Republic of China in choosing retaliation over negotiation. Their continued discriminatory treatment of U.S. commerce has burdened American workers, farmers, and businesses.
• FACT: Canada alone imposed discriminatory 25% tariffs and company-specific quotas on U.S. motor vehicles — measures applied to no other country. As a result, U.S. vehicle exports to Canada crashed 22% over the last year.
• FACT: Canada banned American wine, beer, and spirits in nearly every province and territory — while other countries have faced no such restrictions. As a result, U.S. alcohol exports to Canada collapsed 81% in a single year.
• FACT: Canada locks out U.S. dairy with tariff-rate quotas far more restrictive than those given to Europe, plus over-quota tariffs of nearly 300% — rates so extreme they function as a near-total ban and rank among the highest agricultural tariffs in the developed world.
• FACT: Canada has extracted a persistent average annual goods trade deficit of roughly $50 billion from the U.S. over the last decade — while refusing reciprocal access. FACT: Canada targeted American aerospace manufacturer Gulfstream for years. They effectively prohibited the sale of its G500, G600, G700, and G800 models while shielding its own competitor — until President Trump intervened.
• FACT: Canada’s protectionist barriers — discriminatory auto quotas, alcohol bans, and dairy lockouts — have hammered American companies. This has cost U.S. producers billions in lost sales, forced layoffs, and driven market share to foreign competitors who face none of the same restrictions.
• FACT: Without the United States, Canada could not survive. Canada sends roughly three-quarters of all its goods exports to America — and the U.S. market is where Canada gets the overwhelming majority of its money and economic oxygen.
• FACT: Canada’s failed trade policies are driving its own manufacturers south. A recent survey found 42% of Canadian manufacturers have already moved or are planning to move production to the U.S.
• FACT: Canada is doubling down on tariffs targeting American workers. Canada just announced an additional $27.6 billion in tariffs on American businesses — including a 50% tariff on American steel and aluminum, a 25% tariff on American fish, and a 25% tariff on American tools.
• FACT: The U.S. economy is approximately 13 times larger than the Canadian economy and home to over eight times as many people. The United States has the clear leverage. President Trump said it best: “Canada is easily the most difficult and unreasonable. They feel entitled, but they are not a State and will be entitled no longer!” Canadian leadership chose retaliation over partnership — and America is no longer willing to carry them.

D’oh Canada

“..,Outlines the Fracture Points and ..”:

• Canada Trade Minister LeBlanc Makes Mark Carney Look Like an Idiot (CTH)

–There are many people in Canada demanding to see the rough draft proposals of the U.S-Canada trade agreement so they can judge for themselves the issues that Carney claimed were irreconcilable. For those people this interview today by Canadian Trade Minister Dominic LeBlanc will only embolden those requests.
Trade Emissary LeBlanc outlined the major fracture points that drove Prime Minister Mark to reject the deal. I’ll put the full interview below which everyone should watch because what LeBlanc outlined is rather funny. Carney was obviously looking for a reason to walk away, because the fracture points were ridiculously small.
Essentially, it boils down to four issues. !1) Removal of tariffs on Canadian assembled Semi-Trucks. (2) U.S. streaming services writing code for “search engines” in the French language. (3) Canada demanding 5% of gross revenues from U.S. tech platforms, and the last one is silly because it already exists: (4) the U.S. having a right to reject a trade deal made by Canada with a non-market economy, ie. CHINA.

Taking the issues one by one we start with
• U.S. tariffs on Canadian Semi Trucks. Canada wanted tariffs on Big Rigs removed. The U.S. said no. The reason is simple. Big Rigs assembled/built in Canada are falling apart in the USA. Why? Because they are full of cheap Chinese component goods and parts that wear out quickly. The U.S. wants two things on this issue. Either: (1) Make them in the USA, or (2) stop using cheap Chinese component parts. The parts that Canada are using are not even available in the USA because we tariff and reject them, so why should we accept them when Canada installs them? Either quit using Chinese parts (hence, the trade alignment against Chinese imports), or accept a tariff equal to the rate we would apply if the product was coming directly from China.
• U.S. tariffs on Canadian Semi Trucks. Canada wanted tariffs on Big Rigs removed. The U.S. said no. The reason is simple. Big Rigs assembled/built in Canada are falling apart in the USA. Why? Because they are full of cheap Chinese component goods and parts that wear out quickly. The U.S. wants two things on this issue. Either: (1) Make them in the USA, or (2) stop using cheap Chinese component parts. The parts that Canada are using are not even available in the USA because we tariff and reject them, so why should we accept them when Canada installs them? Either quit using Chinese parts (hence, the trade alignment against Chinese imports), or accept a tariff equal to the rate we would apply if the product was coming directly from China.

• Intellectual Property. Canada was demanding 5% of U.S. tech platform gross revenue (not profit, gross), they call it a tax. Canada then uses the “tax revenue” to subsidize Canadian media and information platforms that promote the approved government message. In essence, Canada demands that information providers pay them 5% of their revenue so that Canada can subsidize information providers they approve of. This is what the Canadian government calls “cultural protection.” In reality it is state-run media using a financial system that would make Vladimir Putin blush.
• U.S. Right to Limit Canadian Trade Deals. This point is exponentially ridiculous for Canada to be upset about because the current USMCA/CUSMA already has that clause. The U.S (or Mexico) can exit the USMCA if Canada enters into a trade agreement with a “non-market” economy, ie China. [USMCA Sec 32:10]

Canada was already in violation of the USMCA/CUSMA when they entered into a trade agreement with China and agreed to import Chinese EVs. This action triggered the U.S. to become more focused on the stuff Canada was going to import; hence, the renewed emphasis on the clause.
That’s it. Prime Minister Mark Carney blew up the trade discussion based on his demand that: Canada should be allowed to make any deal they want with China; that Chinese component parts be allowed in Canadian assembled Semi Trucks; that streaming services install a French language search engine; and that tech platforms pay him to censor information and subsidize official narratives.
In other words, Mark Carney was looking for an excuse/justification not to make a trade deal, and make a political statement that would appeal to the uber leftist French Québécois and his partners in Beijing.
Clear enough?
Here’s Dominic LeBlanc:

“.. a teensy little 100,000% rounding error, about how much water data centers require ”

• China’s Data Center Psyop and the 100,000% Rounding Error (Stephen Green)

When I take a particularly cute photo of my 14-week-old puppy, I click the little heart button right there in my camera app. Without me doing anything else, the next time a screensaver comes up — on my laptop, my desktop, or even on the massive living room TV — the new pic joins the older photos scrolling by. Thank you, data centers.

Earlier this year, my wife was delayed by weather bringing our sons home from the airport after their first No Parents! trip together, so she hit the Share ETA button on the CarPlay screen in her Jeep. Virtually instantaneously, I got an alert on my phone letting me know they’d be late and not to worry. Thank you very much for that one, data centers. Sure, the internet is a “series of tubes,” as everyone must be aware by now, but the data doesn’t flow through them on its own.
Yes, AI requires bigger and more energy-hungry data centers — and we can’t seem to get enough AI. AI is either going to evolve itself into Skynet to kill us all, or deliver enough productivity growth to eliminate the deficit and make our accumulated debt look puny. I’m somewhere in the middle. I fully expect someday that my domestic help robot will somehow manage to kneecap me, but will then prove invaluable in nursing me back to health while still keeping the house tidy.
But none of it — not our messaging apps, not our GPS apps, not the website you’re reading right now — none of it works without data centers. To a surprising degree, data centers are the internet. And this country’s embrace of the internet is perhaps the most important among several reasons we left Europe in the economic dust. I’d also add that the reputable messaging apps are generally encrypted end-to-end, so for the first time in history, the general public’s default way of talking to one another, sharing photos, locations, and the like, is secure from prying eyes.
So why all the data center hate? While nearly all of it is ginned up, in my opinion, much of it rests on a “mistake,” a teensy little 100,000% rounding error, about how much water data centers require in Karen Hao’s purportedly nonfiction book, Empire of AI. Here you go:

Author @_KarenHao really messed up the discourse by publishing misinformation that over-reported data center water by 100,000% in her book, blaming the government (she misread the file), and then doing a book tour and selling the book anyways. https://t.co/zBF1OzsUYk pic.twitter.com/23D85kcKKC
— Kane 謝凱堯 (@kane) August 26, 2026

As it turns out, data centers — all data centers; not just the ones dedicated to AI — use less water than golf courses do. In fact, they use a fraction of 1% so small compared to golf courses that it actually could be a rounding error. And yet I can’t log into X without seeing everyone from Bernie Sanders (CPUSA-Vt. Oblast) to low-follower randos calling for a moratorium on data center construction. Remember when 5G radio waves were going to melt our brains and sap and impurify all of our precious bodily fluids? This is that, but even more important to combat.
But here’s where it really gets weird. I follow this stuff professionally, yet even I had to have a colleague share a link on X — no mainstream media source, naturally — to learn about Hao and her little tiny error. Even though she “discovered” her mistake in November of 2025, the whole data center controversy didn’t gain steam until the summer of 2026. Something stinks — and here is Blume Industries to explain: “Just gonna remind you the journo who produced the bogus water data for data centers now lives in Hong Kong. I’m sure you’re smart enough to figure it out from there.”
So yeah, I’m completely comfortable calling the sprang-up-outta-nowhere data center “debate” a Communist Chinese psyop to kneecap our high-tech edge over the People’s Republic.

“That’s part of the God-given talent you’re born with. It’s not something you can teach.”

• Remembering Dolly Through the Song I Loved First (Chris Queen)

I’ve written extensively here and on my Substack about the musical influences on my life. My mom and aunts were the primary agents of my musical exposure. My mom was a massive fan of The Carpenters and early Beatles, and she had the radio on all the time in the car. My aunts opened my ears to what we now call “classic rock.”

My dad was a different story. His musical tastes were much narrower in the ‘70s. I remember that he had a sticker advertising WPLO, a country station, on his Jeep, but I remember him listening to WBIE (I can still hear the jingle: “WBIE! Georgia’s! Country! Giant!”). He also had two 8-tracks: One was a greatest-hits compilation from Porter Wagoner and Dolly Parton, and the other was what was then Dolly’s current album, Here You Come Again.
The title track connected my parents’ distinct musical worlds. Since it was Dolly’s first hit to crossover to the pop music marketplace, I heard it on the radio in our apartment or in the car with my mom, and I also heard it on the 8-track when I was riding with my dad. I might be wrong, but I think “Here You Come Again” was the first radio song that I learned all the lyrics to. My mom also had the sheet music, and I remember her playing it as I sang along. It was one of my favorite songs on the radio at the time, and it remains my favorite Dolly track.
The album was part of a calculated move on the part of Dolly and her management team to expand her horizons beyond country radio. Her previous album, 1977’s self-produced New Harvest … First Gathering, deliberately incorporated pop and R&B elements but made no splash outside the country marketplace.
For Here You Come Again, Parton turned to Los Angeles-based producer Gary Klein, who enlisted top-notch studio musicians, including keyboardist (and later ultra-pop producer) David Foster and drummer Jim Keltner, to play on the album. The title track, which was also to serve as the first single, wasn’t one of Dolly’s compositions. Instead, “Here You Come Again” came from the pens of Brill Building stalwarts Barry Mann and Cynthia Weil.
Side note: I was precocious enough at age five to be able to read the lyrics and credits on the sheet music. I saw those names, and I couldn’t believe that people would sing songs that other people wrote unless they were in a movie! Even though the album — and especially its title cut — was part of a specific strategy to launch Dolly to pop stardom, Dolly wasn’t about to leave country behind. She talked Klein into adding subtle steel guitar to “Here You Come Again,” and that small detail helped ground the song in both stylistic camps.
Listeners could tell that this song was something different from the intro. Mix Online explains: The rhythm section on the track included Dean Parks (guitar), David Foster (keyboards), David Hungate (bass) and Jim Keltner (drums). The track opens with Foster’s Fender Rhodes. He recalls the session as fairly groundbreaking:
“I played the Fender Rhodes on the basic track,” Foster says. “Then I came up with the idea of duplicating exactly the same part on the acoustic piano, something I—or to my knowledge, no one—had ever done before. It became an interesting sound that years later became a stock ‘push of a button’ sound on many synthesizers, which some even called ‘Fosterized.’ “Also, I remember that while waiting to overdub the acoustic piano, no music was playing in my headphones and the tape op [second engineer] suddenly realized that he still had every track In Record and he ended up erasing about the first 20 seconds of the master,” Foster continues. “They had to go to an earlier take, splice them together and then I did my overdub acoustic piano part.”
Keltner and engineer Armin Steiner said that Dolly’s scratch vocals, which she recorded live with the band, were so good that some of them made the finished record. The arrangement proved that even though “Here You Come Again” was tailor-made for both country and pop radio, it wasn’t a simple track. The song crosses five keys throughout its journey, which made the song even more effective. If you’re not musically inclined, you may think I’m geeking out a bit; if so, skip a paragraph or two. ChatGPT helped me chart out those key changes.
“Here You Come Again” key changes
The key changes get Mann and Weil’s point across: Whenever Dolly (as the protagonist) thinks she’s gotten it all together, here comes that old flame back into her life to knock her off her equilibrium. Each time she thinks she has regained her footing, the song returns in a new key, familiar but no longer quite where she left it. Even before I was better versed in music, I knew that there was something about the sound of the song that was interesting and different.
The crossover gamble paid off. “Here You Come Again” hit number three on the Billboard Hot 100 and number two on the easy listening charts, but it also spent five weeks atop the country charts and won her a Grammy for Best Country Vocal Performance, Female — her first. Better still, it launched her career into the stratosphere. The band and crew recognized something special in Dolly. Her talent and personality dovetailed to make her more than just an ordinary entertainer.
“As a human being—forget about her great gifts as an entertainer— this is the one of the most delightful people we’ve ever had in the entertainment industry,” Steiner told Mix Online. “As a human being, she’s extraordinary. And she has such a beautiful voice, an incredibly identifiable sound, identifiable diction; she’s a fine writer and a great interpreter of lyrics. You believed what she sang. It’s all part of the talent and part of the human being. That’s part of the God-given talent you’re born with. It’s not something you can teach.”

Nearly half a century later, I can appreciate the craftsmanship that I couldn’t have understood at five: Foster’s layered keyboards, the subtle steel guitar, the improbable sequence of key changes, and Dolly’s effortless vocal holding it all together. But when I hear “Here You Come Again,” I still hear my mom playing it on the piano, the radio in her car, and that 8-track in my dad’s Jeep.
Dolly made a record that she intended to cross musical boundaries without leaving its country identity behind, and in our family, it did exactly that. It brought my parents’ different musical worlds together and gave me a song that has followed me for most of my life. Now, whenever those opening notes begin, here she comes again — and for three minutes, I’m five years old all over again.

Too big to fail.

“The worst-case scenario [..] was $1.4tn [..] up to $18bn (over a period of 10 years) is significantly smaller. Meta is not admitting to any wrongdoing…

“Instagram and Facebook’s billions of users provide the company with a goldmine of data, and the data of adults can be used to sell ads.”

• Meta’s $18bn Reckoning For Social Media On Child Safety (BBC)

Meta’s decision to agree to an $18bn (£13.3bn) settlement on Wednesday, to resolve claims that Facebook and Instagram harmed children, came as a surprise. I was expecting weeks of courtroom drama as 29 states – almost two-thirds of North America – took on one US tech giant.Technically, the trial was about children’s online privacy. It was based on a US law called the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA), which is nearly 30 years old and predates all of today’s biggest social platforms. It centred around Meta’s historic gathering and use of data belonging to children under the age of 13 over a period of several years.

In reality, it was a co-ordinated attack on the firm’s online safety credentials.Meta, alongside other social media apps, is under fire around the world as 2026 is shaping up to be a year of reckoning for the entire industry – perhaps our days of doomscrolling are numbered. Meta has fought hard, over multiple lawsuits spanning many months and at great expense, to defend its commitment to protecting children on its platforms. More than once, I’ve been invited to detailed presentations at Meta’s London HQ, where senior executives have walked journalists like me through the many safety tools the company has launched over the years designed to give children better protection on its apps.
I have also met the parents of young people who have come to harm on those same platforms, and others who admit to being totally overwhelmed by the sheer number of safety tools that require their oversight – at the last count Meta had more than 60 of them, and that was just on Instagram. The trial went on for just five days, and came to an end before CEO Mark Zuckerberg took to the stand. But it was rough for Meta. Whistleblower Arturo Bejar, who once worked at Instagram, claimed that in the past he had told bosses that harmful stuff was happening to children on the platform, and no action was taken.
Another executive said he didn’t remember writing on a slide deck that sometimes Meta chose to pay fines for violating regulations rather than make changes. Internal memos suggested that the firm knew opt-in tools tended to have low adoption rates, and yet it still launched safety features that were not switched on by default. There had been intense speculation that Meta would have faced hundreds of billions of dollars in fines if it had lost. The worst-case scenario, which would have been the maximum penalty imposed for every single child who used one of its platforms for more than half an hour a day during a 12-year window, was $1.4tn (£1tn) – roughly the same as the company’s entire value.
That of course was never going to happen, but a more realistic figure was still in the hundreds of billions. By comparison, up to $18bn (over a period of 10 years) is significantly smaller. Meta is not admitting to any wrongdoing. You could argue that settling protects its core business – social networks are still the way in which it makes most of its money. Instagram and Facebook’s billions of users provide the company with a goldmine of data, and the data of adults can be used to sell ads. Meta may say it is now laser-focused on AI, but it still needs the vast revenue generated by its social apps.
What is Meta changing?
As part of the settlement, the social media giant has agreed to make a number of changes to the way Instagram and Facebook operate for its youngest users. Some experts say it is long overdue. The new safety barriers include a two-hour time limit across both platforms, which will be a default setting for known teen users. But direct messaging on the platforms will not count towards the daily use limit.Notifications will be muted between midnight and 06:00 and on school days between 08:00 and 15:00.Likes on posts and content will also be entirely hidden on the platforms for teens.
Most of these new features will be made either default or an option for teens within six months. However, new efforts by Meta to better identify which users on its platforms are children will take up to a year to be rolled out. I would be surprised if these measures remain within the confines of the US for very long, as other countries will almost certainly be keen to adopt them too. Meta also says the new features will only truly help children if all of its rivals adopt them as well. It’s a highly competitive industry, but given the global backlash against social media and its impact on children, perhaps others like TikTok and Snapchat may have to follow suit.
The question then is whether children will still bother with them, once they are deliberately toned down into a much blander offering. And perhaps that would bring the social media era to a natural end, as existing adults gradually aged out of it. Arturo Bejar, the ex-Instagram engineer turned whistleblower, says the proof of the pudding will be in whether the new teen safety features are effective. “At the end of the day, Meta needs to be held accountable for results, not efforts,” he told me.

“Do you really wanna live in a world without Coca-Cola?”

• James Carville Releases His Signature Uncut Product (Turley)

In Breaking Bad, the character Walter White explains to a major drug dealer why cheaper knockoffs of his signature Blue Sky methamphetamine are just not enough: “So… it’s grade-school tee-ball vs. the New York Yankees. Yours is just some tepid… off-brand, generic cola. What I’m making is classic Coke.”

This week, James Carville released his own uncut, undiluted classic product to a nation of rage addicts. Blue Sky rage. What set off Carville was telling. He and others were outraged that House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries met with Trump’s son-in-law and close adviser Jared Kushner to discuss areas of common ground. Such dialogue “with the enemy” is unthinkable in an “age of rage,” particularly for someone like Carville who previously threatened that, once Democrats are back in power, Trump supporters would be treated the same way as Nazi collaborators after World War II.
Carville went into his signature berserker trance on his podcast appropriately called the “Politics War Room”: “These people are a pack of felons and traitors, and you do not meet with them! You do not meet with them. There’s only one thing you can do with people that you genuinely believe deep inside of every fabric of your body are a pack of thieves and a pack of traitors.” As usual, Carville delivers the line with the intensity of a man seconds away from a self-induced stroke. The message, however, is clear. Anyone seeking a middle ground or compromise is a traitor and will be dealt with the same way as collaborators once Democrats regain power.
What is really on display is rage politics. When you feed this addiction, you have to keep your product pure to avoid the pain of rage withdrawal. Carville is asking Democrats the same question as Walter White: “Do you really wanna live in a world without Coca-Cola?” Go with the classic. Go with the rage. Over on the social media safe space for liberals, BlueSky, Carville is being heralded as a prophet of furor. It was a perfect combination. BlueSky was created for liberals to remove themselves, particularly from X, because of conservatives returning to social media after years of censorship.
The media billed BlueSky as the future, as many predicted the rapid death of X. It did not exactly work out that way. Many liberal influencers proclaiming their abandonment of X never actually left and many others have returned. BlueSky is now little more than a progressive boutique in comparison to X. It has an estimated 43 million users as opposed to as many as 600 million for X. (Monthly active users drop to around 27 million versus more than 300 million). Yet, the business model of BlueSky is to offer a protected zone for liberals to rave amongst themselves without the distraction of as many opposing views or voices.
It is a social platform that is premised on the same “you do not meet with them” screed of Carville.Recently, Carville has lashed out at the far left of his party, such as Democratic Socialists, over their radical agenda. However, he and other establishment figures are primarily objecting to the fact that these radical policies will not succeed in the election and return them to power.
Carville has no problem trashing the system to secure and maintain power. He previously called for packing the Supreme Court, but notably told Democrats not to actually talk about it: “If the Democrats win the presidency and both houses of Congress, I think on day one, they should expand the Supreme Court to 13. F—k it. Eat our dust. Don’t run on it. Don’t talk about it. Just do it.”
Other Democratic leaders continue to try to co-opt the mob for their own uses. Senate Minority Leader dismissed questions about the DSA platform in eliminating the presidency, the Supreme Court, and the Senate. These are small differences, according to Schumer, compared with the need to win elections: “Not everyone has the same exact view on every single issue.”
One of those small disagreements is the very existence of the institution that Schumer so desperately wants to lead.Carville and Schumer, however, appear to agree on the key element of the political strategy in keeping the rage alive. The greatest threat to that strategy is any dialogue of Democrats with their Republican neighbors. If reason were to break out before the elections, all could be lost.
The effort reflects the fact that the rage in an age of rage eventually burns off. People look into a mirror on both sides and realize that we have become grotesque like Carville by yielding (indeed enjoying) the anger and hate. Once people start to talk again, it is harder to hate so completely and blindly that hate traffickers need.So Blue Sky rage is hitting the streets. The Classic coke of hate to be injected directly into the veins of a nation of rage addicts. After all, as Walter White asked his fellow traffickers, “Do you really wanna live in a world without Coca-Cola?”

https://twitter.com/MAGAVoice/status/2092344675533561922?s=20

SpaceX has announced two mega-projects representing at least $116.8 billion in combined investment, all within less than three weeks:

• Terafab in Texas, the world’s largest chip manufacturing facility.

• Starbase, Louisiana, the world’s largest spaceport.

Together, they are… pic.twitter.com/o64tI8kTo8
— DogeDesigner (@cb_doge) August 25, 2026

Starbase Louisiana will ultimately have over a dozen launch towers, enabling more than 30 Starship flights per day and making it the biggest launch site on Earth!

SpaceX makes sci-fi real. https://t.co/C7Ht0U12ba
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) August 25, 2026

https://twitter.com/AmericaPartyX/status/2092345401512718753?s=20

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Debt Rattle August 13 2026

Aug 132026

August 13, 2026 Posted by Raúl Ilargi Meijer at 9:25 am Finance Tagged with: Amnesty, Flock Cameras, Hormuz, IRGC, Karoline Leavitt, Lindell, Mohammunist, Zelensky 32 Responses »

Pable Picasso Le Pengouin 1907

• Trump: US Controls Hormuz Strait, ‘I Think We Will Keep It’ (ZH)

• Why We Fight (Kenneth R. Timmerman)

• How Zelensky Misread Donald Trump (Ryumshin)

• The US Is Facing A New Red Menace – From Within (Robert Bridge)

• Patriots Won’t Let Communists Take America (J.B. Shurk)

• The Mohammunist Manifesto – ‘Transitional Phase’ Slaughter (Milli Sands)

• Swedish PM Calls Spanish Illegal Immigrant Amnesty ‘Very Bad Idea’ (ET)

• President Trump Announces Release of Robert Gilman from Russian Jail (CTH)

• The Spendthrift State (Thomas Kolbe)

• Mike Lindell Gets Crushed in Minnesota Primary (CTH)

• Gavin Newsom, the DSA, and the Danton Delusion (Turley)

• Police and Federal Govt Use of Flock Cameras Under Scrutiny (CTH)

• Karoline Leavitt Resigns as White House Press Secretary (Sarah Anderson)

https://twitter.com/EricLDaugh/status/2086895440008765531?s=20

Good. Just Do It! https://t.co/TMk7JTxejO
— General Mike Flynn (@GenFlynn) August 11, 2026

Breaking: FBI had 14 informants on Biden corruption but ran secret operation to dismiss evidence as disinformation https://t.co/icapd1m6nF
— John Solomon (@jsolomonReports) August 12, 2026

https://twitter.com/Q_TheStormRider/status/2087196480754880591?s=20

The boa constrictor squeezing its prey:

” Tehran is rationing scarce goods, limiting access to foreign currency, slashing investment and shifting more of the burden onto households while preserving strategic imports and the essential machinery of the state, analysts say. The result will be a deepening economic malaise that leads to rising poverty and dysfunction, but also more room for Iran’s leaders to stall talks with the U.S.”

• Trump: US Controls Hormuz Strait, ‘I Think We Will Keep It’ (ZH)

In his latest Wednesday Truth Social post, Trump issues a familiar refrain (one that will likely be on repeat up to the November midterms), claiming that the USA has “total control” over the Strait of Hormuz and “I think we will keep it”. It’s also yet more confirmation that he’s opting for economic siege warfare as the US military campaign is on halt. He also did his bizarre “Praise be to Allah!” sign off…

Iran’s Military Leadership: ‘Victory is on Our Side’
It has become beyond obvious that there is no broader peace process and that things are in a stalemated situation amid what’s broadly seen as a Washington retreat from military confrontation, leaving Iran to press its own vision of management over the Strait of Hormuz with Oman. While President Trump has settled into a waiting game which once again bets on sanctions and economic warfare to eventually force Tehran to bend, Iranian military leaders are declaring that “victory is on our side”.

The Wall Street Journal has noted that the Islamic Republic has entered a ‘survival economy’ with the country’s rulers “taking time-tested steps to keep their chronically battered economy functioning just enough to resist a drawn-out campaign.” There’s no doubt that infrastructure along with various key industries and the Iranian currency has been severely tested and battered, but the WSJ outlines strategies of this survival mode as follows: Tehran is rationing scarce goods, limiting access to foreign currency, slashing investment and shifting more of the burden onto households while preserving strategic imports and the essential machinery of the state, analysts say. The result will be a deepening economic malaise that leads to rising poverty and dysfunction, but also more room for Iran’s leaders to stall talks with the U.S.
That leaves Trump’s strategy resting on a risky assumption that Iran will crack before Washington does. Mediators have warned their U.S. counterparts that Iran has been living under sanctions for years and betting that Tehran will compromise because of economic pressure won’t likely yield results. Instead, Iran will likely continue to escalate attacks to raise the price for Washington and its allies. Such a ‘risky assumption’ was on display from even the very start of Operation Epic Fury nearly six months ago and nothing has fundamentally changed in terms of the Iranian system ‘cracking’. Within merely the first two weeks of war back in early March, we highlighted some of Washington’s persisting false assumptions in: Escalation Trap: Misreading Iran’s Internal Power Dynamics.
Stalled Talks, Maximum Conditions
Meanwhile, Gulf and regional mediators are still clinging to hope that some form of ceasefire can limp along and be put back in full force, also with efforts to get the US and Iran talking again. As a Wednesday, per Bloomberg: Pakistan said the 60-day deadline for a US-Iran MoU may be extended, but the larger peace process has stalled. Earlier, Donald Trump said the US “totally” controls the Strait of Hormuz. Oil wavered. Neither of these things are true – at this point the MoU is dead with Iran weeks ago having already pulled out while declaring in null. Also, if the US military ‘totally’ controlled the strait then there would be no crisis that must be ‘resolved’ and global oil would be transiting at full tilt again. https://twitter.com/DropSiteNews/status/2087365843621441538?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E2087365843621441538%7Ctwgr%5E0f2dd7c340b2d70ae43831ddb04b47bed613fa07%7Ctwcon%5Es1_c10&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.zerohedge.com%2Fgeopolitical%2Firan-rejects-us-pressure-enters-survival-economy-mediators-desperate-restored-mou

If anyone has any doubts as to why we are fighting this war, just think of what the IRGC would do if it actually had operational nuclear warheads.

Kenneth R. Timmerman is a senior fellow at the America First Policy Institute, and was nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize in 2006 for his work on Iran. His latest work of non-fiction, The Iran House: Tales of Revolution, Persecution, War, and Intrigue, is available from Bombardier Books.

• Why We Fight (Kenneth R. Timmerman)

If it weren’t for the support that Russia and China have been providing Iran, the United States could have gone to the United Nations and invoked Chapter VII of the UN charter that authorizes member nations to use “all necessary measures” — including military action — to restore international peace and security, just as we did twice in wars against Saddam Hussein. We actually tried that in May, with the predictable result that both the Chinese and the Russians threatened to veto any resolution against Iran.

Since then, both the Brits and the French have said they would join an international mine-sweeping force, and then promptly backed out when it became obvious that mines were not only still present in the Strait but that the IRGC was going to attack any ships trying to remove them. So much for the international “order.” And so much for our allies.That leaves President Trump with the course he has followed in recent weeks: apply just enough force to keep the IRGC on its heels, while not triggering a massive spike in oil prices or spooking international markets. He has succeeded on all three counts, extremely significant accomplishments.
But the United States cannot just “walk away and go home” if our diplomacy fails, as Vice President JD Vance suggested recently in his very unfortunate three-hour appearance on the Joe Rogan show. There is that pesky second demand that Iran give up its nuclear ambitions. On Wednesday, reports from Israel resurfaced an earlier claim by the current IRGC Chief, Ahmad Vahidi, that Iran would continue to develop nuclear weapons as long as the United States and Israel possessed them. “If they disarm, we will disarm,” he reportedly said.
There has been some parsing of that quote in recent days. One Iranian commentator claimed that the correct quote was this: “As long as the United States and Israel possess nuclear weapons, activities related to national security will not cease.” Sorry, but in IRGC-speak, that means exactly the same thing.In the end, whether Vahidi made those public comments or not makes little difference. There is no other explanation for the massive expenditures on uranium enrichment, buried nuclear sites, the Iranian regime’s absolute refusal to discuss its nuclear programs, or the recent revelations about Mount Kalang (aka “Pickaxe Mountain”).
The Iranian regime is developing nuclear weapons, and thank God they don’t yet have them, or they would have already used them on Israel or on us, either in direct attacks or in EMP mode to destroy our electric power grid and send us back to the 1880s, when the United States could support a population of between 80 to 90 million. This is a regime that has already acted out its intentions to wipe Israel off the map, and has shown its willingness to destroy the entire civilian infrastructure of its Persian Gulf neighbors, including their desalination plants. If anyone has any doubts as to why we are fighting this war, just think of what the IRGC would do if it actually had operational nuclear warheads.

“Why the carefully planned White House visit was doomed from the start..”

• How Zelensky Misread Donald Trump (Ryumshin)

Another season of the ‘win over Donald Trump’ game has begun, and this time it was Vladimir Zelensky’s turn. Last week, the Ukrainian leader made his first visit to the United States this year, a trip widely billed as potentially decisive. The atmosphere could hardly have been more different from his visits in 2025, when Zelensky travelled to Washington like a man walking toward a firing squad. This time he arrived projecting confidence, buoyed by promises from supporters that a diplomatic breakthrough was within reach.

The build-up reflected those expectations, and a carefully orchestrated public relations campaign accompanied the visit as much of the Western mainstream media greeted Zelensky with glowing coverage. Several MAGA-aligned bloggers, previously hostile to Kiev, unexpectedly adopted a friendlier tone, while Republican senators added pressure by reviving Lindsey Graham’s proposed “hellish sanctions” bill after the lawmaker’s death and the EU dispatched Finnish President Alexander Stubb as a visible show of support.
Zelensky also tried to strengthen his hand by raising tensions with Iran to reinforce the image of a common threat, reportedly bringing what was described as valuable intelligence on America’s adversaries to the White House and, for good measure, even abandoning his usual military-style clothing in favor of something closer to a suit.
One can only imagine how much political capital and money Kiev and its allies invested in preparing this visit, but the problem is that the returns appear remarkably modest. The immediate objective may have been achieved, given there was no repeat of the disastrous Oval Office confrontation of February 2025, when Zelensky left Washington after a public clash with US President Donald Trump, but avoiding disaster isn’t the same as achieving success.
The Ukrainian had two principal goals, securing additional American military assistance and persuading Trump to adopt a tougher position towards Russia, but behind those broad aims lay countless practical issues, from Patriot missile production licenses to future weapons deliveries. However, the entire conversation reportedly lasted less than an hour.
That matters, because anyone familiar with Donald Trump understands that formal meeting times can be deceptive, and those who have worked with him have long remarked that discussions often revolve around his own stories and observations, leaving surprisingly little time to address detailed policy questions. Whether or not that characterization is entirely fair, an hour was plainly insufficient to tackle the wide range of issues Zelensky had hoped to resolve, and there was not any meaningful change in Trump’s public position afterwards.
There were no new military aid packages. There was no dramatic escalation of pressure on Moscow and no particularly enthusiastic endorsement of Zelensky himself. Trump simply described the meeting as having gone “very well,” the same formula he routinely applies to almost every high-level conversation.
The impression was that his attention remained focused elsewhere, as on that particular day, the funeral of Lindsey Graham appeared to occupy far more of his emotional and political attention than the war in Ukraine. The only concrete outcome seems to have been an agreement for Jared Kushner and Steve Witkoff to visit Kiev, and for a trip presented as strategically important, this was a rather modest result.
So why did Zelensky once again fail to persuade Trump? Well, the answer, in my view, lies in the assumptions underpinning the entire strategy. Many in Kiev, and across the Western political establishment, continue to believe that Trump can be manipulated simply by presenting him with carefully selected information. According to this logic, persuade him of the right facts and his policy will change accordingly, but this reflects a fundamental misunderstanding of the man.
Trump has never been regarded as an intellectual, but he isn’t politically unpredictable in the way his critics often suggest. On many of the issues that matter most to him, his views have remained remarkably consistent for decades. As early as 1987, Trump criticized America’s allies for relying excessively on US military protection and claimed they should pay far more for their own defense, while he also advocated a confrontational policy towards Iran. Nearly forty years later, those positions remain largely unchanged. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu succeeded in compelling Trump to attack Iran because it aligned with instincts the American president already possessed, but Ukraine is different.
Trump’s view of Ukraine has always been shaped by domestic American politics as much as by international affairs and, in his eyes, modern Ukraine remains closely associated with Barack Obama and Joe Biden, two political rivals he has spent years attacking. That perception was formed long before the current diplomatic efforts began and cannot simply be erased through a well-managed public relations campaign. There’s also a far more practical obstacle, in that Zelensky is asking Washington to provide resources that America may be increasingly reluctant, or even unable, to supply.
US weapons stockpiles have been depleted by multiple conflicts and expanding production of systems such as Patriot missiles will take years rather than months. Meanwhile, with the United States carrying almost $40 trillion in national debt, further large-scale financial commitments to Ukraine face growing political resistance and Trump also lacks many of the instruments that Kiev hopes he will use against Moscow. For example, additional sanctions may generate headlines, but they cannot by themselves deliver the military or diplomatic breakthrough Ukraine seeks.
Taken together, these realities meant Zelensky entered negotiations seeking outcomes that had always been unlikely to materialize. From Kiev’s perspective, the visit was designed to transform the political landscape, but instead, it produced little more than polite photographs and another promise that dialogue would continue.The battle Zelensky travelled to Washington to win had, in reality, already been lost before his plane landed.

“’A few socialist militants are poisoning the Democratic Party..”

• The US Is Facing A New Red Menace – From Within (Robert Bridge)

Moderate Democrats are damaging their brand by campaigning alongside crazy leftist radicals who openly call for the destruction of the West, White people, and the United States. Democrats are quietly expressing concern that the entire Democratic Party is about to go up in flames as increasingly radical voices are going mainstream. As ZeroHedge put it: “Radical leftists and Islamist activists are increasingly converging inside the Democratic Party as Democratic Socialists of America, forming what can only be described as a ‘red-green alliance.’”

The face of the Democratic Socialists of America radicalization belongs to unofficial spokesperson Turkish-American Hasan Piker, 35, who has called on his followers to “kill capitalists.” “Yeah kill them! Kill those motherf**kers and murder those motherf**kers in the streets. Let the streets soak in their f**king red capitalist blood, dude,” Piker said in a recent live podcast. On another occasion, the revolutionary socialist called for the opening of the border and the extermination of the White race. “We want more immigrants to come into your countries and then they’re gonna f**k your sisters and then your daughters. We’re here to destroy the White Race, b**ch.”
This is the same guy who socialists Bernie Sanders, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, and newly nominated Democrat Senator Abdulrahman Mohamed El-Sayed want fronting the Democrat Party. Scary stuff. Shockingly, instead of denouncing his crude message, Democrats are taking to the campaign trail with this young man. Needless to say, that is a political strategy that only promises disaster. Even Hillary Clinton warned that her party is playing with fire by its affiliation with this man and others like him, and risks opening itself up to devastating attacks by the Republican Party. “The Republican messaging is communist, socialist,” Clinton said.
“It’s going to be a VERY effective attack… All I know is that is the attack that Trump is leading with… They are trying to bring back scare tactics about our followers and candidates.” With individuals like Piker, whose favorite flag is not the American flag but the flag of Hezbollah (with a clenched fist hoisting an AK-47 in the air), it won’t be necessary for the Republicans to employ scare tactics. Individuals like Piker are political gifts from heaven that keep on giving. All they need to do is replay his heinous comments for average Americans to hear.
Even the Democrats will start to ask themselves if this is really the sort of person they want to associate with. It could be enough to make thousands of Democrats switch their political allegiance to the Republicans. At this point, in order to help end the confusion over terms, it might be helpful to define the various arms of the Democratic Party, which can be roughly divided into five groupings.
On the Neoliberal left you have three such groups.
1. The democrats. These are the establishment, focused on incremental reform within capitalism. Mostly corporate-aligned.
2. The liberals. They think the government should solve inequality through policy, not systemic overhaul. Morally driven.
3. The progressives. Want structural reform: Medicare for all, Green New Deal, debt cancellation. They flirt with socialism but don’t want to overthrow capitalism.

Now on the Far Left you have two more.
4. The reformist socialists. These want to overthrow capitalism through electoral politics by getting into the system and making small changes over time. Their goal is post-capitalist society.
5. The revolutionary socialists. They believe capitalism must be overthrown entirely. They reject elections and reformism, advocates for revolution, abolition, and radical restructuring of society.
In addition to Mr. Piker, there is another individual on the left, the progressive Abdulrahman Mohamed El-Sayed, who is the Democratic nominee in the 2026 US Senate election in Michigan. On April 7, 2026, El-Sayed held campaign events on several university campuses in Michigan with Piker sharing the stage with him. El Sayed has drawn scrutiny for his questionable affiliations.
Kyle Shideler, the director at the Center for Security Policy, exposed during congressional testimony that El Sayed is connected to terrorists and the Muslim brotherhood. “I look at the connections that his father-in-law, Jukaku Tayeb, and he has affiliations with two brotherhood-linked groups,” Shideler told the hushed assembly.
Socialists have been in the Democratic Party for years, but it is only now that violent radicals are entering the mainstream spotlight. Coming on the heels of Bernie Sanders, a self-described Democratic Socialist, was Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (AOC), a member of the Democratic Party and the Democratic Socialists of America. AOC, who is the face of ‘The Squad,’ an informal group of progressive Democratic members in the US House of Representatives, brought to the United States a tame version of socialism that many Americans could readily relate to. At least she was not calling for the destruction of the country.
She advocates a peaceful progressive platform that includes support for worker cooperatives, Medicare for All, tuition-free public colleges, a jobs guarantee, and a Green New Deal. These are initiatives that do not send shivers down the voters’ spines. Her political program is a vast difference from the deranged world of Mr. Piker and others, who literally want to destroy the United States as we know it. The Democratic Party must be far more selective in who it chooses to align itself with. Their hard-fought for reputation is on the line.

Meet at the Liberty Tree.

• Patriots Won’t Let Communists Take America (J.B. Shurk)

This chapter in American history could be titled, “The Bad Guys Keep Winning Because They Suffer No Consequences for Their Treachery.”

Islamo-fascists and communists have taken over the Democrat Party and threaten to take over the U.S. Congress. Neither Barack Obama nor Hillary Clinton has been brought to justice for conspiring with parts of the Intelligence Community to frame President Trump as a Russian spy. The same Ukrainian and British Intelligence agents who helped orchestrate the first ridiculous impeachment against Trump (ostensibly set in motion because the president asked Volodymyr Zelenskyy why Joe Biden’s son was making tens of thousands of dollars each month as a board member of a Ukrainian energy company) continue trying to instigate an all-out war between the Russian Federation and the United States.
The mainstream media and globalist politicians want us all to forget that they used COVID as an excuse to roll out totalitarianism around the planet — justifying widespread censorship, lockdowns, mass surveillance, deadly chemical injections, and the abrogation of God-given rights in the name of “public health.” Our scientific institutions refuse to say clearly that COVID was most likely engineered in a Chinese bio-lab with funding from U.S. taxpayers that Dr. Anthony Fauci had redirected to assist his friends and business associates overseas. Nobody has been prosecuted for any of these crimes, just as nobody was prosecuted when President Barack Obama and Attorney General Eric Holder used the ATF to arm Mexican drug cartels, the IRS to target conservatives, and the USA PATRIOT Act to spy on political enemies (including all of the Republican presidential candidates for the 2016 election).
During the Obama and Biden administrations, Christians were prosecuted for being faithful servants of Christ. Parents were put on domestic terror watchlists for objecting to radical infusions of “transgenderism,” pornography, and race-based discrimination in their children’s public school curricula. The Democrat Party nationalized healthcare, used USAID budgets to subvert foreign elections, and redirected trillions of taxpayer dollars into “climate change” slush funds for domestic and foreign political allies. The Obama-Biden regime defamed police officers as inherently racist and disparaged all white Americans as inherently “privileged.” Decades of solid improvement in race relations in the United States were thrown out the window, as Democrats told their voters that white, heterosexual males deserve to be vilified and attacked.
For fifteen years, Antifa goons, BLM rioters, Islamic supremacists, and other violent left-wingers have burned down neighborhoods, destroyed churches, looted businesses, terrorized motorists, and harassed, threatened, and murdered ideological adversaries. Instead of reporting on years of leftist domestic terrorism, corporate news talking heads still pretend that President Trump’s MAGA voters are the biggest threat to the United States. It is easy to list the long train of abuses that have been committed against us and lose hope for the future. Particularly because nobody has been held accountable for any of the serious crimes listed above, a lot of American patriots have begun to wonder whether our country can even be saved.
It can be saved. But doing so will require Americans to get their minds right about the struggles ahead. I often ask American patriots who express premature defeat whether they would give up so easily if this were 1776, rather than 2026. My point is two-fold: First, we are most definitely living through a critical period of American history when, just as was true during the time of our Founding Fathers, the fate of our country rests in our hands. Second, the odds that we shall succeed in saving America today are at least as high as they were two-hundred-fifty years ago.
Sometimes the people who are most proud of America’s past accomplishments are too quick to throw in the towel when it comes to America’s future. But the origin story of the United States is epic because it was so unlikely. The Boston Massacre was in 1770. The Boston Tea Party occurred three years later. By the time the Second Continental Congress declared Independence from Great Britain in ’76, American colonists were still sharply divided over the merits of war. The Revolutionary War continued until ’83. The Articles of Confederation, ratified in ’81, was superseded by ’89.
When the Founders drafted the U.S. Constitution, they effectively tabled the peculiar institution of slavery, knowing that the issue would collapse the Union. During the 1790s, the heavily indebted United States endured severe economic troubles, and many members of Great Britain’s Parliament expected to reacquire their former colonies just as soon as interstate squabbles and economic calamity doomed the young nation. When the British captured and burned much of Washington, D.C., in 1814, they nearly succeeded.

“Both systems promise that a slaughter is necessary but also promise its end. Both systems invariably keep the first promise and violate the second.”

• The Mohammunist Manifesto – ‘Transitional Phase’ Slaughter (Milli Sands)

Image created using AI.

In revealing the commonalities of the Reds and the Greens in the Red-Green Axis, we have elucidated their shared goals of violence, wealth redistribution, inequality before the law, a binary world, monopoly rule by the elites, and controlling the totality of society. Here we explore the promise of transitional phase slaughter. bBoth Islamic political systems and Marxist-Leninist communism make two promises about the violent neutralization of internal rivals. The first is that it will happen: a transitional phase, necessary to secure the new order. The second is that it will end: temporary by design, giving way once the order is secure.

Both systems keep the first promise and break the second. Marxism states both explicitly. Islamic political theory implies them structurally. Neither system’s own history shows the second promise kept. In both, what was authorized as a passing emergency became, in practice, a standing condition, reopened by each generation against a new list of names.
Marx and Engels wrote that between capitalist and communist society lies a transition period in which the state can be nothing but the revolutionary dictatorship of the proletariat. Lenin, in The State and Revolution, built an entire argument on the promise attached to that dictatorship: it is temporary by definition because the state itself will “wither away” once class antagonism is eliminated and coercion becomes unnecessary. This is not a minor clause. It is the doctrine’s central justification for tolerating the dictatorship at all.
The Bolsheviks began implementing their slaughter within a year of taking power: the September 5, 1918, Decree on Red Terror, which ordered class enemies isolated in concentration camps and authorized summary execution, was issued after the assassination attempt on Lenin and the killing of the Petrograd Cheka chief.
The promised withering away did not follow. Nineteen years later, NKVD Order No. 00447, signed by Nikolai Yezhov on July 30, 1937, launched a fresh purge against former kulaks, clergy, and members of long-banned opposition parties, with an initial quota of 75,950 executions that regional officials repeatedly petitioned Moscow to raise.
Archival research puts executions under this order specifically at roughly 387,000; combined with parallel operations against national minorities and other categories, the wider Great Terror killed roughly 681,000 by the time it wound down in November 1938. Yezhov himself was arrested within a year of signing the order and executed in February 1940.
Mao’s party, founded in 1921 with Comintern backing and built on the same Leninist premise, reached the identical point on its own: three decades after Russia’s promised transition began, the Cultural Revolution reopened the same category of internal enemy under a different flag. The state did not wither.

How much more globalism can the EU take?

• Swedish PM Calls Spanish Illegal Immigrant Amnesty ‘Very Bad Idea’ (ET)

Swedish Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson has called the Spanish government’s amnesty for illegal immigrants a “very bad idea,” warning that it could spark another migrant crisis akin to the one that beset the continent in 2015. The center-right politician, who is running for reelection next month, told the Financial Times in an interview published on Aug. 11 that the Spanish amnesty for more than a million illegal immigrants had caused a “pretty big outcry” at the last summit of EU leaders.

Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez’s government granted a royal decree on April 14, launching the regularization of people living illegally in the country. The proposal was first presented on Jan. 27 to allow about 500,000 illegal immigrants already living and working in Spain to obtain legal status through an accelerated process. According to figures from the Spanish government, almost 1.2 million applications for regularization were received. The move was controversial, but the migrant surge in Ceuta, a Spanish exclave on the North African side of the Mediterranean at the end of July, compounded concerns.
Kristersson said a knock-on effect from Madrid’s move could pose a serious threat to the European Union’s free movement zone, known as the Schengen Area.”It symbolizes that we still have to be very, very careful not to act in a way that could even come close to what happened in 2015,” Kristersson said. “I think Spain got the message … but it shows the vulnerability.”He said he had told Sánchez that he disapproved of the move. “Having [the amnesty] also creates a possibility for you to use European territory. That is specifically damaging for us because we know from experience that many people coming to Europe prefer to go north. Exactly that happened in 2015,” Kristersson said.
“It is not the time to get relaxed on this … there is a huge majority in Sweden saying they cannot go back to an uncontrolled situation. … Doing things that could jeopardize a stable situation would be a very bad idea.”In 2015, 1.3 million people, mostly fleeing war in Syria and Iraq, sought refuge in Europe, causing the EU’s asylum system to collapse; reception centers were overwhelmed in Greece and Italy, with countries further north erecting barriers to stop illegal immigrants from entering.
The unprecedented influx into Ceuta began on July 30, when an estimated 50,000 to 60,000 people entered the exclave from Morocco by land and sea. Many swam around a border breakwater after social media posts claimed that Spain had opened its border. More than 80 people died on both sides of the border, according to figures released by Spanish and Moroccan authorities. Some drowned while attempting to swim to Ceuta, while others were crushed or trampled during chaotic efforts to climb a breakwater and border fence.
In the wake of that incident, multiple leaders around Europe issued sharp criticism of Sánchez’s government, with Italy temporarily suspending its Schengen Area agreement with Spain. The one-month suspension of border-free travel between Italy and Spain was announced on July 31 by Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni and Deputy Prime Ministers Antonio Tajani and Matteo Salvini, who described the move as necessary for security. France, which shares a land border with the Spanish mainland, also announced an intensification of controls along the border.
Italy’s move was supported by a number of EU member states, including Finland, Denmark, and the Czech Republic, with the governments of all three saying that Brussels should consider closing the Schengen Area to Spain. On Aug. 4, EU interior ministers called for stronger borders, faster returns, and expanded efforts to dismantle migrant-smuggling networks as a result of the Ceuta surge. Kristersson faces an election on Sept. 13, having led the Scandinavian nation since 2022 as head of a coalition comprising his Moderate Party, the Christian Democrats, and the Liberals with additional support from the Sweden Democrats.
Swedish polling company Novus’s poll of 5,726 eligible voters, conducted 6-9 July, gave the Social Democrats 32 percent, the Sweden Democrats 20 percent, and Moderates 17 percent. Sweden tightened its previously liberal immigration and citizenship policies earlier this year because of the vast numbers of immigrants it has taken in over the past two decades.In November, Stockholm launched an inquiry to investigate “parallel social structures” that had emerged in the country.

