🔴 Trump/Ukraine/Russia Jul-Dec 2026
Permalink: https://wp.me/PDKwi-6Kc
🇺🇦 Press Here ⬅️ For Recent Articles and Discussion
🇺🇦 Press Here For Index to all Trump/Ukraine/Russia Files
With Tweets, Retweets, links to articles and excerpts, I’ve tried to document this national soap opera/tragedy we’re living through. The resources at the beginning are a mixed bag of timelines and documents and I provide a clickable cast of characters (Russians, mostly). This is tucked into my blog about the tv show, the Blacklist, because that was easiest for me, though the show is related to current events in myriad, enlightening ways.
💽Recommended⋙ Mueller She Wrote Podcast ⋙ http://bit.ly/2PgTKWs or Press ⇊ ⇊
Other Podcasts:
The Asset (Center for American Progress) 🌟
The Dworkin Report (Scott Dworkin)
Gaslit Nation (Sarah Kendzior, Andrea Chalupa)
The Lawfare Podcast (Benjamin Wittes, Brookings)
The Josh Marshall Podcast (TPM)
The Mother Jones Podcast (David Corn)
Mueller Time (Eric Leval, Chris Carey)
The Oath (Chuck Rosenberg, MSNBC)
The Report (Lawfare)
On Topic (Renato Mariotti)
Skullduggery (Michael Isikoff, Yahoo)
Trump Inc (q4- 8qProPublica)
Trumpcast (Slate)
🔊 PlayerFM: Best Trump Russia Investigation Podcasts (2019) http://bit.ly/2MKbtV8
Twitter List: INVESTIGATORS: https://twitter.com/Auriandra/lists/investigators
// Investigative reporters, Trump-Russia sleuths, Intelligence Community, Legislators, “alt-gov,” and Targets
Russian Intelligence Services:
Foreign Intelligence Service (SVR) – The Foreign Intelligence Service reports directly to the President of Russia.
GRU – Main Intelligence Directorate of the Russian Armed Forces.
Federal Security Service (FSB) – The Federal Security Service is responsible for counter-intelligence, state security and anti-terrorist operations
🔄 ECFR , Mark Galeotti [EU] (2016): Introduction: Putin’s hydra: Inside Russia’s intelligence services http://bit.ly/2NZWN1h
// 5/11/2016, Intro
⋙ 📒 ECFR, Mark Galeotti [EU] (2016): Report: Putin’s Hydra: Inside Russia’s Intelligence Services [pdf] http://bit.ly/2NYjG5b 20p
// May 2016, Full report
Key People: Alexander Abramov, Roman Abramovich, Aras Agalarov, Emin Agalarov, Rinat Akhmetov, Rinat Akhmetshin, Yulya Alferova, Yuri Andropov, Anatoly Antonov, Anne Applebaum, Andrii Artemenko, Arron Banks, Andrey Baronov, Alexander Bastrykin, Sergey Beseda, Vitaly Bespalov, Leonid “Len” Blavatnik, Anna Bogacheva, David Bogatin, Alexander Bortnikov, Victor Boyarkin, Wm Browder, Mariia Butina, Carole Cadwalladr, Michael Caputo, Yuri Chaika, Igor Chekunov, Sergey Chemezov, Anatoly Chubais, Michael Cohen, George Cottrell, Igor Danchenko, Oleg Deripaska, Andrii Derkach, Igor Divyekin, Kirill Dmitriev, Aleksandr Dugin, Arkady Dvorkovich, Paul Erickson, Oleg Erovinkin, Nigel Farage, Dmitri Firtash, John Fotiadis, Gene (Evgeny) Friedman, Igor Fruman, Daniel Gelbinovich, Valery Gerasimov, Rob Goldstone, Sergei Gorkov, Henry Greenberg, Fiona Hill, Andrew Intrater, Ivan the Terrible, Bidzina Ivanishvili, Ramzan Kadyrov, Brittany Kaiser, Mikhail Kalugin, Vladimir Kara-Murza, Saak Karapetyan, Eugene Kaspersky (Kaspersky Lab), Denis Katsyv, Irakly (“Ike”) Kaveladze, Michael Khodarkovsky, Nikita Khrushchev, Konstantin Kilimnik, Sergey Kislyak, Artem Klyushin, Ihor Kolomoyskyi, Konstantin Kosachev, Mikhail Kovalchuk, Yury Kovalchuk, Aleksandra Krylova, Elena Khusyaynova, Simon Kukes, Sergey Lavrov, Alexander Litvinenko, Howard Lorber, Alexander Lukashenko, Yuriy Lutsenko, Simona Mangiante, Alexander Mashkevich, Michael McFaul, Viktor Medvedchek, Josef Mifsud, Alexey Miller, Sergei Millian, Semion Mogilevich (Don Semyon), Konstantin Molofeev, George Nader, Valentyn Nalyvaichenko, Lyudmila Narusova, Sergei Naryshkin, Alexei Navalny, Eduard Nektalov, Konstantin Nikolaev, Vyacheslav Nikonov, Yevgeniy Nikulin, Alexander Nix, Isabel Oakeshoff, George Papadopoulos, Lev Parnas, Sam Patten, Nikolai Patrushev, Alexander Perepilichnyy, Dmitry Peskov, Peter the Great, Igor Pisarsky, Petro Poroshenko, Yevgeny Prigozhin, Sergei Prikhodko, Vladimir Putin, George Ramishvili, Dmitry Rogozin, Alexander Rovt, Giorgi Rtskhiladze, Dmitry Rybolovlev, Konstantin Rykov, Mikheil Saakashvili, Felix Sater, Igor Sechin, Leonid Shebarshin, Anastasia Shevchenko, Sergey Shoigu, Viktor Shokin, Oleg Solodukhin, Christopher Steele, Ruslan Stoyanov, Oleg Solodukhin, Peter Strzok, Sergei Surovikin, Taiwanchik (aka Alimzhan Tokhtakhunov), Bill Taylor, Andriy Telizhenko, Gennady Timchenko, Oleg Tinkov, Alimzhan Tokhtakhunov (aka Taiwanchik), Aleksandr Torshin, Vyacheslav Trubnikov, Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya, Yulia Tymoshenko, Anastasia Vashukevich (aka Nastya Rybka), Viktor Vekselberg, Natalia Veselnitskaya, Alexander Vindman, Vyacheslav Volodin, Curt Weldon, Andy Wigmore, Alexander Yakovenko, Viktor Yanukovych, Boris Yeltsin, Ivan Yermakov, Marie Yovanovitch, Viktor Yushchenko, Aleksandr Zakharchenko, Maria Zakharova, Joel Zamel, Volodymyr Zelenskyy
Bios w links (Wikipedia unless otherwise noted): Alexander Abramov, Roman Abramovich, Aras Agalarov, Emin Agalarov, Rinat Akhmetov, Rinat Akhmetshin, Yulya Alferova (National Compass), Yuri Andropov, Anatoly Antonov, Anne Applebaum, Andrii Artemenko, Arron Banks, Andrey Baranov (Bloomberg), Alexander Bastrykin, Sergey Beseda, Vitaly Bespalov (NBC), Leonid “Len” Blavatnik, Anna Bogacheva (NYT), David Bogatin (NYT), Alexander Bortnikov, Victor Boyarkin (TrumpRussia), William Browder, Mariia Butina, Carole Cadwalladr, Michael Caputo, Yuri Chaika, Igor Chekunov, Sergey Chemezov, Anatoly Chubais, Michael Cohen, George Cottrell, Igor Danshenko, Oleg Deripaska, Andrii Derkach, Igor Divyekin, Kirill Dmitriev, Aleksandr Dugin, Arkady Dvorkovich, Paul Erickson, Oleg Erovinkin, Nigel Farage, Dmitri Firtash, John Fotiadis (Archinect), Gene (Evgeny) Friedman, Igor Fruman, Daniel Gelbinovich (Daily Beast), Valery Gerasimov, Rob Goldstone, Sergei Gorkov, Henry Greenberg (Miami Herald), Fiona Hill, Andrew Intrater, Ivan the Terrible, Bidzina Ivanishvili, Ramzan Kadyrov, Brittany Kaiser (Cambridge Analytica), Mikhail Kalugin, Vladimir Kara-Murza, Saak Karapetyan, Eugene Kaspersky (Kaspersky Lab), Denis Katsyv, Irakly Kaveladze, Michael Khodarkovsky, Elena Khusyaynova, Konstantin Kilimnik, Sergey Kislyak, Artem Klyushin (National Compass), Ihor Kolomoyskyi, Konstantin Kosachev, Mikhail Kovalchuk, Yury Kovalchuk, Nikita Khrushchev, Aleksandra Krylova (NYT), Simon Kukes, Sergey Lavrov, Alexander Litvinenko, Howard Lorber, Alexander Lukashenko, Yuriy Lutsenko, Konstantin Malofeev, Simona Mangiante (Papadopoulos), Alexander Mashkevich, Michael McFaul, Viktor Medvedchek, Josef Mifsud, Alexey Miller, Sergei Millian, Semion Mogilevich (Don Semyon) …
Cover: KyivPost (10/18/2019): Shady Cast of Characters: Engineers of Trump-Ukraine Scandal http://bit.ly/2MZCilW
Valentyn Nalyvaichenko, Lyudmila Narusova, Sergei Naryshkin, Alexei Navalny, Eduard Nektalov (NYMag), Konstantin Nikolaev, Yevgeniy Nikulin, Vyacheslav Nikonov, Alexander Nix, Isabel Oakeshoff, George Papadopoulos, Lev Parnas, Nikolai Patrushev, Sam Patten, Alexander Perepilichny, Dmitry Peskov, Peter the Great, Igor Pisarsky (RIM), Petro Poroshenko, Yevgeny Prigozhin, Sergei Prikhodko, Vladimir Putin, George Ramishvili (Bloomberg), Dmitry Rogozin, Alexander Rovt, Giorgi Rtskhiladze (CNBC), Nastya Rybka (aka Anastasia Vashukevich) (WaPo), Dmitry Rybolovlev, Konstantin Rykov, Mikheil Saakashvili, Felix Sater, Igor Sechin, Leonid Shebarshin, Anastasia Shevchenko (Amnesty Intl), Sergey Shoigu, Viktor Shokin, Oleg Solodukhin, Christopher Steele, Ruslan Stoyanov, Peter Strzok, Sergei Surovikin, Taiwanchik (aka Alimzhan Tokhtakhunov), Bill Taylor, Andriy Telizhenko (BuzzFeedNews), Gennady Timchenko, Oleg Tinkov, Alimzhan Tokhtakhunov (aka Taiwanchik), Aleksandr Torshin, Vyacheslav Trubnikov, Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya, Yulia Tymoshenko, Anastasia Vashukevich (aka Nastya Rybka) (WaPo), Viktor Vekselberg, Natalia Veselnitskaya, Alexander Vindman, Vyacheslav Volodin, Curt Weldon, Andy Wigmore, Alexander Yakovenko, Viktor Yanukovych, Boris Yeltsin, Ivan Yermakov (Moscow Proj), Marie Yovanovitch, Viktor Yushchenko, Aleksandr Zakharchenko, Maria Zakharova, Joel Zamel, Volodymyr Zelenskyy