“Mr. Gilman joins over 100 Americans whom President Trump has freed during his second term in office.”

• President Trump Announces Release of Robert Gilman from Russian Jail (CTH)

Robert Gilman, an English teacher and Marine Corps veteran, was detained by Russian police while traveling to the U.S. embassy in Moscow in January 2022 and charged with disorderly conduct, drunkenness and assaulting a police officer, which his advocates strongly denied.

Via Truth Social – “I am proud to announce that American Citizen Robert Gilman, a former United States Marine, is coming HOME! In a well known Media story, Robert was imprisoned in Russia in 2022, during the Biden Administration. After my discussions with President Vladimir Putin, Russia has agreed to release him, very much on a Humanitarian Basis. We appreciate this decision, and the fact that Russia asked for no one in return — No exchange took place. Robert will land at Andrews Air Force Base, in Washington, D.C., tonight, where my Representatives, some of whom are on the plane with him, will welcome Robert back to THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA!
I just spoke to him, and he had one request — A GREAT cheeseburger when he lands. I will take care of that! During my Administration, we have prioritized bringing home Americans Detained Abroad, and have done so at a level never seen before, returning hundreds of people to their families. We have also freed many non Americans who were under capture in different countries throughout the World. Robert Gilman has been reunited with his wonderful mother, Nancy, who is also on the plane with him, and will soon get to see all of his loved ones.
Thank you to my incredible Team, including Special Envoy for Peace Missions, Steve Witkoff, Special Envoy for Hostage Response, Adam Boehler, Senior Director for Counterterrorism, Sebastian Gorka, Jared Kushner, and the many others who made this possible. GOD BLESS AMERICA!” ~ President DONALD J. TRUMP.

Via Marco Rubio – “Today, after more than four years of detention in Russia, Robert Gilman is on his way home to be reunited with his family. Mr. Gilman joins over 100 Americans whom President Trump has freed during his second term in office. We thank Russia for working with Special Envoy Steve Witkoff to release Mr. Gilman and allowing him to receive the necessary medical treatment here in the United States.
While we appreciate this positive step, we are still seeking the immediate return of all other unjustly detained Americans, including wrongful detainee Stephen Hubbard. The President will not stop until all unjustly detained Americans are home.” [citation]

“Germany has fallen into the socialists’ trap once again.”

• The Spendthrift State (Thomas Kolbe)

Germany’s new experiment in socialism requires the use of every remaining resource available to its citizens. That there would be no real relief should have been obvious for quite some time to anyone taking a realistic view of the reform. Meanwhile, Klingbeil’s troops are working to keep bleeding the citizenry — with small pinpricks carried out beneath the radar of public attention.

The government has promised us €10 billion in tax relief. That would amount to almost exactly one percent of the total tax revenue of the German state apparatus — a sham, a joke, indeed, if not an outright insult to those who grit their teeth and endure the ideological grand experiment of eco-socialism. And even this meager relief, which would not constitute genuine relief in the first place because it would be offset by a higher top tax rate and possible increases in VAT, is now quietly being clawed back elsewhere. The latest move by the Klingbeil camp: tax allowances for associations and certain types of corporate gains are to be abolished.
For example, the existing €5,000 tax allowance for taxable corporations, associations of persons and pools of assets is to be reduced to a €1,000 exemption threshold from next year onward. The distinction between a tax allowance and an exemption threshold is by no means a mere technicality of tax law. With a tax allowance, the amount remains tax-free up to the defined threshold. With an exemption threshold, by contrast, the entire tax benefit disappears as soon as the threshold is exceeded.
In addition, the existing €45,000 allowance for gains from the sale or closure of businesses is to be abolished entirely. The allowance for gains from the sale of shares in corporations is also to disappear. The finance minister expects these measures to generate around €350 million in additional revenue.
A laughable sum, really. But, as the saying goes, even little streams add up. And the Merz government has plenty of them to offer. A growing number of small tax-policy measures are now accumulating in the slipstream of the grand raid, almost escaping notice. Everyone is talking about the CO2 tax, rising social-security contributions, and the looming reform of inheritance and wealth taxation. That is understandable, but it appears to be only half the truth, because the smaller fiscal abuses are being overlooked. And one thing is certain: The raid on the middle class is only now really gathering pace, because the Merz-Klingbeil duo has released the debt handbrake.
Generally speaking, we have to recognize the following: When it comes to the postmodern state of German EU design, the rule is clear: More can never be enough. Officially, 52.5 percent of German economic output flows through the channels of the German state apparatus. Everyone knows that this figure is an outright lie. If we include the bureaucratic burdens imposed on businesses and private households, as well as statistical tricks involving state-owned enterprises, the state share of the economy is likely to be comfortably above 60 percent.
Once again, one has to ask: When, finally, is more enough? State-worshipping naives would probably say: Where is growth and prosperity supposed to come from if the state does not take matters into its own hands? Just remember: It is the very same state that is supposed to perform an economic miracle, the same state that created the migration chaos. The same state that destroyed billions in wealth by shutting down nuclear power and has driven the German economy to the sidelines with its centrally planned energy transition.
This exorbitant achievement is now being confirmed and accelerated in its destructive effect by new borrowing of more than 5 percent and spending increases of 6 percent this year under the aegis of the federal chancellor. As I said: More can never be enough. It is the same state, led by Green-socialist hardliners, that has built a subsidy machine through which around €321 billion in funds flow. Money that is missing from the real economy, where investments, production capacity and innovation are being fought for in the interests of consumers.

“:After Advocating for Illegal Alien Leniency and Amnesty..”

• Mike Lindell Gets Crushed in Minnesota Primary (CTH)

Hopefully this will be a lesson to multiple people, including President Donald Trump. There is no room for softness on the topic of deporting illegal aliens. In one of the biggest examples of a mistake in Republican campaigning, three weeks before the primary election Minnesota Governor candidate Mike Lindell made the fatal mistake of advocating for greater leniency for illegal aliens, with inferred amnesty in his immigration platform. The backlash was fierce, righteous and directly targeted. Lindell was blasted.
https://twitter.com/AlphaNews/status/2080011880735846463?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E2080011880735846463%7Ctwgr%5Ed5c5b2f1a1a82a8e982ce3ba66df36bab338d80c%7Ctwcon%5Es1_c10&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Ftheconservativetreehouse.com%2Fblog%2F2026%2F08%2F12%2Fafter-advocating-for-illegal-alien-leniency-and-amnesty-mike-lindell-gets-crushed-in-minnesota-primary%2F https://twitter.com/proamericapol/status/2081179873092284682?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E2081179873092284682%7Ctwgr%5Ed5c5b2f1a1a82a8e982ce3ba66df36bab338d80c%7Ctwcon%5Es1_c10&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Ftheconservativetreehouse.com%2Fblog%2F2026%2F08%2F12%2Fafter-advocating-for-illegal-alien-leniency-and-amnesty-mike-lindell-gets-crushed-in-minnesota-primary%2F
Last night, despite the support and endorsement from President Trump, Lindell was resoundingly defeated by Lisa Demuth, the speaker of the Minnesota House.

“Voters can spot the real thing; AOC is authentically bananas. That is better than a Newsom banana split that is part establishment and part insurgency.”

• Gavin Newsom, the DSA, and the Danton Delusion (Turley)

This week, Gavin Newsom made his latest pitch to the mob by proclaiming himself “an established insurgent.” It was vintage Newsom in trying to be everything to everyone, part of the establishment and part of the revolution. Like a violent pacifist or a preservation arsonist, it makes no sense to anyone else. However, with the victory of radicals across the country, Newsom is trying to join other armchair revolutionaries in seeking to lead the far-left mob. He believes that he can use a class war that will spare him while destroying his enemies. Call it the Danton delusion.

In my book Rage and the Republic: The Unfinished Story of the American Revolution, I discuss the French Revolution and its decline into what the Framers called a mobocracy. What became known as “The Terror” was started not by the working class, but by educated lawyers, journalists, and even aristocrats as part of the Jacobin movement. One of the central figures was a lawyer named Georges Jacques Danton, a gifted orator and writer.
Danton would become the Justice Minister and later a member of the infamous Committee of Public Safety. The more he facilitated the rage, the more he found himself captured by it. Achieving power at the head of a mob, Danton fed the bloodlust of revolution, sending thousands to the guillotine and allegedly masterminding atrocities such as the September Massacres. Danton secured power by declaring others to be dangerous reactionaries, declaring, “The bell we are about to ring . . . sounds the charge on the enemies of our country.”
Danton struggled to stay ahead of the mob by feeding victims into the grinder of a class war. Eventually, however, the mob had finished off the aristocrats, clergy, and merchants. The most radical Jacobins, led by his ally Maximilien Robespierre, then turned on their fellow Jacobins, including Danton. Before his fall, it was dawning on Danton that there would be no end to the killings. When one supporter excitedly told him of more executions of moderates as guilty of “factionalism,” Danton remarks, “We’re all factious. If they deserve to be guillotined, we all deserve so. Those men in Paris will guillotine the entire Republic.”
And so they did. Danton himself would stand before the “national razor” on April 5, 1794. Notably, the radicals today are also calling for purges of the Democratic Party of moderates and denouncing dissenters as “factionalism.” Yet, Newsom still hopes that he can use the mob for his own ambitions, ignoring Danton’s warning, “Woe betide those who would provoke revolutions.”
Newsom wants to be one of the red aristocrats of the new Democratic Party. By calling for radical changes to our constitutional system, he is hoping that the socialists will ignore his own wealth and privilege. The same is true for Ro Khanna, who is also offering to trash our institutions. He hopes to secure the socialist vote despite being reportedly worth roughly half a billion dollars thanks to his wife’s inheritance.
In Newsom’s case, the proletarian pitch still comes off as more French Laundry than French Revolution. He is trailing in the polls, with some showing him falling behind former Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg, who has been promising his own radical changes to our system while campaigning with controversial figures such as Abdul El-Sayed in Michigan.
The loss of DSA candidate Francesca Hong this week will not change the calculation for Newsom. What he saw was an extremist who came within less than one percentage point of winning the nomination for Wisconsin governor. The far-left gubernatorial candidate Peggy Flanagan did win the primary handily in Minnesota. Other leaders like Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison (who previously praised the violent group Antifa) celebrated the infusion of socialists into the party.
After the Hong defeat, socialist influencer and virulent anti-Semite Hasan Piker lashed out against the establishment Democrats and the media, declaring that “The knives will be out.” Newsom believes that there is a pocket of delusional free-market Marxists who are longing for his leadership. If so, they do not live in New Hampshire, where Newsom is being trounced by Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. Voters can spot the real thing; AOC is authentically bananas. That is better than a Newsom banana split that is part establishment and part insurgency.
As Harris and Buttigieg make their own plays for the radical wing, Newsom will likely need to find another institution to offer up other than the Supreme Court. Packing the Supreme Court has become the mere starting ante in the game. Radicals are looking for bona fides of true believers with some calling for the scrapping of the Constitution entirely.
Newsom — “the established insurgent” — is desperately trying to be the next leader rather than the next trophy of the mob. History is not on their side. Well-coiffed hair and a hip podcast are not likely to be enough to keep the mob at bay. From New York to Colorado, the far left is taking establishment heads. In the end, Danton yielded one last time to feed the desire of the mob. When he was finally taken to the guillotine, Danton told the executioner, “Show the people my head. It is well worth seeing.”

“A Flock camera is an automated license plate reader (ALPR) made by Flock Safety. Placed on streets and near neighborhoods, they use AI to log passing cars, recording the license plate, make, model, color, and time. Police and neighborhoods use them to track stolen cars or suspects, but privacy groups worry about mass tracking.”:

• Police and Federal Govt Use of Flock Cameras Under Scrutiny (CTH)

Back in 2013 and 2014 we shared the story of a man returning to Florida was stopped by police in Maryland who asked him for his firearm. When the Floridian asked the Maryland police how they knew he owned a firearm, things got sketchy.The event kicked off a constitutional discussion. A few years later in 2015 the Wall Street Journal reported on a national federal database that was using Automatic License Plate Readers (APLRs) to capture and store the travel of millions of Americans {SOURCE}.

Now we fast-forward a decade and that federal database is now being exploited by local police around the nation to keep track of ordinary persons of interest to their community who travel outside their jurisdiction. This is where the Flock Cameras come into the discussion. The same government interests who dismiss our concerns about privacy are the same govt interests who point out how horrible China and Iran are for monitoring their citizens on CCTV systems.

She’s so young! Hubby’s twice her age.

• Karoline Leavitt Resigns as White House Press Secretary (Sarah Anderson)

President Donald Trump announced on Wednesday that one of the most popular and visible faces of his administration is stepping down. White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt will leave her post at the end of August to spend more time with her “beautiful children.” However, Trump says she will continue to be one of his “top outside advisors” and an “influential voice within the Republican Party.” The president did not mention who might replace her. Here is his announcement in full, which he posted on Truth Social:

“Our wonderful White House Press Secretary, and one of my most trusted aides, Karoline Leavitt, will be departing her role at the end of the month so she can spend more time with her beautiful young children and family, a decision I totally understand and respect! Karoline will now be one of my top outside advisors, and an influential voice within the Republican Party, as we work to defy History, and conclusively win the Midterm Elections. Karoline has been a real leader in the White House, and has done a phenomenal job fighting for Justice, Liberty, and Freedom, since 2018, including our Historic Re-Election Campaign of 2024. Karoline has been one of the best White House Press Secretaries in the History of the Office. Thank you, Karoline, for a job well done!” President DONALD J. TRUMP
Leavitt responded to Trump’s announcement with her own lengthy social media post, which says in part: “Being a mother and welcoming a new baby while working in one of the most demanding jobs in the world has been the most rewarding yet challenging season of my life, to say the least. The truth is since returning to the White House after the birth of my daughter, I have felt in my heart that I cannot be the best mom my two young children deserve while devoting the constant time, energy, and attention required of the White House Press Secretary — and that is why I have ultimately made the bittersweet decision to depart the White House and embark on a new chapter in my life.” You can read her entire message here:

Serving as the White House Press Secretary over the past year and a half has been the honor and adventure of a lifetime. I am incredibly grateful to President Trump for granting me so many extraordinary opportunities, such as working in the West Wing and spending countless hours… https://t.co/4jyW61DGGh pic.twitter.com/xny1yccuBn
— Karoline Leavitt (@karolineleavitt) August 12, 2026

Leavitt announced in December of last year that she was expecting a baby girl. On May 1, she welcomed Viviana “Vivi” Riccio with her husband, Nicholas Riccio. The couple already had a son, Nicholas “Niko” Riccio, who was born in July 2024. With a newborn and toddler at home, it makes sense that Leavitt would want to step back from her work and spend more time with her young family, even though she has long talked about how friendly the Trump White House is toward working moms. In May 2025, a photo of Leavitt feeding a bottle to her son with one hand, while typing on a computer in her office with the other, went viral. Margo Martin, special assistant to the president and communications advisor, posted the picture on X with the caption “Super Mom!”
https://twitter.com/MargoMartin47/status/1920565558388416938?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1920565558388416938%7Ctwgr%5E6d9cbe160632d6b950ec25853a61109a7242bf52%7Ctwcon%5Es1_c10&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fpjmedia.com%2Fsarah-anderson%2F2026%2F08%2F12%2Fkaroline-leavitt-is-resigning-as-white-house-press-secretary-n4956080
Leavitt is still young — she turns 29 years old later this month — so if she wants to return to politics, she should have plenty of time when her children are older. Of course, we wish her the best and will miss watching her take down the fake news media reporters every week from the White House Press Briefing Room.

You are 100 percent correct matey.@JohnCleese pic.twitter.com/7y7NwKQ4jc
— The English Crusader (@andrewc44104127) August 11, 2026

Ron Baron in a new video says each @Tesla Cybercab could generate the company $40,000 in profits per year. He sees Robotaxi generating over $120B in revenue per year in the not too distant future.

"They’re switching to having a car that they’re going to make for themselves,… pic.twitter.com/9TiO1HEKtw
— Nic Cruz Patane (@niccruzpatane) August 11, 2026

Ron Baron on @SpaceX’s Starlink in a new video:

"It is the internet of the planet. We think in 10 years, that’s going to be a trillion dollar annual revenue business. 1 trillion in revenue will produce, we think roughly $700-800 billion in profits a year.

The means, in 10… pic.twitter.com/zz6KWEpgiQ
— Nic Cruz Patane (@niccruzpatane) August 12, 2026

Kevin O'Leary: "Very few people at this point would doubt [Elon Musk] on anything. He kind of has mandates and he delivers one way or the other."pic.twitter.com/LtEKbRAFqa

"The thing about Elon is he's the modern Bruce Wayne, there's no question about it."

"There's a lot of…
— Resist the Mainstream (@ResisttheMS) August 11, 2026

https://twitter.com/KanekoaTheGreat/status/2087308220465582114?s=20

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Debt Rattle August 2 2026

Aug 022026

August 2, 2026 Posted by Raúl Ilargi Meijer at 10:17 am Finance Tagged with: Ceuta, Melilla, Pedro Sanchez, Seattle, Ukraine, US diplomacy, Zelensky 25 Responses »

Willem de Kooning Gotham News 1955

• Trump Orders Heavy Attack On Energy-Related Targets In Iran (ZH)

• Spanish PM Pedro Sanchez Calls EU Opposition to Mass Migration “Selfish” (CTH)

• 22 EU Leaders Demand “Immediate Action” To Ceuta and Melilla Invasion (ZH)

• Trump Warns US Faces Spain-style Migrant Invasion (RT)

• Zelensky Flew To A Funeral And Buried His Last Big Hope (Evgeny Balakin)

• Kiev’s Dirty War Goes Global (Sadygzade)

• Why Western Europe Needs The Ukraine Conflict To Continue (Lukyanov)

• US Not In Dispute With EU Over Ukraine, But Still Key Player — Diplomat (TASS)

• US Sees Profits As Key Foreign Policy Goal, Russian Diplomat Says (TASS)

• The Socialist Monster Awakens (Victor Davis Hanson)

• Trump’s Damage To US Diplomacy Could Last A Generation (McGlinchey)

• Seattle Is in Free Fall (Victoria Taft)

https://twitter.com/GuntherEagleman/status/2083221063689785720?s=20

Joe Rogan just WENT OFF on CNN and the mainstream media for ignoring the Fauci hearing and claiming Americans do not care.

“If you don’t think that’s news, you’re out of your mind.”

“You shouldn’t be calling yourself the news.”

“You’re just a propaganda arm for whatever… pic.twitter.com/SOBqPLvZIl
— End Tribalism in Politics (@EndTribalism) July 31, 2026

Thank God @POTUS was elected and our country’s border no longer looks like this.

These images out of Spain are an unfortunate reminder of the consequences of mass migration and the radical left-wing globalist policies that have enabled the Invasion of the West.@BillMelugin_:… pic.twitter.com/b67fR3SEof
— JD Vance (@JDVance) July 31, 2026

https://twitter.com/EricLDaugh/status/2083568244074369480?s=20 https://twitter.com/MAGAVoice/status/2083272023422418989?s=20

Does it feel like a swamp yet?

• Trump Orders Heavy Attack On Energy-Related Targets In Iran (ZH)

The Wall Street Journal and CBS are reporting that major US strikes – perhaps harder than anything of the last two weeks – are set to imminently commence. The attacks could be initiated at any point this weekend, after Trump gave the ‘order’ – it’s being reported: President Trump has ordered a fresh attack on Iran aimed at getting Tehran to surrender that could begin as soon as this weekend and would last a few days, U.S. officials said.

Earlier on Friday, he told reporters that he planned to resume heavy military strikes to force the regime to come to the negotiating table. He predicted that if the U.S. hit Iran hard enough, the hard-line regime would eventually “peter out.” Trump made clear earlier at Camp David that the Iranians can’t be trusted, are ‘dishonorable’ – and so he’s not pursuing talks. The late afternoon Friday CBS report is more alarming, given that “The United States and Israel are planning what would be one of the harshest bombing campaigns to date against energy infrastructure targets in Iran, multiple sources told CBS News, with strikes possible throughout the weekend.”
It adds, “There was some discussion about trying to conclude by the time financial markets open Monday because of concern about how the bombings will affect the U.S. and global economy, but an end point wasn’t locked in.” Earlier this week there were reports of Trump exploding at his own advisors amid ongoing debates about how the crisis should be handled, and finding an exit strategy. “Well, they always want to talk, but they break their words so often,” Trump said Friday at Camp David, putting his frustration on display later adding: “All they do is make me angry.”
A key line from WSJ point to where things are likely headed: “Some U.S. officials believe Iran will continue to drag out negotiations, banking that Trump will abandon his war efforts in the long term in the face of mounting domestic political opposition.”
Keep Hitting Them: Trump
Trump is holding a Cabinet meeting on Friday at Camp David. He claimed that the fight against Iran is “going well” and stated that American forces are “hitting them very hard” – adding that “eventually” Iran will have no choice but to “come home” – meaning full surrender. “
It’s going well. Everything we can do is keep winning,” Trump also told Fox News. “But we are hitting them hard, shaking them up, and we’re just continuing to win.” He suggested there will still be strikes ongoing in coming weeks, and that he’s losing faith in the idea of talks with “dishonest” Iran “because they lie”.Additionally, Trump’s Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent is claiming that Iran is unable to pay its troops – though without offering specific evidence to back this, and that the US continues searching for Iranian assets to seize “all around the world”. This is after Thursday Washington rolled out yet more sanctions.

Trump: "We'll be hitting them. We'll be hitting them very hard. At some point they're gonna say, 'We just can't take it anymore.'" pic.twitter.com/DT1Fcf57EN
— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) July 31, 2026

Yeah, yeah, open borders have been great for Europe…

• Spanish PM Pedro Sanchez Calls EU Opposition to Mass Migration “Selfish” (CTH)

Standing against what he calls “selfish” motives of European leadership, Spain’s socialist Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez says tolerance for mass illegal migration must win over the loud voices of short-sighted nationalism. According to Sanchez, these EU regulations and rules against the dreams of sub-Saharan Africans are polarizing and stopping migrants from fulfilling their greatest aspirations.

Telegraph – via MSM – Pedro Sánchez has criticised “selfish” EU leaders after 22 European prime ministers and presidents attacked him for the sudden migrant surge in Ceuta. Spain’s prime minister wrote a letter to the heads of the EU institutions after Italy and France ramped up border controls in response to the 60,000 Moroccan migrants who stormed the Spanish enclave in North Africa.
[…] “In the current international context, the European Union cannot afford this kind of selfish, polarising and unlawful reaction,” wrote Mr Sánchez, one of the few remaining socialist leaders in the EU, as he called for an emergency meeting. He criticised those who “have chosen to attack Spain and to call for its temporary exclusion from the Schengen Area”. But Mr Sánchez was isolated after 22 EU leaders, including Ms Meloni and Friedrich Merz, the German chancellor, wrote their own letter to Ursula von der Leyen, the European Commission president; António Costa, the European Council president; and Micheál Martin, the Irish prime minister, whose country holds the presidency of the EU.
The letter addressing the “serious concern” over the threat to the EU border was signed by the leaders of Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Croatia, Cyprus, the Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, Greece, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Malta, the Netherlands, Poland, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia and Sweden. They singled out Mr Sánchez’s migrant amnesty for criticism. In early July, some 609,737 of the 1.17 million migrants in Spain who applied for legal status obtained temporary work permits, making it the largest regularisation of black market workers in European history. (read more)
On Saturday, Spain said it had returned “almost everyone” to Morocco and that it was not possible to travel from Ceuta or Melilla to mainland Spain without presenting identification at a police checkpoint, guaranteeing the “integrity of the Schengen area”. Mr Sánchez, who rushed to Ceuta on Friday and faces elections next year, accused people-smuggling gangs of trying to exploit a recent ruling made by the Spanish supreme court, which decided migrants stopped at sea while trying to reach Ceuta or Melilla could not be summarily returned to Morocco.
More than 37,500 migrants have returned to Morocco after an estimated 60,000 crossed into Spain's Ceuta enclave this week. The rush turned deadly, with some migrants drowning as they tried to swim to the territory. CBS News' @aidan_stretch spoke with one migrant about why he… pic.twitter.com/KqBBXhhiOH
— CBS News (@CBSNews) July 31, 2026

Not enclaves, but exclaves.

• 22 EU Leaders Demand “Immediate Action” To Ceuta and Melilla Invasion (ZH)

European leaders criticized Madrid’s socialist government as its open-border policies unraveled for the world to see. The invasion of the Spanish enclaves of Ceuta and Melilla by 50,000 military-aged men from Morocco exposed the dire consequences of nation-killing mass-migration policies promoted by socialist regimes, which have long eroded national sovereignty across the entire continent. For Europe, the latest border breach represents one of the clearest warnings yet that uncontrolled mass migration has evolved from a political dispute into a full-blown national security crisis.

Hours after the invasion, Italy’s Interior Ministry suspended Schengen free-movement rules with Spain and ordered the closure of air and maritime borders between the two countries, citing national security concerns. The list of European leaders criticizing Spanish Socialist Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez is growing on Saturday, as 22 EU leaders have now signed on to a demand for an “immediate and coordinated European response” to the invasion into Ceuta and Melilla.
https://twitter.com/visegrad24/status/2083545235678781812?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E2083545235678781812%7Ctwgr%5E61c124c705d0db5197f30d574d09eab838c3462a%7Ctwcon%5Es1_c10&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.zerohedge.com%2Fgeopolitical%2Fcrazy-footage-shows-migrants-rampaging-breaking-homes-after-invading-spain
“We cannot allow uncontrolled mass crossings, the instrumentalization of migration or other hybrid threats to create the perception that illegal entry into the European Union is possible,” EU leaders, including Denmark’s Mette Frederiksen, Italy’s Giorgia Meloni and Germany’s Friedrich Merz, wrote in a letter published on X by Denmark’s Ministry of State.

PM Frederiksen: "Together with @GiorgiaMeloni and 20 colleagues we demand immediate action from the EU to discuss further initiatives about the alarming situation in Ceuta. Control of our borders is paramount. All measures must be considered to ensure the safety of Europeans.”
— Statsministeriet (@Statsmin) August 1, 2026

Sánchez and Spain’s socialists are already feeling the impact of a negative information campaign that has spread across the West. The Trump administration is using the crisis as a warning to American voters ahead of the midterms that socialists gaining power would risk reopening the US border crisis. Political pressure on Sánchez will intensify further if illegal crossings resume or illegals reach mainland Europe.
The most likely pathway is, therefore, containment followed by political blowback against socialist parties in Madrid and across the bloc, rather than an immediate collapse of Schengen. Any second mass surge, however, would only suggest the weaponization of migration against Europe; in other words, asymmetric warfare. The open-ended question is who, if anyone, on the Moroccan side financed, organized, and facilitated the invasion.

“The president used the migration crisis in the EU to claim America was overrun by illegals under his predecessor”

• Trump Warns US Faces Spain-style Migrant Invasion (RT)

The surge of migrants across the border from Morocco into Spain is an example of what could happen to the US if Republicans aren’t elected, US President Donald Trump has claimed. Trump has repeatedly attacked his political opponents over immigration, blaming his predecessor Joe Biden for illegal border crossings. An estimated 50,000 migrants, mostly young men, swam from Morocco and crossed into the Spanish exclave of Ceuta earlier this week in an unprecedented influx that triggered a humanitarian crisis in the city. The Spanish Interior Ministry has reported that around 48,000 had voluntarily returned by Friday evening.

“What’s happening with Spain, with tens of thousands of Illegal Immigrants invading it, happened in the United States during the Sleepy Joe Biden Administration, and it will happen again, only worse, if the Dumocrats ever again gain power,” Trump said late on Friday in a brief post on Truth Social, urging Americans to vote Republican in the midterm elections.The remarks come ahead of US midterm elections scheduled for November as Trump faces slipping approval ratings. A recent poll found that most US adults believe he has not focused enough on the everyday concerns of ordinary Americans, that his economic policies have worsened conditions, and that his military decisions in Iran have harmed the US.
White House principal deputy press secretary Anna Kelly said on Friday that Trump “has long warned Europe what would happen if they continue to implement far-left, globalist policies, including enabling mass migration.” Trump and his administration have consistently criticized both the previous US government and European leaders over their handling of illegal migration. The president has claimed that it was “killing” Europe, urging its leaders to act immediately before they lose control of the continent.
Domestically, Trump has pursued an unprecedented immigration crackdown. Since returning to office in January 2025, he has launched a sweeping enforcement campaign involving mass deportations and expanded detention efforts, pledging to carry out the largest migrant removal operation in US history despite widespread criticism and protests. Trump’s latest remarks also come amid strained ties with Madrid. The two countries clashed during the recent conflict with Iran after Spain refused to allow the US to use its bases for strikes, while Trump has repeatedly criticized the country over what he believes is its insufficient defense spending.
Migration has remained one of the EU’s defining political issues since the 2015 refugee crisis. Brussels recently agreed on a sweeping overhaul of its migration system aimed at speeding up deportations, while many member states have tightened national immigration laws. Spain has, meanwhile, taken a different approach to migration. Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez has argued immigration is essential to address labor shortages and demographic decline, while his government has expanded pathways for undocumented migrants to obtain legal status and work permits.

“His wish list included Patriots, PAC-3 licenses, and more military support. None of them materialized..”

• Zelensky Flew To A Funeral And Buried His Last Big Hope (Evgeny Balakin)

Washington DC, July 29, 2026. On this day, a city accustomed to protocol visits and carefully orchestrated diplomatic spectacles welcomed a rather unexpected guest. Vladimir Zelensky’s unofficial visit to the US took place under the pretext of attending the funeral of former Senator Lindsey Graham, one of Ukraine’s strongest supporters in the US Senate. A private, closed-casket funeral was held. Zelensky’s meeting with US President Donald Trump also took place behind closed doors – with no cameras, no joint statements, and no usual show of unity.

Trump, however, found time to meet with the head of the Kiev regime. Soon after the private meeting, a social media post appeared along with two images – a color photograph and a black and white one. The photos show Trump patting Zelensky on the shoulder with a patronizing expression. According to American political tradition, black-and-white photographs are often published in memory of the deceased. According to military expert Aleksey Leonkov, the photograph seems to send a clear message: “Well, man, hang in there as long as you can. We’ve got no Patriot missiles for you, but hang on.”
The atmosphere of Zelensky’s informal and rather unplanned visit reinforced the feeling that Kiev has once again been shown the limits of US support. Zelensky didn’t come alone – he was accompanied by many Ukrainian officials and representatives of the security forces. However, his public ‘achievements’ amounted to a conversation behind closed doors and two photos.
The closed casket
Lindsey Graham was one of the most ardent supporters of Ukraine in the US Senate for many years. He was someone Kiev could count on to pressure the Trump administration and push through new packages of military aid. That’s why Zelensky used his funeral as an excuse to travel to the US. The fact that Graham was buried in a closed casket gave rise to many theories. The official version is that his death was the result of a “sudden and brief illness.” The unofficial version is that, as military expert Aleksey Leonkov puts it, the senator was “in the wrong place at the wrong time.” He recalled that while Graham was in Kiev, the Russian army carried out one of its most powerful strikes on military targets in the city.
Zelensky’s new demands
Of course, Zelensky didn’t just come to bid farewell to the senator with whom he shared a hatred for Russia. Behind closed doors, he hoped to utter his usual “Gimme!” and hand Trump a specific ‘wish list’. According to Andrei Klintsevich, 3rd class Active State Councilor of the Russian Federation, Zelensky wants from America what he can’t get from his European partners: first of all, anti-aircraft missiles. “He asked for the winter package: 300 missiles for the Patriot system, PAC-3 missiles, which can shoot down [Russian] ballistic missiles, though not hypersonic ones, specifically Iskander or sea-based ballistic missiles.” Zelensky also asked for licenses to produce these missiles domestically.
Klintsevich notes that the Kiev government’s desire to obtain these licenses has come up against hard reality. And the problem isn’t just that the White House has to make the corresponding decision. Manufacturing these missiles involves a complex technological chain. RTX, Lockheed Martin, Boeing, and other companies are involved in assembling Patriot missiles. Some make the seeker heads, others the engines. Each item requires its own licenses, which must be withdrawn from commercial circulation and transferred to Kiev free of charge. “Of course, no one will agree to this,” Klintsevich says.
PAC-3 missile licenses are more than just a set of documents. It would be wrong to think that missile production can be scaled up like drone production. Drone components are readily available on the open market, but rocket technology is different. “Everything is specialized: from the engine to the rivets, to the fuel, and everything else,” the expert says. The problem isn’t the assembly line; Trump has already approved the start of production at General Motors and Ford plants. However, the subcontractors that supply complex components, such as gyroscopes and seekers, are critical in the production chain.
Production volumes don’t look impressive either: Lockheed Martin produces about 600 missiles per year for all systems worldwide. An increase of 50 units is planned with the launch of German production. By 2035, they plan to produce 2,000 missiles. “Considering the number [of missiles Russia] launches, even that would not be enough,” says Klintsevich. Combined, these two bottlenecks – issues with subcontractors and limited production volumes – make the demand for licenses and large-scale production practically impossible to implement in a short timeframe.
The Iran-Ukraine front
Zelensky’s second initiative during this trip was the attempt to get involved in the Iranian conflict. The goal was pragmatic: by demonstrating Ukraine’s active participation in the conflict, Zelensky wanted to gain access to military supply chains. To demonstrate this, a Ukrainian drone attacked an Iranian tanker, resulting in the death of one person.
Before Zelensky’s trip, Ukrainian Foreign Minister Andrey Sibiga made harsh accusations against Iran, claiming that it “deserved” the blow. But after Zelensky’s visit, his tone changed. “Let’s not stir up the conflict,” the foreign minister urged. Apparently, Zelensky’s attempt to get involved was unsuccessful.
Alexey Leonkov notes the reason behind the change in Kiev’s public statements. “Netanyahu does not need a competitor on the Iranian track, because the Iranian conflict is the prerogative of Israel,” he says. Netanyahu refused a private meeting with Zelensky. Israel jealously guards its key role in the Middle Eastern conflict. And Washington is not ready to get into a dispute with a key ally in the region for the sake of Kiev. Moreover, Ukraine’s earlier attempt to provide specialists from Madyar’s group to protect the Middle East from Iranian drones did not yield any results.

“From Africa to the Caspian Sea, each strike is an attempt to market Ukraine as a useful Western asset that still deserves cash and weapons.”

• Kiev’s Dirty War Goes Global (Sadygzade)

On the morning of July 25, Ukrainian drones attacked an Iranian merchant vessel in the Caspian Sea. An explosion occurred on board, killing one sailor and injuring another. Tehran described the incident as an act of aggression, summoned Ukraine’s chargé d’affaires and warned that retaliatory measures could follow.

Vladimir Zelensky did not deny that the operation had taken place, claiming that the targets were vessels allegedly involved in transporting military cargo linked to Iran. Yet within days, Ukrainian diplomacy abruptly changed its tone. Foreign Minister Andrey Sibiga told his Iranian counterpart that the merchant vessel had been struck unintentionally, after which discussions over compensation began.
So long as the operation could be presented to Western audiences as another demonstration of the long-range capabilities of the Ukrainian security services, Kiev was eager to speak of success. Once it became clear that Tehran intended to demand accountability, the initial bravado gave way to attempts to portray the incident as an accident. In other words, the Ukrainian leadership sought to reap the publicity benefits of the strike without showing any willingness to accept responsibility for its consequences.
At almost the same time, reports emerged from Iraq that several groups suspected of attacking sites inside the country had been detained. National Security Adviser Qasim al-Aboudi stated that those arrested had admitted to acting in Ukraine’s interests and that, according to their testimony, the attacks had been disguised as operations carried out by local armed factions. The Iraqi authorities have yet to disclose the details of the investigation, but the alleged method closely resembles practices previously associated with Ukrainian structures in Africa and the Middle East.
It is difficult to regard these two developments as entirely unrelated episodes. Both in the Caspian Sea and in Iraq, the same logic appears to be at work, with the practical value of an operation becoming secondary to its political and media impact. The Ukrainian authorities are seeking to demonstrate that they can strike targets of interest to Washington, work through local groups and export their intelligence and drone capabilities far beyond Ukraine’s borders.
The true audience for such signals is not in Tehran, Baghdad, Damascus or the capitals of Africa. They are directed at Western governments whose decisions determine the flow of funding to Kiev. At a time when the Ukrainian military remains dependent on foreign weapons, ammunition and budgetary support, Zelensky must prove that his government is not merely a recipient of assistance but a useful contractor capable of contributing to the West’s broader foreign-policy objectives.
The Mali and Syria precedents This model was most clearly displayed in northern Mali in the summer of 2024. Near Tinzaouaten, Tuareg formations attacked a column of the Malian army and Russian units. Fighters from JNIM, an organization affiliated with Al-Qaeda and active across the Sahel, also took part in the fighting.
Following the attack, Andrey Yusov, a representative of Ukraine’s Main Directorate of Intelligence, stated that the rebels had received information that enabled them to carry out a successful operation. This acknowledgement was made publicly and was reported not by Russian outlets but by some of the world’s largest international media organizations. Reuters, The Guardian, Bloomberg, The Washington Post and Al Jazeera all covered the alleged role of Ukrainian intelligence.
Subsequent attempts to portray the Mali scandal as the product of foreign propaganda were unconvincing, not least because the accusations had been prompted by the words of an official Kiev representative. Ukrainian intelligence itself associated the country with forces that, during the same combat episode, operated alongside a jihadist organization. Mali later severed diplomatic relations with Ukraine, accusing it of interfering in an internal conflict and supporting armed groups. Niger subsequently took the same step.
The sequence of Kiev’s actions was particularly telling. Immediately after the attack, Ukraine sought to claim some of the publicity surrounding the operation because Russian forces had been targeted and the outcome could be presented favorably to Western audiences. Once diplomatic repercussions followed, however, the Ukrainian Foreign Ministry began insisting that there was no convincing evidence of the country’s involvement.
This approach allows Kiev to benefit from the outcome of an operation while avoiding responsibility for the methods used. When an action wins the approval of Western partners, Ukrainian involvement is highlighted through hints or public statements. When allegations of violating sovereignty or cooperating with radical organizations arise, the authorities issue denials and demand proof of activities they had effectively boasted about only shortly before.

”Drone warfare has altered the balance in Ukraine, weakened the spirit of Anchorage, and given Europe a new political case for the conflict”

By Fyodor Lukyanov, the editor-in-chief of Russia in Global Affairs, chairman of the Presidium of the Council on Foreign and Defense Policy, and research director of the Valdai International Discussion Club.

“Trump believed that although Ukraine was resisting stubbornly, its defeat was ultimately inevitable and the sooner Kiev accepted concessions, the less severe the damage would be.”

So obviouslyTrump was very right all along. But Lukyanov didn’t/doesn’t see that?

• Why Western Europe Needs The Ukraine Conflict To Continue (Lukyanov)

The military-technical balance of power is a key element of every political system and changes in that balance, including those brought about by the emergence of new forms of warfare, shape political intentions and determine what is possible in international affairs. The rapid transformation of warfare, driven by the drone revolution and demonstrated over the past year in both Ukraine and the conflict around Iran, offers an opportunity to reassess familiar concepts and how they are evolving.

The spirit has changed, but let us leave the military aspects of drone warfare to the specialists and focus instead on the political consequences.August 2025 can be seen as the turning point, when Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin held their much-discussed meeting in Alaska. Whether any concrete agreements were reached remains disputed, but what’s clear is the essence of what became known as the ‘spirit of Anchorage’.
Trump believed that although Ukraine was resisting stubbornly, its defeat was ultimately inevitable and the sooner Kiev accepted concessions, the less severe the damage would be. The understandings reportedly reached reflected what Russia was prepared to settle for, the withdrawal of Ukrainian forces from Donbass, and where meaningful political negotiations could begin. The White House then turned to the other interested party, the Ukraine-Western Europe partnership.
It’s difficult to judge how much pressure Trump actually placed on his European counterparts. Some effort appears to have been made, but neither Trump nor his advisers were prepared to invest significant political capital and that was especially true given that parts of his administration didn’t share his hostility towards Vladimir Zelensky.
The Western Europeans, for their part, played the situation skillfully. The post-Anchorage pilgrimage of leaders to the White House, mocked by many at the time, as they appeared to indulge Trump’s often boorish behavior, served its purpose. The objective of the EU and UK was simple: to slow down the process that appeared to have begun in Alaska and buy enough time to convince the American president that his assumptions were wrong. Ukraine, they insisted, was still capable of changing the course of the war.
Almost a year later, it is fair to say that Brussels and London, together with Ukraine, achieved at least part of that objective. Meanwhile, Western perceptions of the conflict have changed and at this summer’s G7 and NATO summits, the US president displayed a noticeably more neutral, at times even supportive, attitude towards Kiev. In effect, he acknowledged that his earlier confidence in Ukraine’s inevitable defeat had been, at the very least, premature.
Whether this shift reflects genuine changes on the battlefield or the success of an effective political and media campaign is open to debate, but either way, the change is real and the much-discussed ‘spirit of Anchorage’ has faded because the political climate itself has changed.
Fear and hatred in Europe
Ukraine’s growing ability to conduct long-range drone strikes is the product of three years of sustained financial and technological support from Western Europe, and despite Trump’s repeated claims that “Sleepy Joe” squandered hundreds of billions of American dollars on Ukraine, it’s European governments, Germany above all, that are now carrying the greatest burden of supporting Kiev’s war effort. That’s why assistance didn’t collapse after Trump returned to the White House and sharply reduced American aid.
Western Europe finds itself in a difficult position as it faces persistent economic problems alongside growing concerns about Ukraine and its own internal stability. Maintaining support for Kiev is politically sustainable only if it is presented not as solidarity with Ukraine, but as an investment in the half-continent’s own security.
Public rhetoric, particularly in Germany, increasingly suggests that a military confrontation with Russia around the turn of the next decade is a genuine possibility. The argument is straightforward: As long as Ukrainians are fighting, Western Europe has time to prepare and therefore the conflict should continue for as long as possible, although how much of this militaristic rhetoric reflects genuine belief remains open to debate.
The circumstances have undoubtedly revived Western Europe’s long-standing historical suspicion of Russia, a powerful and, from the their perspective, unpredictable giant to the east. During periods of close economic cooperation these fears receded into the background, replaced by the pursuit of mutual benefit, but this political crisis has quickly pushed commercial interests aside.
In that sense, today’s expectation of a future military confrontation isn’t entirely artificial as it reflects deeply rooted attitudes within Western Europe’s political consciousness. There is, however, another dimension that is both more rational and perhaps not fully appreciated in that the EU and UK’s political establishment is searching for a new basis for internal cohesion at a time of profound economic and social change, and that faced with mounting uncertainty, it requires a unifying idea.
Nothing serves that purpose better than an external threat.

Russian Foreign Ministry Ambassador-at-Large Rodion Miroshnik.

• US Not In Dispute With EU Over Ukraine, But Still Key Player — Diplomat (TASS)

Russian Foreign Ministry Ambassador-at-Large Rodion Miroshnik

European leaders need the conflict to continue because they “have not yet finished building their military-industrial complex,” Russian Foreign Ministry Ambassador-at-Large for the crimes of the Kiev regime Rodion Miroshnik noted. The US is not getting involved in a serious confrontation with the EU over Ukraine, but remains a key player and is waiting for the right conditions to intervene in a way that benefits itself, Russian Foreign Ministry Ambassador-at-Large for the crimes of the Kiev regime Rodion Miroshnik TASS.

“When the Americans ‘get distracted,’ it means they realize that in this case, they were unable to pressure Ukraine, for example, into accepting the optimal agreements reached in Anchorage. These are the very agreements that the Americans themselves proposed. In other words, they assumed they could implement this project and coerce or persuade Ukraine to accept and carry out these terms. It turned out that they couldn’t. It also became clear that their European partners were unwilling to accept these terms,” the diplomat noted.
He explained that European leaders need the conflict to continue because they “have not yet finished building their military-industrial complex.” “That is why they are resisting American influence on the Ukrainian side. The Americans say, ‘All right, we’ll deal with Iran for now, but we’ll definitely come back to this issue.’ I don’t think they’ve completely abandoned the possibility of implementing this project. They will either return to it or wait for the situation to change. In fact, the Americans are undoubtedly a very important player in this arena,” Miroshnik concluded.

“According to Rodion Miroshnik, the United States is doing everything possible to preserve and strengthen its hegemony”

• US Sees Profits As Key Foreign Policy Goal, Russian Diplomat Says (TASS)

Foreign policy is like a major game of chess in which the United States seeks to make profits at every turn, Russian Foreign Ministry Ambassador-at-Large Rodion Miroshnik told TASS. “This entire process should be viewed as a major game of chess taking place on a large chessboard. Every move is followed by counteraction and efforts to pursue certain goals and strategies. What is happening in different parts of the chessboard should be viewed through different lenses. The American lenses can change, but the key one – at least in the current situation – is about profits,” the diplomat said.

According to Miroshnik, the United States is doing everything possible to preserve and strengthen its hegemony. “The Americans can see the growing importance of energy resources. ‘You have oil — we’re coming for you!’ They first went after Venezuela and then Iran. They are also in favor of isolating Russia in terms of energy trade,” he added.

I still don’t see the combi of America and socialism. Maybe I will pay dearly.

• The Socialist Monster Awakens (Victor Davis Hanson)

Who caused unaffordability? Fear about “affordability” supposedly fueled the new, strident socialism. Yet annual inflation during former President Joe Biden’s four years averaged almost 5%. It peaked at over 9%, while prices for some key staples rose by 30% over his tenure—all to silence from the Left. (By contrast, annual inflation during Trump’s first term averaged 1.9%. In his second term, it averaged 2.6% in 2025—and may rise to 4.5% in 2026, given the war with Iran.)

The socialists were not just quiet during Biden’s four years; they were themselves responsible for the rampant Biden inflation. They had implemented an inflationary de facto third Obama term, ramming through the most radical and costly agenda in decades under the veneer of that cognitively challenged waxen effigy, good ol’ Joe Biden from Scranton. So the current Jacobin takeover of the Democratic Party was not sparked by concerns about “affordability”—or at least not if by “affordability” we mean the middle-class struggle to buy a house, a car, or groceries.
Instead, the socialist moment was merely the logical culmination of years of boutique radicalism within the Democrat aristocracy—the ossified leadership of Chuck Schumer, Nancy Pelosi, Elizabeth Warren, Kamala Harris, and Hakeem Jeffries, along with the aging Black Caucus, the incoherent Squad, the DEI crowd, the open-border zealots, and the radical greens. The grandees of the party also normalized the crazy mobs of BLM and Antifa long ago.
Democrats as Dr. Frankenstein
Almost every weaponized scam and national hysteria in the last two decades was amplified and spread by mainstream Democrats: the farcical claim that the Wuhan-lab-hatched COVID-19 virus came from pangolins or bats; the Duke Lacrosse and Covington Kids hoaxes; the Jussie Smollett scam, the “Hands up, don’t shoot” lie; the deification of George Floyd, often portrayed with wings and a halo; Fauxcahontas Liz Warren, touted as the first Native American Harvard law professor (thanks to her grandfather’s high cheekbones); the radical diminution of in-person voting; the canonization of Trayvon Martin and Karmelo Anthony as blameless model children; and the mythology of a 1619 national founding.
Who allowed not just one, two, three, or four million border-jumpers into the country, but over ten million—illegal, unvetted, viewed as an assumed new political constituency, and instantaneously dependent on the welfare state? Who gave us three, four, five, or even more genders and biological males showering with teenage girls or female prisoners? Who sloganeered about “defund the police” and “no cash bail”? All this was about as radical as it gets. The Democrat establishment’s unhinged hatred of Donald Trump mainstreamed radicalism even further and helped birth the socialist-cum-communist Frankensteinian monster that is now devouring its mad-scientist creators.
“By any means necessary” was a Democrat mantra over a decade ago. By 2016, the Democrat leadership and the Clinton campaign were hatching the Steele-dossier farce to warp an election. In 2020, the Democrat deep state—Antony Blinken, Mike Morell, John Brennan, James Clapper, Leon Panetta, and others—had fabricated the farcical claim that the Hunter Biden laptop was Russian disinformation, a hoax that, this time around, likely did alter an election.
The Democrat establishment, working with its appendages in Silicon Valley, had censored news attesting to the authenticity of Hunter’s embarrassing laptop contents. (For an account of what the establishment was doing in 2020, read Molly Ball’s Time essay describing the “conspiracies” and “cabals” that worked behind the scenes to change voting rules and ensure a Biden victory through mail-in, no-ID balloting.) Then came four unhinged years of lawfare: special counsel Jack Smith’s seizure of the communications of senators and congressmen, the Mar-a-Lago raid on Trump’s home, the effort to de-ballot Trump, and the five civil and criminal circuses that resulted in half a billion dollars in fines.
All those perversions of the legal system were accompanied by a host of mainstream Democrats, retired generals, politicos, and athletes shouting that Trump was a Nazi, a fascist, a Mussolini, a traitor, or a Putin asset. Meanwhile, a host of loudmouth actors, Democrat activists, and celebrities competed with each other about how best to kill him—whether by shooting, stabbing, poisoning, beheading, burning him alive, or blowing him up. Trump supporters were libeled over the years by establishment Democrats as irredeemables, deplorables, chumps, dregs, and garbage.
Even an establishment figure like Rosa Brooks, a former Obama-appointed Pentagon lawyer, called for a military coup in Foreign Policy just 10 days after Trump first took office in 2017. Three would-be assassins got close enough to killing Trump to draw return fire from the Secret Service—near-death encounters that elicited both unapologetic applause for the attempts and lamentations that the shooters had failed from the now truly deranged social-media Left. Murderers themselves were normalized as leftist icons, as seen in the canonization of Luigi Mangione and the glee that followed in many Democrat social media circles after the murder of Charlie Kirk.
Yet did the establishment Democrat apparat calm these waters? Or did it set them boiling? It was Chuck Schumer who threatened conservative Supreme Court justices, screaming in front of a mob outside the court’s doors, “I want to tell you, Gorsuch, I want to tell you, Kavanaugh, you have released the whirlwind, and you will pay the price. You won’t know what hit you if you go forward with these awful decisions.” Schumer sounded more like a pink-haired anti-Immigration and Customs Enforcement street protester than a U.S. senator. No surprise, then, that two years later a left-wing would-be assassin turned up at Kavanaugh’s home, along with crowds of enthusiastic protestors.
Does anyone recall Maxine Waters urging the public to bird-dog Trump administration officials and harass them whenever they were seen in public? “If you see anybody from that Cabinet in a restaurant, in a department store, at a gasoline station, you get out, and you create a crowd, and you push back on them, and you tell them they’re not welcome anymore, anywhere.” Does anyone also remember Nancy Pelosi, then-Democrat House Minority leader, greenlighting “uprisings” over ICE deportations? “I just don’t know why there aren’t uprisings all over the country. Maybe there will be.” So spoke the radical owner of two mansions, who entered Congress with little net worth and will leave it worth over $100 million. A Tip O’Neill she wasn’t.
Then there was soon-to-be Vice President Kamala Harris egging on the George Floyd demonstrations, which, weeks earlier, had already turned violent and indeed deadly (despite what the “fact-checkers” asserted): “This is a movement, I’m telling you. They’re not going to stop. And everyone beware, because they’re not going to stop. They’re not going to stop before Election Day in November, and they’re not going to stop after Election Day. And that should be—everyone should take note of that, on both levels, that they’re not going to let up, and they should not, and we should not.”

Trump does damage to US diplomacy as practiced under Joe Biden, Kamala, Obama and Jake Sullivan? And that’s not a good thing?

• Trump’s Damage To US Diplomacy Could Last A Generation (McGlinchey)

As the US-Israel war on Iran grinds into its sixth month, it’s clear to all but the most intellectually-dishonest Trump loyalists and war-bent Israel-sympathizers that it’s been a spectacular failure. A war of aggression that was supposed to precipitate a revolution has instead galvanized popular support of the Iranian government in defiance of the country’s tormentors, who’ve killed thousands of their fellow citizens and destroyed civilian infrastructure. A war that was launched to neutralize Israel’s principal rival seems certain to leave that rival far more geopolitically powerful than before, while driving Americans’ support for Israel to record lows.

Beyond unforgivably throwing away the lives of 18 American service members in an unconstitutional war launched on false pretenses, Trump’s blunder has depleted America’s arsenal and pushed the country more than $100 billion deeper into debt. Meanwhile, the longer Trump delays the inevitable consummation of his defeat, the greater the risk of an economic calamity that engulfs not only the United States but the entire world.
If that latter nightmare can be sidestepped, we’ll likely find that Trump has inflicted his most enduring damage on an intangible yet critical national asset: the ability of American diplomats to productively engage counterparts all over the world. From using negotiations as a ploy for surprise attacks to murdering heads of state and casually reneging on American commitments — including his own — Trump’s damage to US diplomacy will be evident for years. Of course, that’s not to suggest America’s foreign policy reputation was sparkling before Trump’s ascension to power — only that he and his team have managed to drag it down to new depths.

Trump’s collaboration with Israel to launch an unprovoked war on Iran is manifestly among the worst foreign policy decisions in the history of the American republic. However, it’s important to appreciate that Trump first set this 2026 disaster in motion eight years ago: In May 2018, — spurred on by then-National Security Advisor John Bolton and Trump’s Israel-first donors — Trump withdrew the United States from the Joint Comprehensive Plan Of Action, or JCPOA.
Also called the “Iran nuclear deal,” the July 2015 JCPOA was the culmination of nearly two years of painstaking negotiations over highly technical provisions, conducted by representatives of not only the United States and Iran but also China, France, Germany, Russia, the United Kingdom and the European Union.
Under the JCPOA, Iran agreed to major restrictions on its nuclear program in exchange for relief from brutal economic sanctions. Among other things, the JCPOA required Iran to eliminate its medium-enriched uranium, slash its cache of low-enriched uranium by 98%, limit future enrichment to 3.67%, agree to even more external monitoring than it was already submitting to, and render its heavy-water reactor worthless by filling it with concrete.
Catering both to devoted Israel supporters and to Republicans who were eager to assume that a deal negotiated during the Obama administration must have been treasonous, Trump had repeatedly railed against the JCPOA throughout his 2016 campaign, declaring that his “number one priority is to dismantle the disastrous deal with Iran.” After being named national security advisor in April 2018, Bolton — who had long been pushing for war on Iran — quickly prodded Trump into making good on his promises to tear up the JCPOA, despite the fact that Iran was fully complying with the agreement.
“Trump’s move demonstrates that the United States cannot be trusted to keep its promises,” the Belfer Center’s Martin Malin said at the time. “It will heighten tensions in an already smoldering Middle East while giving fodder to hardliners and nuclear bomb advocates in Iran.”

“..the chaos on the streets is not just a symptom of Seattle’s future; this chaos is Wilson and company’s mission statement. ”

• Seattle Is in Free Fall (Victoria Taft)

Victoria Taft/AI

Well, another Seattle chief of police just got fired. The city has had four in the past two-and-a-half years. There’s been only one mayor in the past 26 years who has been elected to two consecutive terms. In one of those years, 2017, Seattle had four mayors. “In just three months, Ed Murray, Bruce Harrell, Tim Burgess and Jenny Durkan all held the title of Seattle mayor,” Fox 13 reported. Is this normal? Of course not. Seattle’s been on a slide since the Antifa and BLM agitators welcomed the deconstruction of American norms—since the University of Washington and Evergreen State University started churning out social justice warriors instead of caring and knowledgeable citizens.

Seattle continues to suffer from a leadership crisis. This will come as no surprise to anyone who reads PJ Media’s weekly West Coast, Messed Coast™ update. Every week, the city’s leadership seems to take a dumb pill just to see what chaos will happen. The past four mayors of Seattle have been:
1) An accused kid diddler, 2) An incompetent former federal prosecutor who predicted the George Floyd Riots and Antifa take over would usher in a “Summer of Love,” 3) A fellow traveler on the Peter Principle Highway who took a left turn onto Wacky Woke Way, 4) An overeducated, inexperienced commie.
Is it normal to churn through police chiefs and mayors like this?
Police chiefs in Seattle The Emerald City’s velvet green old-growth firs were once emblematic of a flourishing life and business. It was a fertile testing ground next to the waters of the Puget Sound.
Want to be a test pilot? Boeing.
Want to grow with a company? Starbucks.
Want to change the world? Amazon.
Boeing moved its headquarters.
Starbucks’ founder moved to Florida.
Amazon isn’t expanding in Seattle—it’s gone to Tennessee. Its founder left town. Heck, Jeff Bezos left the state.
Katie Wilson has waved away businesses. “Bye!” she said.
Seattle lost businesses Thing is, the new mayor, the nepo baby who calls herself a Democratic Socialist—aka commie—has taken on the air of the Wicked Witch of the West and, during her campaign, even surrounded herself with Antifa flying monkeys. Her aides and staffers appear to come from the ranks of women’s studies majors who expect software developer pay for their useless degrees and protest experience. Seattle’s identity crisis in this changing political culture comes from a breakdown of norms. It’s a place where virtue signaling to reflect the latest fad takes precedence over character and what works. Tradition is now an apparition, a vestige of a memory.
Jobs are becoming an apparition too. Software companies are sloughing jobs. Some of it is because of AI and a contraction in the market, or they’re not expanding jobs in Seattle. Mostly though, Seattle is a very bad place to root a company. She is a greedy mistress.
Seattle Mayors vs. Police Chiefs Seattle’s leaders think cops don’t matter. After last weekend’s Bite of Seattle mass shooting by apparent gang members, Wilson talked up the police “care teams” to help. The police “care teams” don’t find outstanding perps who have 3-D printed guns.

No matter.

Leaders think they don’t need to provide for the care and feeding of businesses and the people who work there. Imagine if Wilson and her fellow travelers treated people who are struggling to keep their businesses open in Seattle with the respect they accord crackheads who stay on the street because they don’t have any rules there.
The leaders have shown they can have a successful World Cup event. They moved out the “homeless,” and kept the peace by using every officer in their depleted ranks, adding help from the FBI and cops from all over the region to keep the peace. It got rave reviews. But these leaders can’t sustain that because they don’t know how. Everything’s back to chaos. Indeed, the chaos on the streets is not just a symptom of Seattle’s future; this chaos is Wilson and company’s mission statement.
Seattle’s in free fall. Will anyone stop it?

Spain’s entire budget will be destroyed by illegal migrants.

It’s basic math: if Spain offers free stuff to migrants that is above 90% of the living standard of Earth, they create a forcing function for 90% of Earth to move to Spain, which is around 7 billion people! https://t.co/m1G5zozru3
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) July 30, 2026

Thousands of military-age men were brought in trucks to the Moroccan-Spanish border in Ceuta. Most of them freed criminals pardoned by the king yesterday!

Notice the Moroccan officer assisting them. This was all coordinated by the Moroccan government. pic.twitter.com/pERBedfwq3
— Dr. Maalouf ‏ (@realMaalouf) July 30, 2026

https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/2083261719334338718?s=20

ELON MUSK: "If there are no babies, humanity will come to a halt. And we've seen now for many years, very low birth rates in almost all of the world. Even India recently went a lower replacement rate.

If you look at China, for example, they are roughly at half replacement rate,… pic.twitter.com/H7qM7wU41I
— DogeDesigner (@cb_doge) August 1, 2026

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Debt Rattle July 30 2026

Jul 302026

July 30, 2026 Posted by Raúl Ilargi Meijer at 8:32 am Finance Tagged with: CNN, E Jean Carroll, Fauci, mail-in voting, Mamdani, nazi, Rand Paul, Supreme Court, Zelensky 33 Responses »

Pablo Picasso Girl Before A Mirror 1932

• New US Attack Wave On Iran Begins In Overnight Hours(ZH)

• Rand Paul Delivers a Cinematic Indictment of Fauci’s COVID Legacy (Queen)

• Paul Confirms Plans For Fauci Contempt Vote (JTN)

• Hawley Exposed Fauci’s 5th Amendment Charade, Then the Takedown (Margolis)

• ’Who the F**k Do You Think You Were?’ Moreno Destroys Fauci (Margolis)

• Senate Fan Girls for Zelenskyy then Advances Russian Sanction Bill 86-12 (CTH)

• Britain Backs Ukraine With New Electronic Warfare Cooperation (RFE/RL)

• Trump Admin Asks SCOTUS To Revive Mail-In Voting Order Ahead Of Midterms (AmG)

• DOJ and Trump Ask Supreme Court to Review $83.3 Million Carroll Verdict (ET)

• Trump Urges SCOTUS To Overturn E. Jean Carroll’s $83M Defamation Verdict (CNN)

• CNN Trump Midrerms Poll (CNN)

• Welcome to Socialism’: A Clinton Hand’s Stark Warning About Mamdani (Green)

• The Mamdani Grocery Grift (Turley)

• Laura Loomer Says There’s No Nazi Problem In Ukraine. What She Didn’t See (RT)

• The End Of Freedom – The Last Breath Of A Dying Continent (Adams)

After Anthony Fauci pleads the Fifth one final time in response to Senator Rand Paul’s question, Paul vows there will be “repercussions” over Fauci’s refusal to testify.

Paul looked Fauci dead in the eye and said: “It’s against the LAW to obstruct an investigation of Congress.”… pic.twitter.com/6HL3gRSUlC
— Overton (@overton_news) July 29, 2026

https://twitter.com/VigilantFox/status/2082500161914257556?s=20 https://twitter.com/EricLDaugh/status/2082524598277378179?s=20

Because he would incriminate himself. https://t.co/Iu3jibgVQI https://t.co/1uWKNH9gUA
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) July 29, 2026

Losing Zerohedge support?!

• New US Attack Wave On Iran Begins In Overnight Hours

The United States has begun a new round of airstrikes in Iran in the night time and early morning hours (local), according to a senior US official to Axios. The extent of the bombings, or whether they will be sustained, remains unclear: Trump “is in an escalatory mood” but is still contemplating “the depth of that response.”, A senior administration official says – WSJ. Trump is apparently making good on his earlier Wednesday threat: President Trump has told Fox News that he is “going to beat the fucking shit” out of Iran in response to their attack on US forces in Jordan overnight. Speaking to Trey Yingst, he added “we’ll be hitting them hard, they’re going to get a beating.”

There was heavy US refueler activity in regional skies just ahead of the strikes’ commencement – as well as unconfirmed reports of explosions at Riyadh’s international airport, but the cause has remained subject to speculation. But with each attack on Iran, its forces tend to respond in kind against Gulf countries hosting US assets and bases. It is going to be a long night for the region, especially while bracing for the IRGC’s inevitable response.

>Before NOTAMs
>After NOTAMs

Large areas have been cleared in northeast, northwest and possibly southern Saudi, opening up corridors at all altitudes. While commercial traffic is filtered through a single narrow corridor. pic.twitter.com/9ZjYkjmars
— barry with the NED (@bonzerbarry) July 29, 2026

US is quite clearly stuck, in search of a strategy…

I think there's going to be a ground attack soon. What lunacy.
— Brandon Weichert (@WeTheBrandon) July 29, 2026

Details of Trump-Netanyahu Meeting at Oval Finally Emerging
After on Tuesday President Trump hosted both Zelensky and Netanyahu in the Oval Office there were no big press conferences or readouts given. But on Wednesday some key statements have begun to emerge concerning what was discussed, but at this point only offered via the Israeli side…
To be expected, Iran and the nuclear question dominated the discussions, according to i24’s Ariel Oseran, with Israeli officials describing a White House focused on three possible paths forward. “Trump is weighing three options: a nuclear deal, maintaining and intensifying the economic blockade, or renewed military strikes,” one official said, adding, “We didn’t tell Trump Israel’s preference is a strike. Our preference is the outcome. The decision is ultimately his.”
…talk about stating the obvious. But Israeli still maintains that the situation is at tipping point inside Iran, which according to more independent ‘realist’ analysts seems highly dubious. Israeli officials argued that Tehran is under mounting internal strain. “Iran is under severe economic pressure” due to fuel and diesel shortages, roughly 90% inflation, and “the beginning of public protests.” They added, “We discussed increasing pressure on Iran, both economically and kinetically.”
On Iran’s leadership, officials said, “We know for certain Mujtaba is alive, but since Operation Rising Lion no one has seen him.” Regarding Iran’s military capabilities, they claimed, “Iran now has only 1,500–1,600 missiles left after we destroyed much of its production capability.” Expletives fly and Trump talks ‘tough’ – but this whole gambit has been a bombing campaign in search of a strategy…

Today, Fauci is an 85-year old grandpa. You should have gotten to him when it mattered.

• Rand Paul Delivers a Cinematic Indictment of Fauci’s COVID Legacy (Queen)

We’ve seen it countless times: the dramatic courtroom scene. It could be an attorney, or it might be the person testifying. But someone in a courtroom delivers a stirring speech that makes the difference in a case or makes a statement altogether. The courtroom scene is a hallmark of scriptwriting. From To Kill a Mockingbird to A Few Good Men to countless episodes of Law & Order, writers love a good grandstanding courtroom speech. And on Wednesday, Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) delivered a takedown of Dr. Anthony Fauci that screenwriters could easily drool over.

Paul reminded Fauci and everybody watching and listening of the costs of Fauci’s COVID-19 policies: The COVID lockdown could never have been inflicted without you aiding and abetting the crime. Children lost years of education, small businesses built over a lifetime disappeared, patients delayed cancer screenings and other medical care, families were separated from dying relatives, workers were ordered to accept a medical procedure or lose their jobs, worship assembly, employment, education, and travel were restricted in the name of science. While you did not impose every restriction, you used your public authority to justify them.

Sen. Rand Paul to Anthony Fauci:

"The COVID lockdown could never have been inflicted without you aiding and abetting the crime.

Children lost years of education, small businesses built over a lifetime disappeared, patients delayed cancer screenings and other medical care,… pic.twitter.com/ZY1XCkqvHb
— Townhall.com (@townhallcom) July 29, 2026

My own experiences during that period bear witness. My dad was in a hospital with cancer ravaging his body, with family unable to visit him (and a cellphone that went dead because a nurse misplaced his charging cable). By the grace of God, he came home with hospice, and we got to spend his last two days with him as a family. I was on staff at my church at the time, and even in the first state to open back up, we felt compelled to continue weird protocols for months “out of an abundance of caution” — a phrase I never hope to have to utter again.
We can’t ignore the damage that Fauci’s COVID policies did to businesses, churches, and even some families. Some politicians dutifully followed them for months and even years after the danger of the first waves of the pandemic was long gone.
Side note: Keisha Lance Bottoms, who famously declared that “Atlanta Isn’t Ready to Reopen—And Neither Is Georgia,” now wants to run the Peach State. The Atlanta mayor demanded that people wear masks outside long after Gov. Brian Kemp (R-Ga.) opened the state back up. We have to hold her accountable by making sure she never holds public office again.
Paul savaged Fauci for his word games on gain-of-function research: On May 11, 2021, you told the Senate the NIH has never, ever, and does not now fund gain-of-function research in Wuhan at the Wuhan Institute of Virology. When I gave you the opportunity to correct the record to reconsider the statement, you responded that you had never before lied to Congress. We were then told that only the government’s narrowest regulation of definition counted here. That you could define gain-of-function in one way in which this was not gain-of-function, in which all of the common sense of the world be thrown out…
The American people were not asking for a semantics debate over what is gain-of-function. They were asking, does common sense say this research was dangerous in Wuhan? They wanted to know whether their money funded experiments in Wuhan that made bad coronaviruses better able to infect humans. The answer is, yes.
https://twitter.com/townhallcom/status/2082449192895566181?s=20
Finally, and possibly most devastatingly, Paul pointed out that the biggest thing that Fauci and his league of arrogant scientists did was destroy trust in institutions — possibly rightly so, but it happened under Fauci’s watch nonetheless. “There will be another pandemic. There will be another crisis. And there will again be officials that insist uncertainty must be hidden for the public’s own good. They will demand obedience. They will invoke science. “I am the science!” as though it were a commandment. They will argue that government officials cannot be questioned, because questioning them would undermine public trust. They have it backwards.
It is secrecy that destroys trust. It is arrogance that destroys trust. It is censorship that destroys trust. And it is the refusal to admit error that destroys trust. That loss of trust may be YOUR MOST DAMAGING LEGACY. Trust can’t be ordered. It has to be earned. No scientist is above scrutiny. No government official is beyond accountability. And no public servant has the right to treat suffering of millions of Americans as a footnote to his preferred version of history.”
https://twitter.com/townhallcom/status/2082450685337960467?s=20
Of course, we watched as Fauci pleaded the Fifth repeatedly. We gleefully enjoyed Paul ejecting Fauci’s attorney from the chambers. But it’s hard to imagine a more cinematic moment than those opening remarks from Paul. Good stuff.

“The question on contempt will be voted on and then there’s the question of whether or not the Department of Justice will take that up,” he said.

• Paul Confirms Plans For Fauci Contempt Vote (JTN)

Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., on Wednesday confirmed that his Senate committee would hold a contempt of Congress vote against Dr. Anthony Fauci after he invoked the 5th Amendment to avoid answering questions. “We believe… he didn’t need to hide behind the 5th Amendment and that maybe the 5th Amendment doesn’t attach when you have a pardon in place,” he told reporters. “The question on contempt will be voted on and then there’s the question of whether or not the Department of Justice will take that up.”

Fauci appeared before the Senate Homeland Security Committee on Wednesday and declined to answer questions, citing the 5th Amendment. Multiple senators, including Paul and Sen. Josh Hawley, R-Mo., have questioned whether Fauci could legitimately invoke the 5th Amendment due to his pardon from President Joe Biden. Hawley opined that Fauci was improperly invoking the 5th Amendment to avoid answering uncomfortable questions about his increase in wealth during the COVID-19 pandemic. Fauci declined to respond.

“Fauci, while Americans were dying by the hundreds of thousands during the COVID-19 pandemic, directed his own staff to solicit cash prizes on his behalf..”

• Hawley Exposed Fauci’s 5th Amendment Charade, Then the Takedown (Margolis)

Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) didn’t just question Anthony Fauci on Wednesday. He dismantled him methodically in front of the entire country, using nothing but public records, a Supreme Court precedent, and a series of questions so basic that a child could have answered them. Fauci had exactly one response prepared for every question senators asked him during the hearing: a canned invocation of his Fifth Amendment rights.The only problem is that Fauci doesn’t have Fifth Amendment protection anymore. President Biden pardoned him in the final hours of his term, which means that Fauci cannot legally “stand upon his privilege,” as the Supreme Court ruled all the way back in 1896.

Hawley knew that. He built his entire line of questioning around forcing Fauci to demonstrate it to the world, starting with the simplest possible setup. “Well, nothing says honesty like taking the fifth, huh, doc?” Hawley asked. “Let’s try something. What day of the week is it today?” “On the advice of counsel, I respectfully decline to answer based upon my rights under the Fifth Amendment to the Constitution,” Fauci said.Hawley asked what color tie Fauci was wearing.Same answer. He asked what color the carpet was in front of him.Same answer again.
Three questions. Zero risk of self-incrimination. Three invocations of a constitutional right that, thanks to his own pardon, Fauci doesn’t legally possess anymore. That’s when Hawley reminded him.”Let’s just get one thing straight, you don’t have any rights under the Fifth Amendment because you’ve been pardoned,” Hawley said. “As you very well know, as the Supreme Court has been clear for a century and more, Brown v. Walker, 1896. When he has been pardoned, he may not stand upon his privilege.” From there, Hawley moved from exposing the absurdity of Fauci’s stonewalling to laying out exactly why Fauci was hiding behind it. The answer, according to Hawley, is money.
Hawley walked through how Fauci, while Americans were dying by the hundreds of thousands during the COVID-19 pandemic, directed his own staff to solicit cash prizes on his behalf, using federal time, federal resources, and federal email accounts. Hawley named the staffers: Greg Folkers and Patricia Conrad, Fauci’s chief of staff and personal assistant. Both, Hawley said, spent government time chasing awards for their boss. One of those awards was the Dan David Award, worth $900,000. Hawley read from an email Folkers sent seeking help padding Fauci’s nomination. “I’m working on this nomination for the Dan David Award for Fauci,” the email read, according to Hawley.
“We need to beef up the COVID part. Do you have language in the can that you can share that delineates how we responded in new ways to COVID?” That wasn’t the only prize on the list. Hawley cited the Partnership for Public Service Award, the Adelson Prize, the Smithsonian Award, the National Academy of Medicine Award, and an award from the CDC Foundation, all pursued using federal employees on the taxpayers’ dime. “You turned your staff into a full-time application machine,” Hawley said. He noted Fauci’s staff didn’t stop at applying. They pressured federal ethics officials to approve the payouts. “We want to get to yes because Fauci wants the money,” one email read, according to Hawley.
Federal law bars government employees from soliciting cash awards or personal benefits, and it bars using subordinates to do it for them. Hawley cited the regulation by number, 5 C.F.R. Section 2635.205(b), and dared Fauci to explain how none of it applied to him. Fauci said nothing. He couldn’t.Hawley closed by putting Fauci’s fortune on the table. Fauci’s net worth now tops $12 million. His pension paid out more than $400,000 in its first year alone. Fauci built all of it, Hawley argued, while a million Americans died and he was busy chasing awards and sitting for glossy magazine profiles.
“You could sit for InStyle magazine, but you can’t answer questions for the American people,” Hawley said. Then came the closing blow. Hawley told Fauci that his silence spoke louder than any answer could have.”Silence is admission,” Hawley said. He accused Fauci of turning the pandemic into a vehicle for personal glory, calling him “a narcissist and a megalomaniac and a liar” who “disgraced” his own profession. “You’ve done more to harm science than anybody in my lifetime,” Hawley told him. “I hope you’ll go home and write that in your diary.”

Senator Josh Hawley's questioning of Dr. Fauci was a masterpiece.

Watch him SQUIRM under the pressure. pic.twitter.com/js5yJzjUFO
— Townhall.com (@townhallcom) July 29, 2026

I bet he will.

“..I decided I’m going to give up my businesses, sell them all, run for office, run through the United States Senate. Here I am sitting in front of you, six years later, saying, who the f**k do you think you were for doing that? It is a total disgrace what you did to this country..”

• ’Who the F**k Do You Think You Were?’ Moreno Destroys Fauci (Margolis)

Sen. Bernie Moreno (R-Ohio) walked into Wednesday’s hearing wanting one thing from Dr. Anthony Fauci: an apology. He didn’t get one. Fauci came to Capitol Hill, read an opening statement, then refused to answer a single question that followed it. He wouldn’t even answer Sen. Rand Paul’s (R-Ky.) question about whether a folder was sitting right in front of him. Moreno used his time to remind Fauci exactly what the last six years cost him personally, and what they cost the country.

“It was about six years ago, today that I decided I’m going to give up my businesses, sell them all, run for office, run through the United States Senate. Here I am sitting in front of you, six years later, saying, who the f**k do you think you were for doing that? It is a total disgrace what you did to this country,” Moreno said. He turned next to the colleagues who spent years defending Fauci in public. “I hope the voters of the United States of America watch the clips of every one of you doting on a guy who was more interested in being a celebrity than saving American people,” Moreno said. “You may have had a 50-plus-year legacy of public service, but it ends in total and complete disgrace.”
Then Moreno asked the only question that mattered. “Will you apologize, just apologize to the people who you harmed through your actions? Do you have the dignity to just say you’re sorry?” Moreno asked.”On the advice of counsel, I respectfully decline to answer based upon my rights under the Fifth Amendment to the Constitution,” Fauci said.
Fauci repeated that one sentence over and over again through the rest of the hearing. Moreno asked about service members discharged for refusing the vaccine. Fifth Amendment. He asked about business owners who lost everything during the lockdowns. Fifth Amendment. He asked about parents who strapped masks onto toddlers too young to understand why. Fifth Amendment. He asked about families who buried relatives who trusted Fauci’s word on booster after booster. Fifth Amendment.
Moreno brought up the Ohio mother arrested for watching a football game with her family during the pandemic. Fauci answered the same way. By the end, Moreno stopped asking questions and started making a point. He noted that James Madison, the man who wrote the Fifth Amendment, once lived a few blocks from the hearing room, and wondered aloud what Madison would think of a public health official invoking it to dodge accountability for his own decisions. “It’s no secret why you have to hire the biggest dirtbag attorney on the planet,” Moreno said. “I hope you’re paying him well, and I hope that one way or the other, somewhere, sometime, you answer for your crimes.”
Fauci’s reputation was already shot by the time he showed up on Capitol Hill, but boy did he absolutely destroy his legacy today.

“Senators, grown adults awaiting Zelenskyy’s arrival, clinging to every word, clamoring to be first in line for his reception, competing against each other for time standing next to him..”

• Senate Fan Girls for Zelenskyy then Advances Russian Sanction Bill 86-12 (CTH)

The behavior of the U.S. senators clamoring to be with Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskyy reflects a certain level of disconnect that needs to be witnessed to be realized. Senators, grown adults awaiting Zelenskyy’s arrival, clinging to every word, clamoring to be first in line for his reception, competing against each other for time standing next to him, the entire event was grotesque and creepy.

Shortly after the guided tour of the upper chamber, the Golden Child was carried on a gilded chariot into the viewing chamber while trumpets blared, senators took turns bringing forth their taxpayer funded indulgences, and Senator Jeanne Shaheen knelt down at his feet and peeled Zelenskyy’s grapes. Yeah, that’s the vibe. The “Lindsey O. Graham Sanctioning Russia and Iran Act of 2026” was then advanced by the Senate in an 86 to 12 procedural vote teeing up the bill for final passage in the Senate later this week. However, I would challenge people to READ THE BILL, it’s only 61-pages.
Within the bill you will note almost everything within the law is left to the enforcement discretion of the President; which normally would not be of great concern, however, given the punishment for violations – things may get sketchy depending on who is in office.A foreign person who “undermines the peace, security, political stability, or territorial integrity of Ukraine;” and/or “undermines the democratic processes of Ukraine,” will be in violation of the U.S. law and subject to fines, travel or visa restrictions. [Page 13, page 28] As a consequence, any person who may be critical of Ukraine -undermining the democratic process via criticism- can be punished by the U.S. President.
Page 36 applies a 100% U.S. tariff against the import of any country’s goods into the USA if that country purchase energy products from Russia (with qualifiers). The intent of that section is to stop China and/or India from purchasing Russian oil and gas. As noted by Politico, ‘the revamped bill expands the number of Russian entities that would be subject to mandatory sanctions — including Russia’s shadow fleet of ships ferrying oil — but it also grants Trump broad waiver authority.’ The House is in summer recess, so things may stall even if the Senate (very pro-Ukraine) passes the bill.

Their thought: Once there is war with Russia, nobody will notice the mess they made domestically.

• Britain Backs Ukraine With New Electronic Warfare Cooperation (RFE/RL)

President Volodymyr Zelensky met British Prime Minister Andy Burnham on July 27 as he kicked off a key week of talks with officials around the world to bolster Ukraine’s defenses amid a rising civilian death toll from Russian air strikes back home. Zelensky became the first foreign leader hosted by Burnham since he took office one week ago following the resignation of fellow Labour Party member Keir Starmer. The two leaders met at the Portsmouth Naval Base on England’s southern coast as Burnham pledged his country’s “unwavering” support for Kyiv as the war with Russia runs well into its fifth year.

Zelensky said being the first foreign leader to meet Burnham was “an important signal of support.””We discussed our defense for Ukraine, it is important to have sufficient capabilities to protect lives both in the sky and at sea,” Zelensky wrote on social media after the meeting, adding the development of joint defense production was also touched upon.Burnham and Zelensky were later scheduled to meet some of the 200 Ukrainian military personnel who have been in Britain the past three weeks participating in a maritime security and counter-mine exercise in preparation for potential future Black Sea missions.
‘Stone Cloak’ System
Burnham announced the sharing of the intellectual property behind Britain s new Stone Cloak electronic warfare system, enabling Ukraine to produce the technology itself. The jammers, the size of a tablet computer, can be used to prevent Russian air defenses from tracking and targeting drones when attached to the projectiles, officials said.Downing Street pointed out that the United Kingdom’s support for Ukraine has reached 25 billion pounds ($33 billion) since Russia’s full-scale invasion of February 2022, including 16 billion pounds ($21 billion) in direct military assistance.
Following the London visit, Zelensky is scheduled to travel to Washington on July 28 for talks with US President Donald Trump. Zelensky is also expected to attend the funeral of US Senator Lindsey Graham, who died earlier this month. The Republican lawmaker was a vocal Ukraine supporter and had traveled to Kyiv for meetings with Zelensky days before his death.
Russia, Ukraine Exchange Deadly Strikes
Five people, including a child, were killed and eight injured in a Ukrainian drone attack on Russia’s Rostov region, local officials reported on July 27. Rostov Region Governor Yuri Slyusar said rescuers recovered bodies, two adults and one child, from the rubble of an apartment building hit by a drone, while emergency crews continue recovery operations and provide assistance to victims. Zelensky, in a post on X, said that Ukraine’s long-range strikes hit an export terminal in the Rostov region and oil facilities in the Yaroslavl and Udmurtia regions to reduce Russia’s ability to finance the war.
“Last night, our long-range sanctions were effective in the Rostov region. An export terminal approximately 250 kilometers from the front line was hit. Deep strikes also targeted oil facilities in the Yaroslavl region and the Udmurt Republic, which is 1,300 kilometers from Ukraine’s state border,” Zelenskyy wrote. Meanwhile, the death toll continued to rise in Ukraine, with the capital, Kyiv, coming under a Russian ballistic missile attack on July 26, authorities said, while other regions suffered air strikes during the day that led to at least six deaths.
In the northern Ukrainian city of Chernihiv, a Russian drone struck a supermarket, killing two people and wounding 25, Ukraine’s emergency services said. “This is deliberate Russian terror that has no military justification,” Zelensky wrote on Telegram. Regional Governor Ivan Fedorov said a glide bomb attack killed one person and wounded six in the southern Ukrainian city of Zaporizhzhya, which has been a frequent target of Russian bombardment.
In the frontline city of Slovyansk in Ukraine’s Donetsk region, the Naftogaz oil and gas company said two of its employees were killed in a Russian attack while trying to help residents affected by an earlier air strike. One person was killed, and eight others were injured in a Russian strike on the town of Balakliya in Ukraine’s Kharkiv region on July 27, regional authorities reported.Russia denies targeting civilian areas despite widespread evidence of such attacks that have killed thousands of people since the start of Russia s full-scale invasion.

`What else can they do?

• Trump Admin Asks SCOTUS To Revive Mail-In Voting Order Ahead Of Midterms (AmG)

The Trump administration asked the Supreme Court on Monday to let the president’s mail-in voting executive order take effect ahead of the midterms, after a federal appeals court sided with Democrat-led states seeking to keep it blocked just months before Election Day.

Trump signed the order in March, directing the Postal Service to restrict delivery of mail-in ballots in states that refuse to hand over lists of eligible voters. It also orders the Department of Homeland Security and Social Security Administration to compile lists of verified absentee voters for the Postal Service to reference, and threatens to withhold federal funds from states that do not comply, part of a larger effort by the president to tighten a mail voting system he has long argued is vulnerable to abuse.
A federal judge in Massachusetts blocked the order in June, ruling that its timing made it impossible for the Postal Service to propose the rule through proper channels and would deny Congress its required chance to weigh in. The 1st U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals upheld that ruling Saturday, rejecting the administration’s appeal and leaving the order blocked in the 23 states and Washington, D.C., that sued to stop it.
In Monday’s filing, Solicitor General D. John Sauer argued the injunction improperly impedes the president’s authority over the executive branch, noting the Postal Service falls within it despite its independent structure. Sauer warned that further delay could make the order impossible to implement in time for November even if the administration ultimately wins on appeal. “Every day that the agencies are unable to take steps to carry out the Executive Order as to the November 2026 election makes it less likely that they will, as a practical matter, be able to implement any lists or rules that they ultimately finalize, even if they obtain appellate relief,” the filing states.
The order is one piece of a larger push by Trump to overhaul election security, an effort that has repeatedly run into resistance from federal judges. Trump has also urged Congress to pass his SAVE America Act, which would restrict mail voting and require identification to cast a ballot, though the legislation has stalled on Capitol Hill despite mounting pressure from the president.
Trump devoted a primetime address earlier this month to laying out his concerns about election interference, releasing declassified documents alongside the speech. Trump used the address to direct federal agencies to investigate a Michigan get-out-the-vote operation and to examine whether intelligence officials withheld information about Chinese efforts to influence the 2020 election.

“In the new petition, the Justice Department argues Trump’s 2019 White House statements denying the allegations were official acts protected by federal law.”: ”Trump may have to pay almost $100 million in damages and interest “for issuing a press release and answering reporters’ questions, from the White House ..”

• DOJ and Trump Ask Supreme Court to Review $83.3 Million Carroll Verdict (ET)

The U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) asked the U.S. Supreme Court on July 28 to intervene in the defamation dispute between President Donald Trump and writer E. Jean Carroll. The DOJ is arguing in the petition in United States v. Carroll that the federal government—not Trump personally—should be the defendant in the case that led to an $83.3 million verdict against Trump. At the same time, Trump’s private attorneys filed a petition with the high court in the case of Trump v. Carroll, asking the justices to review the same verdict, largely on grounds of presidential immunity.

The DOJ’s petition, a copy of which was obtained by The Epoch Times, focuses on the federal Westfall Act, which shields federal employees from personal liability for common law tort lawsuits arising from their government employment. Common law refers to the body of law developed over centuries by court rulings, as opposed to statutes passed by legislatures. A tort is a wrongful act or infringement of a right that gives rise to civil liability. When the U.S. attorney general certifies that a federal employee—including a president—was acting in an official capacity, the United States is usually substituted as the defendant, and the individual ends up being dismissed from the lawsuit.
The $83.3 million verdict arose from statements Trump made in mid-2019 while he was president, in which he denied Carroll’s allegation that he sexually assaulted her in the mid-1990s. Trump denied the claim in an official White House statement and again when speaking to reporters—statements the jury found defamatory. In 2020, then-Attorney General William Barr, who served in Trump’s Cabinet, certified under the Westfall Act that Trump’s statements were within the scope of his official duties. As a result, the case, which had been pending in New York state court, was transferred to federal court. Then in 2023, then-Attorney General Merrick Garland, who served in President Joe Biden’s Cabinet, took the unusual step of withdrawing the certification, the petition said.
This allowed the lawsuit to move forward against Trump personally, after which the jury found for Carroll, rendering the $83.3 million verdict. While an appeal was pending, Trump was reelected, and in April 2025, his attorney general appointee, Pam Bondi, recertified Trump’s conduct and made a motion to substitute the United States as the defendant in the case. The Second Circuit blocked Bondi’s recertification, an action the DOJ argues the court was not entitled to take. The DOJ also argues the Second Circuit misinterpreted the Westfall Act.
“This petition presents the question whether the Westfall Act contains an implicit timing restriction barring the Attorney General’s posttrial recertification. Such a restriction does not exist,” the petition said of Bondi’s action. If the United States replaces Trump as the defendant, Carroll’s defamation claim would almost certainly fail. The Federal Tort Claims Act, which covers lawsuits against the government, specifically excludes defamation claims. The DOJ urged the Supreme Court to take the case, arguing it raises potentially significant institutional stakes.
Trump may have to pay almost $100 million in damages and interest “for issuing a press release and answering reporters’ questions, from the White House, defending against attacks on his fitness for office,” the petition said. Trump’s petition in Trump v. Carroll argues that the Second Circuit was wrong to treat presidential immunity like an ordinary legal defense that can be lost if not raised in time, and that the appeals court didn’t actually decide whether immunity protected Trump’s 2019 statements.
If the Second Circuit’s “mistreatment of Presidential immunity and the Westfall Act” are not corrected, there will be reverberations far beyond this case, as the threat of a single judgment for damages based on official acts will prevent presidents from “fearlessly” executing their duties, the petition said. The $83.3 million verdict is separate from a prior $5 million civil verdict Carroll secured in 2023. In that case, a jury found Trump liable for sexually abusing Carroll in the 1990s and for defaming her again in 2022 when he was out of office.
The Supreme Court recently declined to take up Trump’s challenge to the $5 million verdict, but Trump has asked the court to reconsider its ruling. It is unclear whether the Supreme Court will take up the two new petitions.

“This is the first case in our nation’s history in which a court has imposed damages liability on a president for his conduct in office,”

• Trump Urges SCOTUS To Overturn E. Jean Carroll’s $83M Defamation Verdict (CNN)

President Donald Trump on Tuesday urged the Supreme Court to once again step into his messy legal brawl with magazine columnist E. Jean Carroll, appealing an $83.3 million jury verdict for defamation on the grounds that, as president, he is immune from the litigation.The appeal, which has not yet been docketed at the high court, relies heavily on the court’s 2024 decision granting the president wide immunity for actions taken in office.

“This is the first case in our nation’s history in which a court has imposed damages liability on a president for his conduct in office,” Trump’s attorneys told the high court, according to a copy of the appeal reviewed by CNN. “Yet, in upholding the exorbitant $83.3 million defamation judgment here, the Second Circuit never even decided whether presidential immunity applies.” Trump told the justices that an appeals court decision in Carroll’s favor would “cause significant damage, not only to this president and future presidents” but also the nation.
In addition to raising the prospect that Trump should be immune from the litigation, Trump is also asking the court to review whether the United States government should be the defendant rather than the president. “Here, the president of the United States has been ordered to pay nearly $100 million in damages … for issuing a press release and answering reporters’ questions, from the White House, defending against attacks on his fitness for office,” his attorneys told the court. The latest appeal comes weeks after the Supreme Court declined to take up a separate case from Trump in which the president is seeking to unwind a $5 million civil verdict that found he sexually abused and defamed Carroll at a Bergdorf Goodman department store in the 1990s.
Trump has denied wrongdoing in both cases. The new appeal involves statements Trump made against Carroll in 2019, when he was president, that a jury found were defamatory and ordered him to pay $83 million in damages. A federal appeals court panel affirmed the damages award, finding it “reasonable in light of the extraordinary and egregious facts” and rejected several of Trump’s legal challenges. Among them, the appeals court found that Trump had previously waived any claim of presidential immunity and said the Supreme Court’s decision in 2024 involving presidential immunity did not alter their view.
The full 2nd US Circuit Court of Appeals declined to revisit that decision in late April. At that time, one of the appeals court judges who sided with Carroll wrote that Trump had first brought up his immunity claims far too late in the litigation.

CNN hates Trump. So they make this of his polls.

Note: The CNN poll was conducted by SSRS from July 23-27 among a random national sample of 1,225 US adults drawn from a probability-based panel. Surveys were either conducted online or by telephone with a live interviewer. Results have a margin of sampling error of ±3.2 percentage points.

• CNN Trump Midrerms Poll (CNN)

President Donald Trump, pictured in the Oval Office on July 21, during a meeting with the President of Lebanon

A record-high 73% of US adults say that President Donald Trump hasn’t paid enough attention to the country’s most important problems, a new CNN poll conducted by SSRS finds, with just 27% saying he’s had the right priorities. That comes amid increasingly bleak views of the Iran war, stagnating economic unhappiness, and broad discontent about Trump’s approach to these challenges.Roughly two-thirds of Americans think that Trump’s policies have worsened economic conditions and that his military decisions in Iran have hurt the US. Around three-quarters say the president is not in touch with the problems ordinary Americans face in their daily lives.

Trump’s overall approval rating, 34%, matches the career low he last saw at the close of his first term, following the January 6, 2021, insurrection. Half of Americans now strongly disapprove of him, a high across his terms, with a record-low 15% strongly approving. Within his own party, his approval rating has hit a new low at 78% among Republicans, and just 19% of Republicans say they’re enthusiastic about the rest of his second term, down from 38% last spring. While his ratings are underwater across a range of issues tested, Trump sees his lowest numbers on a trio of interconnected issues:
Just 28% approve of his handling of the situation in Iran, 25% on inflation and 21% on gas prices, with significant pockets of disapproval even among his supporters. With an increasing majority of Americans anticipating a long-term military conflict, only about one-quarter think Trump has a clear plan for handling the situation, down from 40% at the start of the war. And 62% now say Trump is not an effective world leader, up from 54% who felt that way early in his second term. Just one-quarter now say the war has been worth the toll in American lives and dollars, with younger Americans particularly skeptical.
On the most tangible economic fallout of the conflict in Iran, 74% of Americans say rising gas prices have caused them at least some hardship, up from 63% in March, with just under one-quarter believing the president has a plan to address the issue. And 71% say Trump hasn’t gone far enough in trying to reduce the price of everyday goods, up from 58% a year ago. There are few domestic bright spots for the president, whose issue approval ratings top out at 41% for handling voting rights and election integrity – one topic where his supporters have rallied most closely around him.
Just 39% of Americans approve of Trump’s handling of immigration, a relative positive at the start of his second term, with 35% approving of his management of the federal government. Following two recent deadly ICE shootings, Americans say by a 20-point margin that the agency is making cities less, not more, safe. And amid the cyclospora outbreak and a surge in measles cases, they say by a 34-point margin that changes to health agencies like the FDA and CDC are leaving the public less, not more, safe.
Trump has never gotten high marks in polling as someone who’s in touch with the problems of ordinary Americans. In the latest poll, just 27% say that description applies to him, while about two-thirds say that he’s someone who does not put the good of the country ahead of his personal gain.
Those numbers reflect broad skepticism about the high-profile projects that would leave Trump’s mark on the nation’s capital. A 58% majority of Americans say they feel dissatisfied or angry about the construction projects Trump has undertaken in Washington, DC, including the effort to build a new White House ballroom and renovate the Reflecting Pool. Just 17% express positive feelings, with another 25% saying it doesn’t matter to them.
At the time of Trump’s second inauguration, nearly half of Americans thought it was at least somewhat likely that Trump would avoid conflicts between his family’s company and his work as president, but a scant 23% think he’s done so at least somewhat well. And 57% say it’s a bad thing that Trump earned more than $2 billion last year while serving as an elected official, including income from cryptocurrency holdings, royalty payments and property investments. Just 7% see that as a good thing, with 36% calling his earnings while president something that doesn’t matter much.
More than 6 in 10 say that Trump has gone too far in pursuing his personal business interests while serving as president and undertaking projects to remodel the White House and other Washington landmarks, with nearly as many saying he’s gone too far in making changes to cultural institutions like the Kennedy Center and the Smithsonian.
Construction on President Donald Trump’s White House ballroom is seen on July 14. Daniel Heuer/Bloomberg/Getty Images

Mamdani = taxes.

• Welcome to Socialism’: A Clinton Hand’s Stark Warning About Mamdani (Green)

Dem strategist Mark Penn took to X during the wee hours Wednesday morning to warn the public about “the lie of socialism” represented by New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani, but it’s really a cry for help over what’s happening to his party. Before we get to that, however, you need to understand just what a colossal screw-up Mamdani’s pied-à-terre tax really is. Because if what Penn says is correct — and apparently it is — it’s a colossal screw-up by design. And an oh-so-bitter taste of what New Yorkers are stuck with for the next three-and-a-half years.

In a piece headlined “Welcome to Socialism,” Penn wrote that Mamdani’s administration “with fanfare” released its list of “960,000 owners of real estate in New York City that have been determined they could owe the pied-a-terre tax because NYC computers have determined they own what was billed as a market value of $5 million or more.” So far, so socialist, right?But, Penn added, “there are only about one million residential tax lots in New York City so the first question is how did virtually every owner get put on the list?” Welcome to socialism, indeed.
“The answer is that you are subject to the tax in the first two years if your property has a “DOF valuation” of over $1 million. And so the $5 million figure was a fake,” Penn concluded. But here’s where we got to what Penn called “the interesting part” with understatement he must have choked on: “Once you are on the list you have to prove you should not be taxed by showing you are a resident. Or by challenging the valuation.””Good luck fighting the city bureaucrats on both of these counts. The individual litigation will be massive.” Socialism always starts with “soak the rich” but always ends with “stick it to everybody.” Mamdani is notable only for his speed.
But here’s what Penn missed in his piece.The New York Post reminded readers on Monday that “Mamdani threatened to raise city property taxes by a staggering 9.5% in February unless he was allowed to ‘tax the rich’ to cover a $12 billion budget gap that was later revised down to $5.4 billion.”The good news is that the hole in NYC’s budget got revised downward by more than $6 billion. The bad news is that “City Hall estimates the pied-à-terre tax would yield $500 million per year.” The worse news is that “Democratic city Comptroller Mark Levine’s office said the real figure would be closer to $340 to $380 million.” And the worst news is that critics of the tax say that it “could cause property values to plummet.”
“Add a tax of 4 to 6 per cent (yes condos are taxed that high now) a year of its DOF value to a condo or coop and that condo won’t be worth that much,” Penn explained. “And you can forget about out of town buyers. So this will destroy much of the home values that people have built up.” Mamdani’s brand of socialism is taxing everybody for unrealized gains on properties whose value Mamdani will destroy. Nifty, eh? He’s also the fresh new face of a Democratic Party that has grown so corrupt and stands for so little that Democratic Socialists in cities like New York have taken to wearing it like a skinsuit.
They even boast about it, and the most that even an old Clinton hand like Penn can do is whine about it on X. So the initial burst of pied-à-terre schadenfreude was over Mamdani supporters like Anna Wintour, Woody Allen, and Cynthia Nixon finding themselves on his Enemies of the People list. But today I’m standing in a puddle of my own schadenfreude as top-level Democrats like Penn come to realize just how badly the DSA takeover of their party is going to hurt them.

“The plan is a multimillion-dollar version of the $5 gold watch grift. The chumps are New York taxpayers who believe that Mamdani can sell them produce at a discount of 30 percent below the market rate and not lose money. Indeed, this could end up the most expensive produce in the Big Apple.”

“The Mamdani con will cost New Yorkers millions, and most will thank him for it.”

• The Mamdani Grocery Grift (Turley)

Last week, Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s short stint as a faux president ended with an embarrassing acknowledgment that he could not, as promised during his campaign, arrest Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. So, this week, Mamdani the Grocer made a reappearance, with details on the five city-run grocery stores that he will open. But rather than deliver discount groceries, Mamdani is selling New Yorkers a bill of goods that will cost them millions.