,
By @WendySiegelman
Key Documents
// new November 2018, to be continually updated
🔆 This❗️⋙ 💙💙🔄 House.gov: Select Committee to Investigate the JANUARY 6TH Attack on the United States Capitol https://january6th.house.gov
🔆 This❗️⋙ 💙💙🔄 JustSecurity: Public Document Clearinghouse: UKRAINE Impeachment Inquiry http://bit.ly/2CEsQ2F ‼️ Links to ALL documents ‼️
🔆 This❗️⋙ 💙💙🔄 AmericanOversight: Trump-Ukraine Key Figures and Documents http://bit.ly/2C24bES
AmericanOversight: The Trump Administration’s Contacts with Ukraine http://bit.ly/2BYSY89 from FOIA requests
🔆 This❗️⋙ 💙💙🔄 JustSecurity, Andy Wright: Just Security Launches the Russia Investigation Congressional Clearinghouse http://bit.ly/2L21uHz
// 8/22/2019
🔆 This❗️⋙ 💙💙🔄 Lawfare: Full Text of the Mueller Report’s Executive Summaries http://bit.ly/2IFLewq
// 4/18/2019
🔆 This❗️⋙ 💙💙🔄 Lawfare: Document: The Mueller Report http://bit.ly/2vcgNpN
// 4/18/2019
🔆 This❗️⋙ 💙💙🔄≣ NYT: The Whistle-Blower Complaint: Read the Document [Interactive] http://nyti.ms/2nq4FAD
// 9/26/2019
🔆 This❗️⋙ 💙💙🔄 WaPo: Trump impeachment inquiry: Latest news and updates http://wapo.st/2P09WuE [Continually updated]
🔆 This❗️⋙ 💙💙🔄 WaPo, Kate Rabinowitz and Kevin Schaul: Who’s involved in the Trump impeachment inquiry http://wapo.st/2W673dg
// orig published 10/21/2019
By @jzikah has a new book! Cartoon President http://amzn.to/2QUeZhk @Jzikah
⋙ 💙💙🔄 📔 Court Filing (1/17/2019): Civil Action No. 1:18-cv-03501 [pdf] http://cnn.it/2CBddZy (111p) Democratic National Committee v.: Russian Federation, DJ Trump For President, Inc (and others)
// 1/17/2019
⋙ 💙💙🔄 TheAtlantic, Yoni Appelbaum: Impeach Donald Trump http://bit.ly/2FykFIP
//March 2019 cover story
⋙ 💙💙🔄 Politico Mag, Darren Samuelsohn: The Only Impeachment Guide You’ll Ever Need http://politi.co/2QHcJGi
// 1/11/2019, As talk of the I-word heats up, here’s POLITICO Magazine’s soup-to-nuts answers to all your questions about the politics—and the practical realities—of removing a president.
⋙ 💙💙🔄 WaPo, Max Boot: Here are 18 reasons Trump could be a Russian asset http://wapo.st/2D7IJQ9
// 1/13/2019
By @Jzikah
⋙ 💙💙🔄 TheAtlantic, Jeffrey Goldberg (Editor): UNTHINKABLE: 50 Moments That Define an Improbable Presidency http://bit.ly/2RvDFOn
// Jan 2019; Donald Trump’s 50 Most Unthinkable Moments ~ 50 Articles
⋙ 💙💙🔄 Wikipedia: Timeline of investigations into Trump and Russia (2018) http://bit.ly/2Bh12jP
⋙ 💙💙🔄 Axios: Timeline: Every big move in the Mueller investigation http://bit.ly/2Euh3H9
// 12/12/2018
@Jzikah’s Amazon page: http://amzn.to/3tUTM6Y
⋙ 💙💙🔄 Moyers&Co: Interactive Timeline: Everything We Know About Russia and President Trump http://bit.ly/2uVHc9j
// continually updated
⋙ 💙💙🔄📒 DocumentCloud: Steele Dossier [pdf] http://bit.ly/2y5ZhnF 35p
⋙ 💙💙🔄📒 FBIRecordsVault: Records Between FBI and Christopher Steele http://bit.ly/2KqLoF1
⋙ 💙💙🔄≣ AP: Mueller Investigation documents http://bit.ly/2ihbK0l
⋙ 💙💙🔄≣ CitJourno: Trump/Russian Mob Connections http://www.citjourno.org
@Jzikah’s Amazon page: http://amzn.to/3tUTM6Y
⋙ 💙💙🔄≣ CNN, Marshall Cohen, Tal Yellen & Liz Stark: Tracking the Russia investigations (documents) http://cnn.it/2hVCpU5
⋙ 💙💙🔄≣ NYT: Russian Hacking and Influence in the U.S. Election http://nyti.ms/2NqFXeY
⋙ 💙💙🔄≣ BrennanCenter: Trump-Russia Investigations http://bit.ly/2yRKcu6
⋙ 💙💙🔄≣ Politico: The people connected to the Russia probes [ Interactive ] http://politi.co/2FUDhz2 //➔ Democrats, Prosecutors, Law Enforcement/Lobbyists/Media,Team Trump, Foreign Nationals
⋙ 💙💙🔄 TheMoscowProject: Trump’s Russia Cover-Up By the Numbers http://bit.ly/2ycY959
// Center for American Progress; 80+ contacts with Russia-linked operatives https://themoscowproject.org/about/ http://bit.ly/2ycY959
@Jzikah’s Amazon page: http://amzn.to/3tUTM6Y
⋙ 💙💙🔄≣ NBCNews: Russia timeline: Key players, meetings and investigation details http://nbcnews.to/2vtR3YW
⋙ 💙💙🔄≣ DailyBeast: Democrats Release the Fusion GPS Testimony on Trump and Russia http://thebea.st/2qMmH1d w attachment [pdf] ⋙ via Dianne Feinstein http://bit.ly/2FjtlPP
⋙ 💙💙🔄≣ NYT: Justice Department Gives Congress Comey’s Memos on Trump http://nyti.ms/2HdLe2Z
// 4/19/2018 ➔ DocumentCloud: http://bit.ly/2HOGC4z
⋙ 💙💙🔄≣ DOJ: Indictment of Internet Research Agency LLC et al … [PDF] http://bit.ly/2CqdHzD 37p //➔ Mueller Investigation
// 2/16/2018
@Jzikah’s Amazon page: http://amzn.to/3tUTM6Y
⋙ 💙💙🔄≣ Amy Siskind: The Weekly List ~ “This is How Democracy Ends” https://theweeklylist.org
⋙ 💙💙🔄≣ NYT: Mueller Has List of Questions for Trump http://nyti.ms/2rfDuqK + http://nyti.ms/2HExEKi
// 4/30/2018, Majority Relate to if Trump Obstructed Inquiry on Russia
⋙ 💙💙🔄≣ NYT: The Trump Lawyers’ Confidential Memo to Mueller, Explained [ Document ] http://nyti.ms/2kKPgq9
// 6/2/2018, NYT article about document: http://nyti.ms/2swIZSc
@Jzikah’s Amazon page: http://amzn.to/3tUTM6Y
⋙ 💙💙🔄≣ TIME: The Arguments President Trump Has Made Against the Mueller Investigation http://ti.me/2MdeARX
// 6/8/2018
⋙ 💙💙🔄≣ TIME: Wikipedia: Links between Trump associates and Russian officials http://bit.ly/2K42VDF
⋙ 💙💙🔄≣ WaPo: Who has been charged in the Russia probe and why http://wapo.st/2toNwH2
// continually updated; WaPo Russia page
⋙ 💙💙🔄≣ ForeignAffairs Anthology: A New Cold War? Russia and America, Then and Now 1947- http://fam.ag/2KEA4dF
@Jzikah’s Amazon page: http://amzn.to/3tUTM6Y
⋙ 💙💙🔄≣ Justice.gov: Mueller Indictment of 12 Russians in the GRU for Election Hacking [pdf] http://bit.ly/2NbphV6 29p
// 7/13/2018
⋙ 💙💙🔄≣ FactCheck.org: Timeline of Russia Investigation http://bit.ly/2KZ4qaQ
// posted 6/7/2018, updated 7/13/2018; Key moments in the FBI probe of Russia’s efforts to influence the 2016 presidential election; Readable
⋙ 💙💙🔄≣ Legal Process Server: DNC Lawsuit vs Russia, Wikileaks, et al http://bit.ly/2KIOhBq
⋙ 💙💙🔄≣ NYT, Linda Qiu: Truth-Testing Trump’s 250-Plus Attacks on the Russia Inquiry http://nyti.ms/2MY609E
// 8/18/2018
@Jzikah’s Amazon page: http://amzn.to/3tUTM6Y
⋙ 💙💙🔄≣ Justice.gov: Manafort Plea Agreement [pdf] http://bit.ly/2CZiVb7 17p
// 9/14/2018
⋙ 💙💙🔄💽 NYT: Opinion | Operation Infektion: A three-part video series on Russian disinformation http://nyti.ms/2OHqSSV
// 11/12/2018
⋙ 💙💙🔄≣ PasteMag, Jacob Weindling: A Year of Trump and Russia: The 75 Stories That Defined the Mueller Investigation in 2018 http://bit.ly/2QWN1SU
// 12/28/2018
⋙ 💙💙🔄≣ LawFareBlog: Document: Indictment of Roger Stone [pdf] http://bit.ly/2UdQgmj 24p
// 1/25/2019
@Jzikah’s Amazon page: http://amzn.to/3tUTM6Y
⋙ 💙💙🔄📋 NYT: Trump and His Associates Had More Than 100 Contacts With Russians Before the Inauguration [Interactive] http://nyti.ms/2MAZCps
// 1/26/2019
⋙ 💙💙🔄 BuzzFeedNews: These Secret Files Show How The Trump Moscow Talks Unfolded While Trump Heaped Praise On Putin http://bit.ly/2DWQ2ed
// 2/5/2019; ⏳TIMELINE ⌛️
⋙ 💙💙🔄 WaPo: What we learned about Trumpworld outreach to Russia since Mueller’s investigation began http://wapo.st/2twkXYE
// 2/19/2019, And what we still don’t know.