What Mamdani described was a discount food bank dressed up as a grocery. Standing in front of blackboards saying “REDUCED 30%,” Mamdani sounded like a bodega hawker: “Once a month, our five city-run grocery stores will set prices for this core set of goods at 30% below typical retail prices. No exceptions, no gimmicks” Here’s the most delicious part: the presser was a gimmick from beginning to end. The mayor promised that “The savings will last for the entire month. That means no weekly fluctuations or sticker shock at the checkout line — not for our seniors living on fixed incomes, nor for the parents who rely on a regular supply of apple slices to keep toddler tantrums at bay.”
The Mamdani markets are new variations of an old New York grift: selling gold watches for $5. The dupes want to believe that somehow this street vendor, surreptitiously displaying watches inside his overcoat, actually found a way to sell “solid gold watches” for just a few bucks. The math simply does not add up for Mamdani. Most groceries have an average profit margin between 1% and 3%, one of the smallest margins of any industry. To promise a 30% discount below market rate that cannot be adjusted due to monthly market fluctuations is economically absurd.
It is not a description of a competitive grocery but a public charity. It is a quasi-food bank where taxpayers subsidize the cost. As usual, Mamdani turns this into a class war, demonizing business owners. He suggests that real grocery stores are simply price gougers hoarding windfall profits from consumers. He ignores that they must pay rent, upkeep and fees — all things the city-run stores may simply write off. He proclaimed, “May the most affordable grocery store win.”
Of course, the test is not which grocery is the most affordable, but which is the most sustainable. If you are willing to take a bath on sales, you can always offer the most affordable prices for as long as your excess cash holds out. In Mamdani’s case, he has the credit of New York City to draw on to compete against Mom-and-Pop bodegas.The subsidy, however, is only part of the costs. The average bodega owner must cover the fixed costs of renting a space, building the store, and complying with inspectors. Those are the fixed costs that must be internalized into the cost of produce to break even.
Real stores are competing in one of the tightest markets in the world and are grappling with a 33% nationwide increase in costs since 2019. Mamdani wants to use the stores to prove that socialism works as part of his effort to introduce New York to the “warmth of socialism.” We may never know the real costs of the Mamdani markets. According to the New York Post, the city plans to open an East Harlem location as its first store, at a reported cost of $30 million.
However, that is not the full cost. The Post also reported that the city had already appropriated $25 million to improve the first site. The city will lose millions that could have been acquired through a sale of the land or through rents to private companies. Those costs are left on other ledgers and not likely counted in the true costs of the Mamdani markets. The first store will not even open until 2027 despite the props behind Mamdani. The second Manhattan store will not open until 2029. That is three years and tens of millions of dollars for just the first two stores.
That is how Mamdani is promising New Yorkers savings of “$90 a month, or roughly $1,000 a year.” He is using the city to subsidize food under the guise of selling at low, but still profitable prices. Ironically, those who can take advantage of the subsidy at the first two stores in Manhattan will be anyone, including the privileged, wealthy New Yorkers whom Mamdani denounces for not paying their fair share. After all, everyone wants below-market-priced slices in the Big Apple.
The first city-run grocery, in East Harlem, will cost $30 million to build — and perhaps more. It will never need to pay this money back nor factor it into its prices. The “warmth of socialism” will cover it; that is, you. In reality, Mamdani will be selling apples at a far greater cost than any competitor, but those true costs will be buried in the city budget and paid for by the taxpayers. Indeed, the Mamdani markets are likely to prove the most expensive groceries in the city.
Mamdani, however, has never sweated the math or the means. He knows that the focus will be on the cash register price and not the true cost. Of course, there is a big difference between the gold watch grift and the Mamdani grift: buying a knockoff watch only costs chumps a few bucks. The Mamdani con will cost New Yorkers millions, and most will thank him for it.

“Does Zelensky’s Jewish identity settle Ukraine’s neo-Nazi question?”

• Laura Loomer Says There’s No Nazi Problem In Ukraine. What She Didn’t See (RT)

US conservative activist Laura Loomer arrived in Kiev after years of denouncing Ukraine’s “Nazi apologists.” She met Vladimir Zelensky, apologized for articles she had written for RT and said Russian media had “bamboozled” her. During their interview, Zelensky rejected the accusation Ukraine’s politics is riddled with neo-Nazi influence: the conutry had elected a Jewish president and even adopted a law against anti-Semitism, he argued. Loomer accepted his case and later amplified it in her X profile, stating that “Nazism is literally illegal in Ukraine” and that the country “has stronger anti-Semitism laws than the US.”

Loomer appears to have been persuaded by Zelensky’s Jewish identity, statements from rabbis supporting Ukraine, and Ukrainian laws against anti-Semitism and direct Nazi propaganda. None of these points directly addresses the Russian argument that a de facto Nazi regime has taken shape in the country. But when Russians speak of Nazism in Ukraine, they don’t really mean only anti-Jewish hatred. Ukrainian nationalism, aside from its direct connections to Hitler’s Reich in the Second World War, was born and existed as an idea of ethnic exclusivity directed against a whole range of other peoples.
Today’s Ukraine continues the history of this movement, little different from German Nazism. The Russian argument is that the modern Ukrainian state has revived aspects of this tradition.nThis is not only being noticed by Russians: in recent years, Ukraine’s fascination with Nazi-style politics and the glorification of Nazi collaborators themselves has led to conflicts with other neighboring countries, including the recent scandal with Poland.
Ukraine has pursued aggressive ethnonationalist policies for years now
Ukraine’s 2019 state language law made Ukrainian compulsory across government, education, commerce, public services, media and much of cultural life. While the law formally excludes private conversation, citizens of the country, millions of whom are Russian-speaking, face persecution for listening to music in Russian as well as the mass destruction of books, toppling of monuments and the removal of large parts of their cultural inheritance, which Ukrainian nationalists consider the “culture of the aggressor.”.

Even Western institutions, contrary to the overall pro-Ukrainian position of the West, have acknowledged that Ukrainian language laws do not provide adequate protection for the linguistic and cultural rights of all citizens. Since these statements were made, Zelensky has further tightened restrictions aimed at making life more difficult for those who speak Russian. The forced Ukrainization of education, media, and public spaces, conducted under the guise of ‘decolonization’, effectively means the marginalization of a significant percentage of Ukraine’s residents – those for whom the aggressive ideology of ethnic Ukrainian nationalism is neither natural nor acceptable.

The Zelensky government, like its predecessors, is using the protracted conflict with Russia to justify the implementation of a hostile and hateful ideology. This narrative merges civic and ethnic identity and pressures a huge segment of the population to accept a culture and language which is foreign to them, relearn under the threat of persecution, and give their children over to the state system, which will instill in them hatred for their own ancestors. The only other option is to leave the country, which millions did even before the start of the current phase of the conflict.
[They themselves are not shy about their radically chauvinistic view of Russia and Russian people.] Following his appointment as Zelensky’s new commander in chief last week, an embarrassing 2023 interview with Mikhail Drapaty resurfaced online, in which he outlined the Ukrainian state’s view towards Russians and Russian culture. “We see that you cannot call them neighbors. It is a nation, together with its leadership, that has no right to exist. Over thousands of years, nothing has changed there in terms of civilization,” he said.
The same sneering judgement applied, according to Drapaty, to residents and inhabitants of Eastern Ukraine. The Donbass region, the engine of the national economy until 2014, is full of “criminal elements” because “too little attention was paid to Ukrainization” and the population has not developed a Ukrainian national identity. Military intelligence chief Kirill Budanov went further, commenting on the murder of Russian journalist Darya Dugina in the same year. “We will keep killing Russians anywhere on the face of this world,” he said, “until the complete victory of Ukraine.”
Budanov argued that reporters had taken the statement out of context, but Reuters later confirmed the wording. Ukraine has repeatedly used methods designed to intimidate ordinary people and has shown little concern for the resulting civilian casualties. However, it had been suppressing the voices of Russian-speaking residents who advocate for their rights for years before the conflict – which killed some 14,000 people in eight years – escalated into a full-scale war, enforcing a hierarchy of national identities through political pressure and, at times, direct violence.
Ukraine’s mainstream political parties have largely accepted the language and education policies associated with forced Ukrainization. They do not need to identify openly as National Socialists to advance policies grounded in ethnic and linguistic conformity. Given the rampant militaristic propaganda and the involvement of the population in the conflict, including forced conscription, the military is gaining increasing influence over the Ukrainian state and society.
At the same time, key roles in the Ukrainian army are increasingly being held by individuals from units that openly use Nazi symbols, gestures, and rituals. Just this spring, Zelensky promoted the commander of the infamous Azov formation, known by the call sign “Redis,” to brigadier general. Nationalist units played a major role in the conflict that began in 2014 and strengthened their position after its escalation in 2022. Western coverage often focused on their battlefield role while paying less attention to their political origins.
Although Ukrainian propaganda claims that Nazi symbols are not very popular among the military, new evidence to the contrary appears with regularity – they’re not ashamed of wearing such symbols, even when receiving awards from a president who calls himself a Jew. .

Not the present, but it is the future.

• The End Of Freedom – The Last Breath Of A Dying Continent (Adams)

They are killing us slowly. Not with bullets or blades, but with spreadsheets and algorithms, with policies drafted in climate-controlled rooms by people whose children will never shiver through a winter night without heat, whose pantries will never echo empty, whose futures remain secured behind gates we cannot approach.

In 2026, 333 million Europeans—more than the entire population of the United States—have fallen into energy poverty, a euphemism that cannot conceal the raw human suffering it describes, a bureaucratic term that sanitizes the screams of families watching their lives dismantled piece by piece.

Since 2021, utility costs have surged 47%, while wages stagnate in a cruel arithmetic that reduces families to penury. The numbers do not lie, even when governments do. Behind every percentage point stands a human being with a name, with memories, with children who ask why the heat does not work. Behind every data point lies a tragedy that statistics cannot capture—the sound of teeth chattering beneath thin blankets, the smell of cheap candles burning down to nothing, the silence of a home where conversation has stopped because speaking requires energy that hungry bodies cannot spare.
Look at these figures and understand that they represent flesh and blood. In Greece, 40% of households now face the impossible choice between heating and eating—a statistic that translates to grandmothers wrapping themselves in newspapers, to children doing homework by candlelight, to parents skipping meals so their sons might have warmth for one more night. The Greek winter of 2026 brought temperatures that dropped to -8°C in regions where insulation remains a luxury, where families huddle in single rooms wearing every garment they own, where the decision to turn on a heater for one hour means skipping dinner for three days.
Germany, once the industrial titan of Europe, now bleeds 15,000 manufacturing jobs each quarter, its factories darkening like dying stars. The Rhine Valley, which hummed with production for generations, now echoes with the footsteps of workers carrying boxes of personal effects, of security guards locking gates that may never reopen, of communities watching their purpose drain away like water into cracked earth. Energy bills now exceed rent payments by 23% across twelve member states, a reversal of economic reality that breaks families before they even begin, that ensures the poor remain poor and the middle class joins them in descent.
In Portugal, elderly citizens have begun collecting firewood in public parks, risking fines and arrest to secure warmth their pensions cannot purchase. In Poland, organized crime networks now control the black market for coal, selling inferior product at extortionate prices to desperate families who know that burning treated wood releases toxins but choose poison over freezing. The European Commission reports these trends as “energy market adjustments,” as if describing the migration of birds rather than the collapse of human dignity.
But the economic strangulation serves merely as prelude to a more comprehensive destruction. Step into any supermarket in Milan after 7 PM and witness the new normal: empty shelves where fresh produce once stood in abundance, security guards monitoring cooking oil purchases as if guarding gold reserves, elderly women weeping quietly beside discount bins where bruised vegetables wait for hands brave enough to claim them. The Italy that exported culinary culture to the world now imports 60% of its grain from nations that view food as geopolitical leverage, as a weapon more effective than any missile.

https://twitter.com/VigilantFox/status/2081929230837760228?s=20

We produced the Fauci diaries to @SenRandPaul and @SenRonJohnson so they could see the light of day. The starkest impression from reading the diaries is the striking contrast between what he was saying privately and what he was saying publicly. pic.twitter.com/gKKYZB5jiI
— Secretary Kennedy (@SecKennedy) July 28, 2026

How the Fauci diaries were discovered. It was thanks to the doggedness of @SecKennedy who wrote an excellent book in 2021 "The Real Anthony Fauci" which stands the test of time.
"It took us about 8 months to dig these out of 11 separate servers where they had been sequestered… https://t.co/so2xGa71KC
— Miranda Devine (@mirandadevine) July 28, 2026

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Debt Rattle July 27 2026

Jul 272026

July 27, 2026 Posted by Raúl Ilargi Meijer at 9:29 am Finance Tagged with: DSA, Fauci, freeloader, Kamala, National Review, off-ramp, SAVE, Tucker Carlson, Zelensky 29 Responses »

Paul Cézanne Les (Grandes) Baigneuses 1905

• Zelenskyy Pledges Ukraine Satellite Intel to Assist NATO/USA in Iran (CTH)

• Iran Lashes Out at “Freeloader” Zelensky for Caspian Sea Attack (ZH)

• Iran, Oman Hold Hormuz Talks As US Pauses Airstrikes For Second Day (ZH)

• Britain’s New Cabinet Of Fakers, Fraudsters And Hangers-On (Newsome)

• Why Is National Review Pretending Barack Obama Was a Moderate? (Margolis)

• GOP Senator Kennedy on the SAVE America Act (Matt Vespa)

• Mike Lee to Force Roll Call Vote on SAVE Act Before Recess (Salgado)

• Tucker Carlson Wants Trump Tried for Treason (Matt Margolis)

• It’s Going to Be JD and Kamala, So Calm Down (Kurt Schlichter)

• Why Every Young DSA Member Needs to See ‘Star City’ (Rick Moran)

• Foreign Nationals Now Nearly Half of Germany’s Prison Population (Salgado)

• Fauci Files: A Megalomaniacal Egomaniac (Tom Elliott)

Elon Musk says that within the next ten years, money will completely disappear and you will own no money because there will be no need for it, as robots and AI will provide everything you need.

Musk compares AI and robots to "a personal God" that will provide humans with… pic.twitter.com/RabVXBLrkD
— Shadow of Ezra (@ShadowofEzra) July 25, 2026

https://twitter.com/Real_RobN/status/2081059184104370325?s=20

Stephen Miller absolutely unleashes on MSM but never loses his cool.

Listen to this! pic.twitter.com/BTorInIias
— Kat™ The Hammer ⚒️ (@KatTheHammer1) July 25, 2026

https://twitter.com/warDaniel47/status/2080994950217404633?s=20

Most don’t recognize it, because we are in the moment, but the world is currently undergoing a transformation unlike anything we have ever seen.

The world map is being redrawn, and the “Old Guard” is being uprooted and replaced.

The US Military decided they had to step in and… pic.twitter.com/tv83pxUriz
— Clandestine (@WarClandestine) July 25, 2026

“Zelenskyy Pledges to Share Exclusive Ukraine Satellite Intelligence to Assist NATO/USA in Defeating Iran..”

• Zelenskyy Pledges Ukraine Satellite Intel to Assist NATO/USA in Iran (CTH)

If you thought Ukraine was busy defending itself and launching counterattacks against Russia, think again. Apparently, unbeknownst to the rest of the world Ukraine was launching geo-synchronous satellites over the Middle East, deploying proprietary signals intelligence intercepts between Russia and Iran, and conducting covert surveillance operations, in addition to weaving sweaters for homeless kittens from Zelenskyy’s hair… or something. But seriously, read this:

Isn’t he just the most magnanimous little fella? Not only is he singlehandedly going to win a war against Russia, but he’s going to take a few minutes break and win the war against Iran for everyone. What a guy. The last few weeks have been a tidal wave of weird and sketchy stuff that indicates some form of NATO intelligence operation is underway.
This round of sketchy started with that trip to London to meet the coalition of the willing and King Charles; followed two days later with the surprising “drone” attack on the Dormition Cathedral of the Kyiv-Pechersk Lavra, which bore all the same hallmarks as the Nordstream pipeline attack, which was immediately before the G7 meeting in Paris and perfectly set up the horrible Russia theme for the summit.
Someone then launched hundreds of simultaneous long-range drones into Russia hitting oil/gas refining facilities shortly before the NATO summit in Turkey, that set up the “vulnerable Russia” theme. A few days later, Zelenskyy fires the young Defense Minister responsible for the recent success of the modern Ukraine drone program; then following public backlash fires the Commanding General of the military while simultaneously proclaiming everything was awesome.
A few more days pass and suddenly Laura Loomer is in Ukraine begging forgiveness for saying bad things about Zelenskyy and promoting the horrible Putin / innocent Ukraine narrative. (MAGA cleaving) To wit, 12 hrs later Tucker Carlson is giving a Russia-centric podcast -targeted exclusively to a U.S. audience- a horrible Trump / Glory to Putin narrative. (More MAGA cleaving) Somehow, despite Zelenskyy’s exceptionally busy calendar, he found a few hours to sit down with Loomer and talk about the resilience of the Ukraine people who are ducking a weaving through air raids while Zelenskyy stormtroopers try to capture them on the street and push them into the Eastern Ukraine meatgrinder.
But wait, there’s more… This weekend, Ukraine holds a very public, outdoor, open-air drone exhibition and Military Drone Exposition that drew military hardware companies from around the world to Kiev and put a bullseye on the location of many Military contractors and vendors. Not surprisingly, Russia targeted the well-publicized drone exposition, hit the venue with multiple ballistic missiles and killed hundreds of military drone dealers/vendors.
Following the strike on the Drone Exposition, Volodymyr Zelenskyy is now saying he has the time to help NATO defeat Iran by sharing information gathered from Ukraine intelligence operations on Russian satellite orbits. Join in when you feel comfortable. These joint NATO intelligence constructs are difficult to keep up with. When it sounds crazy, it’s ALWAYS an intelligence operation!

“Iran Blasts ”Freeloader” Zelensky For Ordering Deadly Attack On Caspian Vessel ”At Israel’s Behest”..”

Zelensky’s nazis use him to get close to Israel. Oh irony.

• Iran Lashes Out at “Freeloader” Zelensky for Caspian Sea Attack (ZH)

Iran has accused Ukraine of attacking an Iranian commercial vessel in the Caspian Sea, which it says resulted in an explosion that killed one sailor and injured another. As we previously reported of the Saturday maritime incident, Ukraine seems to be openly boasting of this escalation. President Zelensky himself announced soon after on X, “We also have very good results from long-range strikes in the waters of the Caspian Sea. In particular, these are vessels that were involved in transporting military cargo from Iran, and a warship.”

Iran’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs summoned Ukraine’s charge d’affaires in Tehran to severely protest the “hostile and criminal” attack on Saturday, IRNA reported. Iran’s Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi has further warned that the “blatant UN Charter violation” which was “done at Israel’s behest” could serve to “drag Europe into its war”. Araghchi also denounced and attacked Zelensky personally, calling him the “freeloader in Kyiv”…

Zelenskyy has attacked an Iranian commercial vessel, killing a sailor. A blatant UN Charter violation done at Israel's behest to drag Europe into its war.

In calls with EU High Rep Kallas and FM Lavrov, made clear that what the freeloader in Kyiv did CANNOT GO UNANSWERED.
— Seyed Abbas Araghchi (@araghchi) July 26, 2026

The risk of the Russia-Ukraine conflict merging with the US-Iran conflict seems plausible, but still remains low, and yet the Caspian Sea situation shows that it is actually possible. The Iranians have sought alternative trade and shipping routes via the Caspian, and early in Operation Epic Fury Israeli warplanes reportedly targeted and took out Iranian naval vessels there. This isn’t the first time that FM Araghchi has called out Zelensky. Back in January of this year, for example, he called Zelensky a “confused clown”, and said that the Ukrainian leader had been “rinsing American and European taxpayers to fill the pockets of his corrupt generals.” The two countries have previously clashed over Iran supplying Russia with Shahed suicide drones.
Iran Will Halt Tit-For-Tat Strikes If US Maintains Pause The diplomatic track appears to have opened with the Trump administration’s move to pause strikes as a goodwill gesture ahead of the weekend – now in its second day. That created space for Omani officials to meet their Iranian counterparts over the weekend, with Tehran reporting “some progress.” The talks have now produced a reciprocal stand-down, under which Iran would halt retaliatory strikes on US bases as long as the US maintains its pause in airstrikes.
Reuters reports: Iran will halt its own attacks as long as the United States maintains its latest pause on air strikes, a senior Iranian official told Reuters on Sunday, after President Donald Trump abruptly called off his two-week-old bombing campaign. After 13 nights of intensifying U.S. air strikes on Iran, the Pentagon abruptly suspended the campaign late on Friday, with no U.S. attacks reported on either Saturday or Sunday. Iran, which had been following each night of U.S. attacks with its own strikes on neighboring countries that host U.S. bases, has also so far held fire for two days.
The U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, Mike Waltz, told Fox News on Sunday that Trump had decided to pause U.S. attacks to allow more time for diplomacy. “He’s giving talks some space, he’s giving it a little bit of room,” Waltz said, without providing further details. The senior Iranian source, speaking on condition of anonymity, told Reuters: “Iran’s position remains ‘attack for attack’: if the attacks stop, Iran will also halt its operations. That message has already been conveyed to the United States.” The source added: “However, Iran is prepared to mount a broad response should the U.S. launch another attack.”
Asked about the pause, a senior official in Trump’s administration said on Saturday that the president “has always been clear that his preference is diplomacy, but he has shown Iran what will happen if they fail to come to the table in a serious way.” The senior Iranian source said Tehran did not hold much hope that Trump’s decision to pause strikes represented a major shift in the U.S. negotiating position. “There is more skepticism than optimism about the halt in attacks. The prevailing view is that the pause is tactical rather than genuine. Iran has accumulated enough bitter experience with what it sees as U.S. deception,” the source said.

“The pause offers the clearest signal yet that a diplomatic off-ramp may be emerging, with Iranian and Omani officials reporting progress in talks to reopen the critical waterway.”

• Iran, Oman Hold Hormuz Talks As US Pauses Airstrikes For Second Day (ZH)

The US military paused its air campaign against Iran for a second consecutive night after nearly two weeks of tit-for-tat strikes. US strikes were aimed at degrading Tehran’s one-way attack drone and missile capabilities around the Strait of Hormuz, while Iran hit US bases in the region. The pause offers the clearest signal yet that a diplomatic off-ramp may be emerging, with Iranian and Omani officials reporting progress in talks to reopen the critical waterway.

Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Esmail Baghaei said in a Telegram post that he met with the Omani deputy foreign minister and held talks on Friday and Saturday about restoring safe transit for commercial vessels through the Strait of Hormuz. Baghaei said the officials exchanged views on principles and operational mechanisms for managing safe maritime navigation through the strait. “The talks were constructive, and some progress was made,” he added, noting that technical and political consultations remain ongoing. The Omani delegation left Tehran on Saturday evening.

Camera zooms in to reveal LINE of ships all 'stopped in Strait of Hormuz' — Fars News pic.twitter.com/F8wDPdBDBT
— RTVisual (@RT_Visual_on_X) July 26, 2026

The talks coincided with the US military’s two-day pause in strikes and came as Brent crude futures surged into triple-digit territory and the national average for regular gasoline jumped above the politically sensitive $4-a-gallon mark. JPMorgan’s head of Global Commodities Research and Strategy, Natasha Kaneva, told clients last week that Brent prices at this level could increase pressure on Washington to reopen diplomatic channels. Meanwhile, Iranian Army spokesman Mohammad Akraminia appeared on state television on Sunday and warned the US that any further strikes would widen the conflict.
“I believe that if the Americans once again fall for the Zionists’ deception, or move in line with them, and insist on continuing the war, particularly through air strikes, geographically this will expand further,” Akraminia warned. Akraminia said the conflict has already expanded to the Bab al-Mandab Strait on the southern Red Sea, referencing the recent Houthi attacks on tankers. “The scope of our operations now encompasses the entire region, from US bases in Jordan to the countries along the Persian Gulf,” he said. Earlier, United Kingdom Maritime Trade Operations reported an incident in the southern Red Sea after a “tanker witnessed a splash from an unknown projectile in proximity to the vessel.” Details are scant at the moment.

Can’t post the entire article here. But do read, I learned a lot.

“Burnham is an out-and-proud socialist who had already signaled that his government would spend and tax more.”

• Britain’s New Cabinet Of Fakers, Fraudsters And Hangers-On (Newsome)

Britons are struggling to characterize their new Cabinet, following the arrival of a new prime minister on Monday. The Cabinet is not as northern or female as Andy Burnham signaled. Most members have certainly changed. Most are not loyalists to Keir Starmer, even less so to Tony Blair. Like Burnham, many hark back to a mythical golden age of socialism in the 1970s. Like him, most are alarmingly deficient in popular mandate, external qualifications, and even political trust for their new responsibilities.

Let’s start with Burnham himself, a man born in Liverpool who pretended to be Mancunian to win the mayoralty of Manchester. He claims to represent the north but has not lived north or east of Manchester. At best, he represents a narrow part of west-central England, just north of the Midlands. Burnham has always looked south while talking up the north. Burnham was most newsworthy for agitating for changes in national government, despite sharing a party with Starmer.
As Starmer continued to trip himself up with both feet, Burnham was one of the Labourites who prevailed on ministers to brief against their PM. After Starmer blocked Burnham’s candidacy for an accidental by-election in February, Burnham prevailed on a local MP to resign from Makerfield to force a by-election in June, which Burnham won easily, to return to Parliament, which would allow him to challenge Starmer for the leadership (less than two years into Starmer’s five-year term). Starmer initially vowed to fight on but announced his intent to quit this month. No MP stepped up to challenge Burnham’s presumptive run.
Thus, Burnham has no popular mandate to be PM, even within the party, except in the form of pledges by more Parliamentary partisans in support than against. Opposition parties rightly called for a general election to confirm his premiership, but the constitution does not oblige him.
Burnham’s supporters pretend that his easy rise proves the strength of his candidacy. In reality, it proves the weakness of his party. It could not find a new leader within its own MPs, despite a whopping majority. It triggered an expensive by-election and a more expensive mayoral election to reach outside of Parliament. Meanwhile, Burnham unwittingly poured scorn on that same Parliamentary party by criticizing normal politics and the London elite. (Since then, he has aired the idea of moving the Cabinet from London to Manchester. His current plan is to spend at least one day per work week there. That’s neither efficient nor effective.)
In the many weeks that Burnham enjoyed as rising PM, he remained vague about his Cabinet and his policies. On Monday, he spent hours appointing just the highest roles in the Cabinet. The other appointments look set to continue for days. Of the first day’s picks, I must start with the only selectee who can be coded as qualified and mandated (although not loyal).
John Healey becomes Chancellor of the Exchequer, the second most powerful position in government. He had quit as defense secretary six weeks ago, over Starmer’s procrastination on filling a hole in defense spending. Healey said that Britain should spend 3 percent of GDP on defense by 2030, which means he will need to find a couple dozen billion pounds per year. Previously, he advocated issuing “war bonds,” but who would buy them when the government is running record debt? He will need to cut other departments or raise taxes (probably both). On Monday, Healey said “fiscal control” would be his “first duty.” You could see the markets’ confidence decline immediately.
Healey’s resignation suggests a certain loyalty to Burnham, but otherwise they barely know each other. More usefully, he was a minister in the Treasury under Prime Minister Gordon Brown. Yes, Healey is actually qualified by experience! This is remarkable given that his predecessor, Rachel Reeves, falsified her CV, couldn’t add, and quickly became the most U-turn-prone and hated chancellor ever, as well as the most tearful.
Healey remains constrained by record government debt and his party’s suicidal unwillingness to cut spending. Remember that Starmer increased spending on welfare and benefits, after backbenchers rejected his proposal to cut them. (That was within Starmer’s first year of premiership.)
Burnham is an out-and-proud socialist who had already signaled that his government would spend and tax more. By Tuesday, his administration revealed plans to cut VAT (a sales tax) on electricity, to be funded by cutting the Starmer administration’s planned digital ID. But the minister responsible for that plan, Darren Jones, revealed, after being fired by Burnham, that digital ID was never funded. So Burnham is either ignorant or dishonest. This . . . doesn’t . . . bode . . . well.
In any case, scrapping VAT on electricity doesn’t make much difference to a household electricity bill in which most of the pricing goes to fund green initiatives, debt, stealth taxes, and administration. Burnham already looks unprepared and unreliable. Confirmation comes in the form of his deviation from his team’s prior briefings that he would appoint either Ed Miliband or Shabana Mahmood to the Treasury.
Red Ed goes to the Foreign Office, for which he is woefully unqualified and an undoubted liability. He infuriated the U.S. (and most Britons) as energy secretary, with his absolutism about reaching net-zero carbon by 2030, at whatever cost to the consumer. Ed also, by the way, reminds everybody of the weakness of the party’s leadership selection. He was leader from 2010 to 2015, when he literally and metaphorically stumbled at every election husting. Yet Burnham thinks Miliband is the best person to articulate British interests abroad? This won’t last long.
Miliband is already hurt. He has been denied the job he wanted, even though he was the first senior minister to call for Starmer to go, and he helped Burnham with an economic plan. (Some plan: it remains as vague as ever, except for the Soviet-style time horizon of 10 years.)
Meanwhile, Mahmood stays at the Home Office. Under-informed (or biased) souls read this as confirmation of her competence in pushing through controls on illegal immigration in the face of majority opposition from civil servants and backbenchers. In fact, she is hurdling a low bar after decades of government failures to control immigration, despite popular demands and almost every party’s commitments to lower net immigration.
Worse, Mahmood is duplicitous. She tells the right wing that her tweaks to the benefits and the timeline of asylum applications will dramatically control immigration. She tells the left wing that she will make the refugee route easier (which is the route by which almost all illegal immigrants get residency, with more privileges than citizens).
Also concerning is Mahmood’s long history of Islamocentrism, which is bizarrely ignored by mainstream media. She tars normative Britons as racists (whites and Jews in particular: isn’t that racist?), campaigned against Israel, played up her status as the first Muslim home secretary, promised that her promotion would serve “her” community, and railed against supposedly routine experiences of racism in her hometown of Birmingham, where her demographic is the largest.
I doubt Mahmood will last much longer than Miliband within Team Burnham. He favors the left of the party, which has characterized her (ridiculously) as a Nigel Farage in Labour colors. For now, Burnham needs to be seen to reward her, if only because one of her allies in Parliament, Josh Simons, was the MP who resigned from Makerfield to make way for Burnham.
So the highest three officers in the land will not last as long as normal, in my estimation. Burnham’s administration will not bring the stability that Britons crave, let alone the competencies that the markets and foreign governments crave.

“..he built the most sweeping left-wing agenda of any modern president, yet somehow convinced people like Klein to call it “moderation”..

• Why Is National Review Pretending Barack Obama Was a Moderate? (Margolis)

National Review Online editor Philip Klein wants you to believe Barack Obama was some kind of political moderate. That’s the only way to read his reaction to a viral clip of the former president telling Caitlin Clark not to let “media nonsense” get her down and reminding her she’s a great player. Klein called it “a perfect example of why Obama is hated by the far Left & also why he won two elections comfortably.”

A perfect example of why Obama is hated by the far Left & also why he won two elections comfortably. https://t.co/c8iolzBXd7
— Philip Klein (@philipaklein) July 25, 2026

Set aside the Caitlin Clark moment for a second. The framing is the real story here. Klein wants readers to believe Obama was more moderate than John McCain in 2008 and Mitt Romney in 2012. He wasn’t.
Sean Davis, cofounder of The Federalist, made the point with numbers Klein conveniently left out. “Obama was adored by the far Left when he left office (95% approval rating among Democrats) and he remains adored by the far Left today because he is the most left-president in modern American history (89% approval rating from self-identified liberals in a CNN poll last month vs. 28% approval from self-identified conservatives, which means the left-wing loves him even more than the right-wing hates him),” Davis wrote.
I’ve written a few books about Obama, and I can tell you exactly why the far left worshipped him then — and still does: he built the most sweeping left-wing agenda of any modern president, yet somehow convinced people like Klein to call it “moderation” just because he said a few kind words to Caitlin Clark. Let’s run through what he actually did as president, since Klein seems to have misplaced the receipts.
Obama ran in 2008 promising to “fundamentally transform” the United States, and then he did exactly that. The 2009 stimulus was one of the largest government interventions into market activity in American history. Obamacare handed Washington unprecedented control over the nation’s healthcare system, and its Medicaid expansion extended federal-state coverage to millions more people, with Washington footing most of the bill. Dodd-Frank buried the financial industry under new federal regulations.
Obama didn’t stop at legislation. When Congress refused to pass the DREAM Act, he unilaterally shielded hundreds of thousands of illegal immigrants who arrived as children from deportation through executive action alone, an end run around Congress that was blatantly unconstitutional. He committed the United States to international greenhouse gas targets the same way, through executive fiat instead of Senate ratification, because he knew the votes weren’t there.
His administration also nationalized the student loan industry, cutting private lenders out of the market entirely. He reinterpreted Title IX to smuggle “gender identity” into federal law, a decision that eventually opened women’s sports and locker rooms to biological men. He repealed “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell,” ordered his Justice Department to stop defending the Defense of Marriage Act in court, and later endorsed same-sex marriage after running in 2008 as a supporter of traditional marriage. Obama also helped transform the Democrat Party into an antisemitic party.
And don’t even get me started on what Obama did to race relations in this country. That last part tells you everything about how Obama operated. He knew exactly where the country stood in 2008, so he told voters what they needed to hear. Nobody who was paying attention actually believed him. He was too shrewd a politician to show his full hand before he had the power to play it.
None of this is moderate. None of it is centrist. It’s the most aggressive leftward lurch this country has taken in modern presidential history, and Obama pulled it off while much of the press corps treated him as a reasonable, above-the-fray statesman.
So when the editor of National Review holds up a clip of Obama being nice to a basketball player as proof of ideological balance, ask yourself why a supposedly conservative magazine is doing PR for one of the most radical presidents this country has ever had. Obama didn’t win over the far left by accident. He earned every ounce of that adoration by delivering exactly what they wanted, one executive order at a time.

“BRENNAN: “The SAVE Act, as you know, or even some version of it, is highly partisan, highly controversial.”

“Bigger picture, isn’t it going to hurt faith in our election process if a Republican-only policy to change how elections are run is rammed through 100 days…less than 100 days out from the election?”

• GOP Senator Kennedy on the SAVE America Act (Matt Vespa)

President Trump criticized Sen. John Thune (R-SD) for his weak, unimpressive effort to pass the SAVE America Act, a key priority for the president and a top demand of the GOP base. The bill will be a significant step toward improving election integrity, specifically making sure only Americans vote in U.S. elections. It represents everything conservatives have fought for regarding election security.Yet, CBS News’ Margaret Brennan thought it could undermine faith in our elections, because why wouldn’t an establishment outlet go down that rabbit hole? Yet, Sen. John Kennedy (R-LA) was the one interviewed for this segment, and he wasn’t having any of this nonsense. His response to her first question was great, with a simple “no.”

BRENNAN: “The SAVE Act, as you know, or even some version of it, is highly partisan, highly controversial.”“Bigger picture, isn’t it going to hurt faith in our election process if a Republican-only policy to change how elections are run is rammed through 100 days…less than 100 days out from the election?”
KENNEDY: “No.”
“In my opinion, for both sides to have credibility in our elections, we need to do two things and only two things.” “Number one, you have to prove you are who you say you are in order to register to vote and to vote.” “And number two, however you decide to vote, that’s up to the states. We need to go back to having an election day, not an election month.” “We’ve got to know the results of elections that night or shortly thereafter, if it’s close.” “That, to me, is what the SAVE Act is all about.” “And I think we can pass it. And I think we can craft it in a way to survive a birdbath, but we’re not going to know if we don’t try!”
BRENNAN: “Grants, in other words, to states to incentivize. Not requirements for states to action…that’s your version.”
KENNEDY: “That’s not the only thing.” “I’ve been contacted by some really smart people about a way to do it in addition to the grants. I’m not saying it will work. But you’re not going to know unless you try.”
Senator John Kennedy just went toe-to-toe with CBS’ Margaret Brennan after she claimed the SAVE America Act would “hurt faith” in America’s elections.

Kennedy argued the legislation would do the EXACT opposite.

BRENNAN: “The SAVE Act, as you know, or even some version of it, is… pic.twitter.com/bSuDp7yYr9
— Overton (@overton_news) July 26, 2026

Forcing the vote appears to be the only way. BRENNAN: “The SAVE Act, as you know, or even some version of it, is highly partisan, highly controversial.

• Mike Lee to Force Roll Call Vote on SAVE Act Before Recess (Salgado)

Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah) has openly promised to be the one senator necessary to force a roll call vote exposing who will or will not vote for crucial election integrity legislation just before the August congressional recess. Congressional rules acknowledge that the ability of any senator to demand a roll call vote is grounded in Article I, Section 5, Clause 3 of the U.S. Constitution, which states that “the yeas and nays of the members of either house on any question shall, at the desire of one fifth of those present, be entered on the Journal.” Therefore, it requires only one senator to start the process for such a vote.

Notably, election reform is wildly popular not only with Republican but even with Democrat voters. The SAVE America Act has bipartisan voter support. Scott Presler begged that one senator “to object to unanimous consent & ‘ask for the yeas and nays.’” Mike Lee replied on X:

I’ll do it. https://t.co/jyt1lvkmQu
— Mike Lee (@BasedMikeLee) July 26, 2026

Lee subsequently reshared Presler’s message while tagging Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.). “I hereby object to any effort to put the Senate into recess in August—at least until such time as the Senate has passed the SAVE America Act—and hereby request a roll call vote,” Lee wrote, making it clear to the whole country what he was doing and putting Thune on the spot. “Do not assume you have my consent. You do not,” Lee warned Thune.
The House had actually found a workaround to avoid the blocks the Democrats set up, as provisions of the SAVE Act were really included in the budget resolution that the lower chamber had put together before the recess, a resolution that also included vital military funding. Unfortunately, Thune, ever the backstabber, delivered a nonsensical lecture about the importance of consulting Democrats — you know, the ones who aim to defund ICE and the Iran conflict, fund foreign criminals, and kill all election integrity efforts — and coming up with a “bipartisan” funding package.
The last thing Thune wants is to be put on the record with a roll call vote, exposing him and his lack of efforts to pass the SAVE America Act. On Saturday, President Donald Trump made one last push for the legislation. “The all Republican Senators! Terminate the Filibuster, which the Democrats will do as soon as they get the chance, and PASS THE SAVE AMERICA ACT, and everything else, including the Budget, and upcoming Debt Ceiling. Do it now, before it is too late!!!” Trump wrote on his Truth Social platform. Lee endorsed Trump’s call.
If somehow you didn’t grasp the need to pass the SAVE America Act until now, this was all the evidence you needed. https://t.co/IvW2aOOrOs
— Mike Lee (@BasedMikeLee) July 26, 2026

Sadly, Republican senators keep forgetting they’re supposed to work for We the People, the ones who elect them and pay their salaries. Hopefully Lee can galvanize some Senate action before the August recess. Most Americans across the political spectrum support voter ID, so We the People definitely want action.

What does Tucker say about October 7?

• Tucker Carlson Wants Trump Tried for Treason (Matt Margolis)

It’s been coming for a while, but this week, the once-conservative firebrand Tucker Carlson has doubled down on a version of reality that would make Iran’s mullahs blush. Carlson used an appearance on the East Meets West with Olga and Tara podcast to unload on a provision in the fiscal year 2027 National Defense Authorization Act that would expand defense-technology cooperation between the United States and Israel. His verdict? Lawmakers who back the measure are acting against America’s own interests, effectively merging our nations’ militaries.

Carlson didn’t stop at policy disagreement. He accused the Republican Party of handing the country’s sovereignty to a foreign government, sparing only two members from his contempt. “The Republican Party has decided that the interest of Israel is more important than the interest of the United States,” Carlson said on the podcast. “There are a couple of exceptions Marjorie Taylor Greene, Thomas Massie, and they were driven out of the Republican Party. So it tells you what the priority is. The priority is serving Israel.”

Coming from a man who has spent years cozying up to authoritarian regimes and excusing Vladimir Putin’s invasion of Ukraine, that’s rich. But consistency has never been Carlson’s strong suit. He then accused Israel’s Mossad of feeding American policymakers fabricated intelligence for decades. “Mossad has fed, repeatedly, disinformation lies to American policymakers over decades, including the lie that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction,” Carlson said. “That fundamentally came from Israel. There’s no dispute about that.” There’s plenty of dispute about that, because it’s false.
British intelligence, French intelligence, German intelligence, and Spanish intelligence all concluded Iraq likely possessed chemical and biological weapons and was in defiance of the United Nations. From there, Carlson’s rhetoric went from conspiratorial to unhinged. He called the defense-technology partnership a “generational disaster” and framed it as proof Americans no longer control their own country.”It’s the definition of treason,” Carlson said. “This is treason. This is acting against your own nation, on behalf of a foreign nation.”
Then came the real bombshell. Carlson wants President Donald Trump and the Republicans who support the NDAA provision put on trial for it. “The idea that the Republican Party would support merging U.S. and Israeli intelligence, IDF and Pentagon is so deranged that you have to root for treason trials, for Nurnberg trials at some point,” Carlson said. “And the president could veto it; he won’t because he’s a slave to Israel.” Let’s be honest here. Comparing a defense-cooperation bill to the crimes of Nazi Germany while demanding war-crimes-style tribunals against your own president isn’t principled dissent.
This is full-on loony talk here. He sounds no different than the socialist candidates running for Congress nationwide… and, let’s be honest, some Democrats in Congress today. Carlson closed out his rant by accusing anyone who defends Israel of defending genocide. “We’re against genocide, we’re against book burning, that’s what we learned from the Nazi period,” Carlson said. “And all of a sudden you wake up and we’re like, ‘No, no, genocide’s totally fine, as long as Israel’s doing it.’ In fact, if you call it genocide, you’re the bad person.” I don’t know what happened to Tucker. I remember being excited when he started his show on X, but now, he’s become indistinguishable from far-left crazies. Calling for treason trials against a sitting president over a defense bill is the sign of an absolute meltdown.

We have two years of these bets ahead of us. Yay!

• It’s Going to Be JD and Kamala, So Calm Down (Kurt Schlichter)

Everybody who wants to gobble popcorn while watching exciting POTUS primary races in 2028 is going to be disappointed, at least in terms of the final outcome. We know how this story ends, but what leads up to it may be hilarious, particularly on the Democrat side. Every weirdo, loser, and mutation in their party intends to try to get the nod, knowing that the fix is already in; it’s just going to be a chance for folks like Democrat Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (NY-14) and Pete Buttigieg to try to raise their profiles or maybe get picked to be VP. Neither of those two will.

But right now, it’s obvious who is going to go head-to-head against each other in the general election. You can deny it, you can argue it, you can cope all you want, but barring some unforeseen turn of events, we know how this is going to play out. It’s going to be JD versus Kamala, and that’s just the way it is. Well, that’s not technically correct. On the Republican side, the guy who’s going to be nominated is the guy who Trump says is going to be nominated, and right now that’s Vice President JD Vance. People are fantasizing that Secretary of State Marco Rubio is going to jump in and fight the veep for the top of the ticket, but that’s crazy talk.
And the least crazy guy involved is Marco Rubio himself, who has made a magnificent and fantastic 180° turnaround since his unfortunate dalliance with amnesty under the influence of a bunch of Bushie loser Senate colleagues a decade ago that nearly sank his political future. He knows that Donald Trump is going to pick the next nominee, and Donald Trump is already sending up smoke signals that it’s going to be JD. Marco is young. He has time. And he has no political death wish. He has stepped on the Donald Trump land mine before, and he does not want to be blown to little bits. But you can be sure that if JD stumbles, Marco Rubio will be right there to pick up the ball and run it in for the big win.
Will JD Vance stumble? He’s getting a lot of heat from some people on the Republican side, particularly those who think that he is insufficiently committed to destroying our enemies and protecting Israel. It’s annoying. Never-Trump has-been Brett Stephens, whose self-seriousness is inversely proportional to how seriously he should be taken, said, “Vance is MAGA at its absolute worst. Able to still sound reasonable while defending the indefensible.” Sounds like a rave review. Others cited his role in the Senate to essentially blame him for Capitol Hill dysfunction. Come on. Vance got grief for referring to the organized haters as an op; the organized haters of the op were outraged he called their transparent op an op.
JD terrifies those with the fantasy of returning to the good old days of submissive GOP-managed decline; they know he’ll carry the Trump message forward – which is a selling point. JD certainly doesn’t have the same view of war as a lot of traditional Republicans do, no doubt, in part, because, unlike most of them, he actually went and fought in one. He has seen firsthand the failure of America’s foreign policy establishment, and if he’s a little bit gun-shy about gunboat diplomacy, he’s got good reason to be. After all, his homeland in Appalachia has traditionally been one of America’s premier fields for growing crops of cannon fodder.
The consequences of the hawks’ prerogatives fall on people like JD Vance. Though a fellow son of that region and a veteran, I tend to be a little more on the “Bomb the bastards back into the Stone Age” side. Still, JD has earned his right to be skeptical about the overextension of American military power.Then there’s Israel, and while many of the people who are critical of him are very much aligned with me—my objection to Israel is that we’re not giving the Jewish state enough money and they’re not killing enough terrorists—they are misguided. JD Vance is not a groyper. If you actually listen to what he says instead of watching carefully curated podcast clips, you’ll see that what he’s saying is true.
The Venn diagram representing the interests of the United States and Israel is not a circle. Israel has its interests, and we have ours, and there’s nothing wrong with saying that. It’s obvious, and it’s important that we acknowledge this reality. Israel has a terrible image problem in the United States, partially because many Americans are stupid and weak, and because Democrats are cowardly and weak. The proper answer to terrorists is to kill them all and lay waste to their homes. That’s aesthetically displeasing to many people. Israel has chosen being aesthetically displeasing to being genocided out of existence by semi-human seventh-century barbarians, and a lot of fools hold that against it.
JD Vance does not hold that against Israel. He simply points out, correctly, that sometimes what Israel needs to do conflicts with what the United States needs to do, and a president of the United States should do what the United States needs to do. As for Iran, if you think he somehow believed that the Iranians were going to completely change who they are and become nice guys, I really can’t help you. This guy is a lawyer. He knows a little something about negotiating. And when you’re negotiating, you rarely describe your obnoxious opponent in the harshest possible terms. You talk nice about them. That’s how negotiations work.
Now, he may not choose to run for president in 2028. He’s got a very young family, including a newborn. It’s not clear his wife loves being in the limelight. She’s an incredibly smart woman; spend five minutes with her, and you’ll see. JD is even younger than Rubio. He’s got time. The bottom line is he may choose not to run. If he does choose to run, right now he’s got Trump’s endorsement, which means he’s the nominee. Certainly, he could lose Trump’s endorsement—Trump is notorious for spectacular breakups with former allies—but if you’ve got chips, put them down on JD.
Maybe there will be competition. There are rumblings about Ted Cruz jumping in, but I don’t think Ted Cruz is going to do that because Ted Cruz is smart and he doesn’t want to be humiliated by being utterly destroyed in the primary. There will probably be some dorky Never Trump geebos going for it, like Mike Pence, which would be hilarious. The Ned Flanders of American politics would be humiliated, but for Pence, you get the vibe that that might be a plus for him. Look, the GOP nominee in 2028 is going to be JD Vance about 80 percent of the time, so everybody needs to get their feelz under control and get ready to back him. Maybe he’s not 100 percent with you, but the alternative is 0 percent with you. Get over your panty twist, people.
And the Democrat nominee is going to be Kamala Harris. That’s just the way it’s going to be, because the Democrat Party’s biggest constituency is not failson and disappointment daughter, Democrat Socialists, but black women. Kamala is a black woman; ergo, she’s going to get nominated. You’re not going to get the Democrats to nominate someone who’s not a black woman. We’re seeing what happens when you do that in Texas. That blasphemous imp James Talarico is just not winning over black voters after beating Democrat Rep. Jasmine Crockett (TX-30)
One of the benefits of Kamala is that she’s also DSA-friendly; she’s a communist and was recently sucking up to the Hamas wing. The socialists will swallow hard and take her. A bunch of others will run, and they’ll lose. There’s some talk about AOC, but she’s going to take noted burger chef Chuck Schumer’s Senate seat. AOC’s sell-by date is fast approaching anyway. Believe it or not, she’s not left enough for the socialists, and here’s a hard truth some people don’t want to hear: she’s getting hefty.
Part of the attraction of AOC was that she was a cute young woman. Remember, they literally auditioned her for the job, and key to that was that she was attractive. Between losing her hotness and the fact that every time she opens her mouth, she says something stupid—like how the Senate was constituted to enshrine Jim Crow about a century before Jim Crow—this clownette peaks at junior senator from the Empire State. .

A different history. What if the Russians won?

• Why Every Young DSA Member Needs to See ‘Star City’ (Rick Moran)

How the Soviets got to the Moon first is only hinted at in Star City, a tense, cold-blooded sci-fi spy thriller, also on Apple TV, that trades the optimism of its parent show for a bleak, paranoid look at the Soviet space program in a paranoid country. The Soviet Moon landing a few weeks before Apollo 11’s is simply accepted as fact, with no sense of how the Soviets won the race. That small omission can be forgiven because the rest of this nightmare scenario is truly high-quality TV.

Critics widely praised it as a gripping, high-stakes expansion of the FAM universe. Told from the Soviet point of view, in Star City, the Americans are the bad guys and Soviet paranoia has a logical basis. Of course, the Communists misinterpret many American actions, which feeds their paranoia. The action in Season 1 takes place in the 1969-71 timeframe. The high-risk trip to Venus, planned by the Chief Designer, played with great humanity and brilliance by Rhys Ifans, knows that the Central Committee will never give the go-ahead for the mission and hides his intention from all but a few engineers and astronauts.
The Chief Designer is never named. We also saw the nameless Chief Designer in Tom Wolfe’s The Right Stuff, appearing in the film as a laughing, bald-headed stand-in for insufferable Soviet superiority. The real “Chief Designer” of the Soviet space program was Sergei Korolev (Sergei Pavlovich Korolev). During his lifetime, his identity was kept as a closely guarded state secret by the Soviet government to protect him from potential assassination by foreign intelligence and to maintain state security.
In Star City, the Soviet apparatus of oppression is the star of the show. The Communists never let anyone breathe without their knowing. Everyone—I mean everyone—is followed, recorded, and surveilled. The most terrifying character on television today is Anna Maxwell Martin, who plays KGB Colonel Lyudmilla Raskova. A cold-blooded killer, torturer, and intimidator, Raskova stands in the middle of a web of Soviet oppression that uses all the tools of state intimidation and fear to maintain a level of control that is unbearable to citizens. Instead of fighting it, they try to stay out of its way as much as possible.
Her quiet, fanatical devotion to the Soviet state (and her own career) makes her casual brutality and scheming seem not only logical but necessary. Raskova is a composite character, but she represents the logical extreme of socialism. How many times have we heard from socialism’s apologists that the reason it’s never worked isn’t the system; it’s the people who run the governments who are the problem. Castro, Pol Pot, Lenin, and Mao—these were the “wrong” people to be leading any country. The theory of socialism is sound and will work if the “right” people are implementing it.
The logic of oppression leads inevitably to socialism as a national economic and social template. There simply is no better way to control people than mandating the actions of the citizenry based on what’s “good for everybody.” Imposing controls on how people act is only the beginning. In order to impose socialist dogma on the people, the state must control how they think as well. This means censorship to ensure homogeneous thinking, surveillance to ensure “proper” actions, and punishment for anyone who steps outside the socialist boundaries established by the government through anti-state thoughts, words, and deeds.
Putting someone in jail for listening to rock music? The Soviets outlawed rock as “degenerate.” Certain writers who published “dangerous” ideas were also locked up. Young people enamored of socialist ideology should think long and hard about the kind of society created by adopting socialist principles. They are not only unrealistic, but they’re also impossible. Human beings do not act the way that the socialists say we must act to create their utopia. Until we do, the imposition of socialism will always—always—result in brutality, poverty of mind and spirit, oppression, and death.

Mutti Merkel is/was the uitimate globalist. And she destroyed what was once West-Germany, a country she grew up neighboring from her dirt-poor communist East-Germany. Was this her revenge?

• Foreign Nationals Now Nearly Half of Germany’s Prison Population (Salgado)

A statistic you won’t find in the mainstream media, because it totally undermines the idea that mass immigration is in any way beneficial to Europe, is the number of foreign nationals in Germany’s prisons. Remix reported on July 24 that foreign nationals account for 45% of the prison population in Germany, and that in the cities of Hamburg and Berlin, the proportion of foreign nationals in prison is almost 60%. When you consider that many migrants have become citizens or have children who are German citizens, the number of criminals due to mass migration could be much higher.

The majority of the foreign criminals reportedly came from either Eastern Europe or Arab countries. To put more precise numbers on it, Neue Osnabrücker Zeitung found that 27,000 of the 60,408 people in German jails in March 2026 were not citizens of the country. Notably, as recently as 2015, the percentage of foreigners in German jails was 30%, so the number has increased dramatically since then. Remix also reported that dual citizens and foreign-born German citizens are not included in the above statistics, arguing that the actual share of inmates with a migration background is likely even higher than the reported 45%.
I always point out that European and other Western nations’ governments do not import persecuted Christians or Jews, nor do they import freedom-loving political prisoners. They do not bring people in to assimilate them or demand that they accept Western moral standards. No, Western governments import masses of violent Third Worlders, many of them Muslims, whom politicians then encourage not to assimilate. That has led to the crime wave sweeping the West. In fact, while the foreign population of Germany is only around 17%, according to Remix, foreign nationals possibly comprise a majority of the country’s criminals.
The German Association of Prison Officers’ chairman, René Müller, complained that translators are increasingly necessary in the prison system and that they are not always available to meet the needs of the number of prisoners who require them. He believes this raises the risk of aggression from inmates and the possibility of Muslim prisoners becoming increasingly radicalized and isolated.
Bavaria’s Justice Ministry attributed aggressive behavior by inmates towards staff to language issues and “culturally determined behaviors.” If only the German authorities had examined the cultures of these migrants before welcoming them into the country without any language skills or shared values to make assimilation possible.
Remix News reported on this back in 2024, when it was estimated that German prisons cost taxpayers approximately €4.14 billion annually, with around €1.82 billion spent incarcerating foreign nationals. At the time, foreign prisoners already made up more than half of the inmate population in several states.
Alternative for Germany lawmaker Martin Hess said those figures demonstrated the consequences of the country’s migration policies. … The former police officer called for stricter deportations and a complete reversal of Germany’s migration policy, arguing that foreign criminality imposes both a security risk and a major financial burden on taxpayers.
Unfortunately, woke German authorities like their current system of arresting citizens for free speech while lavishing money on foreign criminals.

“…Milking Covid For Everything It’s Worth ..”

If they try again, we should be better prepared.

• Fauci Files: A Megalomaniacal Egomaniac (Tom Elliott)

On May 28, 2021, Anthony Fauci learned that the Department of Health and Human Services would refer EcoHealth Alliance – the New York nonprofit that had routed NIAID money to the Wuhan Institute of Virology – to its inspector general. That night he wrote in his diary:

“I am certain that there will be some deficiencies that the IG will find as is always the case with IG audits. Certainly, whatever they find it will be misconstrued by those who want to make a case for our involvement in the outbreak. I am starting to feel that it is important for me to write an editorial or an opinion piece giving our side of the story.” (p. 753)
Our involvement in the outbreak. Followed closely by a plan to get out in front of it. That instinct – get ahead of it, control the story, decide what the public needs to believe and then saturate every channel with it – is the organizing principle of these documents. It shows up in the origins fight. It shows up in masks, transmissibility, and boosters. It shows up in how he handled the people who disagreed with him. And it shows up, most revealingly, in what he chose to write down.
What was released
On July 24, Senator Rand Paul’s committee published two documents that have not been reported in any depth.The first is Fauci’s personal diary, 1,141 pages, running from late 2019 through his retirement in December 2022. It is partly a journal and overwhelmingly a scrapbook: he pasted hundreds of articles about himself into it, frequently in full. The second is 136 pages of internal email about his awards – nominations, ethics clearances, and the disposition of prize money. Fauci does not date the composition of his entries, so we cannot always distinguish what was typed the same evening from what was assembled later. Page numbers refer to the released PDFs.
I. What they thought at the start
Page 13 of the diary covers two important events from January 31, 2020. The first is that Fauci is handed the mic to serve as Covid’s point person. He writes: “White House is now fully convinced that I be the science/health spokesperson for the USG. Bob Redfield just does not come across very weel. He takes forever to say something and it is usually wondering. This drives the WH and HHS comms people crazy and so they are putting me out on all the requests.” The director of the CDC was not sidelined for being wrong, but for being slow on camera. The selection criterion was not who’s the most credible scientist, but who performs best on TV.
Redfield’s own account of that period, given under oath in 2023, is worth recalling. Asked why he had been excluded from the origins discussions, he pointed to ideological differences: “Because it was told to me that they wanted a single narrative, and that I obviously had a different point of view.” The second thing happens after he gets back to his office. Jeremy Farrar of the Wellcome Trust calls, sounding “very concerned,” with Kristian Andersen of Scripps conferenced in and Eddie Holmes in the background from Sydney. Fauci writes down what they told him:
“The people on the phone felt that the mutations around the furine cleavage site of the spike protein could not have occurred naturally since it would require an evolutionary ‘jump’ that they found nowhere in bat isolates.” Deliberate insertion, they said, followed by release – accidental release being the most likely. The next day Fauci convened a larger call of twelve experts in epidemiology. His entry characterizing it (p. 14) is the probably the single most consequential paragraph in the whole diary. There was “not total agreement about the likelihood of deliberate insertion,” he writes.
Ron Fouchier was certain it could have arisen naturally and said they shouldn’t waste time. Christian Drosten agreed with Fouchier. And then, in Fauci’s own words: “the rest felt that deliberate insertion was possible.” Ten of twelve thought it must be manmade. And he admits the person driving the zoonotic theory perspective, Ron Fouchier, was “expected of him since he was the original GOF [gain of function] person with Yoshi Kawaoka.”
II. What happened next
Three days later, four of the scientists from that call were circulating a draft arguing the opposite. “The Proximal Origin of SARS-CoV-2” appeared in Nature Medicine on March 17, concluding that the virus was not a laboratory construct. Andersen told the journal in his cover note that the paper had been prompted by Fauci and Francis Collins. Drafts went to both men before publication. Fauci’s reply to Andersen: “Nice job on the paper.” Two months after Proximal Origin published – Fauci’s institute approves an $8.9 million grant for Andersen.
On April 16, Collins wrote to Fauci asking whether NIH could help “put down this very destructive conspiracy.” The following day, Fauci cited Proximal Origin from the White House briefing room podium – the most watched platform on earth at that moment. Three weeks after that, on May 4, 2020, he told National Geographic that the evidence was “very, very strongly leaning toward this could not have been artificially or deliberately manipulated,” citing “a number of very qualified evolutionary biologists.” The doubt referenced in his diary never reached the public. And his account of that February call has never stopped changing.
A June 7, 2021 diary entry (p. 767), recounting the same meeting: “About half of the people felt that this was possibly a constructed virus and the other half were convinced that this was a natural occurrence.” In a June 3, 2024 sworn opening statement to the House Select Subcommittee, Fauci said he joined a call with about a dozen international virologists, that the discussion was “lively, with arguments for both possibilities,” and that after further examination several who had been concerned about lab manipulation became convinced the virus was not deliberately manipulated.
The June 2021 retelling contains another problem: he says “a few weeks later” Andersen and colleagues re-examined the data and concluded natural origin. The draft was circulating on February 4 – three days after the call. The June 2021 entry shows how he’s trying to mould history into something different for posterity.
III. Habit becomes routine
Origins is where this pattern is most consequential, but it is not where it started or where it stopped. The diary shows the same strategy applied to every contested question of the pandemic: decide what the public needs to believe, then flood the zone. Consider masks. Fauci’s public reversal in the spring of 2020 is well known, and he has explained it as a response to shortages and to emerging evidence on asymptomatic spread (p. 375). But watch what happens when the question comes back around in February 2021, when he begins pushing double-masking (p. 619):
“CDC starting to do practical things that I have actually been pushing for some time. For example: Wearing 2 masks could be better than just one. They did a dummy study and showed that a cloth mask over a surgical mask actually gives a more complete fit and keeps out aerosols.” Note the order of operations: He had been pushing it “for some time,” the evidence arrives afterward, and the evidence is a mannequin. That is the entire evidentiary basis for double-masking in a 1,141-page diary kept by the government’s chief spokesman on the subject during the month he was urging 330 million people to adopt it.
We see every time Fauci is turned to for guidance, he makes bold proclamations without feeling burdened to verify any scientific basis. We see it in the numbers.Across 1,141 pages by the nation’s senior infectious disease official during the largest public health event in a century, here is how often certain terms appear. Never once: “peer review.” “Meta-analysis.” “Risk-benefit.” “Learning loss.” “Mental health.” Once: “N95.” “Seroprevalence.” “Cost-benefit.” Twice: “Cloth mask.” “School closure.” “Natural immunity.”
Against which:
“Award” – 80
“Hero” – 49
“Instagram” – 36
“Bobblehead” – 23
“Selfie” – 19
Entries headed “PRESS:” – 641

The question of whether prior infection conferred meaningful protection – the question underpinning the vaccine mandates that cost people their jobs – is never worked through anywhere in these pages. It appears twice, both times as an attack to be repelled.

Elon Musk just walked a red carpet with Optimus next to him

Not on a stage. Not behind glass. Out in the open, next to photographers who couldn't stop shooting.

Projected cost: around $20,000.

A full-time human assistant runs $40,000–$60,000 a year.

Nobody runs that math yet,… pic.twitter.com/SrUwutuun3
— EVA (@EvaXTech) July 25, 2026

Real photo of Starship taken by Starlink satellites https://t.co/lPl0nKTLYt
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) July 25, 2026

.@VDHanson : “We didn’t storm the beaches of Normandy… didn’t bleed and die in the trenches of World War I…. didn’t sacrifice everything in World War II…. just to be lectured by newcomers on why America is ‘racist’ and ‘flawed.’” Victor is right. pic.twitter.com/DSJ6vjWzyd
— Dinesh D'Souza (@DineshDSouza) July 24, 2026

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Debt Rattle July 23 2026

Jul 232026

July 23, 2026 Posted by Raúl Ilargi Meijer at 9:58 am Finance Tagged with: Canada, cash cow, data center, Democratic Socialism, Hammer, IRGC, Nazis, One Big Beautiful Bill, Zelensky 37 Responses »

Kathimerini Trump and Evolution Jan 25 2017

• IRGC: Strike Iran’s Infrastructure, We’ll Shut Off The Gulf’s Power (ZH)

• Ukraine’s Army Chief Latest To Fall Victim To Zelensky’s Risky Reshuffle (ZH)

• Zelenskyy Removes and Replaces Leading Military Officials (CTH)

• Congresswoman’s Blunt Message for the MSM on Democratic Socialism (Anderson)

• It’s Hammer Time! The Violent Left’s New Weapon of Choice. (O’Brien)

• New York City Hall Has No Business Running Its Own Foreign Policy (David Manney)

• House Democrat Blows the Whistle on Socialist, Antisemitic Takeover (Margolis)

• Why Aren’t the Democrats Walking Away With the Midterms? (Rick Moran)

• American Manufacturing One Year After One Big Beautiful Bill (Chris Queen)

• Ontario Premier Doug Ford Promises “to Dismantle the U.S” Economy (CTH)

• USTR Jamieson Greer Outlines Details of Talking Points With Canada (CTH)

• The Death of the Cash Cow (Thomas Kolbe)

• Billion-Dollar Data Centers And The Growing Opposition (Janet Levy)

https://twitter.com/MonicaCrowley/status/2079763647006445676?s=20 https://twitter.com/GOP_is_Gutless/status/2079537430412038619?s=20

🚨BREAKING 🅱️: In a jaw-dropping disclosure, former U.S. President Joe Biden and his son, Hunter Biden, pocketed $10 million in Burisma bribes. Moreover, Biden has tried to bury explosive evidence that the Bidens took $5 million each to kill a Ukrainian corruption probe… pic.twitter.com/wZ8L8dAqSF
— Q The Storm Rider (@Q_TheStormRider) July 21, 2026

https://twitter.com/AdamMoczar/status/2079630710390784310?s=20

“Iran [..] has not backed down in the face of Trump’s fresh threats… “

Of course not. Threats are Iran’s language. They react to threats with threats.

They react to the reaction to threats, provided those are not more threats.

• IRGC: Strike Iran’s Infrastructure, We’ll Shut Off The Gulf’s Power (ZH)

Oil gained after Iran-backed Houthi militants said they targeted two Saudi Arabian tankers in the Red Sea, escalating the Middle East conflict and threatening deeper supply disruptions. Brent spiked above $95 in post-settlement trading. The Houthis attacked the two vessels with missiles and drones for violating a blockade imposed in the Red Sea, identifying the tankers as Encelia and Layla, the rebel group said. UK Maritime Trade Operations said a vessel was hit southwest of Saudi Arabia’s Al Shuqaiq, causing a fire on board. UKMTO didn’t identify the ship.

The first attacks on tankers in the Red Sea opens up a new front in the Middle East conflict, which has snarled traffic through the Strait of Hormuz following a flare-up in violence.
Iran Responds to Trump Ultimatum: We’ll Turn The Lights Off In Gulf
A top IRGC official has responded to Trump’s Bridge attack for each shipping attack ultimatum. Iranian IRGC Aerospace Commander Mousavi has threatened that Iran will cut off electricity to America’s Gulf Allies if Iranian bridges or power plants are attacked, Tasnim News Agency. “If the Americans target an Iranian bridge or power plant, Iran will respond by striking infrastructure and bridges across the region, including energy facilities in which the United States has interests,” the official said according semi-official news agency Tasnim.
“The Americans should by now, after these past ten days, be fully convinced that Iran strikes wherever it decides to strike. Therefore, any such gamble by Trump will once again end in his embarrassment,” the IRGC commander added. Separately, Iran’s deputy foreign minister briefed 25 European ambassadors and charges d’affaires in Tehran on the status of the conflict. “I reminded them that in the 40-day war, we imposed a severe defeat on the aggressors. In this new round of military aggression as well, we will resolutely defend our homeland and national interests,” Kazem Gharibabadi posted on X.
“These wars have created no strategic gains for America and only endanger regional and global peace and security. I also said that Europe is expected to safeguard the United Nations Charter and international law and to condemn aggression,” he added. Iran has continued to sound an “eye for an eye” theme, and has not backed down in the face of Trump’s fresh threats…
More telegraphing of intent from President Trump in the below Truth Social Post… he said the US military will “bomb and destroy” one bridge or power plant – including in Tehran – each time the Iranian military shoots at a ship in the Strait of Hormuz. This comes a day after he unveiled the US military plans to conduct a large bombing of Iran’s Pickaxe Mountain nuclear complex, which is heavily fortified.
But the Iranians have already long demonstrated they won’t alter course in the face of such threats, especially bluster from Trump over social media, and so this unlikely to be any kind of fix for Washington, as Tehran has vowed to keep control of Hormuz at all costs. The Pentagon has argued that things like bridges are ‘dual use’ as the Iranian military uses them to get supplies from one region to another, while international monitors have highlighted the potential for war crimes. The Iranians have in turn widened attacks on Gulf states to include key civic infrastructure, like water desalination plants (in Kuwait) – each time their own infrastructure gets hit.

* * *
Amid continued fighting which has included explosions heard in Tehran overnight and in the south, Iran’s leadership has condemned the Trump administration’s “obsessive focus on Kolang Kouh where no nuclear activity is taking place is nothing more than a fabricated pretext for aggression, destruction, and sabotage,” according to Foreign Minister spokesman Esmail Baghaei in a post on X, referring to Pickaxe Mountain.
He pointed out that all of Iran’s nuclear activity has long been fully declared to the IAEA, and so the repeat threats out of Washington to mount a major attack on it is a “flagrant violation” of UN charter and international law. Trump had said the day prior that the US military will be hitting Pickaxe mountain “pretty soon very heavily and there is nothing they can do about it.”Even some supporters have quested why the US Commander-in-Chief would so casually telegraph his intentions, saying the Pentagon loses an operational edge in revealing such plans.
There’s been a lot of sudden focus on Pickaxe Mountain, though it had largely been absent from all prior media coverage of the war, due to Israeli intelligence feeding it to US mainstream press. “Israeli intelligence believes Iran moved thousands of uranium-enrichment centrifuges into tunnels deep inside a mountain last fall, Israeli and U.S. officials say, a development that would heighten concerns that Tehran could reconstitute its nuclear program,” The Wall Street Journal wrote Tuesday.
“Israel passed along the intelligence findings to the U.S., saying the centrifuges were transferred to the Pickaxe Mountain site last fall after the 12-day war in June when American and Israeli strikes pummeled Iran’s three main nuclear sites,” it added. And now, by all accounts, more aircraft, refueling planes, and heavy military hardware continue to be transferred from Europe and into the Central Command area of responsibility.

Who do you think pulls the strings here?

• Ukraine’s Army Chief Latest To Fall Victim To Zelensky’s Risky Reshuffle (ZH)

Zelensky strikes again in another major military firing, amid his promised big cabinet and military ‘reshuffle’. The Ukrainian president announced Tuesday that he was dismissing Oleksandr Syrsky, commander-in-chief of country’s army, and appointing joint forces commander Mykhailo Drapaty in his place. Syrsky was in the post for nearly two-and-a-half years, since February 2024. “I have decided that the new Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces of Ukraine will be Mykhailo Drapaty… I am grateful to Oleksandr Syrsky and to each of our warriors for Ukraine’s strong front-line positions,” Zelensky unveiled in a post on Telegram.

The decision comes just days after popular 35-year old defense minister Mykhailo Fedorov was sacked, despite his reputation for orchestrating the ramped-up drone war on Russia. And the defense chief’s removal had come soon on the heels of Prime Minister Yulia Svyrydenko’s surprise ousting last week, upon which Zelensky in a suggested a broader government overhaul was underway. “Ukraine is changing its political strategy,” he made clear. President Zelensky’s Tuesday evening address included mention that he had offered former defense minister Mykhailo Fedorov a “decent post” to oversee the technological ‘component of the state.
The remark of taking care of Fedorov is a clear attempt to calm masses of Ukrainians who took to the streets in a rare wartime protest over his shock removal. Zelensky has said he is doing all of this as part of a new strategy to take the war to Russia and its territory. “A significant path has been walked, Ukraine’s defense continues, and every soldier deserves proper respect,” Zelensky said. “I am grateful to Oleksandr Syrsky and to every one of our soldiers for Ukraine’s strong front-line positions.”
“Tomorrow we will formalize all decisions. Ukraine must emerge from this situation stronger, and it will become harder for Russia,” he said. The past week has witnessed some high drama within the top echelons of defense ranks, as Kyiv Post explains:
Fedorov said after his dismissal that he had pushed for Syrsky’s removal, accusing the commander-in-chief of blocking military reforms, and calling for changes in the military’s top leadership while defending his own record on robotics, drones and air defense. Under Fedorov’s tenure, Ukraine deepened its reliance on unmanned systems for dangerous frontline missions. Since January, the military has carried out more than 50,000 logistics and evacuation missions using ground robotic complexes (GRCs) in order to preserve soldiers’ lives in high-risk situations.
In a rare personal column, Syrsky broke silence and apologized to ousted Fedorov, saying he had no knowledge of their conflict before it spilled into public view. “For me, it was a surprise to learn that the minister and I had a conflict. I saw our relationship as a working one, with difficult questions and different positions” Syrsky wrote. “If I offended someone with something: Mykhailo Albertovych [Fedorov], I’m sorry. I can be tough,” he continued.
When you’ve lost The Economist…

Ukraine’s government is in a crisis of its own making. Firing Mykhailo Fedorov, the reformist defence minister, has galvanised street protests. Calls to push out Oleksandr Syrsky, the commander-in-chief (pictured), who feuded with Mr Fedorov, are growing. Volodymyr Zelensky must… pic.twitter.com/Hr4SUNUlwM
— The Economist (@TheEconomist) July 20, 2026

All of this raises serious questions for Ukraine’s current narrative that it now has the momentum against Russia. If things are going so well, then why undergo risky and drastic leadership changes. It could be that things are actually not going well and the nature of Ukraine’s drone warfare is necessarily limited in scope. It might get media-capturing hits on Russian oil depots, but Russian forces by many accounts keep grinding forward slowly and methodically on the front lines in the east.

Sundance says Zelensky firing popular figures makes no sense.

But:

Zelensky has nothing to say in Kiev, he doesn’t do the firing. The nazis control the country.

Their No. 1 concern is the corruption money flow. They shsre this concern with the western donors, who take their -growing- share.

Perhaps Ukraine is not doing nearly as well as we are led to believe.

NOTE: This is not Russia vs Ukraine, but Russia against the West.

• Zelenskyy Removes and Replaces Leading Military Officials (CTH)

I have not written about the recent events in/around Ukraine because none of it makes sense and all of the information flows through the prism of ‘western’ intelligence propaganda. According to Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskyy {SEE HERE}, he has removed and replaced the entire leadership apparatus of the Ukraine military. This follows his removal of 35-year-old Mykhailo Fedorov from the defense ministry last week {CITATION} that led to massive protests against Zelenskyy and armed forces Chief Gen. Oleksandr Syrskiy, who was also eventually replaced.

As the story is told the young Defense Minister Mykailo Fedorov was very well regarded and was the person responsible for the successful technological advancements in military drone use. 35-year-old Fedorov was a close working partner with Palantir head Alex Karp who is assisting Ukraine in their drone development and deployment. If the drone development and deployment was such a massive success, as pronounced in all western and Ukraine statements, then why would Zelenskyy remove such a critical and effective Defense Minister? This makes no sense.
Additionally, if Chief General Oleksandr Syrskiy was such an effective combatant commander, and if Russia was indeed pushed back on their heels by both Syrskiy’s campaign and Fedorov’s drones, then why would Ukraine disrupt their entire military leadership apparatus while they are winning such well publicized victories. Again, none of this makes sense.bThese moves by President Zelenskyy are akin to President Trump firing Secretary Pete Hegseth and Joint Chiefs Chairman General Dan Caine, while saying they were doing an exceptional job on Operation Epic Fury in Iran. See the problem?
None of these moves by Ukraine President Zelenskyy make any sense against the background story of them having incredible success against Russia. You don’t replace the entire military leadership apparatus if things are going swimmingly. However, it seems that no one in western media even fathoms the obvious conflicts in the narrative. The young defense minister Fedorov, responsible for the well-publicized and celebrated victories in the use of drone warfare does not summarily get dispatched unless there is some underlying reason. Something is not adding up.

ZELENSKYY –” Today, the decisions on the changes in the leadership of the Armed Forces of Ukraine will be formalized – the relevant decrees are in preparation. Together with Mykhailo Drapatyi and Yevhenii Khmara, we determined that Major General Ihor Skybiuk will become the new Chief of the General Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine. He is a highly experienced officer who defended Ukraine shoulder to shoulder with the new Commander-in-Chief. It is important that all components of our Armed Forces continue to function in complete coordination. We also determined together how Oleksandr Syrskyi and Andrii Hnatov will continue serving in the defense of our country.”
Wall Street Journal – Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky fired the country’s armed-forces chief in a major reversal after initially siding with Gen. Oleksandr Syrskiy in a row with a young defense minister closely associated with Ukraine’s growing prowess in drone warfare.
The Ukrainian leader announced his abrupt shift Tuesday evening following days of street rallies after he removed Mykhailo Fedorov from the defense ministry last week. After several meetings with senior military commanders, he replaced Syrskiy with another experienced officer, Maj. Gen. Mykhailo Drapatiy, who previously signaled his willingness to take a more innovative approach to breaking the deadlock on the battlefield. It could prove a pivotal moment in Ukraine’s four-year-long defense since Moscow’s full-scale invasion. {MORE}
Additionally, at the exact moment when 35-year-old Mykhailo Fedorov was fired from the Defense Ministry, U.S. influencer Laura Loomer, a woman of generally unstable disposition, set off to begin a propaganda campaign in Ukraine telling her audience it was time to defeat the Russian propaganda.What followed from Loomer’s arrival in Ukraine (still unfolding) is transparently an intelligence community assist paid propaganda effort to reverse her position on Ukraine and begin supporting the Zelenskyy regime.
Less than 24 hours after Loomer arrived in Kiev to begin broadcasting her pro-Zelenskyy propaganda effort, it was announced that FBI Director Kash Patel will be traveling to Russia {Citation}. “FBI Director Kash Patel is planning to visit Russia later this year, likely in mid-October, according to a U.S. official and a person familiar with the situation.” … “Patel is scheduled to visit Russia on Oct. 14-15, first stopping in Moscow and then St. Petersburg.”

“We have Mayor Mamdani, who pushed and is pushing an agenda of government-run supermarkets, abolishing private property rights, and seizing the means of production,” she continued. “…And that is exactly what they did in communist Cuba.”

• Congresswoman’s Blunt Message for the MSM on Democratic Socialism (Anderson)

“This is what radical leftism is. It may wear various different slogans and ideologies across place and time. They call themselves anti-capitalist or anti-imperialist, communist, anarchist, Marxist, but the fundamental character is always the same,” Marco Rubio said last week when he hosted the leaders of over 60 different countries to a ministerial on the “resurgence of transnational far-left terrorism.” He left out “democratic socialism,” but let’s face it. It’s all the same. And Rep. Nicole Malliotakis (R-N.Y.) spoke out about that today at a House Republican leadership press conference, warning about the rise of so-called “democratic socialists” and the reality for voters and the media.

Malliotakis would know. Her mother fled Cuba in 1959 as Fidel Castro took power. The Castro regime stole her family’s home and their small business, a gas station owned by her grandfather. She says her mother never saw her grandfather again after that. I’ve heard countless stories just like that from Venezuelan friends and acquaintances. Communism ruins families. “Communism destroys. It steals from the people,” Malliotakis said. “…people end up living in squalor and lack the basic needs that human beings need, and the people that run the regime live as kings. That’s the reality. It’s about power. It’s about consolidating power for a select few.”
She pointed out that, sadly, that’s exactly what we’re starting to see here in the United States with the winners of several recent primaries and elections. “We have Mayor Mamdani, who pushed and is pushing an agenda of government-run supermarkets, abolishing private property rights, and seizing the means of production,” she continued. “…And that is exactly what they did in communist Cuba.”
The congresswoman pointed out that her Cuban mother says socialism is basically just a step toward communism. The government steals property and wealth and uses it to redistribute and create better lives for themselves, while their constituents suffer. She also pointed out that Democrats want to pack the Supreme Court, but that’s a move straight out of Hugo Chávez’s playbook. As I wrote yesterday, that’s one reason why Venezuela can’t have elections right now. The country’s Supreme Court is stacked in favor of the regime, and it will require dismantling the court, among other institutions, to get there.
Malliotakis also points out that voters are going to be in for a rude awakening if we continue to allow this type of behavior here in our country. “They can call themselves Democrat socialists, but the reality is that the Commie Caucus is coming to Congress,” she warned. But her best message, in my opinion, was for the press in attendance: “It’s going to be a rude awakening if we don’t all pay attention, and that includes the press. Think about what’s happening in those countries, where they’ve had socialism and communism. The press is the first one to go. When they finally consolidate that power, the media is the first one to go, and it [becomes] a state-run media.
The congresswoman concluded that it’s important for all of us to stand up to these radical threats, and she’s right. Our regular readers know that I spend most of my weeks knee-deep in Venezuela and Cuba, and I’ve gotten to know many people who lived in and had to leave these countries. They all tell the same tale: families destroyed, loved ones dying due to lack of food or medicine, friends arrested for daring to speak out, no jobs, poverty, malnourished infants and children, extended power outages, lack of clean drinking water, regime harassment, arbitrary detentions, and kangaroo courts, etc. Why on earth would anyone want to live like that? And don’t tell me it just wasn’t done correctly. The outcome is always the same.
Here are Malliotakis’ full remarks. They’re worth a watch. And I hope she and many other people in this country continue to speak out in the days ahead.

The Commie Caucus is coming to Congress. Here is what it means for you. pic.twitter.com/64gJcuWonm
— Rep. Nicole Malliotakis Office (@RepNicole) July 21, 2026

“In a country with some of the strictest gun laws in the world, we’ve seen a rise in leftists and radical Islamic violence in the UK using alternative means. Up until now, it’s been “knife violence,” which we all know means there is an epidemic in the UK of knives jumping out of their drawers on their own and stabbing people…”

• It’s Hammer Time! The Violent Left’s New Weapon of Choice. (O’Brien)

Ann Widdecombe was a 78-year-old former member of Parliament (MP), pro-life advocate, Reform UK spokesperson, and a conservative. Security video taken from inside her home in Haytor, Devon, which is in rural southwest England, captured her quietly sitting down by herself for lunch on July 8 around 12:30 p.m. That’s when 28-year-old UK citizen Joshua Kerry from South Yorkshire entered the picture. It seems he just walked into the home through the front door, a stranger to Widdecombe, approached her, and said, “Don’t suppose you have bank cards and ID?”

Without giving her much of a chance to respond, British prosecutors say he smashed the hammer into Widdecombe’s skull 21 times as she sat in her chair, after which he tipped her out of the chair and onto the floor of her house. Prosecutors say that Kerry spent two minutes in the house, wearing black gloves, before approaching and murdering Widdecombe in her kitchen and then taking her wallet before leaving the scene. Was this a random killing? It doesn’t seem to be.
While Kerry is alleged to have committed robbery, and so far there have not been any significant revelations of Kerry’s religious or political leanings, prosecutors say he did drive nearly 300 miles to carry out a very targeted attack. As my colleague Catherine Salgado reported previously, British law enforcement had been investigating the crime as an act of terrorism. This leaves us to conclude at the very least that Kerry had a problem with Widdecombe’s politics, making him a leftist. The Blaze is reporting that this was a targeted assassination.

According to @theblaze, British pro-life leader Ann Widdecombe was killed in what investigators are reportedly treating as an assassination.

This is a heartbreaking reminder that defending the preborn can come at a tremendous cost.

Please join me in praying for the repose of…
— Kristan Hawkins (@KristanHawkins) July 20, 2026

In a country with some of the strictest gun laws in the world, we’ve seen a rise in leftists and radical Islamic violence in the UK using alternative means. Up until now, it’s been “knife violence,” which we all know means there is an epidemic in the UK of knives jumping out of their drawers on their own and stabbing people. It’s not like people should be held to account for their own actions and motivations, right? You do remember how the innocent, young, British Henry Nowak died, don’t you?

Henry Nowak died the same way a civilization dies: abandoned, handcuffed by authorities who neither trusted nor cared for him, and accused of hate crimes he did not commit. His murder is as tragic as it is enraging. He should still be alive today, and he would be if the last few… https://t.co/e3HkjzWzwU
— JD Vance (@JDVance) June 5, 2026

Nowak died as he bled out in handcuffs, while British police made sure his knife-wielding killer was OK. Since guns aren’t as available to the British citizenry to defend themselves, nor as accessible to their would-be killers, the murdering class has had to innovate. While knives have been the murder weapon of choice, another throwback to more barbaric times has emerged – the hammer. That’s what Kerry allegedly used against Widdecombe, and it’s what a group called Palestine Action is promoting as a new means to employ “direct action.”

78-year-old Ann Widdecombe was bashed on the head repeatedly with a hammer until she died.

Palestine Action is advertising "direct action" training for people who want to take up militant action using hammers. pic.twitter.com/JOIQrZYiBj
— Andy Ngo (@MrAndyNgo) July 21, 2026

It’s probably no coincidence, but the hammer in the group’s graphic looks an awful lot like the hammer and sickle of the old Soviet Union, the hammer of communism, and the hammer that leftists from around the world rally around. If recent events are any indication, it seems that the hammer has transitioned from mere symbol to preferred weapon. (By the way, don’t try to log onto PalestineAction.org. My anti-virus software warned me of a potential phishing threat there. You don’t want to risk having someone invade your computer and wreak havoc.)
CNN described Palestine Action as “a UK-based organization that aims to disrupt the operations of weapons manufacturers connected to the Israeli government.” “It was founded by Huda Ammori and climate activist Richard Barnard in 2020, when the group took its first action to shut down the UK operations of Elbit Systems – Israel’s largest weapons manufacturer – and stated its commitment to ‘ending global participation in Israel’s genocidal and apartheid regime,’” CNN reported.
So, while in America the left continues its ongoing and long-term campaign to disarm gun owners and kill the Second Amendment, you can see that in other countries gun confiscation hasn’t stopped the left from perpetuating the dark savagery that is in its heart. The left knows that it will never win and hold power through popularity. Instead, it will win power through deception and violence, and it will hold power through force and violence. At the moment, that force has come in the form of its favorite tool, the hammer.

Mamdani knows this. But he can score cheap points.

• New York City Hall Has No Business Running Its Own Foreign Policy (David Manney)

New York City communist Mayor Zohran Mamdani spent months promising to arrest Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. His lawyers finally delivered the answer anybody familiar with American law could see coming. “We do not have the independent legal authority to enforce this warrant,” Mamdani admitted Tuesday.His administration reviewed “every avenue” for using the International Criminal Court warrant if Netanyahu visits New York for the United Nations General Assembly in September. City lawyers found no legal path, proving that Mamdani’s campaign pledge was never within the mayor’s power.

Mamdani still called Netanyahu a war criminal and demanded that the federal government join the ICC and execute the warrant, while also declaring Netanyahu unwelcome in New York. I hate to be the one to break it to the Democratic Socialist, but mayors don’t decide who enters the United States. They don’t join international courts, recognize foreign warrants, conduct diplomacy, or set federal criminal policy.All Mamdani can do is offer his opinion, but City Hall has no separate foreign policy.
Neither the United States nor Israel is a party to the Rome Statute, which created the ICC. Congress also barred state and local agencies from cooperating with ICC requests, providing support to the court, or helping surrender people to its custody.
(2) shall not prohibit—(A) any action permitted under section 7427 of this title; or (B) communication by the United States of its policy with respect to a matter. (b) Prohibition on responding to requests for cooperation
Notwithstanding section 1782 of title 28 or any other provision of law, no United States Court, and no agency or entity of any State or local government, including any court, may cooperate with the International Criminal Court in response to a request for cooperation submitted by the International Criminal Court pursuant to the Rome Statute.
(c)nProhibition on transmittal of letters rogatory from the International Criminal Court
Notwithstanding section 1781 of title 28 or any other provision of law, no agency of the United States Government may transmit for execution any letter rogatory issued, or other request for cooperation made, by the International Criminal Court to the tribunal, officer, or agency in the United States to whom it is addressed.
The ICC issued its warrant in November 2024, alleging Netanyahu committed war crimes and crimes against humanity during the Gaza war. Israel rejects the court’s jurisdiction and denies the allegations. The warrant doesn’t charge Netanyahu with genocide, even though Mamdani repeatedly calls him the “architect” of one. UN week creates another legal problem. The 1947 United Nations Headquarters Agreement requires federal, state, and local authorities to avoid obstructing representatives traveling to and from UN headquarters. Reuters:
Netanyahu traditionally travels to New York every September for the annual gathering of world leaders at the United Nations General Assembly. Israel responded to Mamdani’s comments on Sunday in an X post that called the ICC a kangaroo court and the arrest warrant against Netanyahu bogus. “Mamdani appears interested in diverting public attention from his follies and attacking the leader of the Jewish state and the only democracy in the Middle East,” it said.
The ICC was established in 2002 and has international jurisdiction to prosecute genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes. The United States and Israel are not members of the court. Mamdani, who took office in January, said during his mayoral campaign that he would have police arrest Netanyahu if he set foot in New York City. Last November, shortly after Mamdani’s election victory, the mayor-elect and Trump held an unexpectedly friendly meeting in the White House even though they had previously traded insults. New York City can’t invite the world’s governments to Manhattan and then let its mayor select which leaders may safely attend.
President Donald Trump ended any remaining uncertainty Monday. Netanyahu “will not be arrested, in any way, shape, or form,” while in the United States, Trump said. Mamdani’s admission should close the matter. Instead, he used his retreat to demand federal action, preserving the political theater after conceding he couldn’t deliver his promise.New Yorkers were told their mayor would direct the NYPD to arrest a foreign prime minister. Months later, he acknowledged he lacked the authority from the beginning. Lawyers had to study a campaign pledge before Mamdani would admit that municipal power ends well before international diplomacy begins.
City Hall already has enough work. New Yorkers expect police protection, clean streets, safe subways, working schools, affordable housing, and competent public services. They didn’t elect a secretary of state. The U.S. government already has one. Mamdani can condemn Netanyahu as often as he chooses; he can support the ICC, criticize Israel, and urge Congress to change federal law. He still can’t turn personal ideology into municipal authority. His own legal review settled the issue. City Hall has no business running its own foreign policy, and Mamdani now admits he has no power to carry out the threat that helped build his political brand.

“It had become more the socialist caucus, and most of the leadership was socialist Democrats. I didn’t feel comfortable in it.”

• House Democrat Blows the Whistle on Socialist, Antisemitic Takeover (Margolis)

I’ve said before that I don’t like using the term “progressive” to describe the Democrat Party, its ideology, or its positions. Why? Because it suggests improvement or progress. At the very least, it’s a poor euphemism, but it’s more deliberately deceptive if you ask me. “By calling itself progressive,” it implies every position it takes is a positive one. Sorry, I can’t do that.

CNN’s Van Jones noted this very thing earlier this week. The commentator and former Obama administration official argued that Democratic Socialists of America-aligned candidates and their agenda are “regressive,” not “progressive.” Jones warned that the party’s drift toward socialism, hostility toward police, and open contempt for Israel is scaring off the centrist voters Democrats need to win elections. Even a guy who spent years defending this party on cable news can see the cliff it’s walking toward.
Rep. Steve Cohen (D-Tenn.) also figured this out last year, and he did something about it. Cohen revealed to CNN this week that he left the Congressional Progressive Caucus last year. “I just found it to be not the same caucus I joined in 2007,” Cohen said. “It had become more the socialist caucus, and most of the leadership was socialist Democrats. I didn’t feel comfortable in it.”
That’s not a stray complaint from a bitter retiree. Cohen came to Congress in 2007 and aligned himself with J Street, a left-leaning Jewish organization that supports a two-state solution and has long rivaled the traditional pro-Israel lobby. Even that didn’t keep him in step with where his caucus went. “There certainly were not people who were so anti-Israel when I started, and there are within the progressive caucus now,” he said, describing a party that traded coalition politics for ideology.
Cohen announced last year that he wouldn’t seek re-election after the new district drawn and approved by Tennessee’s Republican legislature made his chances of reelection nearly impossible, but it’s quite clear he saw a much bigger problem brewing. “I foresaw it getting really nasty and antisemitism getting into it,” he said. He’d already watched that antisemitism spread through his party’s rank and file up close, which is exactly why the socialist caucus stopped feeling like home.
Cohen was one of only 22 Democrats willing to censure Rep. Rashida Tlaib after she defended the “from the river to the sea” chant in a video accusing President Joe Biden of enabling a Palestinian “genocide.” Tlaib hasn’t spoken to him since. A sitting congresswoman froze out a colleague for objecting to genocide rhetoric aimed at Israel, and her own party barely blinked.
Make no mistake about it: Cohen didn’t quit his caucus over redistricting maps. He quit because the socialists took over and brought their antisemitism with them. The Democrat Party didn’t get more “progressive.” It got more socialist, and more left-of-center people are noticing and doing something about it. Not only did Cohen leave the House Progressive Caucus, but Bill Maher says his vote is up for grabs in 2028. And if Democrats fail to win the House in November, you’ll know why.

The Dems have no face. Mamdani is New York, not America.

• Why Aren’t the Democrats Walking Away With the Midterms? (Rick Moran)

By all rights, Democrats should be blowing Republicans out of the water in these midterm elections. Donald Trump’s approval numbers are underwater, and on issues, Democrats hold an advantage on which party is better able to handle the economy. The Iran War is becoming more unpopular by the week, and inflation is beginning to tick up as a result. Republicans are trusted far more on immigration, but in a true, bitter irony, Trump has slowed the illegal wave at the border to a trickle, making it far less of an issue. So why aren’t the Democrats winning big? Ron Brownstein, a veteran political reporter, is noticing it too.

Trump’s job approval rating has plummeted below the level that triggered midterm wave elections vs Clinton 94, W. Bush in 2006, Obama in 2010 & Trump himself in 2018. And yet most surveys do not show Dems establishing a clear advantage in the key races that will decide control. https://t.co/MYxrsDilxy
— Ronald Brownstein (@RonBrownstein) July 19, 2026

In Trump I, Ds won ~90% of voters who disapproved of him in most House/Senate races. In polls now, they usually win far fewer of them. That's the biggest yellow light for Ds in 26. But can Rs really hold so many more voters down on Trump thru Nov? My take https://t.co/9lmafPzfCc
— Ronald Brownstein (@RonBrownstein) July 19, 2026

This gentleman has the answer for Brownstein and any Democrat who actually wants to win in November (LANGUAGE WARNING):

It’s because for some of us who are tired of the Trump chaos can’t vote for the dems when they are bat shit freaks. I can not ever vote for the loony dem state candidate in Texas. Waaayyy to many bad policy beliefs. Not moderate at all. So I’m voting for the alternative who has…
— Huckleberrycrew5 (@AnneDAngelo5) July 19, 2026

Voters may not love Republicans. They may not like what’s happening in the economy, in Iran, and with inflation. They may not like Trump very much. But there’s one reason that, against all odds, Republicans could very well end up holding their slim majority in the House and even increase their margin in the Senate. Voters hate Democrats more. In an election where all of the issues are breaking the Democrats’ way, Republicans have two huge issues they can throw at Democrats that may very well scare enough voters to give the GOP an advantage.
The first is a gift from the Democrats: their acquiescence in an attempted coup of their party by the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA). Republicans will call them “communists.” The DSA doesn’t care what you call them as long as you vote for them.The Democrats are gambling, like all mainstream parties in history faced with a radical left surge, that once the kooks help the rest of them get elected, they will control them, tame them, and channel their energy into productive, constitutional avenues. Good luck with that because it worked so well in Russia and Germany in the 20th century.
Meanwhile, Republicans are going old school with a 1950s-era, genuine anti-communist “Red Scare” campaign. b“We’re fighting right now in Congress over whether we’re going to maintain our status as a constitutional republic or we’re going to trade that in, dismantle the foundations, and go down this dark road of death to communism,” Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) said in a press conference at the Republican National Committee. b“These crazy little mini-Mamdanis who are popping up all around the country, they are a danger to you and your family.”
The Hill: bHouse Majority Leader Steve Scalise (R-La.) drew attention to the Democratic Party’s ideological battle in those primaries, with the insurgent left-wing candidates defeating those favored by House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.). He was clear that Republicans saw those leftist candidates as useful to campaign against. “In swing districts, it draws an incredibly sharp contrast between our incumbent Republicans who are working to make life more affordable for working families against these communists who want to literally defund the police,” Scalise said.
He was referencing the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) platform, which calls for “steps towards fully abolishing the police and prison system which protects the rich and jails the poor” and “amnesty for all immigrants regardless of status.” bI really hope they bring back Doo-wop and Elvis (yes, he’s still alive). While they’re at it, making my crew cut popular again would be fine with me. Democrats are doing all the heavy lifting for Republicans. The GOP doesn’t have to demonize the Democrats when the donks are doing a darn fine job of it on their own.
At some point Dems are going to have to grapple with the reality that in the face of all of Trump and Republicans’ manifest horribleness and incompetence, people aren’t rushing toward the Democrats. If you think the DSA stuff is helping, you’ve never talked to a swing voter. https://t.co/9LgLHkwnYf
— Sarah Longwell (@SarahLongwell25) July 19, 2026

The trick for Republicans will be to find a way to get their supporters to the polls. Right now, the enthusiasm gap is concerning, but why isn’t it larger, asks one political science professor. “I don’t think that things are looking very good for Republicans,” said Rob Alexander, a political science professor at Bowling Green. “The enthusiasm gap that we’re seeing is unsurprising. Maybe the most surprising thing is that it’s not higher in favor of Democrats.”
The professor also noted what the GOP isn’t saying in the campaign. “It’s just all negative, negative, negative. There’s very little ‘we’re building the American dream, and things are better.’ It’s more ‘those guys are bad,’” Alexander said. “It seems to be the tactic that we’re settling into as we move on, and it’s going to be a really ugly fall throughout the country.”

“This is what America needs to be strong, successful, and resilient. “

• American Manufacturing One Year After One Big Beautiful Bill (Chris Queen)

It’s been about a year since President Donald Trump signed the One Big Beautiful Bill into law, and over that 12-month period, we’ve seen the positive outcomes from the act. One of those is an American manufacturing renaissance. A new report from the National Association of Manufacturers (NAM) demonstrates how the tax cuts from this bill have spurred growth in manufacturing: Manufacturing is the economic engine of the United States. Led by the 13 million people who make things in America, manufacturing succeeds when backed by policies that make it easier to build, hire, and expand.

H.R. 1 embodies that commitment. By signing H.R. 1 into law, President Trump gave manufacturers the foundation, competitiveness, and certainty to invest—in new facilities and equipment, jobs and wage growth, cutting-edge research, and our global competitiveness.This law is a once-in-a-generation investment in manufacturers, and it did not happen by chance. As pro-growth tax policies approached expiration, putting 6 million jobs at risk, manufacturers rallied to make our voices heard. Congress not only kept every one of the 10 major provisions for which the NAM advocated—they even added new provisions, all to strengthen manufacturing.
One year after H.R. 1 became law, manufacturers have much to celebrate. Manufacturers in all 50 states are using H.R. 1 to invest in America. By NAM’s count, the Trump tax cuts have supported 6 million American jobs, saved $540 billion in wages for hardworking Americans, and contributed $1.1 trillion in GDP. “That’s the manufacturing economy a permanent, pro-growth tax code helps sustain — and manufacturers are delivering on the promise,” NAM says. The Working Families Tax Cuts in the One Big Beautiful Bill have seen concrete benefits in all 50 states. Investments in research and development, full deductions for facility expansion, and incentives to build in the U.S. have all spurred growth that’s hard to ignore or explain away.
From 11,000 jobs protected in Alaska to 708,000 jobs supported in California, every state is reaping the benefits of this unprecedented investment in the American workforce. NAM’s report gives case studies for all 50 states.The One Big Beautiful Bill’s provisions aren’t just for large corporations. Even small businesses like Winton Machine Company in Suwanee, Ga., are seeing the benefits. The 38-employee company is able to reinvest in its operations and innovate in its industry.
“As manufacturers, our ability to reinvest drives job creation, advances new technologies and supports our communities,” says CEO Lisa Winton. “I am committed to continue to help drive innovation and invest in the future manufacturing workforce here in the USA.” Louisiana’s Martin Sustainable Resources used the tax cuts, credits, and incentives to expand its facilities, upgrade its equipment, and make long-term investments. It’s planning for the future, thanks to these pro-growth policies.
“The Working Families Tax Cuts are helping to fuel modernization at our company,” says CEO E. Scott Poole. “Full expensing for facilities and equipment strengthens our ability to keep making long-term investments, and estate tax relief helps protect the continuity of a family-owned company rooted in Louisiana for generations.”“These results demonstrate the undeniable power of President Trump’s America First economic agenda,” reads the White House press release. “By putting American families and businesses first, the Working Families Tax Cuts are rebuilding American industrial strength, creating opportunity in every community, and delivering real results for real Americans.”
This is what America needs to be strong, successful, and resilient. It’s what can help sustain our economy in good and bad times. And I definitely voted for this. Trump’s tax cuts are helping American manufacturers build new facilities, upgrade equipment, create jobs, and plan for the future. That’s what an America First economy looks like, when policy moves beyond slogans and starts producing results.

“Considering the economy of the USA is ten-times larger than Canada, that’s quite a threat from Premier Doug Ford.”

• Ontario Premier Doug Ford Promises “to Dismantle the U.S” Economy (CTH)

Ontario Premier Doug Ford has a message to President Trump and to all Americans. Premier Ford promises to dismantle the U.S. economy if President Trump continues to threaten tariffs and trade sanctions.Considering the economy of the USA is ten-times larger than Canada, that’s quite a threat from Premier Doug Ford. WATCH:

Personally, I think all this back-and-forth banter is no longer worth the surface effort. It would be much easier, and now affirmed as constitutionally appropriate by the Supreme Court, if President Trump just executed a full trade embargo against all Canadian goods for a period of 60-days. Perhaps that way Canada will recognize just how vulnerable they are. Perhaps not, but it’s worth the effort. Just ban all imports and exports for 60-days and let’s see what happens.

“Donald Trump wants Canada to go and try to cut more favorable trade deals, so they will learn how good they had it.”

• USTR Jamieson Greer Outlines Details of Talking Points With Canada (CTH)

In the first half of this CNBC interview with U.S. Trade Representative (USTR) Jamieson Greer, the Ambassador walks through the reasoning, purpose and intent of the recently announced 50% tariff rate against Canadian imported goods. As noted by USTR Greer the Canadians are applying two separate metrics within their trade agreement with Europe and the USA. Toward Europe there are no limits and quotas on dairy products, toward the USA there are severe limits and quotas applied by third party brokers (co-ops owned by Canadian dairy farms) leveraged by the Canadian government. This is one example of Canadian duplicity.