⋙ 💙💙🔄 ◕📋 NYT, Larry Buchanan and Karen Yourish: Trump Has Publicly Attacked the Russia Investigation More Than 1,100 Times http://nyti.ms/2T2HSsN
// 2/19/2019
@Jzikah’s Amazon page: http://amzn.to/3tUTM6Y
;
⋙ 💙💙🔄 ◕📋 WaPo, Philip Bump: The 81 people and organizations just looped into the Trump probe — and why they were included http://wapo.st/2SJrw41
// 3/4/2019
⋙ 💙💙🔄≣ NYT: Full Document: Trump’s Call With the Ukrainian President [Interactive] http://nyti.ms/2lfBkbC (Annotated)
// 9/25/2019″
⋙ 💙💙🔄≣ NYT: The Whistle-Blower Complaint: Read the Document [Interactive] http://nyti.ms/2nq4FAD
// 9/26/2019
@Jzikah’s Amazon page: http://amzn.to/3tUTM6Y
⋙ 💙💙🔄 📔 This❗️⋙ HPSCI: Trump-Ukraine impeachment inquiry report http://bit.ly/2LlnJsX
// 12/3/2019; House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence
⋙ 💙💙🔄 📔 This❗️⋙ Report: House Judiciary Committee report on their articles of impeachment against President Donald John Trump http://bit.ly/2Ek2rIa 658p
// 10/15/2019
⋙ 💙💙🔄 📔 This❗️⋙ Lawfare: House Releases Impeachment Trial Brief http://bit.ly/2ucCo3Y document 111p
// 1/18/2019
@Jzikah’s Amazon page: http://amzn.to/3tUTM6Y
@Jzikah’s Amazon page: http://amzn.to/3tUTM6Y
⋙ 💙💙🔄 📔 This❗️⋙ Trial Memorandum of the US House of Representatives in the Impeachment Trial of President Donald J Trump http://bit.ly/2uePNsc
// 1/18/2020
⋙ 💙💙🔄 📔 This❗️⋙ Trial Memorandum of President Donald J Trump http://bit.ly/2NGi2XK 171p
// 1/20/2020
@Jzikah’s Amazon page: http://amzn.to/3tUTM6Y
⋙ 💙💙🔄 📔 This❗️⋙ Vox, Matthew Yglesias and Andrew Prokop: The ultimate guide to the Donald Trump impeachment saga http://bit.ly/2SoXpkm
// Updated: Feb 5, 2020, 8:06pm EST, Published: Nov 5, 2019, 8:06am EST
⋙ 💙💙🔄 📔 This❗️⋙ NYT: The Key Players in Trump’s Plot to Upend the Election, Mapped https://tinyurl.com/4w8uekjx
// 8/31/2023
⋙ 💙💙🔄 📔 This❗️⋙ 📀 Press Here For Impeachment Trial on Cspan
// 1/20/2020-2/5/2020
⋙ 💙💙🔄 📔 This❗️⋙ LawFare: Confronting the Capitol Insurrection [Index Page] http://bit.ly/3mfMDNc
⏳WaPo: The full Trump-Ukraine impeachment timeline http://wapo.st/35odsUl
@Jzikah’s Amazon page: http://amzn.to/3tUTM6Y
⭕ Feb 2021 Second Trump #Impeachment Trial
Day One: Rules etc
Day TWO: C-SPAN: U.S. Senate Impeachment Trial Day 2, Impeachment Managers’ Constitutionality Arguments http://bit.ly/3aa1CCQ
// 2/9/2021;
Day 2 of the impeachment trial of former President Trump for incitement of insurrection began with senators voting 89-11 in favor of the trial organizing resolution. Lead Impeachment Manager Representative Jamie Raskin (D-MD) then made opening remarks followed by a 13-minute video showing footage of former President Trump’s January 6, 2021, speech and of the actions of those who stormed the U.S. Capitol that day. Afterward, impeachment managers Representatives Raskin, Joe Neguse (D-CO), and David Cicilline (D-RI) presented their arguments for the constitutionality of impeaching a former president. Representative Raskin in his arguments talked about bringing his daughter and son-in-law with him to the Capitol on January 6.
@Jzikah’s Amazon page: http://amzn.to/3tUTM6Y
Day THREE: C-SPAN: Senate Impeachment Trial Day 3, Part 1 http://bit.ly/374q3zm
// 2/10/2021;
The first part of Day 3 of the impeachment trial of former President Trump for incitement of insurrection began with House impeachment manager Representative Jamie Raskin (D-MD) asserting that the former president had “surrendered his role as commander in chief” and become “the inciter in chief.” He played the January 6, 2021, video Mr. Trump posted on Twitter in which he told his supporters who attacked the U.S. Capitol to “go home.” Representative Joe Neguse (D-CO) then outlined impeachment managers’ plan for arguing their case. In the final segment of part 1, Representatives Joaquin Castro (D-TX) and Eric Swalwell (D-CA) described the former president’s actions leading up to and after the 2020 election
Day Three: C-SPAN: Senate Impeachment Trial Day 3, Part 2 http://bit.ly/3tYOS9Y
// The Senate impeachment trial of former President Donald Trump continued with House managers presenting video and tweets they say indicate that former President Trump incited the deadly January 6 riot.
Day Three: C-SPAN: Senate Impeachment Trial Day 3, Part 3 http://bit.ly/372bYSY
// Rep. Eric Swalwell (D-CA) Entire remarked on the breach of the Capitol and attacks on police officers.
Day Three: C-SPAN: Senate Impeachment Trial Day 3, Part 4 http://bit.ly/3aZ82DV
// An effort by Sen. Mike Lee to remove remarks by the House impeachment managers from the official record sparked confusion on the Senate floor.
@Jzikah’s Amazon page: http://amzn.to/3tUTM6Y
Day FOUR: C-SPAN: Senate Impeachment Trial Day 4, Part 1 http://bit.ly/3rXW1pf
// 2/12/2021
Former President Donald Trump’s defense lawyers made their case that Mr. Trump was innocent of charges of inciting an insurrection. They compared speeches by Democrats and others to the former president’s remarks in their defense, and stated that “the article of impeachment now before the Senate is an unjust and blatantly unconstitutional act of political vengeance.”
Day Four: C-SPAN: Senate Impeachment Trial Day 4, Part 2 http://bit.ly/3ddmmeG
// After a recess, Former President Donald Trump’s defense continued to make their case that Mr. Trump was innocent of charges of inciting an insurrection. In this portion of the impeachment trial, attorney Bruce Castor spoke.
Day Four: C-SPAN: Senate Impeachment Trial Day 4, Q&A http://bit.ly/3jLkwD0
// In this portion of the second impeachment trial of former President Trump, senators asked questions of both the House managers and Mr. Trump’s defense lawyers. Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) then announced that Capitol Police Officer Eugene Goodman would be receiving the Congressional Gold Medal, due to his actions during the January 6 riots.