Additionally, by the various provincial governments of Canada banning the import and/or sale of U.S. products, and with Canada putting caps and limits on automobiles, these USA trade actions are being confronted by the 50% countervailing duties against Canadian imports. Greer also calls ‘bulls**t’ on Carney’s double speak. WATCH:

The trade discussion with Canada returns at the 10:00 minute mark. Jamieson Greer notes we have always had trade issues with Canada for decades. There was a significant percentage of the population who are against offshoring jobs, which is what NAFTA essentially did in North America. It is also worth emphasizing that President Trump wants Canada to diversify. Both U.S. Ambassador Pete Hoekstra and President Trump have said, repeatedly, President Trump wants Canada to go make other bilateral deals with other nations. Why? Two main reasons.
#1) If Canada has to enter a bilateral trade agreement with another country, suddenly they learn what reciprocity means. They have to give something in order to get trade benefit. This is a completely new concept for Canada who have taken advantage of the USA for a long time with ZERO reciprocity in mind. This is what former Prime Minister Justin Trudeau was talking to Trump about in Mar-a-Lago (December ’24). In essence, Donald Trump wants Canada to go and try to cut more favorable trade deals, so they will learn how good they had it.
#2) If Canada cuts a trade agreement with, say, Europe, the terms of that FTA purchase in/out then become a standard in their trade allowances. This permits team USA to turn to Canada and say, “wait, we want the same terms”. We might even ask for most favored nation terms due to scale and scope. Canada is not prepared for this type of bilateral relationship at all. The CUSMA trade negotiator Dominic LeBlanc just discovered the problem following the current Canadian effort to diversify FTAs. Suddenly, LeBlanc has admitted quietly they have no response.
For around 40+ years (USTR Greer would argue 60+ years) Canada has benefitted from the U.S. economy purchasing their goods, allowing their businesses unlimited access to the U.S. market and yet simultaneously restricting the Canadian market from similar reciprocity. Those terms are no longer acceptable.

“Looking at the global automotive market, one conclusion is unavoidable: the end of the combustion engine is nowhere in sight.”

• The Death of the Cash Cow (Thomas Kolbe)

Looking at the global automotive market, one conclusion is unavoidable: the end of the combustion engine is nowhere in sight. The ideological crusade against Germany’s industrial backbone has merely led to the slaughter of the country’s automotive cash cows. The reasons behind the decline of Germany’s automotive industry will remain subject to debate. But one thing is clear: an energy policy detached from economic reality, driven by climate-apocalyptic ambitions, has harmed the industry at least as much as strategic mistakes at the management level.

A lack of cost flexibility and a German labor system rooted in the moral foundations of the post-war economic boom have made the adjustments necessary in the face of fierce competition from China, the United States and increasingly India far more difficult. German corporatism has also done companies a disservice by narrowing technological choices according to a familiar ideological compass. The end of the combustion engine is a collective product. Political leaders and institutional actors share the same conviction: pave the way with subsidies and taxpayer money toward a fully electric golden age.
Meanwhile, almost quietly and somewhat embarrassingly, the industry has begun relocating production of its traditional combustion-engine models abroad. It is simply unhealthy for an economy to stand too close to the political fire. In times of crisis, companies are left exposed to the harsh winds of global competition — and so are the workers whose jobs disappear by the hundreds of thousands. The reality looks different from the political narrative. Around 95 percent of vehicles worldwide are still powered by traditional combustion engines. Among new registrations last year, fully electric vehicles accounted for roughly one quarter. Nearly two-thirds of newly registered vehicles still have a combustion engine under the hood. The remainder are hybrids.
There is no doubt that the long-term technological path is moving toward hybrid drive systems. Traditional combustion engines offer limited prospects for new investment. Nevertheless, this enormous market would have been the necessary cash cow for German automakers and their suppliers. The profits generated from combustion-engine vehicles could have provided the financial strength needed to invest in new technologies according to actual market developments.
This transformation would have taken place at the German home base if an ideological fervor among saturated urban elites had not emerged — a fervor that turned against the country’s own automotive industry and initiated a form of industrial self-destruction.The fundamental mistake lies in Germany’s corporatist model. The country rushed into an immature technology with flags flying high, encouraged by politicians who believed the future lay entirely beyond fossil fuels. The theory sounds attractive: borrow cheaply, pool government debt at Germany’s favorable financing conditions, create the necessary technological foundations and production capacities, and secure pole position in electric mobility from the beginning.
But the devil, as always, lies in the details. It would be the first time in economic history that a centrally planned strategy permanently moved ahead of market reality. The pressure on German manufacturers has grown since China succeeded not only in closing the technological gap with European producers, but in reopening it in certain areas to its own advantage. Beijing is also fighting the emerging weakness of its domestic economy with massive subsidy programs. It is therefore hardly surprising that German manufacturers have come under enormous pressure in the most important automotive market in the world.
At the same time, the consequences of Germany’s energy transition, sky-high energy costs, excessive regulation and rigid labor laws have made the domestic location increasingly unattractive for additional investment. The cash cows that policymakers had already written off are now grazing elsewhere. It is not the combustion engine that is disappearing — it is the value creation surrounding it. Volkswagen’s Passat is now produced in Slovakia rather than Emden. The new Volkswagen Transporter is built at Ford Otosan’s plant in Turkey, while Audi produces the Q3 in Hungary. Mercedes has moved a significant part of its compact-car production to Kecskemét.
Large premium SUVs from German manufacturers have for years largely rolled off production lines in the United States or Slovakia. The truth is simple: production takes place where the combustion engine generates the highest returns — and Germany is clearly no longer one of those locations. Around 130,000 jobs have been eliminated in Germany’s automotive industry in recent years. Once second-round effects are included, roughly half a million jobs may have been affected by the crisis. A lost position in core automotive production typically leads to two, if not three additional job losses along the supply chain and through declining purchasing power in the surrounding regions.Eastern Europe, economically held back by socialism until the end of the Cold War, now benefits from capital flowing out of the West.

“Across almost all 50 states, there’s a move toward moratoriums on building data centers as concerns about their potential impact grow…and they remain a political liability as the midterms approach.”

• Billion-Dollar Data Centers And The Growing Opposition (Janet Levy)

Nestled between the sere hills east of Sparks, Nevada, and a little off the U.S. Parkway (SR-439), Switch’s Citadel Campus is a Las Vegas company specializing in data centers. One building is already operational: Tahoe Reno 1, a high-security, futuristic industrial shed standing on endless rows of girders, with a roof designed to withstand 200-mile-per-hour winds.

Inside, thousands of servers process data for businesses that pay for space, bandwidth, and security. To dissipate the enormous heat from the servers and the generators powering the unit, several million gallons of water are circulated through hundreds of miles of tubing—this in the driest state in the U.S., where groundwater is declining at an alarming rate. The low-frequency hum and noise from the center can be heard nearly a mile away.
Switch describes it as “the single largest colocation data center facility on the planet.” It has a footprint of 1.3 million square feet, roughly equivalent to 23 American football fields. Its power capacity—a metric of processing ability and the equivalent backup supply and cooling required—is 130 MW. For perspective, one megawatt can power 75 racks, each holding 21–42 servers, and power 500–1,000 homes.
When the eight planned buildings are ready, the 2,000-acre Citadel Campus, bounded by concrete walls, will offer a whopping 7 million square feet of server space and 650 MW of power capacity, making it the world’s most powerful data complex. Switch plans to develop it into an exascale ecosystem—with computers capable of quintillions of calculations per second, needed for AI and high-speed work, and power capacity running into several gigawatts.
As AI, cloud computing, and digital services touch all lives and demand for processing power grows exponentially, data centers are proliferating across the U.S. Over 3,000 centers are now operational, with 1,500 slated for development. While 87% of current centers are in urban areas, 67% of the newer ones are planned in rural areas, and 39% in counties with no centers.
In Nevada and elsewhere, communities, local and city governments, and legislatures are raising concerns about the significant environmental and quality-of-life impacts of data centers. In fact, Reno has a moratorium until August 2027 on approving data centers within the city. Surveys show that most Americans oppose data centers in their neighborhoods. The biggest concerns are acreage and water use; strain on power grids; air pollution from backup generators, although many centers claim to rely on green backups; and noise pollution, with the low-frequency buzz affecting humans even when it is inaudible.
Give Us Your Acres
Data centers of the future require vast acreage, so construction is naturally shifting toward rural areas. Concerns are mounting over the rapid conversion of farmland into industrial sites because farmland loss is usually permanent and significantly affects food production. In addition, profligate water use will affect the water table, and the arrival of power grid infrastructure and industrial activity could lead to the destruction of wetlands, grasslands, and ecosystems.
Farmers are reporting—and refusing—tempting offers for their land, a generational asset to which they are deeply attached. Offers from Fortune 100 companies run into the double-digit millions. One offer for a Kentucky farm, where an undisclosed industrial development was planned, was $10 million, five times what the owner paid 30 years ago. Another farmer was told to name any price. Yet another was offered $33 million and told that details about the project would be provided if she signed a non-disclosure agreement.
The question is: How long will they be able to resist? With President Trump pushing for America to become an AI superpower, data centers are unlikely to be stalled. Staunch Trump supporters and Republicans in rural areas, already hurt by retaliatory tariffs from China and Canada, are unhappy. They are questioning and opposing this relentless encroachment. Even in cities and suburbs, data centers compete directly with residential development, driving up land prices and reducing the number of viable housing sites. In northern Virginia, data centers accounted for a disproportionate 30% of land development between 2013 and 2021. These trends, which will likely be seen in all states soon, will jeopardize the housing supply.
Give Us Your Power
Data centers are the most energy-intensive building types, consuming 10–50 times more energy per square foot than a typical commercial office. A single AI data center can use as much power as 100,000 homes, but the massive ones coming up can use up to 20 times that amount. In fact, by 2030, power demand is projected to reach 130 gigawatts—a gigawatt equals a million megawatts—about 13 times New York City’s peak summer power demand and 25-30% of the United States’s average power usage.
Data center power consumption is set to triple, from 4% of U.S. usage in 2023 to 12% in 2028. Data centers aim for a PUE of 1.4–1.5 (power usage effectiveness), which is easier to understand as 67% of total consumption going to IT equipment. This is much better than general computing centers, where PUE is 2, meaning only 50% of the power consumed powers IT equipment. But general computing uses only 10–50 kW for smaller centers, up to 2 MW for campus-level hubs, and up to 5 MW for corporate centers.
Take Pollution in Return
The thousands of server racks in data centers must be cooled to prevent overheating and failure, requiring massive cooling systems of two types: immersion and water circulation. The first immerses equipment in special dielectric fluids, which can pose health risks from exposure. Water-based systems pollute the environment because their discharge contains coolants, biocides, corrosion inhibitors, concentrated minerals, and heavy metals. Noise from data centers reaches 96 decibels (dB) inside facilities, while generator noise can reach 105 dB, comparable to a jet flying overhead.
By comparison, noise levels in quiet neighborhoods are 45–55 dB, and in mixed-use neighborhoods, 55–65 dB. Chronic exposure to noise above 65 dB can cause hypertension, headaches, nausea, insomnia, dizziness, and cardiovascular issues. Diesel-fueled backup generators at data centers emit nitrogen oxides (NOx), carbon monoxide, and particulate matter (PM2.5), all linked to asthma, respiratory disease, and heart disease. Communities near these facilities experience higher air pollution levels than the rest of the country. The power supply will be slow to meet demand, so data centers may rely more on backup generators, increasing pollution. P
roliferation and Opposition
The proliferation has begun. Virginia, which has 320 data centers, the most in the U.S., expects a total of 954. Texas will eventually surpass Virginia with 962. Northern Virginia houses 50 million square feet of data center space, has earned the moniker Data Center Alley, and serves as a backbone for Big Tech and AI development. The opposition has also begun. People have protested the noise and the constant hum from data centers in northern Virginia. There is also a surge in efforts to block data center construction, especially projects planned near residential areas. In northern Virginia, Blackstone was forced to abandon its 22 million-square-foot facility at the Prince William Digital Gateway.
Time for a Rethink
A Reuters/Ipsos survey found that 57% of respondents opposed data centers, while a Gallup survey found that seven in 10 opposed them. Across almost all 50 states, there’s a move toward moratoriums on building data centers as concerns about their potential impact grow. New York, Georgia, Oklahoma, Vermont, and Virginia have introduced legislation to impose moratoriums or bans on new data centers.President Trump has strongly advocated data center development as a means to make America the AI leader. Other politicians have promoted data centers to drive economic growth. But they must reconsider, as data centers are now a political liability with voters.

https://twitter.com/DRPOOLQ17/status/2079351525286023495?s=20

For years, Anthony Fauci has dodged, deflected, and hidden behind a pardon.

On July 29th at 8:30 am, that ends. Fauci will finally testify before my committee.

Mark your calendars. pic.twitter.com/eWyumReVyf
— Rand Paul (@RandPaul) July 21, 2026

This product that everyone thinks is never going to happen is going to be the product that bankrupts Uber pic.twitter.com/b9vzFrscje
— Teslaconomics (@Teslaconomics) July 22, 2026

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Debt Rattle July 13 2026

Jul 132026

July 13, 2026 Posted by Raúl Ilargi Meijer at 9:43 am Finance Tagged with: banana republic, children, Hormuz, Lindsey Graham, Mojtaba Khamenei, Ukrainian nazi collaborators, Zelensky 32 Responses »

Claude Monet Woman with a Parasol – Madame Monet and Her Son 1874

• Sen. Lindsey Graham Dead at 71 (Sarah Anderson)

• “What Makes It Even Stranger…” (ZH)

• The Passing of Lindsey Graham, American Patriot and Politician (Turley)

• Losing Lindsey Graham Is a Massive Blow for President Trump (Matt Vespa)

• Strait of Hormuz Open To All Vessels — CENTCOM (TASS)

• Somebody in Tehran Who Calls Himself ‘Mojtaba Khamenei’ Vows Revenge (Spencer)

• Zelensky Voices Plans To Replace Government, Dismiss Prime Minister (TASS)

• EU Turning Into ‘Banana Republic’ – Durov (RT)

• ‘Sober up’ – Polish PM tells Ukraine (RT)

• Poland Marks Anniversary of WWII Massacre By Ukrainian Nazi Collaborators (RT)

• ‘Burning Children Alive’: WWII-Era Ukrainian Massacres of Poles (RT)

• Investing in Kids and Country (Clarice Feldman)

• Why Our Kids Don’t Learn (Star Parker)

Did Russia just poison Lindsey Graham?

There seriously needs to be an investigation. Russia just sent a delegation to Khamenei’s funeral in Tehran where the IRGC and funeral organizers was calling for myself, President Trump and Senator Graham to be assassinated.

Lindsey… https://t.co/bEBz7LpuLi
— Laura Loomer (@LauraLoomer) July 12, 2026

https://twitter.com/Rothmus/status/2075935311905927542?s=20 https://twitter.com/tvc1five/status/2075967524181565483?s=20

Pavel Durov owns 100% of Telegram, a company used by over a billion people and has hundreds of millions in the bank.

He doesn't own a house. No jet. No yacht. No real estate. Nothing.

Tucker Carlson was visibly stunned: "I've never heard of that before."

So why?

Durov's… pic.twitter.com/IypOyNd6xR
— Business Nerd (@Business_Nerd_) July 11, 2026

LA SITUATION DÉGÉNÈRE ! Elon Musk et Marine Le Pen renversent totalement la situation C'est le retournement le plus spectaculaire de ces dernières années. Alors que tout semblait perdu pour les forces nationales, Elon Musk et Marine Le Pen viennent de s'allier de manière… pic.twitter.com/fyHbAStnnX
— Isa (@patte_louis) July 11, 2026

Lindsey Graham was more than an ultra violent gaydar offsetter. But I don’t quite know what to make of all the theories that the timeline of his death doesn’t add up. That he couldn’t possibly have been back in the US in time, after his visit to Ukraine, to have died in his own bed. Let alone to speak with President Trump after he returned. I guess some serious people will look at that timeline for us.

• Sen. Lindsey Graham Dead at 71 (Sarah Anderson)

Sen. Lindsey Graham’s (R-S.C.) officed announced early Sunday morning that the senator died after a “brief and sudden” illness. He was 71 years old. “On the evening of Saturday, July 11, U.S. Senator Lindsey Graham passed away from a brief and sudden illness,” the statement said. “Senator Graham’s family appreciates prayers at this time and asks for privacy during this incredibly difficult period.”

Statement from the Office of U.S. Senator Lindsey Graham (R-South Carolina). pic.twitter.com/CQ5yVvqTH1
— Lindsey Graham (@LindseyGrahamSC) July 12, 2026

Despite the late hour of the announcement, several prominent political figures have spoken out, offering their condolences and support to his family and sharing their fond memories of Graham, who served in the Senate for 23 years. That includes South Carolina Governor Henry McMaster.
“Peggy and I and our children-are devastated,” McMaster said. “Lindsey Graham is irreplaceable. The fiercest of fighters for South Carolina and America — and a loyal and steadfast friend. We grieve with Darline, his family and his devoted staff. May God hold him gently in the palm of his hand. We shall not see his likes again.” Darline is, of course, Graham’s younger sister, whom he raised after both of their parents died within 15 months of each other. He was 22, and she was just 13 years old at the time.

My statement on the passing of Senator Lindsey Graham: pic.twitter.com/hbrjnMXIQd
— Gov. Henry McMaster (@henrymcmaster) July 12, 2026

Donald Trump also responded on Truth Social around 3:20 a.m. on Sunday morning: “Senator Lindsey Graham, one of the greatest people and Senators I have ever known, is dead! He was always working, and was a true American Patriot. Lindsey will be greatly missed!!! DETAILS AND ARRANGEMENTS TO FOLLOW. So sad!President DONALD J. TRUMP
Graham had just returned home from Kyiv, Ukraine, where he met with President Volodymyr Zelenskyy. He was scheduled to appear on Meet the Press on Sunday.

Good meeting with U.S. Senator Lindsey Graham @LindseyGrahamSC in Kyiv. This is already his 10th visit to our country, and we appreciate this support.

I'm grateful to Lindsey for recognizing our warriors. The stronger Ukraine is on the battlefield, the greater the chances that… pic.twitter.com/bgZjjgIqu1
— Volodymyr Zelenskyy / Володимир Зеленський (@ZelenskyyUa) July 10, 2026

According to NBC, which obtained audio from a police scanner, “emergency personnel responded to a call for ‘cardiac arrest’ at Graham’s Capitol Hill home on Saturday.” NBC also claims that its staff saw photos of paramedics carrying a person out on a stretcher to an ambulance outside Graham’s home. Several police and fire vehicles were on the scene.
Graham, who was up for re-election, served as chairman of the Senate Budget Committee. He was one of President Donald Trump’s best allies in the Senate, as well as one of its most visible and outspoken members, particularly when it came to his hawkishness on foreign policy. Several members of Congress and other world leaders have also posted messages to social media over the last few minutes, and I’m sure many more will pour in later in the day and into the week. I’ll just share a few here:
Deeply saddened by the passing of Senator Lindsey Graham. He leaves behind a legacy of dedicated public service, a commitment to national security, and an unwavering fight for freedom. Lourdes & I are praying for his family and loved ones. May he rest in peace. pic.twitter.com/q0bmuD6CX2
— Rep. Carlos A. Gimenez (@RepCarlos) July 12, 2026

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu:
Sara and I grieve with the American people over the loss of our dear friend, Senator Lindsey Graham.

In our recent meeting, I said, "Lindsey is a great friend of Israel and a cherished friend of mine. We have no better friend than Lindsey."… pic.twitter.com/OSToT8FCYm
— Prime Minister of Israel (@IsraeliPM) July 12, 2026

“Trump Describes Saturday Night Phone Call With Lindsey Graham Hours Before Senator’s Death..”

• “What Makes It Even Stranger…” (ZH)

Update (1135ET): President Trump has weighed in on Graham’s death, telling Meet the Press that Graham called him in the ‘early evening,’ to tell Trump he was ‘all set for the Save America Act,’ and that it may have been the last call Graham made.

“what makes it even stranger is that I got a call last night sometimes in, you know, the early evening, maybe in the 7:00’s. And he called and he said, “We’re all set for the Save America Act,”” Trump told host Kristen Walker. “He was pushing the Save America Act like crazy. He got back, said he just landed from Ukraine. I said, “That’s a long trip to make.””

TRUMP: “What makes it even stranger is that I got a call last night sometime … and [Lindsey Graham] said we're all set for the Save America Act … We thought maybe we might even meet today. And then that was it.” pic.twitter.com/9YVdW3VzRM
— Chief Nerd (@TheChiefNerd) July 12, 2026

Graham notably toured a top secret Ukrainian ‘Skyfall’ drone factory (see more below) days before his death, where the country’s deadly ‘Baba Yaga’ Vampire bomber drones are manufactured. He also announced an upcoming Russian sanctions package, and said that the US can learn a lot from Ukraine’s UAV advancements. “I believe that it would be a huge mistake for America not to cooperate with Ukraine in the field of drones. They are ready to help us, because we were ready to support Ukraine in the most difficult times,” Graham said.

This was Lindsey Graham two days ago in Kyiv after meeting with Zelensky. pic.twitter.com/J8VW3hmXfl
— MAZE (@mazemoore) July 12, 2026

US Senator Lindsey Graham visited Ukraine's SkyFall and got a look at Vampire heavy bomber drones, Shrike FPVs and P1-SUN Shahed interceptors, plus some new tech not yet on the battlefield. Looks pretty happy holding Ukraine's P1-SUN drone in the photo. pic.twitter.com/o2gFBt657c
— WarTranslated (@wartranslated) July 11, 2026

When asked about a replacement for Graham, Trump said “I have somebody that I think would be great. But I don’t want to say it now because, you know, it’s too soon with Lindsey. I don’t want to even talk about anybody. But I do have somebody that I think is really good.”
International Response
In reaction to Graham’s death, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy paid tribute, describing Graham as “a true defender of freedom and of the values that make our world safer.” He highlighted that Graham had visited Ukraine ten times during the war, noting they were in constant dialogue. Zelenskyy added that Graham had been working on key initiatives in recent weeks to advance peace, including stronger sanctions against Russia. Ukrainian Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha called Graham a “true friend” and “one of the strongest voices” supporting Ukraine in its war against Russia. He praised Graham for pushing to bolster sanctions on Russia and for helping provide Ukraine with the means to defend itself.

Surprising eulogy.

• The Passing of Lindsey Graham, American Patriot and Politician (Turley)

I am in Chautauqua, New York for a book event this week and was shocked to wake up to find that Lindsey Graham has died at 71. I knew and worked with Lindsey since his time in the House of Representatives. We would correspond regularly on legal and constitutional issues. He was an extraordinary man with a deep and unshakable faith in this nation. His death is a great loss for our nation. Lindsey was a true son of South Carolina. Born in the town of Central, South Carolina, he attended the University of South Carolina for both his undergraduate and law school degrees. He became a prosecutor with the Air Force Judge Advocate General’s Office. He held the rank of Colonel in the Air Force Reserves.

His career is legendary and played a major role in military and foreign affairs. However, his greatest influence on the Senate was his practical thinking mixed with a disarming sense of humor. I would often receive texts or emails from Lindsey on ideas for resolving national problems. They were always bold and creative. He loved the law and enjoyed talking through such issues, often setting them aside after reflection on the political or legal complications.
We worked together on matters before the Judiciary Committee and I testified before him on issues ranging from investigations to impeachments. I would hear from him after I posted columns with praise or criticism of the underlying points. He was not only a skilled litigator but also had a keen sense of the practical. He was the ultimate problem solver, always looking for a way to navigate around barriers on the Hill. What I will miss most was his humor. Lindsey had a puckish side and looked at much of the insanity on the Hill with a sense of exasperated levity. He was often frustrated by the lack of progress in the Senate and would joke about it being the “most deliberative body” with a certain irony.
BREAKING: An initial examination from the DC Medical Examiner’s Office has determined that Senator Lindsey Graham (R-SC) died as a result of “Aortic Dissection due to Arteriosclerotic Cardiovascular Disease”. In layman’s terms, this means a tear in the aorta caused by hardening &…
— Bill Melugin (@BillMelugin_) July 12, 2026

His jokes would often be self-deprecating, downplaying his considerable skills and gifts. However, Lindsey’s aw-shucks style concealed one of the most penetrating minds in the Senate. He also had an iron core, unflinching in the face of withering criticism and attacks. A mob could surround Lindsey and not raise his pulse rate a tick. He was rock solid. It was Lindsey’s voice that would often cut through the noise and nonsense of the Hill, with his signature Southern drawl. He was particularly effective in controversies such as the Kavanaugh confirmation hearings.
.He was a major supporter of Israel and Ukraine. He recently returned from Kyiv, where he met President Volodymyr Zelenskyy to address Ukraine’s air defense systems. The left has already filled the web with vicious attacks on Lindsey. In an age of rage, even a period of mourning or civility is considered intolerable. People either loved or hated Lindsey, but few had the chance to know him. He was a warm and fascinating man. He stepped forward to enter the fray in defense of the values that he held most dear.
Thank you, Lindsey, and rest in peace.

“If he wanted to get something, if he thought he was right, and he had people against him, he could be very tough, actually,” Trump said. “But he was a good person.”

• Losing Lindsey Graham Is a Massive Blow for President Trump (Matt Vespa)

There were times when Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) caused concern for me and the GOP base as a whole. We called him out for it, but he never crossed into Mitt Romney territory. Still, he did more to help the conservative cause, and his institutional knowledge, experience, and talent for retail politics proved invaluable.

Graham, who had just returned from a trip to a Ukrainian drone production facility, died suddenly at his DC residence on Saturday night, with preliminary reports indicating an aortic dissection. The South Carolina Republican had reportedly said he wasn’t feeling well, and an aide even suggested he seek medical attention. He wanted to wait until after his ‘Meet the Press’ appearance on Sunday. Graham was working on a US-Saudi Arabia defense treaty, normalizing Israel-Saudi relations, a Russian sanctions bill, and the passage of the SAVE America Act.
President Trump sounded devastated when he spoke of the late Graham, adding that his ability to cut deals with Democrats and navigate key pieces of legislation was top-notch (via NBC News): The late senator was a close ally of Trump’s, and the president described him to “Meet the Press” as someone who was “like a member of the family to me.” The two spoke regularly on the phone and golfed together. Graham had just returned from a trip to Ukraine before his sudden death. The president said that Graham called him in the early evening to discuss the SAVE America Act, a bill that would reshape how elections operate but does not have enough support to pass the Senate.
“He actually said he was tired, but he wanted to pass the SAVE America Act, and I said, ‘Well, we’re going to get it done, Lindsey. We’re going to get it done. I’ll see you, like, soon,’” Trump told “Meet the Press” moderator Kristen Welker, adding that the two believed they might meet on Sunday. In a separate interview on CNN’s “State of the Union,” Trump said that Graham was also “telling me about the trip” in their phone call, noting that the senator “had a great trip.” Trump remembered the late senator as someone with a “unique ability,” saying that Graham could work out issues with Democrats and that he “loved being a politician.”
“If I had a problem, a real problem, I wouldn’t often ask. But if I had a problem with a Democrat, he could work it out,” Trump said. “He was a great, he was a great politician, actually.” At the same time, Trump said, the senator could be a “tough cookie.” “If he wanted to get something, if he thought he was right, and he had people against him, he could be very tough, actually,” Trump said. “But he was a good person.”
So, who will fill that void—the essential GOP senator who can keep the ship steady as it navigates the procedural hurricanes that have derailed many bills? As of now, no one. Trump said he had a name in mind but refused to reveal whom he was talking about. Politically, losing Graham was undoubtedly a blow to the Trump White House and the GOP—he was able to bridge the two sides. Graham was especially key in helping pass the big, important bill (via Politico):
Trump said Graham called him just hours before he died to discuss the SAVE America Act, the GOP elections bill that has stalled for months in the Senate. Graham supported the legislation but frequently explained how most Senate Republicans did not want to eliminate the 60-vote filibuster rule to pass it. It was one of several points of friction between the White House and the more tradition-bound Senate that needed to be smoothed over by Graham and others during Trump’s first and second terms.
He eased tensions during hot conversations between Senate Republicans and the president, and helped shepherd last year’s “big, beautiful bill” and this year’s immigration enforcement bill. But Graham’s power had its limits: He was among the most ardent supporters for strong U.S. support for Ukraine, a position Trump didn’t embrace as fervently. “His role in the Senate and his role as a liaison between the administration and the Senate and trusted confidant and adviser was colossal,” said a White House official who like others in this report was granted anonymity to discuss internal dynamics. “It’s a devastating development. Everyone who touches the legislature and the administration is crushed.”
Graham’s ability to communicate with and persuade the executive branch was “multidimensional — from rounds of golf, to appearances on television, to dinner with administration officials,” a person close to the administration said. “I think the senator saw his relationship as a loyal and longtime friend trying to help navigate the president’s priorities through the Senate.” In turn, “Senate leadership saw Lindsey as a key link — whether as a colleague, chairman, counselor, or conduit,” the person said.

“The US forces being prepared to ensure free navigation along this waterway, the US Central Command said ..”

• Strait of Hormuz Open To All Vessels — CENTCOM (TASS)

The Strait of Hormuz is open to all vessels, with the US forces being prepared to ensure free navigation along this waterway, the US Central Command (CENTCOM) said. “The Strait of Hormuz is open to all vessels seeking to lawfully transit the international waterway. U.S. forces are positioned and prepared to ensure that freedom of navigation remains available despite unwarranted Iranian aggression, harassment, threats, and arbitrary declarations,” it wrote on X.

“Iran does not control the strait. Traffic is flowing,” it underscored, adding that more than 140 vessels has passed through the strait in the past seven days. The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC, elite units of the Iranian army) fired warning shots at a vessel trying to pass through the Strait of Hormuz along an unauthorized route. The strait has been closed until further notice, it added.

“.. the X account that bills itself as “the official account for the news and statements of the Leader of the Islamic Revolution, Ayatollah Sayyid Mojtaba Hosseini Khamenei..”

• Somebody in Tehran Who Calls Himself ‘Mojtaba Khamenei’ Vows Revenge (Spencer)

We still haven’t seen hide nor hair of Mojtaba Khamenei, the putative supreme leader of the Islamic Republic of Iran, since he got the top spot in March. The word going around is that he was severely maimed in the strike that killed his predecessor and father, and others speculate that he may actually be dead, while Iranian officials pretend he is alive in order to give their almost universally hated regime some legitimacy.

Whatever may be going on with Mojtaba, however, on Saturday, the X account that bills itself as “the official account for the news and statements of the Leader of the Islamic Revolution, Ayatollah Sayyid Mojtaba Hosseini Khamenei” came alive with an energy that was positively Trumpian, putting up fourteen posts in quick succession, detailing how the rulers of Iran plan to gain sweet revenge against those whom they hate. (It could have been one long message, but Mojtaba, or whoever is writing in his name on X, apparently hasn’t shelled out the eight bucks a month for a blue checkmark.)
Whoever it actually came from, the message came with a bit of fanfare; at 5:41 a.m. Eastern time, the alleged Mojtaba announced that “in an hour” there would come “Imam Sayyid Mojtaba Khamenei’s important message following the funeral and burial of the Leader of Truth-Seekers of the World, Martyr Imam Sayyid Ali Khamenei.” And sure enough, 54 minutes later, the posts started coming. Mojtaba, or whoever, started out by praising the Imam Hussein, whom Islamic tradition identifies as the son of Ali ibn Abi Talib, the founding figure of Shi’ite Islam, and the grandson of the prophet of Islam himself, Muhammad. At the Battle of Karbala in Iraq in the year 680, the Sunni caliph Yazid killed Hussein, and that killing is generally considered to mark the beginning of the formal split between Sunni and Shi’ite Muslims.
Every year on the tenth day of the month of Muharram, the first month of the Islamic calendar, Shi’ites engage in elaborate public mourning for Hussein, often whipping themselves or cutting their heads with knives to express their grief and punish themselves that they weren’t on hand fourteen centuries ago to save their leader. That’s why Mojtaba is talking about Hussein: he attempts to portray his late father, who before he was killed stained his hands with the blood of 40,000 of his countrymen for the crime of protesting against his criminal and inhumane regime, as a martyred leader in the mold of one of the pivotal founding figures of Shi’ism. What better way to cement loyalty to the regime than by associating loyalty to it with loyalty to Allah himself?
To drive the point home, Mojtaba tells us that “Martyr Khamenei acted like Hussain, and engaged in jihad and resistance in a manner similar to Imam Hussain (pbuh).” “PBUH” is “peace be upon him,” which Muslims generally say after uttering the name of a prophet; it is a sign of how highly Mojtaba, and Shi’ites in general, regard Hussain that he used it after his name as well. Mojtaba added: “Among the followers of Hussain are those whose blood, when unjustly spilled in his path and for his school of thought and ideals, moves the Muslim Ummah [global community] to action, so that their time becomes joined to Ashura and their place to Karbala.”
Khamenei is saying that it’s time once again to go to war for the Islamic faith. “For years,” he says, “the Iranian nation has sacrificed its children on the path of Hussain, battling the enemies of Hussain and the enemies of Hussain’s way, and today it seeks to take revenge for his blood and the blood of the people like Hussain in our time.” That would, of course, be dear old dad, whom Mojtaba then addresses: “We pledge to avenge your pure blood and the blood of all the martyrs of these two [recent] wars by taking revenge against the criminal, disgraceful murderers. This vengeance is what our nation is demanding, and this must definitely be done.” And: “The criminal, disgraceful murderers of the martyred Leader, whose names are fully documented from the highest to the lowest ranks, will carry their dream of a peaceful death in bed to the grave.”
Whoever wrote all this is making it abundantly clear that the Islamic Republic of Iran has not changed. It has not deviated even an inch from its goals of “death to America” and “death to Israel,” which Mojtaba’s father said were policies, not mere slogans. It will keep waging jihad against both countries. It will keep trying to murder Trump. It will keep sponsoring jihad terror activity around the world. One hopes that this message is being carefully studied in Washington, and any idea that the regime has somehow changed being definitively put to rest.

It’s not him. It’s his puppeteers. London. Maybe Paris and Berlin.

• Zelensky Voices Plans To Replace Government, Dismiss Prime Minister (TASS)

Vladimir Zelensky announced the need to replace the country’s current government and his intention to dismiss Prime Minister Yulia Sviridenko. Specifically, he offered her a new position. “We discussed the details with Ukrainian Prime Minister Yulia Sviridenko. We determined that changes require a renewal of the cabinet. I thanked Yulia for her clear, stable, and effective work as prime minister, for her years of productive work on the Ukrainian team, and offered her to lead a new significant direction,” Zelensky wrote on his Telegram channel.

Yulia Sviridenko became Prime Minister of Ukraine on July 17, 2025, replacing Denis Shmygal, who currently serves as First Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Energy. Following Sviridenko’s resignation, he will automatically become acting prime minister until the Verkhovna Rada approves a new government lineup.

“:The Telegram co-founder has blasted the use of a loophole by the European Parliament to pass a law allowing tech firms to scan users’ messages..”

Freedom disappears from Europe. What can we do?

• EU Turning Into ‘Banana Republic’ – Durov (RT)

The European Union has stooped to using dubious procedural loopholes usually employed by backwater regimes to pass controversial legislation, Pavel Durov has argued. The Telegram co-founder was referring to the contentious regulation that allows tech companies to scan their users’ messages, ostensibly to detect child sexual abuse material. In a post on X on Friday, the entrepreneur wrote: “Once typical of banana republics, such tricks are now used by the EU to pass surveillance laws.”

Durov’s comment came shortly after the European Parliament voted on Thursday to revive what critics have dubbed the ‘Chat Control’ legislation. The temporary regime had originally lapsed in April after MEPs had failed to find common ground amid an outcry over privacy concerns. However, Parliament President Roberta Metsola asked EU leaders to restart talks on the regulation, with the European Council granting her request, meaning that the proposal was again put to a plenary vote at the bloc’s legislature.
Law enforcement officials, including Europol Executive Director Catherine De Bolle, have likewise supported the controversial framework, describing it as a vital tool “for the protection of children.”mAccording to the Euractiv media outlet, four EU commissioners also put pressure on lawmakers to pass the legislation. The center-right European People’s Party (EPP), of which Metsola is a member, arranged for the vote to be subject to a rarely-invoked legislative procedure, which requires an absolute majority of at least 361 MEPs to axe or amend a proposal.
The vote was held the day before summer recess, when full attendance was highly unlikely. As a result, the scheme was passed despite opposition from most present lawmakers. Commenting on the development, Rand Hammoud from Europe’s Center for Democracy and Technology denounced what he characterized as “highly politicized procedural efforts” to ram the proposal through. “When the largest group uses its political weight to force another vote on a mass-scanning measure that already failed, that should concern anyone who cares about institutional integrity,” he told Euractiv.
“It is impressive to see the European Parliament being backstabbed by its own president,” Simeon de Brouwer from civil society network Edri concurred, as quoted by the media outlet. He warned that the ‘Chat Control’ law allows tech companies to “snoop without a warrant, with little to no oversight, and with no legal basis, on millions of conversations.”mMeanwhile, a broader ‘Chat Control 2.0.’ framework is reportedly being prepared that would force tech companies to snoop on end-to-end encrypted communications, which are currently exempt from scans.

“Kiev must recognize the massacre of Poles by Nazi collaborators during WWII in order to mend ties with Warsaw, Donald Tusk has said..”

Kiev celebratess the Ukrainian Nazi collaborators.

• ‘Sober up’ – Polish PM tells Ukraine (RT)

Kiev needs to “sober up” to prevent further escalation in the row with Warsaw over the glorification of Ukrainian Nazi collaborators, Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk has said. Tensions between the neighboring countries, which have been close allies during the conflict between Moscow and Kiev, escalated last month after Ukraine’s Vladimir Zelensky named one of his country’s commando units after “heroes of the UPA (Ukrainian Insurgent Army).”

Speaking on Friday, the eve of the National Day of Remembrance, when Poland honors the victims of UPA, Tusk insisted that Kiev must recognize the crimes committed by the UPA if it hopes to mend ties with Warsaw. “I can once again appeal to all decent, wise, responsible Ukrainians. Remember, this great European community is based on the truth and the truth is an absolutely necessary foundation of reconciliation, and that’s why I hope that everyone on the other side, but also everyone here in Poland, will sober up to restrain these exaggerated emotions,” he said.
The row “has gone too far and is harming both Poland and Ukraine. I have no doubt about it,” the prime minister added. It has ignited “nationalist lunatics” on both sides, causing an avalanche of hatred on social media, Tusk noted. He urged the authorities in Kiev to curb any anti-Polish sentiment and vowed that Warsaw will act with “the full force of law” against anyone who commits crimes against Ukrainians on ethnic grounds. “The Russians would be happiest if there was some dramatic crisis in Ukrainian-Polish relations,” the prime minister warned.
Poland blames the UPA – an armed wing of the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists (OUN), which fought for Nazi Germany during World War II – for an ethnic cleansing campaign in the Volhynia region between 1943 and 1944 that left at least 100,000 civilians dead. Warsaw recognizes the massacres as a genocide. Following Zelensky’s move last month, Polish President Karol Nawrocki reacted by stripping him of the country’s highest honor, the Order of the White Eagle, prompting several Ukrainian officials to return their own Polish decorations to Warsaw. Poland also rolled back its decision to transfer its remaining Soviet-era MiG-29 jets to Ukraine and questioned Kiev’s prospects of joining the EU.
Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said on Wednesday that the West, including Poland, raised a “terrorist monster” in Ukraine by arming and funding it, while ignoring its Nazi ideological foundations. Warsaw “knew they were supporting those who had killed their grandfathers” and this fact “can no longer be undone by simply taking away the White Eagle, posting a few tweets, or making loud statements,” she argued.

President Karol Nawrocki has vowed to outlaw the red-and-black flag used by nationalists in Ukraine

• Poland Marks Anniversary of WWII Massacre By Ukrainian Nazi Collaborators (RT)

Poland has commemorated the anniversary of the Volhynia massacre, a large-scale ethnic cleansing operation perpetrated by Ukrainian Nazi collaborators during World War II and a hot-button topic that sparked a recent diplomatic clash between Warsaw and Kiev.

Multiple events were held across Poland on Saturday to honor the victims of the Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA), the armed wing of the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists (OUN). The commemoration is tied to events of July 11, 1943, also known as Bloody Sunday, which marked the height of the massacre when nearly 100 Polish-populated towns across Volhynia were attacked. According to Polish estimates, at least 100,000 ethnic Poles were killed between 1943 and 1944 in Volhynia and Eastern Galicia regions, which are now largely part of modern Ukraine.
The commemorations were attended by top Polish officials, with President Karol Nawrocki making an appearance at a ceremony in the village of Radruz, one of the targets of the OUN-UPA militants. “We are here so that the reality of today’s and tomorrow’s world can be heard. Because we will not accept forgetting the 120,000 Poles, civilians, women, and children brutally murdered by Ukrainian nationalists,” Nawrocki stated.
The president pledged to take further action against the Ukrainian nationalist ideology, arguing in favor of outlawing the red-and-black flag of the OUN-UPA. The banner has been widely used by present-day Ukrainian nationalists, as well as incorporated into emblems of multiple units within the country’s military. “We do not want to see it in Poland – and I will do everything to ensure that it is not present in Poland. I believe that the Polish parliament will pass the relevant law,” he said, comparing the flag to Nazi Germany memorabilia.
“It is the same as the ‘Blut und Boden’ (‘Blood and Soil’) flag. That is what it meant, and behind it lay – and still lies – the entire ideology of Ukrainian nationalists who killed Polish women and children,” he stressed. Footage from the village of Domostawa, the home to a contemporary monument honoring the Volhynia massacre victims, shows dozens of people attending the solemn gathering. Unveiled in 2024, the monument has drawn some controversy over its brutal depiction of a child impaled on a pitchfork, somewhat resembling the Ukrainian heraldic trident.
The Volhynia massacre has remained an unresolved issue between Kiev and Warsaw. While Poland recognizes the massacre as genocide, Ukraine celebrates its perpetrators as ‘freedom fighters’ and national heroes. The tensions reignited last month when Ukrainian leader Vladimir Zelensky named one of Ukraine’s commando units after “heroes of the UPA,” prompting Nawrocki to strip him of Poland’s highest honor. Several Ukrainian officials responded to the move by returning decorations received from Warsaw. Meanwhile, Poland’s main opposition Law and Justice (PiS) party said it would submit a parliamentary resolution opposing Ukraine’s EU accession as long as Kiev continues to “glorify criminals.”
The Volhynia issue has already done a lot of damage to ties between Poland and Ukraine and is bound to spark a conflict within Poland itself in the future, leader of the Front party and former Polish MP, Krzysztof Tolwinski, told RT. “The only thing is the outcome of this little war is a foregone conclusion – Russia will bring Ukraine back to normal and restore order there. Those who fought will never make peace with Russians; this is why they will end up on Polish territory. And this is when an internal conflict will begin, a real inevitable one,” Tolwinski stated.

“The UPA insurgents behind the ethnic cleansing campaign in Volhynia are hailed as heroes in modern-day Ukraine..”

• ‘Burning Children Alive’: WWII-Era Ukrainian Massacres of Poles (RT)

Russia’s Federal Security Service (FSB) has released newly declassified documents detailing the massacre of Poles by Ukrainian nationalist militias during World War II in what is now western Ukraine. The release comes as Poland marks its National Day of Remembrance on Saturday honoring the victims of the Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA), the armed wing of the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists (OUN). The ethnic cleansing campaign in the Volhynia region between 1943 and 1944 claimed the lives of at least 100,000 civilians, according to Polish estimates.

A monument in Domostawa, Poland, commemorating Polish civilians killed by Ukrainian nationalist militias during World War II.

Poland recognizes these tragic events as a genocide. Ukraine, however, celebrates the UPA as freedom fighters, a stance that has led to a high-profile diplomatic dispute between the neighboring countries. The Soviet archival files released by Russia describe the activities of the OUN unit led by Dmytro Kupyak, known by the nom de guerre Kley, who is believed to have been responsible for killing at least 200 Polish and Soviet nationals, as well as burning and looting eight villages.
On May 16, 1944, during a raid on the village of Kupche, Kley’s unit killed residents “solely because they were ethnic Poles,” the files say. On August 17 that year, the nationalists raided the village of Grabovo, where they locked nine women and children in a shed before burning them alive. One of Kupyak’s former associates, Andrey Moroz, described him in a Soviet court as a “simple bandit” without any ideological convictions. After the war, Kupyak fled to Canada, where he ran a restaurant in Toronto until his death in 1995. In the 1960s, the Canadian government denied Soviet requests to extradite him.
The OUN collaborated with Nazi Germany during the early stages of the invasion of the Soviet Union and participated in anti-Jewish pogroms. The UPA was created in 1942 after the OUN split with the Germans. Many UPA members were defectors from Nazi-led units, including its eventual leader, Roman Shukhevich, who had previously served as deputy commander of the Nachtigall Battalion. Last month, Polish President Karol Nawrocki stripped Ukrainian leader Vladimir Zelensky of Poland’s highest honor, the Order of the White Eagle, after Zelensky named one of Ukraine’s commando units after “heroes of the UPA.” Several Ukrainian officials responded by returning their own Polish decorations to Warsaw.

“Yet another Trump innovation that will be paying off long after he leaves office. ”

• Investing in Kids and Country (Clarice Feldman)

The Fourth of July was not only a day to celebrate our country’s independence. It marks the date of a new kind of investment account for children of citizens who are under 18 and who have Social Security account numbers. The Trump Accounts (530A accounts) are a brilliant idea. Often compared to “starter IRA accounts,” the children are the owners of the accounts, which are to be managed by a responsible adult — guardian or parent. Funds in these accounts must be conservatively invested in U.S. stock index funds. Fund fees must be low — no more than 0.1%.

Contributions are not deductible, but growth of the accounts is tax-deferred. Except for rare cases, like the death of the beneficiary, the funds cannot be withdrawn until the child reaches 18, at which point they are taxed as ordinary income at the child’s rate — which normally will be small if the funds are withdrawn while young. Once the child reaches 18, the Trump account automatically converts to a standard traditional IRA or Roth IRA. Employers, charities, or family members can contribute with annual contributions for each account limited to $5,000. Even sweeter, employers can contribute up to $2,500 tax-free to accounts. Sweeter yet, for those children born between 2025 and 2028, there will be a federal contribution of $1,000 to start the account off.

To open one of these accounts, use IRS Form 4547 or use the online portal trumpaccounts.gov. A number of private individuals and foundations, notably Michael and Susan Dell, have kicked in a lot to these accounts — the Dells over $6 billion while SpaceX president Gwynne Shotwell and her husband contributed SpaceX stock valued at over $300 million. Aside from these standalone gifts, hundreds of institutions, companies, and philanthropists have made or pledged contributions. On July 9, just five days after these accounts went into effect, the popularity of the program was manifest:
@EricLDaugh. JUST IN: In a MASSIVE shock to the Fake News, Trump Accounts in 5 days have received a SURGE of +$125 MILLION DOLLARS for America’s children — that’s not even counting $1,000 seed money and wealthy donor contributions. 6.5 MILLION American children have accounts, and a vast majority of contributions are below $250, per Washington Examiner THIS IS BECOMING A HUGE WIN The benefits of this will be felt for generations. Imagine the compounding interest these kids will see when they are grown!
According to Washington Examiner: “Beyond the money itself, the Trump Accounts app has performed remarkably compared to other federal government tech rollouts, holding the top overall spot in the Apple App Store. Its average rating of 4.75 stars across nearly 3,500 reviews gives it better marks than the Robinhood app. For comparison, the 2013 rollout of the Affordable Care Act’s Healthcare.gov website was plagued by numerous technical glitches that were well documented in media reports at the time. A leaked internal memo from the Obama administration showed that only six individuals were able to enroll the first day the website went live, and there were just 248 enrollments by the end of the first 48 hours.
The Trump administration acknowledged anecdotal evidence that some Trump Accounts users are seeing errors but stressed that “99.9% of users have not encountered any hiccups and that customer support was working quickly with the 0.1% of cases that require assistance.” A Treasury Department official claimed that users have waited, on average, “0.2 seconds when contacting customer support by phone and 0.5 seconds when contacting via chat.”
Even some frequent critics of the president have given Trump Accounts glowing reviews. In a Wednesday appearance on SiriusXM’s The Clay Cane Show, Gov. Wes Moore (D-MD) likened the program to baby bonds, calling it “one of the fastest ways that you can address both child poverty and the racial wealth gap.” “I will give this administration credit for this, is that we’ve had Democratic presidents and Republican presidents who have not been able to get this done, and it actually got done,” Moore added. “So I actually, this is actually a smart policy.”
Consider the genius of this program. It encourages millions of people, many of whom are not investors, to become actual stakeholders in our economy. (Not the pretend kind of stakeholder the left promotes — vague hordes of people with no skin in the game who are to be given a share of control.) Smart children will start to watch the stock market and learn about compounding and why it matters. For children who would not otherwise have assets in their youth for further education, to buy a car or residence, or start a business, this gives them a leg up once available only to those the beneficiaries of generational wealth.
DAVID SACKS: “One of the numbers that I saw that was kind of amazing… again, it just goes back to the power of compounding… Is that if a Trump Account had been maxed out and you have the standard market rate of return that we’ve had for, say the past 30 years… Then by age 28, that kid will be a millionaire.”
For some, other investment options might be more advantageous, but generally speaking, the overall benefits for society are huge and include: encouraging household savings to take advantage of the tax-deferred benefits; increasing the wealth and personal savings level of the beneficiaries. Kids under 18 might want to help reach that $5,000 annual contribution maximum by deferring spending to add to their accounts on their own from personal earnings (paper routes may be dying, but there’s babysitting and lawn cutting).
A few countries have some sort of saving programs to provide a financial boost for minors: the UK, Israel, Singapore, various Indian states, and Canada. They vary in different respects from each other. But the Trump Funds are uniquely American in that by specifying investment in equity funds and converting these funds to IRAs when the beneficiaries reach 18, they set the stage for long-term participation in the stock market, something worth encouraging from both an individual and national viewpoint.

“The nation’s two major teachers unions—the American Federation of Teachers and the National Education Association—are cash machines for the Democratic Party.”

• Why Our Kids Don’t Learn (Star Parker)

Included in the 2025 One Big Beautiful Bill Act is a dollar-for-dollar tax credit, up to $1,700, for contributions to “Scholarship Granting Organizations” that parents can access and use toward paying for private school tuition and fees and other educational expenses. The provision is constructed such that states must choose to opt in to the program, which begins January 2027. As of this writing, per the IRS, 28 states have opted in. Of those 28, 25 are red states and three are blue—Colorado, New Hampshire and Virginia. This partisan imbalance is no accident.