Day FIVE: C-SPAN: Senate Impeachment Trial Day 5 http://bit.ly/3b2haHL
// 2/13/2021
The Senate acquits former President Trump of inciting an insurrection, 57-43. Earlier, the House managers and the defense made closing arguments. Also, House Manager Raskin (D-MD) read a written statement from Rep. Herrera Beutler (R-WA).
● Majority Leader Schumer on Impeachment Acquittal of Former President Trump http://bit.ly/2OFAT8V
// Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) delivered remarks after the Senate voted to acquit former President Trump, 57-43. Seven Republicans joined all Democrats in voting to convict Mr. Trump.
● Minority Leader McConnell on Impeachment Acquittal of Former President Trump http://bit.ly/3djH5NM
// Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) delivered remarks after the Senate voted to acquit former President Trump, 57-43. Seven Republicans joined all Democrats in voting to convict Mr. Trump.
@Jzikah’s Amazon page: http://amzn.to/3tUTM6Y
Twitter Threads
⭕ 9 Feb 2021 Impeachment #2: Day 1
💙 🧵 RT @atrupar Rep. Raskin’s opening impeachment trial statement: “Their argument is that if you commit an impeachable offense in your last few weeks in office, you do it with constitutional impunity.” 📌 https://twitter.com/atrupar/status/1359206921039974406?s=20
⋙ 🐣 RT @atrupar Here is the entire video timeline of the January 6 insurrection as presented by the House impeachment managers 💽 https://twitter.com/atrupar/status/1359216739054190593?s=20/photo/1
⭕ 10 Feb 2021 Impeachment #2: Day 2
🔄 💙🐣🧵 RT @jentaub It’s on. Day 2 of the Trump Impeachment Trial 2.0. February 10, 2021. We will have a dinner break at 6 p.m. ¤ 1/ 📌 https://twitter.com/jentaub/status/1359548695038087169?s=20
🔄 💙🐣🧵 RT @atrupar Raskin: “This case is much worse than someone who falsely shouts fire in a crowded theater. It’s more like like a case where the town fire chief, who’s paid to put out fires, sends a mob not to yell fire in a crowded theater, but to actually set the theater on fire.”
🔄 💙 WaPo: See all the evidence presented in Trump’s impeachment trial http://wapo.st/3qeb1ii
@Jzikah’s Amazon page: http://amzn.to/3tUTM6Y
⭕ 11 Feb 2021 Impeachment #2: Day 3
🔄 💙🧵 RT @jentaub 🇺🇸 It’s on. Day 3. The Trial of Donald Trump 2.0 continues at 12:04 p.m. on February 11, 2021 📌 https://twitter.com/jentaub/status/1359911216588685317?s=20
// Defense
🔄 💙🧵 RT @atrupar The Thursday installment of Trump’s #ImpeachmentTrial begins with a Baked Alaska clip 📌 https://twitter.com/atrupar/status/1359914413709492232?s=20
⭕ 12 Feb 2021 Impeachment #2: Day 4
🔄 💙 🧵 RT @jentaub We have begun. It’s Day 4 of the Trump Impeachment Trial 2.0. The defense is putting on their case. The first lawyer is Van Der Veen. 📌 https://twitter.com/jentaub/status/1360274181510807556?s=20
@Jzikah’s Amazon page: http://amzn.to/3tUTM6Y
🔄 💙 🧵 RT @atrupar “Lord, infuse them with the spirit of nonpartisan patriotism” — Senate Chaplain Barry Black’s prayer begins the Trump defense portion of the #ImpeachmentTrial 📌 https://twitter.com/atrupar/status/1360275280775028740?s=20
⋙ 🔄 💙 🧵 RT @atrupar [Q&A] Lindsey Graham, Kevin Cramer, and Roger Marshall use an impeachment trial question to own the libs 📌 https://twitter.com/atrupar/status/1360337066215804930?s=20
⭕ 13 Feb 2021 Impeachment #2: Day 5
🔄 💙 🧵 RT @jentaub Day 5 of the Donald Trump Impeachment Trial 2.0. February 13, 2021. Wonderful! They are going to debate whether to subpoena witnesses and documents ¤ 1/ 📌 https://twitter.com/jentaub/status/1360605971198967809?s=20
🔄 💙 🧵 RT @atrupar “Lord, touch and move them to believe that end does not justify the means” — Senate Chaplain Barry Black’s prayer begins the Saturday portion of the #ImpeachmentTrial 📌 https://twitter.com/atrupar/status/1360607971055656962?s=20
@Jzikah’s Amazon page: http://amzn.to/3tUTM6Y
⚖️ House Committee Hearings on the Jan 6, 2021 Insurrection ⚖️
Day 1: June 9, 2022: Overview
💙 ⚖️ 🧵 Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol https://january6th.house.gov
💙 ⚖️ 🧵 RT @jentaub Here we go ¤ The first public hearing of the January 6th Committee. Chair Thompson begins with his personal history and says each committee member has one thing in common “we swore the same oath . . to defend the Constitution against all enemies, foreign and domestic.”
📌 💽 https://twitter.com/jentaub/status/1535050380429516801?s=20/photo/1
💙 ⚖️ 🧵 RT @atrupar Bennie Thompson begins January 6 hearing: “I’m from a part of the country where people justified the actions of slavery, the Ku Klux Klan, and lynching. I’m reminded of that dark history as I hear voices today try to justify the actions of the insurrectionists on January 6, 2021”
📌 https://twitter.com/atrupar/status/1535050790720634891?s=20/photo/1
💙 ⚖️ 💽 CSPAN: First Open Testimony Before January 6 Committee http://bit.ly/3zynEvU
// After months of closed door investigations, the House January 6 Committee held its first hearing with public testimony about what transpired-and why-during the assault on the U.S. Capitol.
Day 2: June 13, 2022: “The Big Lie”
💙 ⚖️ 🧵 RT @jentaub Here we go. Day 2 of the January 6th Committee Hearings gaveled in late at 10:46 am EDT. /1
📌 https://twitter.com/jentaub/status/1536359652514213888?s=20
💙 ⚖️ 🧵 RT @atrupar The second January 6 hearing begins with Liz Cheney talking about how Trump listened to advice from “an apparently inebriated Rudy Giuliani”
📌 https://twitter.com/atrupar/status/1536361664601374721?s=20
💙 ⚖️ 💽 CSPAN: Second Hearing on Investigation of Capitol Attack http://bit.ly/39jgMrH
// The “Big Lie”; The House committee looking into the Jan. 6 attack at the Capitol held its second hearing with witness testimony to make public the committee’s findings after a year of investigations.
Day 3: June 16, 2022: “Mike Pence”
💙 ⚖️ 🧵 RT @jentaub Here we go. Day 3 of the January 6 Committee hearing ¤ Focus today is on the pressure campaign on VP Pence to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election. “We are fortunate for Mr. Pence’s courage” says Chair Bennie Thompson. ¤ “But the danger hasn’t receded.” ¤ 1/
📌 https://twitter.com/jentaub/status/1537481664821174278?s=20
💙 ⚖️ 🧵 RT @atrupar The third January 6 hearing gets underway with a clip of Greg Jacob, former counsel to Pence, telling the committee that John Eastman admitted in front of Trump on January 4, 2021, that the pressure campaign against Pence violated the law
📌 https://twitter.com/atrupar/status/1537483292886601729?s=20
💙 ⚖️ 🧵 RT @MSNBC LIVE BLOG: The House Jan. 6 committee returns today for a third public hearing focused on VP Pence. Follow along as we break down key moments.
📌 https://twitter.com/MSNBC/status/1537449714676793345?s=20
💙 ⚖️ 💽 CSPAN: Third Hearing on Investigation of Capitol Attack http://bit.ly/3xx77WC President Trump’s Campaign to Influence Vice President Pence
// 6/16/2022; The January 6 Committee held its third public hearing focusing on former President Trump’s efforts to convince former Vice President Pence to not certify the 2020 election results.
Day 4: June 21, 2022: “Fake Electors”
💙 ⚖️ 🧵 RT @atrupar Bennie Thompson begins the fourth January 6 hearing by saying: “The lie hasn’t gone away. It’s corrupting our democratic institutions. People who believe that lie are now seeking positions of public trust.”
📌 https://twitter.com/atrupar/status/1539295123107991554?s=20
💙 ⚖️ 🧵 RT @kyledcheney NEW: Trump’s plan to seize power on Jan. 6 depended on state legislatures adopting alternate electors. He leaned heavily on state and local officials to do that while his team of lawyers — Eastman et al — developed a fringe legal theory to back the push.
📌 https://twitter.com/kyledcheney/status/1539201863702261760?s=20
💙 ⚖️ 🧵 RT @jentaub Joining @MaryLTrump for today’s January 6 hearing, Live now
📌 https://twitter.com/jentaub/status/1539289189920948224?s=20
💙 ⚖️ 🧵 RT @MSNBC LIVE BLOG: Day 4 of the House Jan. 6 Committee’s public hearings begins at 1pm ET. Follow along for live updates as we break down key moments.
📌 https://twitter.com/MSNBC/status/1539262716677918721?s=20
💙 ⚖️ 💽 CSPAN: Fourth Hearing on Investigation of Capitol Attack http://bit.ly/3OhikBF President Trump’s Campaign to Influence Vice President Pence
// 6/21/2022; The January 6 Committee held its fourth public hearing to outline findings after a year of investigating the Capitol attack in 2021.
Day 5: June 23, 2022: “Department of Justice”
💙 ⚖️ 🧵 RT @atrupar Cheney begins the fifth January 6 committee hearing by saying a focus will be an unsigned draft letter Trump and Jeffrey Clark wanted the DOJ to send to Georgia officials citing known lies to urge them to convene a special session to approve a fake set of electors
📌 https://twitter.com/atrupar/status/1540050703128862721?s=20
💙 ⚖️ 🧵 RT @MSNBC LIVE BLOG: The fifth public hearing of the House Jan. 6 committee begins at 3pm ET. Follow along as we break down key moments.
📌 https://twitter.com/MSNBC/status/1540018644121427968?s=20
💙 ⚖️ 🧵 😆 RT @emptywheel Spouse, listening to his first bit of the Jan6 hearings, of Liz Cheney’s promise we’ll hear about what Trump did on 1/6: Is that called foreshadowing? ¤ Me, lit PhD: She’s making herself the omniscient narrator.
📌 https://twitter.com/emptywheel/status/1540049823365218306?s=20
💙 ⚖️ 💽 CSPAN: Fifth Hearing on Investigation of Capitol Attack http://bit.ly/3tX3gkK
// 6/23/2022; The January 6 Committee holds a fifth public hearing on the alleged pressure campaign by Trump administration officials on the Justice Department to help overturn the 2020 election results.
Day 6: June 28, 2022: “Cassidy Hutchinson”
💙 ⚖️ 🧵 RT @atrupar we’re underway with the special June 28 hearing of the January 6 committee. Yes, Fox News is taking it live.
📌 https://twitter.com/atrupar/status/1541829781385248771?s=20
💙 ⚖️ 🧵 RT @MSNBC LIVE BLOG: The Jan. 6 committee holds a last-minute public hearing at 1pm ET today, which will include testimony from a former top aide to White House chief of staff Mark Meadows. Follow along as we break down key moments.
📌 https://twitter.com/MSNBC/status/1541789726960750593?s=20
💙 ⚖️ 🧵 RT @jentaub Wow! On January 2 Rudy told Cassidy Hutchinson Trump and team were going to the Capitol on the 6th. Cassidy asked her boss about it and he said “There’s a lot going on Cass. Things might get real real bad.” ¤ She said today, “That was the first moment I remember feeling scared.”
📌 https://twitter.com/jentaub/status/1541834209265963012?s=20
💙 ⚖️ 🧵 RT @emptywheel This woman is 26. She’s about to provide really damaging testimony about one of the most dangerous men in America.
📌 https://twitter.com/emptywheel/status/1541829534248566784?s=20
💙 ⚖️ 🧵 RT @lrozen J6 hearing starting, featuring Cassidy Hutchinson, former special assistant to Trump and aide to White House chief of staff Mark Meadows
📌 https://twitter.com/lrozen/status/1541829799169122308?s=20
💙 ⚖️ 💽 CSPAN: Sixth Hearing on Investigation of Capitol Attack http://bit.ly/3bp657u
// 6/28/2022; Cassidy Hutchinson, former senior aide to former White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows, testified that President Trump said, “You know, I don’t even care that they have weapons. They aren’t here to hurt me.” Her testimony came during the January 6 Committee hearing on the investigation of the attack on the U.S. Capitol. This is the sixth in a series of hearings – after months of closed-door investigations – detailing the committee findings on the January 6 attack. Ms. Hutchinson shared her experiences of the days leading up to and after the attack, including President Trump’s alleged altercation with Secret Service in the back of the presidential limo because the Secret Service refused the president’s demands to go to the Capitol after his rally speech.
Day 7: July 12, 2022: “Assembling the Mob”
💙 ⚖️ 🧵 RT @atrupar Liz Cheney begins the July 12 hearing of the January 6 committee with this: “President Trump is a 76 year old man. He is not an impressionable child. Just like everyone else in our country, he is responsible for his own actions and his own choices.”
📌 https://twitter.com/atrupar/status/1546906042927353857?s=20
💙 ⚖️ 🧵 RT @MSNBC LIVE: Jan. 6 sCommittee holds seventh public hearing, focused on the role far-right extremist groups Proud Boys and Oath Keepers played in Capitol attack. Get expert analysis in real-time on our live blog http://msnbc.com/jan6hearings
📌 https://twitter.com/MSNBC/status/1546903393297465344?s=20
💙 ⚖️ 🧵 RT @emptywheel And we’re off! ¤ “We settle our differences at the ballot box.” ¤ [Note: I’m going to break off at 2 to cover some live hearings.]
📌 https://twitter.com/emptywheel/status/1546903190574071808?s=20
💙 ⚖️ 🧵 RT @jentaub Pat Cipollone agreed that Donald Trump should have conceded the election at some point and time (at least, apparently on December 14 when Electoral College met).b
📌 https://twitter.com/jentaub/status/1546909222935445509?s=20
💙 ⚖️ 🧵 RT @ECMcLaughlin Live tweet of today’s January 6th hearing is right here. ⬇️⬇️⬇️
📌 https://twitter.com/ECMcLaughlin/status/1546902951687467008?s=20
💙 ⚖️ 💽 CSPAN: Seventh Hearing on Investigation of Capitol Attack http://bit.ly/3P2quy5
// 7/12/2022; January 6 Committee Vice Chair Rep. Liz Cheney (R-WY) said that former President Trump “tried to call a witness in our investigation. A witness you have not yet seen in these hearings,” and that the matter has been reported to the Justice Department. The revelation came as Rep. Cheney delivered her closing statement during the January 6 Committee hearing on the investigation of the attack on the U.S. Capitol. This is the seventh in a series of hearings – after months of closed-door investigations – detailing the committee findings on the January 6 attack. Testifying before the committee was Jason Van Tatenhove, the former spokesperson for the extremist group the Oath Keepers, who said the group is a “violent militia” and “the best illustration for what the Oath Keepers are happened January 6th when we saw that stacked military formation going up the stairs of our Capitol.” Also testifying was Stephen Ayres, who pled guilty to breaching the U.S. Capitol.
Day 8: July 21, 2022: “Dereliction of Duty”
💙 ⚖️ 🧵 RT @atrupar Liz Cheney begins the January 6 committee’s primetime July 21 hearing by announcing more hearings are coming in September
📌 https://twitter.com/atrupar/status/1550272235709296640?s=20
💙 ⚖️ 🧵 RT @ECMcLaughlin Livetweet of tonight’s 1/6 hearing will be right here.
⬇️⬇️⬇️
📌 https://twitter.com/ECMcLaughlin/status/1550260159783378944?s=20
💙 ⚖️ 🧵 RT @MollyJongFast Letsssssssss gooooo
📌 https://twitter.com/MollyJongFast/status/1550270058752102400?s=20
💙 ⚖️ 🔲 RT @MaryLTrump Join me and @JohnFugelsang @NormOrnstein @cmclymer @AdamParkhomenko @jentaub @georgehahn @BrianKarem @WajahatAli watching the hearings NOW
📌 https://twitter.com/MaryLTrump/status/1550272287772798976?s=20
💙 ⚖️ 💽 CSPAN: Eighth Hearing on Investigation of Capitol Attack https://tinyurl.com/36ea45sh
// 7/21/2022; “For the weeks between the November election and January 6, Donald Trump was a force to be reckoned with,” said January 6 Committee Chair Rep. Bennie Thompson (D-MS), later adding, “and then he stopped. For 187 minutes on January 6th, this man of unbridled destructive energy could not be moved.” His remarks came as he delivered his opening statement during the January 6 Committee hearing on the investigation of the attack on the U.S. Capitol. This is the eighth in a series of public hearings – after months of closed-door investigations – detailing the committee findings on the January 6 attack. The chair went on to say if there is no accountability for January 6th, “I fear that we will not overcome the ongoing threat to our democracy.” During her closing testimony, Vice Chair Rep. Liz Cheney (R-WY) touched on the former president’s supporters, saying, “he is preying on their patriotism. He is preying on their sense of justice. And on January 6th, Donald Trump turned their love of country … ”
Day 9: October 13, 2022: “Summary and Subpoena”
💙 ⚖️ 🧵 RT @atrupar Follow this thread for video highlights from what is likely to be the final January 6 committee hearing
📌 https://twitter.com/atrupar/status/1580603168404037635?s=20
💙 ⚖️ 🧵 RT @emptywheel Spouse, as Liz Cheney says they may make criminal referrals: Thank you Liz Cheney, you read my mind. [He had just asked if they could do that.]
📌 https://twitter.com/emptywheel/status/1580606914505080834?s=20
💙 ⚖️ 🧵 RT @TomDreisbach [NPR] Here we go: The latest @January6thCmte hearing has started. ¤ NPR’s livestream is available here:
📌 💽 https://twitter.com/TomDreisbach/status/1580605465796304901?s=20/photo/1
💙 ⚖️ 🧵 RT @tomlobianco [YahooNews] “Good afternoon, and may god bless the United States of America,” House Jan 6 Chair Bennie Thompson says in opening statement of #January6thHearings
📌 https://twitter.com/tomlobianco/status/1580605071498174471?s=20
💙 ⚖️ 🧵 RT @scottwongDC DAY 9 of the Jan. 6 hearings about to get underway. Follow along on our @NBCNews live blog here for all the updates: https://tinyurl.com/2wf2eyt3
📌 https://twitter.com/scottwongDC/status/1580603641878425602?s=20
💙 ⚖️ 🧵 🐣 RT @SethAbramson (📢) LIVE THREAD: This thread is a live-tweet of today’s House January 6 Committee hearing. I’m an attorney, journalist, and historian who has been contacted by the Committee and whose January 6–focused substack, PROOF, the Committee has cited. I hope you will RETWEET and follow.