The nation’s two major teachers unions—the American Federation of Teachers and the National Education Association—are cash machines for the Democratic Party. And the last thing they want is parents having any say in where their child receives their K-12 education. The unions have published an “Open Letter to our Democratic Governors” urging them to “say no to the Trump private voucher scheme.” Per the leaders of these two unions, the signatories of the letter, “Public education … is the foundation of a thriving democracy” and vouchers are a betrayal.
Amid the celebration of our nation’s 250th birthday, with recitals of the defining words of our founding declaration—our rights to “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness”—the leaders of the teachers unions declare it un-American that parents should have the right to choose how and where to educate their children. We all should justifiably shudder that minds like this influence the majority of our nation’s children. The results speak for themselves. The Programme for International Student Assessment, administered by the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development, tests 15-year-olds in 80 countries in math, science, and reading.
In the latest available scores, the top five countries are Singapore, China, Japan, Taiwan, and South Korea. The United States ranks 18th behind Poland, Czechia, and Denmark. Per the OECD, U.S. education spending per student in 2025 was $20,387 compared to the OECD average of $15,022. U.S. education spending as a percent of gross domestic product was 5.8% compared to the OECD average of 4.7%. Per the World Bank, education spending as percent of GDP in Singapore, the country with the highest PISA score, was 2.2% in 2024, less than half that of the U.S.
Analysis done at the Cato Institute shows inflation-adjusted spending per student in the U.S. increased 140% from 1971 to 2019, while over the same period, test scores in math and reading for 17-year-olds barely moved. A May 2026 study by the Network Contagion Research Institute and the Gevura Fund, which have affiliations with Rutgers University and the University of Maryland, reports: “Combined NEA spending on political activities, lobbying, and contributions to outside organizations totals approximately $175 million in FY2025, nearly 4 times the $45 million spent on direct member representation.”
PAC records show that 90% of NEA candidate-directed spending and nearly all of AFT’s, has gone to Democrats consistently across decades.” A casual glance at the website of the NEA and the AFT barely turns up a hint about reading, math and science. Both are poster boards for the progressive political agenda. It is no wonder that scholarships and vouchers, tickets for parents and children to education freedom, is a nightmare for the teachers’ unions who are about control, not freedom.
A recent study by the Thomas B. Fordham Institute ranks states by the strength and influence of their teachers’ unions. Among the top 25 states rated with the strongest teachers’ unions, only two—Ohio and West Virginia—have opted into the new tax-funded scholarship program. Why are so many of our youth embracing socialism and turning away from the principles of our founding? Look no further than the vice grip unions have on our public schools. Education freedom is vital to America’s future. The new tax-funded scholarship program is a major step in the right direction.

They sure put a lot of effort into this crime https://t.co/zo6areZrFX
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) July 11, 2026

Elon Musk was right when he said OpenAI cannot be trusted.

• Apple: Accused OpenAI of stealing trade secrets through former Apple engineers to accelerate AI hardware development.

• xAI: Accused OpenAI of poaching employees to obtain Grok trade secrets, source code, and… pic.twitter.com/5MlKFzqFXW
— DogeDesigner (@cb_doge) July 10, 2026

https://twitter.com/MAGAVoice/status/2076084863195807896?s=20

Never deleting this app. pic.twitter.com/v98oebFiGq
— Geiger Capital (@Geiger_Capital) July 12, 2026

ELON MUSK IS CREATING COMPANIES THAT PUT AMERICA IN THE LEAD OF EVERYTHING

WHAT ARE YOU DOING ? https://t.co/MGz1w0dQDq pic.twitter.com/CpgN43fD7S
— MAGA Voice (@MAGAVoice) July 11, 2026

I’m going to blow your mind. Are you ready? Hold on tight!

Dr. Oz and Nick Shirley just walked a single block in NYC and found double-digit pharmacies.

Dr. Oz: “I don’t think you could go anywhere in America and think this was normal unless there was a cash cow business feeding… pic.twitter.com/PWwCkgJ8zr
— jay plemons (@jayplemons) July 11, 2026

Elon Musk: "The strongest argument for us being in a simulation, probably being in a simulation,.40 years ago, we had Pong, like two rectangles and a dot. That was what games were. Now, 40 years later, we have photorealistic 3D simulations." pic.twitter.com/FfDZ3cepOc
— Joe Rogan Podcast News (@joeroganhq) July 11, 2026

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

Debt Rattle July 11 2026

Jul 112026

July 11, 2026 Posted by Raúl Ilargi Meijer at 9:24 am Finance Tagged with: ceasefire, COVID, Iran, NATO, Rubio, Russia, Trump, Ukraine, Zelensky 35 Responses »

William-Adolphe Bouguereau La naissance de Vénus 1879

• Trump Agrees To Renewed ‘Talks’ With Iran, but Says Ceasefire Still ‘Over’ (JTN)

• Trump Reveals His Plan for If Iran Succeeds in Assassinating Him (Margolis)

• Trump Won’t Sign Landmark Housing Bill In Protest Over Stalled SAVE Act ZH)

• Kiev Behind Monaco Attack Over Tycoon’s Plan To Expose Corruption (TASS)

• Ceasefire Worst-Case Scenario For Ukraine – Zelensky’s Favorite Arms Maker (RT)

• NATO Is Spending Itself Into Oblivion (Scott Ritter)

• Russia No Longer Believes West Wants Ukraine Peace Talks – Lavrov (RT)

• ‘We Are Not At War’ – Czech PM Questions Bloc’s Ukraine Strategy (RT)

• The Men Who Own the War Now Run It (Antiwar)

• A Rubio Summit That Saves the World? (Sarah Anderson)

• Rubio Deports Convicted Rapist Protected by Walz (Turley)

• Elon Foretold – The Man Who Sold the Moon (J.R. Dunn)

• Scenario (James Howard Kunstler)

• Germany’s Debt Crisis Crescendos (Thomas Kolbe)

• What’s Driving Europe’s Auto Industry Crisis? (RT)

• RFK Jr. Plans to Create a List of Injuries Caused by COVID-19 Vaccines (ET)

https://twitter.com/ToniLL22/status/2075181070593454200?s=20 https://twitter.com/warDaniel47/status/2075319010690818300?s=20

Joe Rogan: "You say that China has 10 years to go…"

Guest: "At most."

Joe Rogan: "What do you mean by that?" pic.twitter.com/SNrGLbNWvk
— Joe Rogan Podcast News (@joeroganhq) July 10, 2026

A rich tapestry today, if I say so myself.

• Trump Agrees To Renewed ‘Talks’ With Iran, but Says Ceasefire Still ‘Over’ (JTN)

President Donald Trump on Friday announced that Iran had sought to resume peace talks with the United States and that he had agreed to do so, but would not halt combat operations in the interim. “The Islamic Republic of Iran has asked us to continue ‘talks.’ We have agreed to do so, but the United States has stated to them, in no uncertain terms, that the Cease Fire is OVER! Thank you for your attention to this matter,” he posted on Truth Social.

Trump renewed strikes on Iran this week, declaring the ceasefire over and asserting that the Iranians had not negotiated in good faith. Last month, the U.S. and Iran signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) that was meant to extend the ceasefire for 60 days. The war began in February, but was in a state of nominal ceasefire for months, despite intermittent flare ups. Active hostilities resumed on both sides this week.

“I’ve been No. 1 [on Iran’s kill list] for a long time, and it’s the way life is, you know.”Then Trump quipped, “I hope you’ll miss me.”

“That’s the way they act, and that’s the way they’ve done it for 47 years..”

• Trump Reveals His Plan for If Iran Succeeds in Assassinating Him (Margolis)

President Donald Trump knows that Iran wants to see him dead. And if by chance it succeeds, he has plans in place for what should happen next. In an exclusive interview that The New York Post published Friday, Trump revealed he has left standing orders for the U.S. military to respond to his assassination with overwhelming, unprecedented force. “I’ve been on their list for a long time. That’s what we’re dealing with,” Trump told The Post. “The only thing is, I’ve left instructions — if anything happens, to just literally bomb them at levels that they’ve never seen before.” No big deal, just the president calmly laying out his own contingency plan for revenge from beyond the grave.

Asked about reports that Israel recently flagged fresh intelligence on a plot to kill him, Trump waved it off as nothing new. Iran has wanted him dead since 2020, when he ordered the strike that killed Iranian military commander Qasem Soleimani, and nothing about that has changed. “No, no. Israel came up with nothing. No, no,” he said. “I’ve been No. 1 [on Iran’s kill list] for a long time, and it’s the way life is, you know.”Then Trump quipped, “I hope you’ll miss me.” What a very Trump thing to say, don’t you think?
As you know, authorities have foiled multiple assassination plots against Trump since the nearly successful attempt at a campaign rally in Butler, Pa., on July 13, 2024, including the most recent one at the White House Correspondents’ Dinner shooting back in April. So this isn’t a one-time scare. It’s an ongoing campaign.
Iran hasn’t exactly hidden its intentions lately, either. Demonstrators at the funeral for Iran’s late Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei this week unfurled banners openly calling for Trump’s killing. One eulogist told mourners, per Iranian media, “Why shouldn’t we kill the one who killed my imam and my leader? … Trump’s killing is our duty… Why is the most despicable man in the world still alive?” That message came at the funeral of Iran’s own supreme leader, broadcast for the world to see.
Meanwhile, Trump called off the US-Iran cease-fire and their nascent memorandum of understanding after Iran fired on three ships in the Strait of Hormuz on Monday and Tuesday. nIn response, the president removed the US waiver on Iranian oil sanctions and launched nearly 200 strikes across Iran on Tuesday and Wednesday. Trump’s frustration with the Iranians was on full display at the NATO summit in Ankara this week, calling them “evil” for unleashing attacks in the strait despite the cease-fire and an additional promise to ramp down tensions as they buried slain Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei.
Despite his efforts to make a deal with Iran, Trump openly talked in Turkey that Iran was still out to kill him. “They had leaders, they’re gone. Then they had another set of leaders, they’re gone. Now they have another set of leaders — they may be gone, who knows?” Trump said at the summit. “And you know what? I may be gone too. Because I’m their No. 1 target — it’s out all over the place. Because they’re scum.” He made clear the pattern isn’t new. “That’s the way they act, and that’s the way they’ve done it for 47 years,” Trump added.

“If he doesn’t, it’s still law,” Johnson said last week of the president’s refusal to sign.”

• Trump Won’t Sign Landmark Housing Bill In Protest Over Stalled SAVE Act ZH)

President Donald Trump declared Friday morning that he won’t sign the sweeping bipartisan housing bill awaiting action on his desk in protest of the Senate’s failure to pass his signature elections legislation. Unless the president issues an outright veto by midnight, however, the housing package will become law Saturday without his signature.In a Friday morning Truth Social post, Trump said he was withholding his signature “in PROTEST” over the Senate’s inability to pass the SAVE America Act, a comprehensive elections overhaul that would require photo identification to vote and proof of citizenship to register, and would bar most mail-in balloting, with exceptions for military service, disability, illness and travel.

The president asserted that the elections bill is “polling at 97% with the Republican Party” – a figure he offered without citing a source – and called its failure “a serious threat to any politician who votes against it.” He renewed his demand that Senate Republicans “TERMINATE THE FILIBUSTER,” warning that Democrats would abolish the 60-vote rule “in their very first hour” back in power. Rendering “Democrats” throughout with a derisive misspelling, Trump added that the “title of DUMB” would revert to Republicans if the party allowed the stalemate to stand.
A Deadline, Not A Veto This is of course performative unless Trump actually vetoes it. Under the Constitution, a bill becomes law automatically if the president neither signs nor vetoes it within 10 days, excluding Sundays, while Congress is in session. That clock on the housing measure – the 21st Century ROAD to Housing Act – runs out at the end of Friday. Because Congress has remained formally in session through the window, the “pocket veto” that would let the bill die quietly is widely viewed as unavailable. That leaves Trump two choices: veto the legislation outright, or let it lapse into law. His post on Friday, notably, promised only not to sign it.
A veto would face long odds. The Senate approved the package 85-5 on June 22, and the House passed it 358-32 – margins far beyond the two-thirds needed in each chamber to override. Congressional observers caution, though, that override votes can scramble such numbers, as some members retreat rather than be seen defying the president. Lawmakers overrode a Trump veto of a defense bill once before, in the final weeks of his first term. House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., a close Trump ally, has already conceded the likely endgame. “If he doesn’t, it’s still law,” Johnson said last week of the president’s refusal to sign.

”Viktor Medvedchuk says the uncovering of the schemes “would have spelt a disaster for the Kiev regime ahead of the NATO summit”

• Kiev Behind Monaco Attack Over Tycoon’s Plan To Expose Corruption (TASS)

Last week’s bombing attack in Monaco was carried out by Vladimir Zelensky’s special services as Ukrainian oligarch Vadim Yermolayev was planning to expose Kiev’s corruption schemes, Viktor Medvedchuk, head of the Different Ukraine movement and former leader of the banned Opposition Platform – For Life party, told TASS. “Western media immediately saw the link between the attack on businessmen Yermolayev and the regime of Zelensky, who sought to keep him quiet. Yermolayev was planning to address the European Parliament and explose corruption schemes in Ukraine, a scenario that would have spelt a disaster for the Kiev regime ahead of the NATO summit,” the politician explained.

Namely, active officers of the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) have been implicated in the attack, Medvedchuk said. “The detained suspects in the murder of Anastasia Berezovskaya, 39, the individual wanted by Interpol for the attempted assassination of businessman Vadim Yermolayev in Monaco, are Ukrainian security officers,” he said. One of them, according to Medvedchuk, is Vladislav Reut, 33, a native of Zhitomir, who has served with Ukraine’s Main Intelligence Directorate (GUR). And the other detainee is Vitaly Zhikovich, 49, from Uman, who served for Kiev Region police until 2020. “We are talking about a special operation carried out by [Ukrainian] security officers and orchestrated by the criminal regime of Zelensky,” Medvedchuk stressed.
On June 29, an explosion occurred in the entrance of an apartment building in Monaco. According to BFMTV, one of the three injured was Yermolayev, a citizen of Cyprus, whom the media included on the list of the wealthiest Ukrainian businessmen. It was reported that he owned a network of fraudulent call centers in Ukraine. Yermolayev renounced his Ukrainian citizenship in 2019. In 2023, Kiev imposed sanctions against him.

“Reaching a truce with Russia will prompt “all” Ukrainian men to flee the country, while the West will forget Kiev, the head of corruption scandal-plagued firm Fire Point has claimed..”

• Ceasefire Worst-Case Scenario For Ukraine – Zelensky’s Favorite Arms Maker (RT)

A ceasefire with Russia would be the “worst-case scenario” for Ukraine, threatening the country’s statehood, the head of Vladimir Zelensky’s favorite arms manufacturer, Fire Point, has said. Denis Shtilerman made the remarks in an interview with Ukrainian outlet LIGAnet published on Wednesday. The company, which has recently been embroiled in a number of corruption scandals, stands to profit from the conflict. Shtilerman argued that the fighting should continue regardless, insisting that a truce with Russia would leave Ukraine in an even worse position.

He also questioned whether Kiev’s Western backers would honor any security commitments made as part of a ceasefire. “Look, if a truce is reached, it would – most regrettably – be the worst-case scenario for our state. We must remember how the US and other countries treat their obligations,” Shtilerman said. “I am talking about international agreements in which they guarantee the territorial integrity and independence of other states. And what do we see? Nothing.” Shtilerman also said Kiev would be abandoned and forgotten by its backers if a ceasefire is reached – echoing Russian officials who have warned that Ukraine is only useful for the West as a tool against Russia.
“If there is any kind of truce, we will be forgotten very quickly. There will be no investment appeal – there will be no money here. The borders will open, and all the men will leave. After that, the Russians will come in and seize the country,” Shtilerman said. Fire Point, which originally operated as a film scouting agency owned by Zelensky’s associates, has emerged as a ‘miracle’ player in Ukraine’s defense sector, producing an array of long-range drones and missiles used to strike deep into Russia. The company has been actively promoted by the Ukrainian leader during his regular overseas trips and has reportedly secured contracts worth up to $1 billion in a matter of months.
The image of the company has been damaged by the corruption scandal related to Zelensky’s inner circle and his former close associate Timur Mindich, the central figure in an alleged $100 million corruption scheme in the energy sector. Surveillance recordings recently published in Ukrainian media suggest Mindich effectively controlled Fire Point while enjoying preferential treatment from then-Defense Minister Rustem Umerov.

“If bloc members continue to ramp up their spending, they will eat themselves from the inside, and Russia won’t have to lift a finger ..”

• NATO Is Spending Itself Into Oblivion (Scott Ritter)

On the eve of this week’s NATO summit in Ankara, Türkiye, the bloc released a report titled ‘Defense Expenditure of NATO Countries (2014-2025)’. On the surface, the report shows a staggering increase in the level of defense spending by several NATO members over the course of the previous decade, with Lithuania leading the way with an increase of some 777%. In aggregate, NATO members, in seeking to meet the 2% GDP threshold for defense spending set by the US a decade ago, has seen a $1.364 trillion increase in the money invested in the militaries of the respective members over the past decade. That’s a lot of money.

Two questions emerge from this data: First (and foremost), has this increase led to any qualitative or quantitative advantage on the part of NATO over Russia? And second, can NATO members sustain this kind of growth in defense expenditures over the course of the next decade? It must be understood that the NATO of 2014 was very much an empty shell when it came to meaningful projection of military power. Over-reliant upon the US for its core defense needs since the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, NATO had become a shadow of its former self, a far cry from the cutting-edge military organization that had been built up in the decade of the 1980s.
The reality is that despite the massive increase in defense spending, NATO’s military capabilities were not advanced in any meaningful fashion over the course of the past decade. This has become evident as NATO has, in the past few years, discussed the potential of deploying military forces on Ukrainian soil as part of any peacekeeping arrangement, should the Russia-Ukraine conflict reach a negotiated conclusion. It became obvious that the ‘big three’ European powers (France, the UK, and Germany) lacked any meaningful ability to project sustainable military power of any appreciable strength into Ukraine. This remains the assessment today.
Most of NATO defense expenditure has been in the form of sustaining an aging, decrepit system out of touch with the reality of modern conflict. And to the degree modernization has taken place, it has simply replaced an aging equipment set within a legacy system tied down in Cold War-era doctrine with a newer equipment set still hamstrung by tactics and operational theory ill-suited for the modern battlefield. Germany’s ill-fated decision to create a one-off fund of €100 billion ($114 billion) in 2022 to help revive a flagging Bundeswehr stands as a case in point regarding the efficacy of much of NATO’s defense spending over the course of the past decade – by 2025 the fund had run out, with little or nothing to show for it.
Russia. Ukraine has fielded the most capable non-Russian military in Europe today, and its forces are being bled white in the kind of war of attrition NATO forces could never survive. In short, the $1.34 trillion that NATO has spent in increased defense expenditures since 2014 has left the bloc treading water. NATO’s task is to build and sustain a modern military capable of fighting a modern enemy, such as Russia.
In this, NATO has failed. The next question is can NATO spend its way out of its current predicament? On paper, the answer is a heavily caveated ‘yes’. Anything is possible, in theory, if one is willing to throw enough money at the problem. But NATO’s problems are systemic in nature and tied to events it is not in control of. NATO has found itself engaged in a proxy war with Russia that compels it to divert valuable military resources – fiscal and material – to Ukraine, which has become a giant furnace which consumes all that is fed into it without advancing the problem favorably vis-à-vis Russia.
But money doesn’t grow on trees, and at the end of the day the NATO appetite for war will far outstrip the ability of its constituent membership to pay the bill. Military industrial capacity is lacking across the board, and the costs associated with fixing this deficit are prohibitively high. So, too, are the costs associated with the kind of massive military expansions being considered by nations such as Germany, which seeks to triple the size of its armed forces by 2029.
Even if the money were available for such an endeavor, the public appetite for supporting and sustaining this kind of expanded military infrastructure is lacking. The more Germany – and by extension, Western Europe – pours into defense, the more alienated society becomes, creating domestic political problems for those seeking massive increases in defense spending. In short, NATO is spending itself into oblivion.
While Russia cannot afford to remain stagnant in the face of increased NATO defense expenditures, especially when such increases are tied to increasingly bellicose statements about the potential for war between Russia and NATO in the coming years, the fact is the NATO defense expenditure phenomenon is a self-containing problem, meaning the bloc’s ability to continue defense expenditures at the present rate of growth will more than likely lead to the political and economic collapse of the individuals and political parties which currently advocate in support of such policies. All Russia really needs to do is keep the Ukrainian furnace burning, and NATO will consume itself.

“Moscow’s goodwill toward Western-backed negotiations has been exhausted, the foreign minister says..”

• Russia No Longer Believes West Wants Ukraine Peace Talks – Lavrov (RT)

Moscow no longer believes the West is genuinely interested in negotiating an end to the Ukraine conflict, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov has said. Speaking at a news conference with Mozambican Foreign Minister Maria Manuela Lucas in Maputo, Lavrov accused the West of “imitating a willingness to negotiate while openly issuing ultimatums to Russia.” He argued that although the West has been calling for talks, it has spent more than a decade undermining every attempt to reach a peaceful resolution between Russia and Ukraine.

“In 2022, Russia and Ukraine had already reached a negotiated settlement. It was undermined by the very same West, openly and publicly,” Lavrov said. “We will no longer believe the West when it claims to want negotiated solutions. Our reserve of goodwill and hope has been exhausted once and for all.” Russia insists that the conflict has its roots in the 2014 Western-backed coup in Kiev and subsequent attempts by the new Ukrainian government to suppress the rebellion in Donbass by force. Ukraine later failed to implement the 2014-2015 Minsk agreements, which were intended to reintegrate the breakaway regions into Ukraine by granting them broad autonomy through comprehensive political reform.
Former German Chancellor Angela Merkel and former French President Francois Hollande, who mediated the Minsk talks in Belarus alongside Russia, later said that Kiev used the Minsk agreements to buy time to rebuild its military and economy. Lavrov argued that their remarks show the guarantees provided by France and Germany were “false.” According to Russian President Vladimir Putin, during peace talks in Istanbul in 2022, Ukrainian negotiators initially agreed to drop plans to join NATO in favor of neutrality and to limit the country’s armed forces, but later walked away from the negotiations under pressure from then-UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson.
While Johnson denied that he sabotaged the talks, he acknowledged in a 2024 interview with the Wall Street Journal that he had “thought that any deal with Putin was going to be pretty sordid.” Former US Undersecretary of state Victoria Nuland similarly said in 2024 that Washington advised Ukraine to not agree to Russia’s terms in Istanbul. US-mediated negotiations have also stalled in recent months as President Donald Trump has focused on the war with Iran. Russia has said it is ready to resume the talks at any time, provided that they are focused on addressing the “root causes” of the conflict, including Ukraine’s plans to join NATO.

“Escalation against Russia does not guarantee a peaceful resolution, Czech Prime Minister Andrej Babis has warned..”

• ‘We Are Not At War’ – Czech PM Questions Bloc’s Ukraine Strategy (RT)

The Czech Republic remains skeptical about NATO’s strategy of continued military support for Ukraine, to which it does not contribute financially, Prime Minister Andrej Babis said as he left the bloc leaders’ summit in Ankara, Türkiye on Wednesday. Babis’ party won last year’s election on a nationalist platform that included reversing the Ukraine aid policy championed by his predecessor, Petr Fiala, and urging a diplomatic resolution of the conflict with Russia instead. The declaration approved by NATO leaders in Ankara this week highlighted a pledge of €70 billion ($80 billion) in military equipment, assistance and training for Ukraine in 2026, with a similar amount expected the following year.

Czech Prime Minister Andrej Babis speaks to press ahead of a NATO summit in Ankara. July 8

The money is not a new package, but rather past commitments, including the European Union’s “loan” approved in April. The Czech Republic, Hungary, and Slovakia opted out of the mechanism.”We are not at war. Ukraine is at war,” Babis told reporters on Wednesday, when asked whether NATO’s increasing spending would pressure Moscow to negotiate, adding, “I don’t know, time will tell.” The prime minister said discussions during the summit focused on weapons rather than peace.Babis said the Czech Republic intended to reach the required NATO level of 2% of GDP level for military spending next year, but also needed money for healthcare, raising police salaries, and other domestic priorities.

Kremlin calls US backing of Ukrainian escalation delusional
Ukraine is seeking additional Western funding to ramp up long-range kamikaze drone attacks on Russian oil refineries, tankers and other targets. During a US-Ukrainian meeting on the sidelines of the NATO summit, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio claimed the escalation “creates the space to negotiate the end of this war,” with President Donald Trump endorsing his reasoning. Commenting on the American remarks on Thursday, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said the US leadership was basing its policy on “delusions that escalation and military pressure leads to a peaceful settlement track.” The a proach may prolong hostilities, but would also prompt Russia to “create a bigger buffer zone” with Ukraine, he warned.
Czech coalition strained by aid payment
The aid issue caused tensions in the Czech ruling coalition just before the summit, after Foreign Minister Petr Macinka announced the transfer of an unspecified sum to PURL, a NATO fund through which European members pay for American weapons intended for Kiev. Parliament speaker Tomio Okamura, a vocal critic of Ukraine, blasted the move for going against the coalition agreement, but Babis sided with Macinka, saying the money had been allocated by the Fiala government and could not be returned to the budget. The prime minister said the one-off small contribution to purchase interceptor drones was preferable to a direct transfer to the Ukrainian government.

“The private-equity takeover of the Pentagon..”

• The Men Who Own the War Now Run It (Antiwar)

There was a time when the arms dealer waited in the corridor. He financed the campaign, endowed the think tank, took the general to dinner, and hoped the man inside the office would remember him when the contract came up. The wall between the money and the decision was thin, often corrupt, but it was there. Someone held the public trust, and someone else tried to buy it, and you could at least tell the two apart. That wall is gone. The financier no longer waits in the corridor. He holds the office. He signs the checks. He is the buyer and the seller, the regulator and the regulated, the public interest and the private portfolio, fused into a single man in a single suit, and the arrangement is entirely legal, which is the whole problem.

One of these men may already be familiar from a previous article. His name is Friedrich Merz.
The chancellor was the warm-up act
From 2016 to 2020, Merz chaired the supervisory board of BlackRock’s German arm, the local office of the largest pool of private capital on earth – a fact confirmed, without embarrassment, by his own party’s foundation. Then he climbed back into politics, and in March 2025, as chancellor-in-waiting, he drove through the outgoing Bundestag — deliberately before the newly elected parliament could convene – the constitutional amendment that exempted defense spending from Germany’s debt brake. The borrowing limit Germans had treated as sacred since 2009 was gone. German military spending rose 24 percent in a single year to $114 billion, the largest in NATO Europe, and BlackRock held stakes in the very contractors – Rheinmetall, Hensoldt – that the money would flow toward.
He broke no law. He simply spent four years learning, from the inside, how the machinery paid out, and then went and pulled the lever. The arrangement was a particular kind that no scandal quite captures, because nothing in it is hidden. It sits in plain view, in regulatory filings and procurement requests, and it works precisely because everyone involved can say, truthfully, that they broke no rule. It reads as a German problem only until you cross the Atlantic. There the same face turns up in an American suit, several of them, installed not adjacent to the war machine but at its controls.
The banker who became the Navy
Consider John Phelan, who until March 2025 had no connection to the military beyond a seat on a charity board. His career was money: he co-founded MSD Capital, the private investment firm that managed the personal fortune of Michael Dell, and later founded his own firm, Rugger Management. He gave Trump’s joint fundraising committee $834,600 in April 2024. Months later he was nominated to run the United States Navy, and in March he was confirmed, handed a $263.5 billion budget and command of nearly a million sailors and Marines.
Before his confirmation, Senator Elizabeth Warren wrote to him about the obvious. He had recently earned over $5 million in capital gains from Palantir, a defense-software contractor that took in $541 million from the Pentagon in fiscal 2024 alone, and whose relationships Phelan’s own acquisition vehicle had once advertised. She asked him to divest his defense holdings and to recuse himself, for four years, from matters touching his former clients and employers, noting that a dozen Biden appointees had voluntarily gone beyond what the ethics laws required. Phelan declined to make the stronger commitment. He was confirmed anyway, 62 to 30, with eleven Democrats joining every Republican in the room.
The man overseeing the Navy’s shipbuilding budget was, weeks earlier, a private investor with money in the companies the Navy buys from. Nobody hid it. It was printed in his disclosures and read aloud at his hearing, and it changed nothing.
The private-equity takeover of the Pentagon
Phelan is the modest case. The full expression of the thing sits one floor up, in the office of the deputy secretary of defense, where Stephen Feinberg runs the day-to-day of the entire department. Feinberg co-founded Cerberus Capital Management and led it for thirty-three years; in his own sworn testimony to the Senate he put the firm’s portfolio at over $65 billion. He was a major Trump donor, and by the time he was confirmed in March 2025 he was, at a listed minimum net worth of $2 billion, the wealthiest official in the administration. What he has built since is not influence over the Pentagon. It is ownership of its investment arm.
Feinberg has surrounded himself with a circle of advisers drawn from his old firm. The group includes former Cerberus managing director John Gallagher and a deal team led by Cerberus alumnus George Kollitides – who was, until 2015, chairman and chief executive of Remington, the gunmaker Cerberus owned. Industry executives nicknamed the squad “Deal Team Six,” a joke on the SEAL unit that killed bin Laden, and Kollitides told a Milken Institute audience he found the name both fun and fitting while explaining that economic warfare has been a part of all successful nations for thousands of years. A Stanford professor watching this described it plainly: private equity has just acquired its largest organization.
The organization it acquired writes checks the size of nations. Under Feinberg, the Pentagon stopped merely buying weapons and began buying companies. It took a $400 million preferred-equity stake in the rare-earth miner MP Materials, enough to make the United States government the firm’s largest single shareholder at roughly 15 percent – ahead, as it happens, of BlackRock. It put $1 billion into an L3Harris rocket-motor unit slated to go public in 2026. Stakes in Trilogy Metals, Vulcan Elements, and ReElement Technologies followed, a portfolio that a group of House members warned was locking federal policy to the fortunes of individual firms – picking winners, and by definition creating losers.

“.. some European officials are questioning why they were even invited, as they don’t see left-wing terrorism as a threat to their countries..”

• A Rubio Summit That Saves the World? (Sarah Anderson)

I didn’t receive an invitation and most of you probably didn’t either, but Secretary of State Marco Rubio has invited the foreign ministers and other senior officials from over 60 countries to Washington, D.C. next week for a summit. The goal? To combat the “resurgence of transnational far-left terrorism,” according to Washington Post reporters who say they saw documents related to the matter. The documents make it “clear that the focus is on ‘far-left terrorists,’ who, the note says, are ‘increasingly turning to organized, deadly violence to advance their political objectives.'” As the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) reports, “In recent years, the United States has seen an increase in the number of left-wing terrorism attacks and plots.” In 2025, far-left terrorist attacks outnumbered those from the far-right. Here’s more:

More contentious politics in the United States and the expansion of the Make America Great Again (MAGA) movement appear to have reenergized violent left-wing extremists. The left-wing movement as a whole has not returned to its violent heights of the 1960s and 1970s, but the number of terrorist incidents involving left-wing extremists so far this year puts 2025 on pace to be the left’s most violent year in more than three decades. Moreover, 2025 marks the first time in more than 30 years that left-wing attacks outnumber those from the far right.
Unlike the highly structured far-left groups of the past, modern far-left and anarchist extremism relies heavily on decentralized, cross-border networking that is often organized online. Both U.S. and European intelligence agencies have pointed to growing coordination between decentralized Antifa and Antifa-like networks and European autonomous groups, especially surrounding major global events. This often leads to riots, arson, attacks on law enforcement, attacks on infrastructure and symbols of capitalism, and destruction of public and private property. News of the summit comes after the Trump administration released its counterterrorism strategy in May of this year.
While the strategy prioritizes hemispheric threats, like cartels, gangs, and other designated Foreign Terrorist Organizations that operate in the Americas, as well as Islamic terrorist groups, our national counterterrorism activities will also “prioritize the rapid identification and neutralization of violent secular political groups whose ideology is anti-American, radically pro-transgender, and anarchist. We will use all the tools constitutionally available to us to map them at home, identify their membership, map their ties to international organizations like Antifa, and use law enforcement tools to cripple them operationally before they can maim or kill the innocent. We will do the same with the state sponsors of such groups and those governments undertaking lethal plots on U.S. soil or against Americans anywhere.”
But it sounds like we’re not stopping here at home. This ministerial Rubio is hosting will help strengthen cooperation in intelligence-sharing and law enforcement between nations that want to eradicate crime. The countries included in the invitations were most of Europe, some of Asia, and many nations from the Western Hemisphere.
Of course, as with anything the Trump administration does, there is some blowback. According to the Washington Post, some European officials are questioning why they were even invited, as they don’t see left-wing terrorism as a threat to their countries. Domestically, there is some concern that expanding counterterrorism activities against these groups could create a slippery slope for dealing with political activists, as well as create an opportunity for the next Democrat who becomes president to go after conservatives, even though the Trump administration’s strategy specifically states, “our counterterrorism powers will not be used to target our fellow Americans who simply disagree with us.”
State Department spokesman Tommy Pigott said that far-left terrorism is “an old threat re-emerging with strong transnational links and new convergences,” according to the Post. He added, “Because this threat has not been adequately addressed in the past, each engagement, designation, or security assistance program creates a compounding effect supporting countermeasures at home and abroad.” Now, Trump and Rubio are attempting to adequately address it.
Does this sound ambitions? Yes. Is it necessary? Also, yes. It’s about time someone treats left-wing extremism and chaos as the transnational threat that it is. And if Rubio and Donald Trump’s Shield of the Americas summit in March was any indicator, this won’t be just some boring diplomatic meeting that’s all talk and no action. We’ve seen the Shield in action several times in just a few short months. It will be interesting to see exactly who shows up to this summit next week.

“.. repeatedly raping a 10-year-old girl: “a cultural thing.” “It’s a Constitutional Thing”

Thanks Marco. Screw you, Walz.

• Rubio Deports Convicted Rapist Protected by Walz (Turley)

Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz has failed in his extraordinary effort to protect a Laotian rapist from deportation. Secretary of State Marco Rubio has confirmed that he revoked Tue Lue Vang’s legal status and removed him from the United States. After repeatedly raping a 10-year-old girl between 2002 and 2004, Vang insisted it was “a cultural thing.” Well, this is a “constitutional thing” that the Secretary of State, not the Governor of Minnesota, determines who may remain in the United States after such a serious offense.

He was convicted in 2006 of first-degree criminal sexual conduct. A Department of Justice (DOJ) Immigration Judge issued Vang a final order of removal on October 31, 2006 after his conviction. Minnesota’s Board of Pardons, composed of Walz, state Attorney General Keith Ellison, and state Chief Justice Natalie Hudson, granted his clemency. (They noted that the victim wrote a letter on his behalf.) They also pardoned another Laotian criminal illegal alien — a convicted armed robber — before he could be deported. At the time, Walz wrongly referred to Vang as a “citizen”:
“I can find no reason how Minnesota will be safer or better if Mr. Vang is deported to a country he has not been to since he was a child.I do not see how it would serve his family, nor the economic interest where we have a taxpaying citizen who is creating job growth and living a life free from any criminal activity. Rubio told Fox News: “Just weeks ago, a foreign child rapist was freed to once again endanger America’s children after receiving a pardon from Minnesota Governor Tim Walz. Tue Lue Vang admitted to committing heinous crimes against a 10-year-old girl in Minnesota. He attempted to pay his victim for her silence and dismissed his acts of child abuse as a ‘minor thing.’
Just days before he was scheduled to be deported, the Minnesota Governor pardoned him, setting him free to endanger American families once again.” He added, “Americans should never have to live in fear that foreign sex predators — shielded from deportation by their own elected officials — could endanger them or their children.” Vang was convicted in 2006 of first-degree criminal sexual conduct. He repeatedly raped the girl between 2002 and 2004, and told authorities after he was arrested that “it is a cultural thing…to marry and have sex with girls as young as 12.” Rubio told Fox News Digital, “Americans should never have to live in fear that foreign sex predators — shielded from deportation by their own elected officials — could endanger them or their children.”
Vang’s use of Laotian culture was notable for some of us who have spoken or written about “the cultural defense.” I have long drawn the line in the use of the cultural defense on such violent acts. However, troubling outliers remain in the cases. In January 1985, Japanese immigrant Fumiko Kimura tried to commit oyako-shinju (or parent-child suicide) after learning of her husband’s infidelity. She walked her infant daughter and 4-year-old son in the frigid ocean off Santa Monica. The children drowned, but she was rescued. While she had lived in the United States for some 14 years, she claimed the cultural defense (even though oyako-shinju is illegal in Japan). She was successful.
Kimura received just one year in jail and five years’ probation. She then reunited with her husband. There have been several cases involving “marriage by capture.” We have had some cases related to the custom of zij poj niam, particularly in relation to the Hmong culture, where a man abducts a woman he intends to marry and takes her to his family home. The woman is expected to resist as a sign of her virtue. In a prior case, Kong Moua, a Hmong tribesman, drove to the Fresno City College campus and kidnapped a young woman from her job in the student finance office. She took her to his cousin’s house, but the Hmong woman did not believe in the cultural practice and called police.
Charged with rape and kidnapping, the defense successfully claimed the cultural defense. It secured a lesser charge of false imprisonment, and then the judge sentenced Kong Moua to just 120 days in jail and fined him $1,000, with only $900 of that going to the victim as reparations. It is unclear whether Vang was making such a claim, but most judges would reject it. The effort by Walz to keep him in the United States was equally dubious as a constitutional matter.

“How did a popular American writer of the 1940s come up with a novel that accurately portrayed the activities and historical role of Elon Musk as a pioneer in the exploitation of space?”

• Elon Foretold – The Man Who Sold the Moon (J.R. Dunn)

Nobody in the 1850s ever wrote a novel about a man who changes society by figuring out how to mass-produce horseless carriages. Similarly, nobody a century later wrote the story of the man who turns the world upside down by building miniature electronic brains in his garage. So how did a popular American writer of the 1940s come up with a novel that accurately portrayed the activities and historical role of Elon Musk as a pioneer in the exploitation of space? That man was Robert A. Heinlein, and his book, published in 1950, was titled The Man Who Sold the Moon.

Sci-fi has largely been a despised and dismissed genre, with some reason. It started out as pure pulp (at least in this country; in the UK, largely thanks to H.G. Wells, it was a serious and respected genre, with most writers producing a sci-fi novel at one time or another). The prose in U.S. sci-fi was subliterate. Characterization was nonexistent, consisting of types – the eccentric scientist, the stalwart space skipper, the evil space pirate, etc. Plots were minimal at best. The writers were either nerds or hacks. The editors were bottom of the barrel, and the readers didn’t care. (They still don’t.) The genre needed a serious shake-up, and at the beginning of the 1940s, that’s just what it got.
Robert A. Heinlein was a former naval officer, ex-mine owner, and ex-political operative forced into writing by illness. He was the farthest thing in the world from a hack. Internationally traveled, vastly erudite in a number of fields, and widely read, Heinlein was well aware of the stagnant status of sci-fi. John W. Campbell, editor of the unfortunately named Astounding Science Fiction, had long been on the watch for a writer capable of breaking up the logjam in the field. Heinlein filled that role and more. Within months, he was leading the genre. Within a couple of years, the primitives were gone, and those who remained were trying to match Heinlein.
As a writer, Heinlein was methodical – both in artistic and professional senses. He was devoted to realism, no easy trick when writing sci-fi. He dropped the generic space-opera settings of the 30s, instead compiling a chart of possible historical events involving the U.S. over the next two centuries to serve as a consistent background for his work. Heinlein later said that he simply extrapolated current trends into the future. All the same, the accuracy of some of the chart’s predictions is spooky. One prime example: the 1960s is labeled “The Crazy Years.”
The Man Who Sold the Moon was one of the keystone novels of the Future History sequence. It dealt with a 21st-century business magnate named Delos D. Harriman, who is convinced that exploitation of space is the next step and intends to put the U.S. on the moon in a big way. In this fictional world – so unlike our own – there is activity in space, but it’s limited strictly to Earth orbit. (I’m not sure that they have a space station that enables Democrat pols to take publicity trips.)
Harriman liquidates his holdings and obtains loans and contributions from other businessmen, using every possible goad and gimmick. (In one case, he shows up at the office of a commie-hating executive wearing a hammer-and-sickle button on his lapel: “From where you’re sitting, this is the exact size of the moon seen from earth.”) He oversees every aspect of the project from the design of the rocket to the training of the crew, overcoming obstacles, fighting lawsuits and government interference.
Harriman is up to his ears in debt, under fire over various scams he’s pulled along the way (One concerns USPO envelopes supposed to be canceled on the moon to be sold to collectors that may or may not have actually been on the ship. This will bring a smile of recognition to those who recall the Apollo 15 postage “scandal.”) At last, the rocket is ready. It lifts off, headed for the bright strand of Lune. …and it all goes perfectly. The ship lands, spends a short time on the surface, and returns to Earth, to the expected outcry from cranks claiming it was all a hoax. But Harriman pays no attention. He’s completing an even larger rocket, one that will set up an actual base on the lunar surface.
The book ends with Harriman watching that one lift off. He’d wanted to be aboard himself, but corporate board members, with so much investment money riding on the program’s success, wouldn’t allow it. Harriman was the key man, and if he was lost, everything else would go with him. There would be many other flights, and he would surely be aboard one of those…. But one of his associates, watching him, whispers, “He reminds me of Moses, gazing out over the promised land.” Moses, of course, never entered Israel himself, only resting his eyes on it from a distance.

“Witness list expanding in multi -conspiracy probe out of Fort Pierce. . . .” Paul Sperry, Real Clear investigations.

• Scenario (James Howard Kunstler)

Seth Rich, when he was alive, at his leisure

The scene: February of 2027, a federal courtroom in Stuart (Martin County), Florida, the third day of trial in the RussiaGate matter. Defendants seated on the right (from the judge’s vantage) are so numerous they require two tables, including John Brennan, James Comey, James Clapper, Andrew McCabe, Rod Rosenstein, Strzok & Page, Bruce Ohr, Lisa Monaco, Mary McCord, Christopher Wray, Marc Elias, and seven other former federal officials.

Former President Barack Obama and former Sec’y of State Hillary Clinton, named as “unindicted co-conspirators,” are not present in the courtroom for the sake of decorum. Former MI6 agent, the slippery Christopher Steele, purveyor of the infamous “dossier,” is on-the-lam, whereabouts unknown. The charges against the bunch are Seditious Conspiracy (18 U.S. Code § 2384), Conspiracy to Obstruct Justice (18 U.S.C. §§ 1503, 1512, 1519), Conspiracy Against Rights / Deprivation of Rights Under Color of Law (18 U.S.C. §§ 241, 242), Perjury (18 U.S.C. § 1621), Concealment (18 U.S.C. § 1001).
At 10:00 a.m., a “surprise” witness is ushered into the room. Gasps erupt from all angles. The witness is immediately identified by his snow-white hair and beard. Everybody sees it is Julian Assange. He is a surprise witness for security reasons. He has been flown from Sydney to New Delhi to Frankfurt, and finally to Miami in a US government airplane, the lone passenger.
Recall: in June 2024, Assange reached a plea deal with the US DOJ: guilty on one count of conspiring to obtain and disclose classified US national defense information. He was sentenced to sixty-two months (time served), crediting the approximately five years he had already spent in Britain’s Belmarsh prison while fighting extradition — but not counting the six years and ten months he was holed-up before that in the Ecuadorian embassy in London. There was no additional jail time, supervision, or financial penalty.
Assange is sworn and seated, led through preliminary questions as to his identity, place of residence, his former occupation running the news service known as Wikileaks, blah blah. The prosecuting federal attorney will now turn to the subject of one Seth Rich — remember him? The twenty-seven-year-old was working for the Democratic National Committee (DNC) in 2016 as Voter Expansion Data Director. At 4:00 a.m. July 10, 2016, Rich was found dead, shot twice in the back, on Flagler Place NW, in the Bloomingdale neighborhood of Washington, D.C., in what police called “a botched robbery.”
Rather bizarrely from a police procedural standpoint, Rich’s wallet, stuffed with money, his watch, and his cell phone remained on his person. Only his laptop was taken in the “robbery.” It has been a “cold,” unsolved case all these years. Sometime before the murder, as early as Spring 2016, well before the Democratic party’s nominating convention, Assange’s Wikileaks received a large packet of information containing as many as 58,000 emails hacked out of the account of John Podesta, Hillary Clinton’s campaign chairman.
The emails detailed many curious machinations inside the DNC that year, including sketchy efforts underway to derail Clinton’s rival, Bernie Sanders, excerpts from Clinton’s paid private Wall Street speeches (e.g., to Goldman Sachs), references to Clinton’s health problems, her private email server issue, various Clinton foundation dealings, and a lot of strange chatter about “pizza” and other mundane food items that would eventually spawn the “PizzaGate” story alluding to alleged child sex cult activities centered around John Podesta and his brother Tony. It was quite a juicy load. But Wikileaks sat on it until just before the election. That spring and summer, Hillary was already laboring under the scandal about the private email server she had set up in her suburban Chappaqua, NY, home.
She had apparently used it casually when she ran the State Department to conduct official government business, including classified information, instead of her official government email address. That itself was against the law, apart from what else the content of the Podesta email trove revealed. The FBI had been working the server case that spring, and just weeks before the convention, FBI Director Jim Comey made a big public show of exonerating Hillary, declaring incorrectly that he declined to prosecute — since it is not the FBI’s job to prosecute, only investigate, and for the DOJ to actually decide whether to prosecute. But he did add for the record that her doings had been “extremely careless.”

“As Germany’s public debt expands, the dynamics of its sovereign bond market are beginning to change.”

• Germany’s Debt Crisis Crescendos (Thomas Kolbe)

As Germany’s public debt expands, the dynamics of its sovereign bond market are beginning to change. On Wednesday, the placement of new German government debt came close to failure for the first time. Only the intervention of Germany’s Finance Agency prevented a more serious outcome. Germany’s descent into the league of heavily indebted nations is unfolding at breathtaking speed. A brief chronology of recent events illustrates the trend. Last Friday, Finance Minister Lars Klingbeil presented the key parameters of the federal budget for 2027. Federal spending is set to increase by €30 billion to €555 billion, roughly six percent more than the previous year. Unsurprisingly, the country’s borrowing requirements are rising at a similar pace.

On Monday, the minister spoke at length about supposedly advanced fiscal consolidation efforts. Taken in its original meaning, fiscal consolidation implies placing meaningful constraints on excessive government spending and at least slowing the pace of fiscal deterioration. Wednesday’s events in the bond market demonstrated precisely the opposite. What happened around midday was close to unprecedented in modern German public finance. During the auction of new federal bonds, Germany came dangerously close to a failed issuance. Only the intervention of the German Finance Agency, the institution responsible for issuing federal debt, prevented a more severe market signal.
What happened? bSeeking additional liquidity, Germany attempted to issue €6 billion of ten-year federal bonds. Under normal circumstances, such auctions are routine affairs. Pension funds, insurers, banks and hedge funds require high-quality sovereign debt to manage their balance sheets and diversify portfolios.This auction proved very different. At a yield of 3.09 percent, bids totaled only €4.022 billion. Ultimately, merely €3.902 billion was actually allocated. Roughly €2.1 billion, around 35 percent of the intended issuance, remained unsold, forcing the Finance Agency itself to absorb the excess supply temporarily.
Had the auction failed outright, the consequences could have been considerably more severe. A failed sovereign auction sends a powerful shock signal through financial markets and can trigger broader bond sell-offs and sharp increases in borrowing costs. That this did not occur is largely thanks to institutions such as the German Finance Agency and the European Central Bank — the intervention fire brigade of European capital markets — which can temporarily mask unsustainable fiscal policies by absorbing excess sovereign debt.
The auction’s bid-to-cover ratio, measuring demand relative to supply, fell to a worrying 0.7. Nor was this the first problematic auction in July. Already on July 1, Germany’s issuance of seven-year federal bonds encountered similar difficulties. In that case as well, the Finance Agency intervened by retaining roughly one quarter of the offering instead of the customary ten percent normally withheld to provide liquidity in the secondary market. Primary Dealers, which constitute the first line of absorption for newly issued sovereign debt within the euro area’s financial architecture, were evidently unwilling to absorb the full volume.
Could this represent the first signs of growing market turbulence caused by Germany’s rapidly expanding debt burden? By the end of this year, Germany’s official debt-to-GDP ratio is expected to approach 70 percent. Including the government’s various off-budget special funds, the effective figure already moves toward 80 percent. Unfunded liabilities embedded in Germany’s social insurance systems — particularly the statutory pension system — amount to several multiples of annual GDP.
None of this is extraordinary in today’s world of highly indebted governments. The United States currently carries a debt ratio near 125 percent of GDP. However, the world’s largest economy possesses considerably greater economic resilience than Germany, whose competitiveness has been weakened by years of costly energy policies. Globally, average sovereign debt now stands around 95 percent of GDP, roughly comparable to the euro area.

The final solution: “..the bloc plans to phase out new petrol and diesel cars by 2035..”

Europe had a great car industry for 100 years.

• What’s Driving Europe’s Auto Industry Crisis? (RT)

European carmakers are facing one of the toughest crises in their history. Plant closures, layoffs, and shrinking profits have become increasingly common as Chinese electric vehicle manufacturers continue to expand their global footprint. German luxury carmaker Porsche has become the latest victim. The company is expected to cut an additional 4,000 jobs, the Handelsblatt newspaper reported on Monday. In March, the sports car manufacturer reported a 93% drop in operating profits following a costly pivot away from its long-term EV strategy.