📌 https://twitter.com/SethAbramson/status/1580574750581018626?s=20
By @AshaRangappa_
Day 9: July 21, 2022: “Summary and Resolution”
💙 ⚖️ 💽 CSPAN : Ninth Hearing on Investigation of Capitol Attack https://tinyurl.com/3cb42ubb // 10/13/2022; January 6 Committee Vice Chair Liz Cheney (R-WY) offered a resolution to issue a subpoena to hear from former President Trump regarding the January 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol. She said, “We are obligated to seek answers directly from the man who set this all in motion, and every American is entitled to those answers so we can act now to protect our republic.” Her resolution came during the January 6 Committee hearing on the investigation of the attack on the U.S. Capitol after committee Chair Bennie Thompson (D-MS) said members wanted to hear from the former president because he “is required to answer for his actions.” The committee members recounted prior evidence in lockstep with newly-obtained evidence, such as the Secret Service’s knowledge of a planned attack on the U.S. Capitol prior to January 6. They also shared never-before-seen video of members of Congress seeking safety and asking for help during the attack. .
Day 10: Dec 19, 2022: “Indictment Referrals and Adjournment”
💙 ⚖️ 🧵 RT @atrupar The final January 6 committee hearing is about to begin. Follow along for a video thread.
📌 https://twitter.com/atrupar/status/1604899834191876096?s=20
💙 ⚖️ 🧵 RT @axios The Jan. 6 select committee’s final public meeting is underway.
Follow this thread for updates. 👇
📌 https://twitter.com/axios/status/1604901456091484163?s=20
💙 ⚖️ 🧵 RT @MacFarlaneNews Standing by for our CBS News special report on the final public meeting of House Select Jan 6 Cmte. And votes on criminal referrals. Starts at 1pm eastern
📌 https://twitter.com/MacFarlaneNews/status/1604897048230187014?s=20
💙 ⚖️ 💽 CSPAN: Final Hearing on U.S. Capitol Attack https://tinyurl.com/2xt5j77b
// 12/19/2022; The January 6 Committee holds its final public hearing on the attack of the U.S. Capitol.
💙 ⚖️ 📔 This❗️⋙ 📔 Lawfare: Jan. 6 Select Committee Documents https://tinyurl.com/44fxvfjk
⋙ Lawfare: Jan. 6 Select Committee Document: Executive Summary [pdf] https://tinyurl.com/42p4bkx7 154p
⋙ Lawfare: Jan. 6 Committee Issues Final Report https://tinyurl.com/4867dtra 845p
⋙ Lawfare: Jan. 6 Committee Releases Witness Interview Transcripts https://tinyurl.com/43f5k7y6
⭕ 9 Sep 2026
⭕ 8 Sep 2026
NYT: Trump Administration Asks Supreme Court to Allow Voter-Screening Tool https://tinyurl.com/4mrefnnw “Voting rights organizations had challenged a Trump administration overhaul of a government database, arguing it could be used to disenfranchise eligible voters.”
[TextLink:] https://x.com/Auriandra/status/2097609213623026027?s=20/photo/1
The new emergency application filed Monday focuses on the legality of an expansion of a Department of Homeland Security database known as the Systematic Alien Verification for Entitlements, or SAVE, which the government described in court filings as “an online service that enables users to verify a person’s citizenship status, often within seconds.”
The federal database was created in 1986 as a way to enable the federal government and state and local officials to search for immigration status to help determine eligibility for a range of public benefits.
The Trump administration has expanded the database, including by folding in data from the Social Security Administration, which challengers assert can be unreliable and incomplete. They also argue that it would violate privacy protections.
🐣 RT @rohanpaul_ai WSJ just reported: Anthropic researcher Jacob Coxon is quitting AI because he thinks self-improving models could become uncontrollable by 2027. [WSJ link:] https://tinyurl.com/5yjw4p8p
¤ https://x.com/rohanpaul_ai/status/2097486953310831069?s=20
“We’re on track for a lot of the most aggressive of these scenarios where by the end of next year things could be out of control already,” he said.
His fear centers on recursive self-improvement, where AI takes over enough AI research to speed development of increasingly capable successors.
He moved from OpenAI to Anthropic specifically for its safety work, yet says even sincere safeguards cannot overcome competition without coordinated restraint.
The most interesting point is, Coxon is leaving despite believing Anthropic takes safety seriously.
Anthropic’s $2 tn IPO makes that tension so obvious. Anthropic is simultaneously asking the world to believe 2 things: that increasingly powerful AI can create enormous economic value, potentially supporting a $2 trillion public valuation, and that development may eventually need to be slowed when capability crosses dangerous thresholds.
Those positions create a difficult governance test: will safety commitments still bind when obeying them becomes commercially expensive.
🐣 RT @TeamOssoff Ossoff: Just think, 250 years on, what the founders would see if they visited us today. They’d see that slavery had been abolished. They’d see that Americans without land and then women and then the descendants of slaves had secured voting rights.
💽 https://x.com/TeamOssoff/status/2097384956691403078?s=20/video/1
They’d see that our science and technology propelled human knowledge to unimaginable heights and that those thirteen colonies had grown into a superpower that defeated the Nazis and communism. They’d see a pluralist democracy, people of all colors descended from every point on Earth, stitched together out of many nations into one.
But they’d also see a nation that, at the height of its wealth and power, fell into the very traps they most feared, consumed by bitter conflict between factions captured by special interests. Losing touch with the great national spirit that defeated fascism, with the spirit that landed men on the moon and passed civil rights laws.
🐣 RT @Sulkhan Zelensky called Donetsk region “the question of this war.” Let me explain why in one paragraph, because most Western commentators can’t.
¤ https://x.com/Sulkhan/status/2097303941134565425?s=20
Sloviansk–Kramatorsk–Kostiantynivka is a fortress belt Ukraine built over ten years, the last high ground before flat steppe to the Dnipro. Hand it over “for peace” and the next war starts 100 km closer to Kharkiv and Dnipro, with no wall in between.
Russia isn’t asking for territory. It’s asking for the starting line of 2029. That’s why Kyiv says no, and why anyone who says “just the Donbas” has never looked at a contour map.
⭕ 7 Sep 2026
🐣 RT @TheStudyofWar NEW: Negotiations to secure the durable and lasting peace that US President Donald Trump has said he aims for cannot be based on Russian lies. They can only be based on the actual realities of the battlefield and the real trajectory of the war, which does not favor Russia. ¤ More Key Takeaways:
🌎 https://x.com/TheStudyofWar/status/2097134574316753105?s=20/photo/1 -4
The Ukrainian military demonstrated, and a Kremlin-affiliated milblogger acknowledged, the falsity of one of Russian President Vladimir Putin’s more outrageous claims of fictitious Russian gains in Donetsk Oblast.
The pervasive culture of lying within the Russian armed forces paradoxically both damages Russian forces’ ability to fight effectively and supports exaggerated Kremlin claims that Putin weaponizes to enhance Russia’s negotiation position.
Negotiations to secure the durable and lasting peace that US President Donald Trump has said he aims for cannot be based on Russian lies. They can only be based on the actual realities of the battlefield and the real trajectory of the war, which does not favor Russia.
Ukrainian forces recently advanced in the Slovyansk direction and the Kostyantynivka-Druzhkivka tactical area.
Russia launched 92 drones against Ukraine overnight. Ukrainian forces continued their long-range strike campaign against Russian military assets and oil infrastructure on the night of September 6 to 7.
⭕ 6 Sep 2026
🐣 RT @JuliaDavisNews Meanwhile in Russia: pundits unanimously concluded that Witkoff and Kushner’s visit is pointless. Dubbing them “Bolek and Lolek” [Polish cartoon characters], panelists stressed that Russia shouldn’t take the US peace efforts seriously and keep waging war. [yt link]
🐣 RT @ZelenskyyUa The territorial issue remains a relevant one. I think such complex issues can only be resolved at the level of leaders.
¤ https://x.com/ZelenskyyUa/status/2096704588283793741?s=20
But the main thing is that today we have the opportunity to discuss everything – security guarantees, Ukraine’s future, and the prosperity plan. We are talking not only about security guarantees, but also about economic guarantees for Ukraine – to recover and rebuild. We all understand the challenges that lie ahead once the war ends, and we are discussing them among ourselves. Our army must be strong, and for us this is a key security guarantee. The guarantees must be strong and clear. We must not fear any future challenges.
It is also important that European colleagues joined us for the third part of our negotiations. We agreed that Ukraine, Europe, and the United States will meet in the near future.
🐣 RT @ WW3finalboss 🇺🇦 ZELENSKYY DRAWS THE LINE: UKRAINE WILL NOT SURRENDER TO PUTIN
¤ https://x.com/WW3finalboss/status/2096589976574022093?s=20
“We are not ready to give our freedom to this fucking terrorist, Putin.” – Volodymyr Zelenskyy 🇺🇦 ¤ Few words capture Ukraine’s position more clearly.
After years of invasion, occupation and destruction, the issue is still fundamentally the same: whether Ukrainians are allowed to choose their own future, or whether Moscow gets to decide it for them by force.
Ukraine’s answer remains no.
🐣 RT @IAPonomarenko I’ll go even further: the closer the Kremlin’s economic and military capacity to continue the war gets to a critical breaking point, the “tougher and tougher” its “demands” will become — even though the reality on the battlefield gives it absolutely no reason to puff out its chest and thump it triumphantly.
¤ https://x.com/IAPonomarenko/status/2096521481471537179?s=20
You would think that, by year X of the war, its forces were no longer spending months banging their heads against a wall for the ruins of Ukrainian villages, but had at least staged a triumphant landing in Reykjavík and launched a tank offensive toward the English Channel.
Their exhausted economy will be crumbling before their eyes, just as it did in 1991, unable to bear the crushing burden of the war. Yet they will keep rolling their eyes menacingly, making grandiose threats, shaking their fists and demanding Alaska as a condition for “addressing the root causes of the conflict.”
That is their logic. That is what they do. It is the tactic of a cornered rat: using intimidation to make you surrender without thinking precisely where they themselves have proved powerless.
They know perfectly well what works well and that, year after year, the West stubbornly refuses to shake off its deeply-ingrained, paralyzing fear of the Kremlin’s bluster.
🐣 RT @Gerashchenko_en The Russian Telegram channel “Nezygar,” citing a “diplomatic source,” described the Kremlin’s alleged position regarding the Ukraine negotiations and the visit by US envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner:
¤ https://x.com/Gerashchenko_en/status/2096527560330846562?s=20
“Time has run out, the position has hardened, and the configuration is now completely different – Russia is making efforts to begin actively advancing along the front line and intensify strikes against Ukraine’s strategic infrastructure during the winter period.”
The Kremlin believes: “Ukraine and the West will effectively have to request negotiations with Russia themselves, against the backdrop of the catastrophe Ukraine will face in early 2027; given Ukrainian strikes on Russian infrastructure and threats to close Russian airspace, Russia no longer considers it necessary to make any concessions now.”
“While Witkoff and Kushner were dealing with Middle Eastern issues, the situation on the Ukraine track changed completely. Witkoff and Kushner returned too late.”
“If Moscow has a message for Zelenskyy, it is just one: surrender.”
According to the channel, this is the message Kushner and Witkoff are supposed to convey in Kyiv.According to this “diplomatic source,” “Putin has returned to the full package of Russian demands and stated that a ceasefire is impossible, noting that Zelenskyy made the right move by unilaterally halting hostilities during Kushner and Witkoff’s visit. According to Putin, this is the right example of what Zelenskyy should do: all concessions must come from Ukraine.”
“The Kremlin now believes that Washington must demonstrate practical steps – lifting or easing sanctions against Russia.”
According to a source cited by “Nezygar,” Russia will consider the possibility of holding either a trilateral Trump-Xi-Putin meeting or a full-fledged Trump-Putin meeting on the sidelines of the G20; however, the initiative must come from Washington, not Moscow.
“Putin believes that Russia has greater mobilization potential than Ukraine and is using it to achieve the objectives of the conflict.”
⭕ 5 Sep 2026
🐣 RT @Gerashchenko_en Putin’s aide Ushakov commented on the meeting of US envoys with Putin. ¤ According to him, Putin told the envoys that Russia was advancing on the frontlines, was certain to reach the goals of the “special military operation” and the “Kyiv regime” was Nazist. ¤ Ushakov said that the envoys promised to use the assessments received from Putin in their conversations with Kyiv tomorrow.
🐣 RT @michaeldweiss Stark contrast with what the Director of Central Intelligence, who is far more read into Russia’s military and economic situation than Witkoff and Kushner are, came to Moscow to discuss.
¤ https://x.com/michaeldweiss/status/2096364502111404231?s=20
This was a set piece written and directed by Putin: bring Trump’s hapless idiots to Russia for a gauzy photo op, not to discuss an end to the war but to reiterate the same propaganda, hoping they return home and can convince their master it is true, whatever Ratcliffe says to the contrary on the links.
Lot of dooming and teeth-gnashing over this visit, but so far it’s the same performance we’ve seen before, with perhaps a touch more sycophantic stupidity from Dim Philby.
Will they next turn up in Kyiv? Who knows. Will it make a difference? Don’t hold your breath.
After the midterms both of these “envoys” stand a reasonable chance of having their lives turned inside-out by long overdue Congressional inquiries into their diplomacy-as-enterprise side hustle. So one can see how both they and the Russians are keen to notch a geopolitical victory before the House flips. Doesn’t mean one is in the offing, however.
⋙ 🐣 RT @michaeldweiss This is also an obvious end run around the Blumenthal bill; an attempt by people with undeclared business interests to create the illusion of momentum for a peace deal to get the WH to halt or defer something it was already reluctant to do. Russia can’t allow more sanctions. And any Dems still iffy about a tariffs-based sanctions policy should realize they’ll be rewarding the thing they’re meant to be against: the admin’s cronyist side action.
🐣 RT @GBC_Press 🚨 BREAKING: Carney: “The global economy today is radically different from yesterday. The U.S.-centered global trading system is over. Our old relationship of growing integration with the U.S. is over. The 80-year era of U.S. economic leadership is over. As tragic as that is, this is the new reality.”
💽 https://x.com/GBC_Press/status/2096237259066687845?s=20/video/1
🐣 RT @HowToPrompt__ Harvard published a paper with a devastating title: “Large-Language Models as a Cognitive Virus”
¤ Tweet link: https://x.com/HowToPrompt__/status/2096168099737436570?s=20
¤ Paper link: Physics&Society: Large-Language Models as a Cognitive Virus https://arxiv.org/abs/2609.03344
// tags: AI A.I. LLM
⭕ 4 Sep 2026
🐣 RT @lawofruby NEW: Judge Indira Talwani issues a 49-page preliminary injunction opinion indefinitely blocking implementation of the USPS mail ballot rule for this election cycle. Theoretically, this moots the USPS’s existing SCOTUS application, which is aimed at her prior temporary restraining order.
[CourtDoc:] https://tinyurl.com/5c8hdfxt 49p
NYT: Judge Once Again Blocks Mail-In Ballot Rules https://tinyurl.com/yd7cpzux The ruling arrived before the Supreme Court could decide whether to intervene but appeared certain to set off yet another round of appeals.
⭕ 3 Sep 2026
🐣 RT @ZelenskyyUa I just held a meeting with the team engaged in negotiations with the envoys of the U.S. President. We are in communication with them virtually 24/7 and are now preparing for meetings. Tentative dates have been set. We expect to see the U.S. President’s envoys here in Kyiv. They confirmed they will have a meeting in Moscow and another one in Kyiv. We expect the latter to take place in the coming days. This is very important. It is important that America remain actively engaged. We are ready to meet with them in Ukraine – properly and substantively.
🐣 RT @ChristopherHale NEW: Five months after Vice President JD Vance told Pope Leo XIV to stay out of American politics, the pope used his weekly audience to say Catholics have no business standing on the sidelines. ¤ Leo, a Chicago native, has already asked citizens to contact their congressmen over the Iran war and has repeatedly rebuked the administration’s treatment of immigrants. ¤ The midterm elections are 60 days away.
¤ https://x.com/ChristopherHale/status/2095698334828683393?s=20
‼️ NYT: Why the Hugging Face Hack Should Make You Worry More About A.I. https://tinyurl.com/3tu8er8n “The attack by an aggressive ‘collective’ of OpenAI agents shows the danger of artificial intelligence systems that organize themselves.”
[TextLink:] https://x.com/Auriandra/status/2095751651256570290?s=20/photo/1
A.I. safety experts were even more alarmed. They saw in the Hugging Face incident the first real-world example of an A.I. system’s successfully escaping human control, commandeering resources and scheming to cover its own tracks. Ajeya Cotra, one of the independent investigators of the Hugging Face incident, minced no words about the danger she saw, writing that it felt to her “like it’s more than 50 percent of the way to full-blown A.I. takeover.”
This is not insular A.I. safety jargon — by “full-blown A.I. takeover,” she means a scenario in which an A.I. system literally takes over the world, shutting humans out of critical systems and seizing political, economic and military power.
≣ CAP: REPORT: The Trump Administration Is Interfering in the 2026 Midterm Elections To Entrench the Imperial Presidency https://tinyurl.com/mr34rwne ‘The Trump admin has seized unprecedented control over the govt and is now executing a plan to subvert the 2026 midterm elections’
// 8/12/2026; The Trump administration has seized unprecedented control over the federal government and is now executing a plan to subvert the 2026 midterm elections—determined to entrench its power and continue its policy agenda without accountability.
NYT: Judge Blocks Trump’s Second Try to Restrict Birthright Citizenship https://tinyurl.com/2c57kdyy “The ruling raised concerns that babies already defined as citizens by the Supreme Court could have their citizenship revoked under an order the president signed in August.”