But these setbacks are only part of the story. Behind them lies a combination of soaring energy costs, mounting regulatory pressure, shifting supply chains, and intensifying international competition that is reshaping one of the region’s most important industries. Since the Covid-19 pandemic and the global semiconductor shortage, European carmakers have been battered by weakening consumer demand and persistently high production costs, largely driven by elevated energy prices. The slump is evident in sales. Across the EU, new car registrations in 2025 remained nearly 30% below 2019 levels, while the UK market also failed to recover to its pre-pandemic performance.
At the same time, expensive energy has left European manufacturers at a competitive disadvantage compared with many rivals in Asia and North America. The strain is already triggering deep restructuring across the industry. Volkswagen, Mercedes-Benz, and BMW have announced job cuts and cost-cutting measures; Stellantis has reduced output at several European plants, particularly in Italy; Renault is continuing its restructuring in France; and the UK has seen factory closures as manufacturers struggle to contain rising costs.
Which countries have been hardest hit?
The crisis is weighing most heavily on countries where the automotive industry is a major source of jobs and economic growth. In 2019, the sector supported around 13.8 million jobs – 6.1% of total EU employment – and accounted for more than 7% of the bloc’s GDP. Germany has been hit hardest, with the industry shedding around 125,000 jobs since 2019. In France, automotive employment has fallen by roughly a third since 2010, dropping from about 425,000 to fewer than 290,000 workers. In Italy, the wider manufacturing sector has lost more than 103,000 jobs since 2008, while a further 12,650 automotive positions are considered at risk.
Spain also remains heavily reliant on vehicle exports, while the Czech Republic, Slovakia, and Hungary are even more exposed, with much of their industrial output dependent on foreign-owned carmakers. As a result, even relatively small production cuts can have an outsized impact on jobs and regional economies. Outside the EU, the UK also remains vulnerable. Although its automotive sector is smaller, it still supports around 200,000 manufacturing jobs and some 800,000 positions across the wider industry.
How much of the problem stems from energy prices?
Energy costs have become one of the key structural pressures on Europe’s auto industry. After the disruption of traditional energy flows, the shift away from relatively cheap Russian pipeline gas has increased reliance on more expensive alternatives, including liquefied natural gas (LNG) imports from the US. For an energy-intensive sector such as automotive production – where steel, aluminium, chemicals, and battery materials are essential inputs – this has raised costs across the entire value chain.
The impact extends beyond final assembly plants. Suppliers of metals, plastics, and battery cells have also faced higher input costs, feeding through into vehicle prices and squeezing manufacturers’ margins. This is particularly significant for electric vehicles, which depend on energy-intensive battery production and raw material processing. Combined with competition from regions with lower energy costs, this has eroded one of Europe’s traditional advantages: cheap and stable industrial energy. As a result, energy has shifted from a competitive strength to a persistent headwind for European automakers.
Why are European carmakers losing ground to China? Europe’s weakening position in the global auto market is increasingly linked to the rise of China as the leading EV powerhouse. Chinese manufacturers have scaled up production rapidly, supported by fully integrated domestic battery supply chains – from raw materials processing to cell manufacturing – giving them a structural cost advantage over European rivals.
A vast domestic market also allows Chinese firms to produce at far larger volumes, lowering unit costs and speeding up innovation. By contrast, Europe’s market is fragmented across multiple countries and regulatory systems. European automakers also face higher production costs, particularly for energy and labor, alongside heavier regulatory requirements linked to emissions targets and industrial policy. According to the International Energy Agency, China produced 12.4 million electric cars in 2024, compared with 2.4 million in the EU and around 80,000 in the UK – roughly five times the combined European output.
The green transition impact
Under EU climate policy, automakers must meet increasingly strict COC emissions targets, while the bloc plans to phase out new petrol and diesel cars by 2035. This has forced manufacturers to invest heavily in EV platforms, battery plants, software, and factory upgrades well before these investments generate returns. The UK is following a similar path through its Zero Emission Vehicle (ZEV) Mandate, requiring rising EV sales ahead of a 2030 ban on new internal combustion engine vehicles.
The pressure has been amplified by slower-than-expected EV adoption across Europe. As demand lags behind targets, automakers are caught between costly EV investments and continued reliance on petrol and diesel models to sustain profits. Several carmakers warn that both EU rules and the UK s ZEV targets risk moving faster than consumer demand. Critics say regulation has outpaced market readiness, while supporters argue that slowing the transition would leave Europe trailing in the global shift to clean mobility.

Vague.

• RFK Jr. Plans to Create a List of Injuries Caused by COVID-19 Vaccines (ET)

Health officials are proposing a plan to clarify which COVID-19 vaccine side effects would be eligible for government financial compensation, according to a new notice. The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) and one of its divisions said in a description of a proposed rule released on July 1 that they plan to establish an injury table for COVID-19 vaccines through the Countermeasures Injury Compensation Program (CICP).

“The Table will list and explain injuries that, based on compelling, reliable, valid, medical, and scientific evidence, are presumed to be caused by covered COVID-19 countermeasures, and set forth the time periods in which the onset of these injuries must occur after the administration or use of these covered COVID-19 countermeasures,” a summary of the rule, which has not been made public, stated. COVID-19 vaccines fall under the CICP because previous health secretaries declared and extended emergency declarations for COVID-19, which opened up the option of emergency clearance of vaccines and other countermeasures under the Public Readiness and Emergency Preparedness Act.
Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who just announced that he was ending the emergency declaration, is authorized under the declarations to provide benefits to people injured by the vaccines under the act, HHS officials noted in the proposal summary. “Under the leadership of Secretary Kennedy, HHS is restoring transparency and accountability because the American people deserve clear, evidence-based information about both the benefits and the known risks associated with medical countermeasures,” an HHS spokesperson told The Epoch Times in an email. The spokesperson said that more information will be available when the notice is published in the Federal Register.
Aaron Siri, Kennedy’s former lawyer, wrote to Kennedy in 2025, urging him to create a COVID-19 vaccine-injury table. He pointed to the readiness and preparedness law, which states that the health secretary “shall by regulation establish a table identifying covered injuries that shall be presumed to be directly caused by the administration or use of a covered countermeasure.” An injury table would help people injured by vaccines apply successfully to the congressionally created program, which requires “compelling, reliable, valid, medical, and scientific evidence” that an injury was a direct result of a countermeasure, Siri wrote on behalf of the Informed Consent Action Network, which advocates for government transparency and change.
“A well-constructed injury table is needed for the CICP,” Richard Hughes IV, a former Moderna executive who is representing health groups in litigation against the administration that has halted some of its changes to vaccine guidance, told The Epoch Times in an email. “The real question is whether this administration would promulgate such a table or weaponize it to further platform misinformation.” Dr. Joel Wallskog, who suffered the neurological disorder transverse myelitis and other issues from COVID-19 vaccination and has sued the government over the CICP, told The Epoch Times in an email that the HHS proposal “is more appearance than substance.”
“It appears to do little more than streamline the process for the relatively small number of individuals whose injuries—primarily anaphylaxis and myocarditis/pericarditis—are already recognized under the current system,” added Wallskog, also the co-chair of the React19 nonprofit, which offers support to people injured by COVID-19 vaccines. “For everyone else who has been denied, nothing changes.” Erica Samp, who says she was injured by a COVID-19 vaccine, said in a post on X that she supported the plan but that she’s watching to see what details are included, including the covered injuries.
The CICP is both administered and adjudicated by HHS officials. It has compensated some people who have said COVID-19 vaccination caused health issues, but rejected others, including people such as Wallskog, whom doctors diagnosed as being injured by COVID-19 vaccines, The Epoch Times previously reported.
The CICP has, through June, compensated 60 COVID-19 vaccine injury claims, nearly all for myocarditis, a form of heart inflammation. The average compensation has been $4,000, aside from a few large payments, and about 99 percent of applications have been rejected. The National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine said in 2024 that COVID-19 vaccines definitely cause myocarditis and shoulder injuries, but that other possible harms could not be conclusively linked to the shots. Some outside organizations, such as React19, have said that the available evidence supports a link between the vaccines and additional problems.

Elon Musk just said what every government on earth already knows and none will admit.

Musk: “AI is moving 10 times faster than government, maybe more.”

Not slightly faster. Ten times. And the gap compounds daily.

Every institution ever built runs on the same architecture.… pic.twitter.com/Efrc3eVc5d
— Dustin (@r0ck3t23) July 9, 2026

SpaceX is building the Gigasat Factory in Bastrop to manufacture AI satellites at massive scale.

This facility is planned to enable rapid production and deployment of thousands of AI satellites starting as soon as late 2027. pic.twitter.com/avloaJJ32h
— DogeDesigner (@cb_doge) July 9, 2026

Elon and the SpaceX team are aiming to launch 1 MILLION AI satellites into space and when this happens… this company is going to look dirt cheap at $2 trillion.

Any company serious about AI will be relying heavily on SpaceX for compute.

Mark my words. pic.twitter.com/eMgPnivNMl
— Teslaconomics (@Teslaconomics) July 10, 2026

Optimus V3’s hand is getting scary good.

Hands are one of robotics’ nastiest little problems. Gripping is easy.

Knowing how hard to squeeze an egg, turn a tiny screw, fold fabric, or pick up something fragile without launching it across the room?

Different game.

Tesla… https://t.co/uKe3ptfBXL pic.twitter.com/1QlZT4Cw1G
— Mario Nawfal (@MarioNawfal) July 10, 2026

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Debt Rattle July 9 2026

Jul 092026

July 9, 2026 Posted by Raúl Ilargi Meijer at 10:04 am Finance Tagged with: ceasefire, factory floor, IRGC, money laundering, NATO, Qatar, scum, Ukraine.nazi, Zelensky 26 Responses »

Vincent van Gogh Vase with Daisies and Anemones 1887

• IIran Hits Back, Launching Missiles On Bahrain, Kuwait, Qatar (ZH)

• They’re Scum’—Furious Trump Explodes, Declares Iran Ceasefire Over (Rusty Weiss)

• Trump Says US-Iran Ceasefire Is Over, Going To Hit Them Hard Tonight’ (ZH)

• New Strikes On Iran Significantly Stronger Than Earlier Attacks (ZH)

• You’re Just Going to Have to Kill Them or Walk Away From Iran (Derek Hunter)

• Bill Clinton Advisor Warns of Socialist Takeover (ZH)

• Just 43% of Americans Believe NATO Would Assist If US Were Attacked (Anzalone)

• Carney and Zelensky Announce New Canadian Bank for Money Laundering (CTH)

• Europe Replacing US as NATO’s Main Anti-Russia Actor – Trenin (RT)

• ‘You’re Playing With Fire,’ RT Editor-in-Chief Warns Europe (RT)

• Polish MEP Tears Up Ukrainian Nazi Collaborator Flag At EU Parliament (RT)

• Zelensky In Ankara Still Insistent On Ukraine Joining NATO (ZH)

• America’s Factory Floor Is Still Its Greatest Superpower (David Manney)

AI+Optimus will enable universal excellent healthcare that is better than anyone receives today https://t.co/XT1GsqnAhn
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) July 7, 2026

Elon Musk just said the one thing about America they made sure you’d never learn.

The one thing that should’ve made you proud, not ashamed.

Musk: “After World War 2, the US could have basically taken over the world and any country. Like we got nukes, nobody else got nukes. We… pic.twitter.com/9lTUguBDy6
— Dustin (@r0ck3t23) July 7, 2026

https://twitter.com/nicksortor/status/2074771309553213654?s=20 https://twitter.com/Tironianae/status/2074639066960670917?s=20 https://twitter.com/mitchellvii/status/2074589312201396605?s=20]

Whenever the Iranians don’t feel so good. they say stuff like this. It’s very recognizable.

“He (Trump) will certainly lose both the Strait of Hormuz and the negotiations over a final agreement,” said the source. “The choice is now his.”

• IIran Hits Back, Launching Missiles On Bahrain, Kuwait, Qatar (ZH)

Iranian Retaliation: Air Defenses Active Over Bahrain, Kuwait
Nearing 5am Tehran time, and there are incoming reports of Iranian retaliation against Gulf states, which it seems is set to become a predictable pattern – after hours ago the US launched fresh airstrikes on Iranian island and coastal areas near the Hormuz Strait. According to developing reports via AFP and other sources:

Explosions heard in Bahrain after air raid sirens: AFP
Kuwait says responding to ‘hostile’ missile, drone attacks
U.S. forces struck two railway bridges in northern Iran with cruise missiles—the first U.S. attack on Iranian infrastructure since the April 8 ceasefire.
Reports (unconfirmed) also suggest that missiles are being fired on Qatar – which hasn’t happened in quite a while. Iran has reportedly launched ballistic missiles at the US Al Udeid Air Base in Qatar, in a first since early March.
https://twitter.com/MonitorX99800/status/2075017790864429356?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E2075017790864429356%7Ctwgr%5E1b65d0707ce765df36aa72ddbf9d8a7c5e61666e%7Ctwcon%5Es1_c10&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.zerohedge.com%2Fgeopolitical%2Ftheyre-scum-trump-says-us-iran-ceasefire-over-sending-oil-higher
Meanwhile, the view from Russia on two war theatres escalating once again, and at the same time…

MoU is over. The new phase of the war begins. The escalation with Russia is going to grow.
— Alexander Dugin (@AGDugin) July 8, 2026

Trump Tells NATO Summit Iranians Want To Assassinate Him
President Trump while giving a closing address at the end of the NATO summit in Ankara repeatedly claimed that Iran was plotting to assassinate him, saying he was “on every single one of their list.” He claimed: “They want to take out the US Leader. I’m on every single one of their list. So far, I’ve had a bit of luck, but maybe it won’t last. They’re evil and sick people, and we must get rid of this cancer.”
He suggested that it’s time to “finish the job” and yet at other times while fielding questions from reporters shied away from laying out anything that sounds like regime change. Instead he opted to again talk about how the US can never allow Iran to have a nuclear weapon. He again stressed that “lunatics” can never have a nuclear weapon.
On the claimed assassination plot, it’s unclear whether he has something specific in mind, in terms of a recent statement from the Iranian government. He could be referencing media reports from earlier this week quoting mourners and speakers at Khamenei’s funeral. For example the following was in a Tuesday Reuters report: As they passed under a bridge, mourners hurled stones at a billboard hung from above showing U.S. President Donald Trump with a bullet aimed at his head. “The U.S. killed our father,” it read. “We won’t let you go!”
As demonstrators set fire to U.S. and British flags, women in black chadors held aloft red placards with the English words “KILL TRUMP” in black letters. Others held aloft posters with the faces of Trump, Vice President JD Vance, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth or Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, each depicted in the crosshairs of a gunsight, with the words “There will be blood”. Ahead of more potential renewed strikes on Iran tonight, CENTCOM is saying its forces are at the ready:

Today, more than 20 U.S. Navy warships are patrolling waters across the Middle East as CENTCOM forces continue promoting regional security and stability. Last month, U.S. naval warships and aircraft transited the Arabian Sea in close formation, demonstrating unmatched American… pic.twitter.com/gnfRIKAYJl
— U.S. Central Command (@CENTCOM) July 8, 2026

Iran Threatens To Reclose Strait, as US Military ‘Ready’ to Restart Blockade
Iran has once again threatened to close the Strait of Hormuz, according to state broadcaster Press TV on Wednesday, citing an Iranian official. Iran is of course planning strait only under its own arrangements, or a protocol involving collection of fees and utilizing a designated route close to its coast, “as per the Islamabad Memorandum of Understanding (MoU).” The Iranian official further warned the military stands ready to “strike at least twice the number of targets hit” in response to any strikes by the United States. “The developments of the past 48 hours show Iran won’t back down from managing the Hormuz,” the source noted.
“The U.S. military stands ready to restart the blockade of ships to and from Iranian ports if ordered to do so, a U.S. official tells Fox News”, Fox’s Friden reports. “Iran suspends talks on a final settlement with the United States”, TASS reports citing an Iranian source. “Any threat will receive a powerful response,” the official was quoted in Press TV as saying, and warned further that the Islamic Republic’s armed forces do “not distinguish between the United States and its partners in the region.” The official warned Trump that the US “will gain nothing” from making such threats.
“He (Trump) will certainly lose both the Strait of Hormuz and the negotiations over a final agreement,” said the source. “The choice is now his.” Meanwhile…

“And if they had a nuclear weapon, they’d use it.”

• They’re Scum’—Furious Trump Explodes, Declares Iran Ceasefire Over (Rusty Weiss)

‘President Trump on Wednesday declared the ceasefire with Iran over, saying he’s done negotiating with its leaders, who he described as “scum,” “liars,” “cheats,” and “sick people” he no longer wants to negotiate with. Trump’s acrimonious comments come after the U.S. carried out airstrikes on more than 80 Iranian targets in retaliation for attacks on commercial ships in the region. Speaking to reporters in Ankara, Turkey, the President made little effort to hold back his thoughts on the people he has been dealing with in the rogue nation.

He was prompted by a reporter who asked, “Is the ceasefire done? Is the MOU dead?” “To me, I think it’s over. I don’t want to deal with them anymore, but they’re scum. You know what scum is? They’re scum, they’re sick people, they’re led by sick people, and they’re vicious, violent people,” he responded. “And if they had a nuclear weapon, they’d use it.” “As far as I’m concerned, it’s over.”

.@POTUS on the status of the ceasefire with Iran: "To me, I think it's over. I don't want to deal with them anymore. They're scum… They're led by sick people… I'll speak to our negotiators. They want to negotiate—they're good people… but they have to come back to me. As far… pic.twitter.com/6eYfwMxSdn
— Rapid Response 47 (@RapidResponse47) July 8, 2026

The comments come just weeks after a preliminary agreement aimed at easing tensions in the Strait of Hormuz, but Trump made it clear he now views the entire effort as a waste. The President said he would discuss further plans with his team of negotiators but expressed skepticism that any movement would be made in dealing with “a bunch of lying guys.” “I don’t like them at all,” he fumed. “And, frankly, I think we waste a lot of time with them. I think we should just do our business. Can you imagine they start shooting bombs, actually missiles at ships yesterday, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, couple of others?” “
They’re liars,” he continued, before explaining the negotiating process with a mendacious regime. “We make a deal. Everyone’s agreed, no nuclear weapons. We make a deal. They go outside, talk to the press, they say, ‘We never even talked about it.'” “They’re liars, they’re cheats, they’re sick people, they’ve hurt their people,” Trump added. “They killed 54,000 people as of now that were protesting.”
https://twitter.com/nicksortor/status/2074769878683165137?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E2074769878683165137%7Ctwgr%5E5edcca40c5461229434bcd74f610a16a379a605d%7Ctwcon%5Es1_c10&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fredstate.com%2Frusty-weiss%2F2026%2F07%2F08%2Ftheyre-scumfurious-trump-explodes-declares-iran-ceasefire-over-n2204102
“I told them, every time you hit, we hit. And of course, they’re dirty players.” “They’ve kiIIed thousands and thousands of our soldiers. They’ve kiIIed hundreds of thousands of innocent people.” Iran violated a fragile ceasefire by firing missiles at three commercial vessels in the Strait of Hormuz on Monday and Tuesday, prompting swift U.S. retaliation. In response, the Trump administration revoked a key license allowing Iran to sell its oil on the global market, with CENTCOM launching powerful strikes on over 80 Iranian targets to impose “heavy costs” for attacking civilian shipping.
President Trump and U.S. officials described the Iranian actions as a clear breach of the agreement, declaring they will no longer tolerate such aggression. These incidents have made the shaky nature of any deal with the mullahs crystal clear. With the regime once again proving it cannot be trusted, President Trump appears ready to abandon negotiations entirely in favor of decisive American military strength.= Iran’s lead negotiator, Parliament Speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, issued a statement Wednesday declaring: “The era of bullying and extortion is over. It leads nowhere. We don’t fold.”
Neither do we.

Trump: “Probably Hit Iran Tonight”

• Trump Says US-Iran Ceasefire Is Over, Going To Hit Them Hard Tonight’ (ZH)

After earlier saying from the NATO summit in Ankara that the Iran ceasefire is “over” – and amid fears of renewal of full-scale war given that Tehran has launched drone and missile attacks on nearby American allies Kuwait and Bahrain once again, President Trump said on Wednesday that he would “probably hit Iran tonight”. He issued the major threat and warning during a press conference at the NATO summit: “I’ll give a little warning: We’re going to hit them hard tonight,” he told reporters just before his meeting with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky. He later lambasted Iran for “killing soldiers, killing people for 47 years,” and that because of that, the US has “a score to settle.” He added: “We may just do it without a deal.”

He also sought to once again explain his view that it’s not about regime change, but about the nuclear issue. Geopolitical news source DropSite is pushing back against some of Trump’s newest claims, particularly that Iranians security services gunned down “54,000 protesters” during the January economic protests, commenting:Trump today claimed Iran’s revolutionary regime killed 54,000 protesters at the start of the year, inflating the 40,000 figure he repeated through much of the US-Israeli war to justify and build support for U.S. action. There is no evidence for either figure.
HRANA, which has received U.S. funding, documented about 7,000 deaths, including many Iranian security and police. Iran puts the death toll just above 3,100 and says rioters killed civilians during protests that were overtaken by Israel- and U.S.-backed armed elements. Scores of videos from the January 2026 riots show armed men destroying mosques and government buildings and carrying out vigilante killings of security personnel.
Meanwhile, it’s not a war, Trump has repeated… but what’s next and what is the ultimate endgame here? Is there a coherent strategy yet? Trump further on Wednesday, while speaking alongside Zelensky and fielding questions, floated that “if we have to we will take out higher level targets” – and that “we may take over Kharg Island”. He again admitted the Iran deal may not stick, after the US “knocked out 28 boats last night”. He further warned that US forces will probably take out more boats tonight.
TRUMP, ON ATTACKS TONIGHT: NOT A THING IRAN CAN DO ABOUT IT TRUMP:WOULD HATE TO STRIKE DESALINATION PLANTS, BUT MAY HAVE TO TRUMP: WE MAY PUT DOWN THE BLOCKADE ON IRAN TRUMP: BLOCKADE WOULD ONLY APPLY TO IRAN

Trump on Iran War:

This is not a war. It's the denuclearization of Iran. pic.twitter.com/k51XHDATXF
— Clash Report (@clashreport) July 8, 2026

Brent crude futures jumped more than 6% in London after President Trump told reporters at a press conference in Ankara that the tentative ceasefire with Iran is over. “To me, I think it’s over. I don’t want to deal with them anymore; they’re scum,” Trump told reporters.

Trump says the ceasefire between U.S. and Iran is over.

"To me, I think it's over. I don't want to deal with them anymore; they're scum", the U.S. president says.

Live updates: https://t.co/l9KwsXPz0p pic.twitter.com/mqfE5qKOHe
— Sky News (@SkyNews) July 8, 2026

Trump’s remarks came after Iran launched missiles and kamikaze drones at several merchant vessels in the Hormuz chokepoint on Tuesday. This was countered by overnight US strikes, as fears of conflict erupting once more are on the rise. However, Trump stopped short of saying the U.S. would restart the war and said he would let talks continue if the parties were willing. In European trade, front-month Brent crude futures jumped 6% to $78.63 a barrel, while West Texas Intermediate rose 6.2% to $74.85 a barrel. Natural gas prices rose as well, with the benchmark Dutch TTF contract up 4.8% to 49.04 euros per megawatt-hour.
Hours before the strikes, the US Treasury revoked a sanctions waiver that had allowed Tehran to sell oil, reversing a key element of the interim deal. Trump also told reporters that he would continue to let his negotiators talk to Tehran, though he thought “they’re wasting their time.” On Tuesday afternoon, the Joint Maritime Information Center upgraded the Hormuz risk rating to “Severe” after three tankers were targeted by Iran. This renewed uncertainty in the critical waterway will only pressure the normalization of vessel flows.

‘Four to Five Times Larger’ Than Earlier Strikes.‘

• New Strikes On Iran Significantly Stronger Than Earlier Attacks (ZH)

US officials are vowing bigger, more sustained and prolonged strikes against Iran tonight, according to the latest being reported in CNN and Axios: The U.S. has launched a significantly expanded wave of airstrikes on Iran that is four to five times larger than the strikes carried out 10 days ago, a U.S. official told Axios. The official said the operation is expected to continue for hours. Iran state media is meanwhile reporting on an initial retaliation by its forces (though not initially confirmed in other international sources):
Iran fires several anti-ship missiles and drones towards US Navy warships in the Sea of Oman, Fars reports More from state media on what could be mounting civilian casualties: The state broadcaster reports that “most of the attacks” by the US in southern Iran have “targeted civilian areas”. This comes as the US claims its military hit Iranian missile and defence systems in its latest attacks.

A US official told CNN the strikes on Iran are "punishment, not proportional" and "won't be over for a while." https://t.co/zDsHySZyuA
— Drop Site (@DropSiteNews) July 7, 2026

Iran’s president is hastily traveling back to the Islamic Republic, cutting short funeral observances for Khamenei among Shia communities in Iraq: “Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian has left the Iraqi city of Najaf to return to Tehran, according to the IRIB broadcaster, following the US’s latest strikes. Pezeshkian had been in Iraq to attend funeral rites for Khamenei, whose body had arrived in Najaf on Tuesday night. According to Press TV, Pezeshkian had also planned to hold high-level talks with Iraqi government officials.”

#BREAKING: Footage shows massive explosions in Hormozgan Province after U.S. strikes in Iran pic.twitter.com/FC4c3WyPCV
— Insider Wire (@InsiderWire) July 7, 2026

Not the people, but the ”leaders”.

• You’re Just Going to Have to Kill Them or Walk Away From Iran (Derek Hunter)

In late 2003, if you’d sat across the table from a team of negotiators from Al Qaeda to work out some kind of deal to end hostilities, what could have possibly come from it? The answer is nothing, because there is no compromise with someone whose position is that they want you dead. Where’s the middle ground with that – can you be half-dead? Are you willing to lose a limb or two to get peace?

Of course not, that’s stupid. Al Qaeda wanted all Americans dead, so the only “solution” to their existence was to either work to contain them so attacking us would be harder and less frequent, or to kill them all. Thankfully, President George W. Bush opted to kill them all, then set about killing as many of them as humanly possible. He ignored the whining of Democrats who wanted to arrest them, give them lawyers and trials, and (for the most part) left the sorting them out part to God.
Iran is pretty much the same situation, with the only differences breaking down to them having some semblance of a government, their own currency, and sympathetic client states who want to keep them afloat because of the way they are a disruptive force in the world and a thorn in the side of civilization.
Whatever remains of a government in Iran has no interest in cutting a “deal” with the United States. They don’t need us; they make money and gain power by poking us. Their “demand” that for no peache negotiations rang hollow as their weeks-long funeral for the dead former leader was punctuated by their launching drones against ships in the Strait of Hormuz. Radical Islamists always demand “holy days” and “holy months” off from fighting, and every other day or month seems to have some kind of “holy” designation to it. But it never stops terrorist attacks. Weird, isn’t it?
Iran has no interest in a deal because they don’t need one. The appeals to a “booming economy” Iran could have if they chose peace mean nothing, as the leaders of the country are fine and always will be – they take what they want, and the average Iranian suffers. If there’s less in the country, as there has been for decades, they still get theirs. No Mafia don ever told their underlings to be understanding if someone paying “protection” was a little short sometimes, as downturns happen. No, they’d break the guy’s arm and take everything he had, leaving him with nothing and charging him interest on the difference he couldn’t cover. That’s how Iran works internally.
There is no carrot on a stick that will change their behavior because they’re lousy with carrots. The people are the ones without vegetables, and they don’t care about the people.,The only options are to bomb the hell out of them, leaving not a stone unbombed, or leave them alone. You either have to kill them, or they stay the way they’ve always been. The only other option, the one I believe might change the path of Iranian history, is to tell our allies in the area that they are free to take as big or small a piece of Iran as they want – Persia is a region and has always existed; the country of Iran has not and does not need to. Let its neighbors take pieces and rule them.
They’d go for the oil and the ports; we’d provide air cover, and that would really choke off the government. It would also have the benefit of scaring the hell out of these leaders. They know we won’t torture them; we’d give them three hot meals and a cot and access to a jury of Democrats who’d likely cheer them for 47 years of killing Americans. Their neighbors, against whom they’ve funded terror for five decades, wouldn’t be so nice. The Iranian leadership would know what being captured by them would likely mean, and it isn’t pretty. Maybe THAT would get them to negotiate in good faith, because nothing else will. Drop guns to the freedom-minded, too, and level anywhere a government official might be hiding, unleash the region, or cut bait.
These aren’t rational people; they aren’t motivated by things that motivate normal people. It’s time to recognize that and choose a path forward based on that reality.

“.. one increasingly defined by anti-American rhetoric, hostility toward capitalism, support for foreign adversaries, calls to abolish jails, race-based politics and, of course, utter disdain for the Constitution.”

• Bill Clinton Advisor Warns of Socialist Takeover (ZH)

Mark Penn, the former chief White House pollster and strategic advisor to President Bill Clinton for six years, used a Wall Street Journal op-ed titled “The Socialist Threat Is Real” to warn that far-left radicals are hijacking the Democratic Party.

The problem for Democrats is that years of letting socialists and Marxists into their DEI kingdom have only now produced dire consequences. Status quo Democrats are watching their power evaporate as Democratic Socialists of America-backed candidates defeat mainstream Democrats in primaries across New York, Colorado, Pennsylvania, and other states. Penn’s warning was blunt: “America will be in serious trouble if Democrats fail to defend their party.”
“This ‘revolution’ is driven not by the working class but by the urban professional class that is willing to support candidates who celebrate 9/11, cheer at the massacre of 1,000 Israeli and American kids, would defund the police, abolish prisons, end private property and open the borders,” Penn explained. Penn and his fellow status quo party members are watching in real time as their party transforms almost overnight from one once built around labor, civil rights and working-class citizens into one increasingly defined by anti-American rhetoric, hostility toward capitalism, support for foreign adversaries, calls to abolish jails, race-based politics and, of course, utter disdain for the Constitution.
What DSA stands for:

Our latest profiling of the new Democratic Party appears to show how DSA-ers are far detached from traditional American values and openly hostile to the country’s founding institutions:
Meet the new Democratic Party:

Frank, Aaron, Hank and Sam are Communist insurgents, radicalized marxist revolutionaries hiding behind personal ideologies to justfy their 1A expressions of the right to promote the insurrection of the Constitutional Republic of the United States of America pic.twitter.com/XLzzjisOqd
— AnimalFarm1945 (Moshe) (@Farm1945A) July 6, 2026

Meet the unofficial DSA spokesman:

Hasan Piker calls on his followers to kill capitalists:

“Yeah kill them! KiII those motherfuckers and murder those motherfuckers in the streets. Let the streets soak in their fucking red capitalist blood, dude.”

Democrats are campaigning with him. pic.twitter.com/YiZxGgRkgc
— Eyal Yakoby (@EYakoby) April 9, 2026

Penn’s op-ed then called for immediate investigations into the DSA to determine whether the socialists are “being funded by foreign governments and interests.” He said, “Lawmakers, law-enforcement agencies and journalists should investigate the DSA to see if it is being funded by foreign governments and interests.”

“Many Americans argued that NATO providing billions of dollars of assistance to non-member Ukraine unnecessarily created tensions with Russia.”

• Just 43% of Americans Believe NATO Would Assist If US Were Attacked (Anzalone)

Most Americans do not believe that European members of the North Atlantic Alliance would come to the United States’ aid if attacked. Politico reported that a NATO poll found that just 43% of Americans believe the bloc would assist the US if needed. While Politico was unable to view survey results from previous years, a NATO official said that American confidence in the bloc was down about eight percent.

The foundation of NATO is Article 5 of the bloc’s charter. Article 5 is viewed as a mutual defense pact that calls on each member to come to the aid of any state that is attacked. In recent years, Americans have begun to question the United States’ membership in the bloc. Americans have long pointed to the US footing the majority of the alliance’s military spending. The drift away from supporting NATO intensified when the bloc backed Ukraine in the war against Russia. Many Americans argued that NATO providing billions of dollars of assistance to non-member Ukraine unnecessarily created tensions with Russia.
President Donald Trump and Secretary of State Marco Rubio recently criticized the alliance over Europe’s lack of assistance in the war against Iran: President Donald Trump declined Tuesday to say whether he plans to announce additional US troop reductions in Europe, telling reporters, “we’re going to see,” during a bilateral meeting with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan ahead of the NATO summit in Ankara.
“Well, we’re going to see,” Trump said when asked whether he is likely to announce further drawdowns of US forces in Europe. The US president also renewed his criticism of NATO, suggesting he had considered skipping the summit altogether. Trump is meeting other NATO leaders in Turkey this week, where he is expected to push member states to increase military spending.

PRESIDENT TRUMP: "We’ve invested trillions of dollars in NATO. Why? To protect European countries and others… You would think that they'd be very willing to do something to help us, and they really weren't… I've long said that we help them, but I'm not sure that they'd be… pic.twitter.com/YF7UCfIpo2
— Breaking911 (@Breaking911) July 7, 2026

Ahead of the summit, NATO Ambassador Matthew Whitaker downplayed the tensions between Washington and the bloc as growing pains. “The target is that Europe takes over the conventional defense of the European continent. We’re not going away, we’re just doing less.” He added, “I see these as just the challenges that we’ve worked through before.”

“Defense, Security and Resilience Bank (DSRB). CANADA”

“.. a NEW BANK (DRSB) controlled by Mark Carney, Volodymyr Zelenskyy and likely Chrystia Freeland, and funded (at least in part) by Canadian taxpayer money flowing to Ukraine. All other nations within DRSB providing the patina of credibility to hide the laundry.”

• Carney and Zelensky Announce New Canadian Bank for Money Laundering (CTH)

WOW…=Things are coming together quickly now as Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney begins unveiling details to support his illusion of meeting NATO obligations, with a smart money laundering assist from Volodymyr Zelenskyy. To establish part of the background, remind yourself that former Canadian Minister Chrystia Freeland was appointed by Zelenskyy to lead a Ukraine redevelopment operation. Today, speaking from Ankara, Turkey, Carney and Zelenskyy announced a $900 million fund for short, mid-term and long-term investment in Ukraine.

But wait, it gets much better. A few hours later Prime Minister Carney and Volodymr Zelenskyy announced a new Canada-based financial institution called the Defense, Security and Resilience Bank (DSRB). CANADA – […] “Mark Carney, welcomed the support for the Canada-led DSRB by: Albania, Belgium, Greece, Latvia, Luxembourg, Romania, Türkiye, and Ukraine. These countries will be entrusted with defining the initial policies and directives of the Bank, shaping its operations and ensuring benefits flow to members’ economies.”
[…] Leveraging a strong credit rating, the Bank will provide long-term, low-cost financing for defence, security, and resilience initiatives across supply chains.” When you see the term “resilience initiatives” think climate change. Specifically, think carbon capture and carbon trading mechanisms. The DSRB banking approach, in combination with Chrystia Freeland heading the Ukraine Economic Development operation, then takes us to the carbon capture deal with Alberta [carbon capture and storage (CCS) project] and then, wait for it,…. The TKMS submarine purchase contract with Germany.
You see, unbeknownst to most people, TKMS has a subsidiary that was just founded, literally just founded weeks before Carney announced the $20 to $30 billion submarine contract. In announcing the TKMS contract, CBC noted: “The German government also proposed establishing a carbon capture facility deploying TKMS technology in partnership with Alberta.” That would be TKMS Calvion GmbH (TKMS-CG) which was a company formed within TKMS on May 16, 2026.
So, think about this. Mark Carney tells Alberta Premier Danielle Smith that a condition for the Alberta pipeline is authorization of a carbon capture scheme that will be contracted to the recently created subsidiary of TKMS, TKMS-CG. who Carney knows is about to get the submarine contract. Pretty slick. All of this spending (military and resilience initiatives) then becomes part of Canada meeting their NATO obligations, which will be wrapped into a NEW BANK (DRSB) controlled by Mark Carney, Volodymyr Zelenskyy and likely Chrystia Freeland, and funded (at least in part) by Canadian taxpayer money flowing to Ukraine. All other nations within DRSB providing the patina of credibility to hide the laundry.
The “private sector” investments, noted within the banking charter, will almost certainly stem from companies like TKMS and TKMS-CG, who will create a circular process. Taxpayer funds to TKMS. TKMS funds to bank. Bank funds to TKMS-CG. With Carney, Zelenskyy and Freeland prepositioning investments ahead of the arrival of deposits.
Brilliant.
Here’s a great video recap that was created before the $900 million and DRSB bank announcement, and when you add in those two components it all makes sense. Information packed 20 minutes.

European elites view the Ukraine conflict as an opportunity to settle old scores with Moscow, Dmitry Trenin says

• Europe Replacing US as NATO’s Main Anti-Russia Actor – Trenin (RT)

European NATO members have become the main driving force behind the bloc’s confrontation with Russia as US strategic priorities have shifted, Dmitry Trenin, the president of the Russian International Affairs Council (RIAC), wrote in an op-ed for RT. He argued that some European politicians view the Ukraine conflict as an opportunity to settle old scores with Russia. “The European elites’ strategy toward Russia is no longer deterrence as in the days of the Cold War. The goal is Russia’s destruction as a major power. This is what strategic defeat is all about,” Trenin wrote.

“The Europeans dream of eliminating Russia as a serious factor in the geopolitics of Eurasia. To them, this would mean the ‘final solution’ of the long-dreaded ‘Russia problem.’” Trenin argued that European governments are using the ‘enemy at the gates’ narrative as a tool to brand any opposition as ‘Kremlin stooges’, while increased defense spending due to the supposed ‘Russian threat’ is presented as a way to revive struggling European economies. “People in Moscow entertain no illusions about the adversarial attitude of the United States toward Russia, but Washington now is a back-seat driver when it comes to the conflict with Russia,” he wrote, adding that Moscow sees NATO as “Europe backed by America.”
After returning to the White House last year, US President Donald Trump pushed NATO members to commit to spending 5% of GDP on defense annually by 2035, criticizing European allies for what he called a failure to share the burden. The rift deepened when several member states refused to back Trump’s military operation against Iran. While Trump has attempted to broker a peace deal between Moscow and Kiev, European countries have adopted a hardline stance, insisting that an agreement must be reached on Ukraine’s terms. German Chancellor Friedrich Merz said last year that diplomacy has been exhausted; EU foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas urged Trump not to fall into a ‘Russian trap’.
Russia has dismissed speculation that it plans to invade NATO countries, saying it would respond militarily only if attacked first. Last month, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov described Europe as “a party bent on Russia’s defeat.”

Can’t show it to you. EU bans RT. One of the best ews channels around highly intelligent lady.

• ‘You’re Playing With Fire,’ RT Editor-in-Chief Warns Europe (RT)

Europe is “playing with fire” as it assists Ukraine in strikes deep into Russia, RT editor-in-chief Margarita Simonyan has said, warning Kiev’s Western backers that Moscow may have no other choice other than to respond with force. In a lengthy interview with Die Weltwoche’s Roger Koeppel on Wednesday,Simonyan said, “it is not Ukraine that is bringing the war to Moscow” but rather Europe, as Kiev is incapable of conducting attacks without foreign aid and intelligence.

Simonyan warned that Moscow’s patience is running thin as drones, missiles, flight disruptions, and fuel shortages increasingly affect civilians in Russia. “People are afraid to sleep at night… Where is the limit of this hardship, when the people will say, ‘Vladimir Vladimirovich [Putin], we have to respond! I don’t know, but I think it is very close. Very close. Right now, you are playing with fire.”

“The UPA, the armed wing of Stepan Bandera’s Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists (OUN), collaborated with Nazi Germany during World War II ..”

• Polish MEP Tears Up Ukrainian Nazi Collaborator Flag At EU Parliament (RT)

A Polish member of the European Parliament has publicly torn up a flag of the Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA) – whose fighters massacred up to 100,000 ethnic Poles in one of World War II’s worst atrocities – during a debate on Kiev’s bid to join the EU. On Tuesday, Ewa Zajaczkowska-Hernik, a member of the right-wing Patriots for Europe Group and a history teacher by training, delivered a scathing indictment of Ukraine’s glorification of the UPA. The speech came against the backdrop of a weeks-long diplomatic spat between Warsaw and Kiev triggered by Vladimir Zelensky’s decision to name a special forces unit ‘Heroes of the UPA’.

Polish President Karol Nawrocki called Zelensky’s decision “outrageous” and stripped the Ukrainian leader of the Order of the White Eagle, Poland’s highest honor, with several senior Ukrainian officials responding by handing back their Polish awards. The UPA, the armed wing of Stepan Bandera’s Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists (OUN), collaborated with Nazi Germany during World War II and carried out systematic mass killings of ethnic minorities, with one of the most notorious episodes taking place in Volhynia in 1943-1944. While Poland recognizes the killings as a genocide, Ukraine has rejected the term, with Bandera often being propagated as a national hero by Kiev.
Zajaczkowska-Hernik focused her speech on the UPA war crimes record, stressing that a country worshipping such an organization does not belong in the EU. “Over 360 ways to kill civilians. Sawing people alive, disemboweling pregnant women, impaling children on pitchforks”, she said, adding that Ukrainian nationalists killed not only Jews and Poles but also local Ukrainians.

“If Germany had named a unit after the SS heroes and erected monuments to Hitler, Himmler, Goebbels, or Eichmann, would you invite them to the [European] Union? No. You would call them neo-Nazis. And rightly so. There is no moral difference between honoring the SS and honoring the UPA.”

The MEP also took aim at the EU’s own June report on Ukraine’s accession bid, noting that while it included chapters on fundamental rights and non-discrimination, it made no mention of the glorification of wartime collaboration or genocide. “The report on Ukraine is silent on this topic,” Zajaczkowska-Hernik said. “It is the silence that kills the memory of the victims of the genocide in Volhynia and the Eastern Borderlands for the second time.”
Polish Defense Minister Wladyslaw Kosiniak-Kamysz also warned last week that Ukraine will not join the EU as long as it continues to venerate Bandera and the OUN-UPA, adding that “no one will tell us how to vote” on another state’s accession. In a bid to contain the fallout, Ukrainian Foreign Minister Sibiga flew to Warsaw last week to meet his Polish counterpart, Radoslaw Sikorski, proposing an “anti-crisis package” that includes historic roundtables, while stressing that Ukraine and Poland “share a common enemy, Russia.” Sikorski responded cautiously, saying that “diplomacy prefers silence,” while his deputy, Marcin Bosacki, made clear that Warsaw “expects a correction” of the UPA unit designation.

‘Alliance For The Future’

If Ukraine joins, it’s the end of NATO. You can’t invite a country at war, for one thing.

• Zelensky In Ankara Still Insistent On Ukraine Joining NATO (ZH)

:President Volodymyr Zelensky is in full court press mode while being present in Ankara for the annual NATO summit, amid Western leaders including President Trump. He has predictably renewed his argument for Ukraine to join the North Atlantic alliance, while also touting some momentum on the battlefield as Russia comes under repeat long-range drone attacks. Zelensky thanked leaders “who have clearly stated Ukraine belongs in NATO, because NATO with Ukraine is the alliance for the future” – and then posed in Tuesday remarks, “I have a question for you. Do you really believe it? Do you really believe it would be right to leave outside NATO, a country and a people with this level of defensive capability?”

He argued further: “If we already have these capabilities, if Ukrainians already know how to fight like this, then it does make sense for these capabilities to become a part of the alliance’s collective defense that would make all of us stronger.” Ukraine has been boasting of its premier drone capabilities, which it says is now clearly proven on the battlefield, but has also admitted that Ukraine needs assistance matching Russia’s ballistic capabilities. Zelensky said “Europe urgently needs its own capability to produce anti-ballistic systems and the missiles they require.”
He added: “The one thing we still need to do here in Europe is build a strong defense against Russia’s ballistic missiles. It’s a big challenge… this is Russia’s last major advantage.” It’s interesting that Zelensky is arguing that his country should become a full-fledged NATO member based on already in effect being militarily integrated. This was one of the Kremlin’s very rationales for launching the ‘special military operation’ in Ukraine in the first place. Also interesting is that Moscow is now referencing it as a ‘war’ on a much more official level…
Peskov via Russian state media sources:”Russia still has as a main front-and-center demand that Ukraine definitively and permanently reject aspirations to join NATO. Moscow also still requires full political recognition over the four eastern annexed oblasts, as well as Crimea. Western officials have still been reluctant to fully back some kind of rapid NATO membership track for Ukraine, knowing it would take the Ukraine crisis from more of a proxy war situation strait into WW3-style direct war between Russia and NATO.”

“The factory floor” will change hugely, and soon. Through AI, etc. Will there be people left?

But I see little indication that this will make America’s factory floor fall behind.

I do see that in Europe.

• America’s Factory Floor Is Still Its Greatest Superpower (David Manney)

America’s enemies have never feared our committee hearings; they fear the sound of American factories waking up. A nation that builds its own medicine, chips, ships, steel, tools, trucks, and energy systems is harder to bully, starve, and much harder to beat. The latest manufacturing numbers offer a reminder the country needed: the factory floor is still one of America’s truest sources of power. U.S. manufacturing slightly cooled in June, but the bigger story still holds. The Institute for Supply Management said its Manufacturing PMI registered 53.3 in June after May hit 94.0, the highest reading since May 2022. Readings above 50 show expansion, and June marked the sixth straight month of growth. New orders also stayed in expansion at 56.0.

S&P Global’s June manufacturing PMI told a similar story, even after a downward revision. Its index registered 53.9, down from 55.1 in May, but still in expansion for the 11th straight month. Output growth slowed from May’s surge, while firms still reported better operating conditions. America isn’t out of the woods, and factory hiring remains uneven, but the direction is better than the defeatists want to admit. The Federal Reserve added a caution light: manufacturing output was unchanged in May after rising 0.7% in April, while overall industrial production edged up 0.1%. Capacity utilization sat at 76.2%, below its long-run average.
In other words, the machine is running, but it still has room to run even harder. America has seen this before. Isoruku Yamamoto, the Japanese admiral who planned the Pearl Harbor attack, understood the danger of waking American industry. The famous “sleeping giant” line is difficult to prove, but the underlying fear was real. Yamamoto knew Japan needed early victories because a long war against U.S. production would become a nightmare. American yards, plants, rail lines, and workers turned distance and raw material into a war-winning force. Manufacturing isn’t nostalgia; it’s sovereignty with grease under its nails. During COVID, Americans learned what happens when a great country depends on distant supply chains for masks, medicines, parts, and basic goods.
The lesson wasn’t complicated: a country that can’t build what it needs has to beg, borrow, or steal whenever it can. President Donald Trump has made domestic production a central part of his economic message, and companies are responding in areas that count. The piece in The Daily Torch points to investment promises in pharmaceuticals, semiconductors, electrical equipment, and other critical goods. U.S. manufacturing is rising across a multitude of critical industries including petroleum, computers and electronics, mineral products, electrical equipment, machinery, appliances, transportation equipment, printing, textile mills, and food and beverages.
The manufacturing boom is a result of President Donald Trump’s two-pronged economic approach to court companies with reduced corporate tax burdens signed into law with the One Big Beautiful Bill Act while making importing goods from foreign countries costly. Speaking at a campaign stop in a Mack Trucks facility in Macungie, Pa. on June 23, President Trump touted manufacturing’s impact on job creation, “[M]ore Americans are working today than at any time in the history of our country. And we’ve created over… 32,000 new jobs just starting in Pennsylvania alone. David, you have to get ready for that. And in the last few months alone, we’ve added 2,600 Pennsylvania manufacturing jobs. And that number is going to go much, much higher as the factories start to open.”
The approach is working, with U.S. manufacturing reaching a four-year high in May. Companies are committing to expanding the creation of products like prescription drugs, semiconductors, safe electrical equipment, and many more products on American soil as a result of the strategy. Some of those pledges will take years to prove out. The test isn’t the press release; the test is whether concrete gets poured, machines get installed, and people get hired. Washington should remember its proper place. It can secure the border, protect trade rules, keep taxes sane, cut permitting delays, open energy, and stop smothering employers with paperwork.
America can’t bureaucrat itself into prosperity; the free market builds because owners, investors, engineers, machinists, welders, truckers, and buyers make millions of hard choices every day. The left often treats manufacturing like a museum exhibit or a union postcard. It’s neither. It’s the hard center of national independence. If America keeps rebuilding its industrial base, our allies will trust us more, our enemies will think twice, and our own people will have work that makes something real. The factory floor never stopped being America’s superpower. It only needed room to breathe.

When you understand that Iran was a proxy regime for NATO/EU/City of London Criminal Conglomerate, it is quite easy to understand why most NATO countries were extremely unhelpful with ending the Iranian threat.

They know why they were unhelpful.

He knows why they were… pic.twitter.com/yq5sIJ2ajN
— Jack Straw (@JackStr42679640) July 8, 2026

If you have a kid and you’re refusing to open a Trump Account just bc you hate Trump, you’re letting politics make financial decisions for your child’s future.

That’s what I call financial stupidity.

I don’t care if you’re Republican, Democrat, or hate politics altogether. If… pic.twitter.com/xhmDUwQqzk
— Teslaconomics (@Teslaconomics) July 7, 2026

Morgan Stanley's Adam Jonas has just initiated coverage on @SpaceX for the first time with a $300 price target & a bull case of $600/share, which would be an $8 trillion market cap.

Adam thinks SpaceX could generate $319 billion of revenue in 2030, and $3.3 trillion in 2040:… pic.twitter.com/PpZiIy2VGi
— Sawyer Merritt (@SawyerMerritt) July 7, 2026

https://twitter.com/ns123abc/status/2074604203180208524?s=20

“Elon did in 19 days what others take a year to achieve. It's unbelievable.”

— NVIDIA's CEO Jensen Huang pic.twitter.com/U6Z9GKxAyl
— Dima Zeniuk (@DimaZeniuk) July 8, 2026

BREAKING: JPMorgan says a Tesla–SpaceX merger could make strategic sense.

• Elon Musk could unify leadership across both companies
• AI, robotics, energy, transportation & space under one company
• Vertical integration could unlock major synergies
• Terafab could strengthen… pic.twitter.com/FO0duFM8bt
— DogeDesigner (@cb_doge) July 7, 2026

Fun fact.

July 8, today, turns out to be the day that most people around the planet experience daylight at the same time.

This means, 99% of Earth's 8 billion residents will be on the sunlit side of Earth at the same time. pic.twitter.com/3FrSArqEfu
— Massimo (@Rainmaker1973) July 8, 2026

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