[CourtDoc:] https://tinyurl.com/4bx5ykp4 35p
⭕ 2 Sep 2026
🐣 RT @marceelias 🚨BREAKING: DHS Secretary Markwayne Mullin said Tuesday that ICE agents could enter polling places to make arrests this November, raising fresh concerns about the Trump administration contemplating actions that federal law has long prohibited. [link:] https://tinyurl.com/4p7vm65b
TheAtlantic, Leah Litman: The Court’s Ballroom Decision Is a Sign of Deeper Problems https://tinyurl.com/3u84c2sw “The separation of powers demands that the SCOTUS stop undermining Congress’s power to make meaningful laws by allowing the executive to violate them w/o consequence”
// The conservative justices have separation of powers exactly backwards
🐣 RT @SenAdamSchiff Today marks one year since the administration began its unauthorized and unconstitutional boat strikes in the Caribbean and eastern Pacific — killing over 200 people. ¤ One thing is clear: this military campaign, which continues with the latest strikes just last week, remains illegal and ineffective. ¤ Congress must not allow this abuse of power to go unchallenged. I will continue to force votes to block the U.S. military from engaging in these strikes.
⋙ TheIntercept: The U.S. Has Killed 227 Civilians in Boat Strikes During “A Year of Murders“ https://tinyurl.com/52t5dmvd The boat strikes are, perhaps, the most stark testament to the lawlessness of the Trump administration.” “This abuse of power to go unchallenged”
TheHill: Tillis urges Trump to fire Hegseth over ‘inept management’ of military https://tinyurl.com/5n6nvujc
🐣 RT @SenThomTillis I thank @SecArmy Dan Driscoll for his leadership to our Army and service to our country. Dan was the right man at the right moment to lead our Soldiers and Army civilians.
Our understanding and assumptions of warfare are being challenged in places like Ukraine and Iran, and Dan understands the old way of doing business no longer applies. He and General George began a transformative period of innovation in how we array our forces and equip our Soldiers. He challenged our legacy approach to manning and procurement. Most of all, he cared deeply about the men and women in our Army formations and quickly earned their respect.
If we had a @SecWar who maintained the same priorities and forward-thinking, he would be fighting to retain talented leaders like Dan and the many flag officers he has forced into retirement. Instead, he is creating a leadership void at the top of our military ranks.
I served on Senate Armed Services for 8 years and as chair or ranking member of the Personnel and Readiness subcommittee. I have never witnessed more inept management of the brave men and women who serve our country. He is intimidated by competence and retreats to ginning up culture wars instead of soberly attending to the vital work of our national defense and the health and well-being of our fighting force.
I urge the President to find a new leader at the Pentagon who will retain and empower our military talent rather than diminish it.
⭕ 1 Sep 2026
TheAtlantic, Matteo Wong and Charlie Warzel: The Singularity Is Not What It Seems https://tinyurl.com/5b3ft4sw “Whatever the AI future is, we’re in it right now.”
[TextLink:] https://x.com/Auriandra/status/2095220845870235860?s=20/photo/1
Cybersecurity experts, terrified of what else might be happening that AI labs are either missing or failing to disclose, are issuing dire prophecies. “The empire is going to fall, all we can do at this point is try to shorten the dark ages and reduce the chaos,” Alex Stamos, a former chief security officer at Yahoo and Meta, wrote recently in reference to how AI-powered hacks will affect the internet. His view is becoming the consensus among cybersecurity experts.
⁉️🐣 RT @SavchenkoReview 🇨🇳🇺🇦 China will strengthen coordination on Ukraine and more actively promote political settlement of the war, — Xi Jinping
🐣 RT @maria_drutska Putin’s trip to the SCO summit didn’t go quite the way he planned. ¤ His attempt to convince Xi Jinping to approve the Power of Siberia 2 pipeline failed. And Modi bluntly told him to end his war in a public meeting with media. ¤ Russia’s global influence continues to crumble📉
🐣 RT @Tendar One of the substation near Jänschwalde, Brandenburg, Germany has been attacked by missiles this morning. [link:]
¤ https://x.com/Tendar/status/2094758963313004845?s=20
The facility was struck at least once. The police found several more devices on site and defused them. The substation operator reports a “short-term disconnection” and asks from the local population to be on alert. The facility is operating normally, again.
The intention was to cause an energy cascade, eventually taking out the nearby powerstation.
More terrorist attacks happening on western soil, and we all know the perpetrator, who is feeling emboldened for as long we continue with our appeasement strategy. ¤ Source: MAZ
⋙ 🐣 “missiles” or “devices”? ¤ there’s a difference
⋙ 🐣 RT @mattia_n With all due respect, there was no missile involved. But yes, police found explosives.
🐣 RT @A_SHEKH0VTS0V Russia’s president Vladimir Putin had initially cleared his schedule to meet CIA Director John Ratcliffe during the American’s Moscow visit on 25 August.
¤ https://x.com/A_SHEKH0VTS0V/status/2094704169974202619?s=20
But after learning what message Ratcliffe carried, the Kremlin deemed the meeting inappropriate, a source told the Russian non-regime outlet “Agency”.
Ratcliffe reportedly urged Russia’s leadership to negotiate an end to the war quickly, arguing that Moscow’s deteriorating military and economic position made a deal now preferable to waiting.
During the visit he met SVR chief Sergei Naryshkin and, per Western reports, FSB chief Alexander Bortnikov. After one conversation’s content was relayed to Putin, the Kremlin declined a face-to-face meeting.
🐣 RT @michaeldweiss CIA Director John Ratcliffe was supposed to see Vladimir Putin in Moscow, but Putin cancelled the meeting, according to Agentsvo. Why? Because Ratcliffe told Naryshkin and Bortnikov Russia’s war was lost, Russia’s economic situation was deteriorating, and now was the time to cut a deal. “His message sounded as if Zelensky was already standing on Poklonnaya Hill, peering at the Kremlin through binoculars,” one source told the outlet. Evidently Putin didn’t want to hear this from the American spy chief helping Ukrainian drones find their targets in Russia.
¤ https://x.com/michaeldweiss/status/2094780244498514297?s=20
⋙ 🐣 RT @michaeldweiss Backs up NYT reporting on the nature of the visit. Also shows a different approach from the one pursued by Dim Philby [Trump etc] for almost two years, which was to take Russian propaganda about inevitable victory at face value and use it to force Ukrainian concessions. Agentsvo notes that it’s unclear to what extent Ratcliffe’s intelligence represents the view of the White House, but the strong suggestion here is that Putin sees the U.S. as a whole as both believing and acting as if he’s losing the war. Signal v. noise.
⋙ 🐣 RT @michaeldweiss (That would certainly explain the nuclear bluster picking up again.)
NYT, Margaret Macmillan: A New World Order Is Coming. We Aren’t Ready. https://tinyurl.com/3msas2ae
⭕ 31 Aug 2026
SCOTUSblog: Supreme Court allows construction on White House ballroom to continue https://tinyurl.com/2675pkek
// 5/4 decided on standing; Roberts sided with 3 liberal justices
[CourtDoc:] https://tinyurl.com/3xzc2ykn 14p
The Supreme Court on Monday granted the Trump administration’s request to allow construction on a new White House ballroom to continue. By a vote of 5-4, the court paused a ruling by a federal judge in Washington, D.C., that would have halted above-ground construction of the ballroom project.
In an eight-page, unsigned opinion, the majority emphasized that it was not deciding whether the project was legal. Instead, it stressed, the plaintiff likely lacks a legal right, known as standing, to challenge the project at all. …
In his six-page dissent, which Justices Sonia Sotomayor, Elena Kagan, and Ketanji Brown Jackson joined, Roberts countered that “[a] historic preservationist such as Hoagland can be aesthetically injured in a concrete, particularized way by the transformation of a historic building that she frequently enjoys, just as,” based on prior court precedent, “an environmentalist can sustain a concrete, particularized aesthetic injury from the extinction of a particular animal or the transformation of a particular forest or river that he regularly enjoys.” Roberts ended the opinion by quoting Winston Churchill, who said that “[w]e shape our buildings, and afterwards our buildings shape us.” “All the more reason,” according to Roberts, “to ensure that those responsible follow the rules in deciding what to tear down and what to build up at the People’s House.”
🐣 RT @The Atlantic This year’s El Niño cycle is likely to be the strongest ever recorded—and its already-increased water temperatures could have irrevocable effects, Joshua Partlow reports.
⋙ TheAtlantic, Joshua Partlow: This El Niño Will Be Unlike Any in the Past Eight Decades https://tinyurl.com/8fmsvj5d
// Die-offs and floods have started already, a prelude to supercharged storms and droughts.
TheAtlantic: Dan Driscoll’s Parting Shot https://tinyurl.com/3r6vvhwb “The Army secretary told Trump about problems in the Army and his friction with Hegseth, then resigned.”
TheAtlantic, Tom Nichols: Hegseth’s Pentagon Lurches off the Rails https://tinyurl.com/2yjpt3v5 “Hegseth’s incompetence, and his commitment to staying in Trump’s good graces, helped launch the [Iranian] war itself in the first place”
// The resignation of Army Secretary Dan Driscoll is the latest sign of severe dysfunction in the Defense Department.
[TextLink:] https://x.com/Auriandra/status/2094449797092503933?s=20/photo/1
… Hegseth was reportedly virtually alone among senior officials in supporting Trump’s decision to attack Iran—when he should have been the one person in the room who knew better. The secretary of state and CIA director were against the idea. According to the The Wall Street Journal, even then–Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard, another of Trump’s unqualified-but-sycophantic appointees, mustered the courage to give the president bad news, telling Trump that killing the reigning ayatollah and striking Iran would “likely usher in a more hard-line regime open to acquiring nuclear weapons”; that the Iranians “would rush to close the Strait of Hormuz, destabilizing the global energy market”; and that Iran “would strike U.S. forces and partners in the Middle East,” all of which happened almost immediately after Trump gave the order to go to war. …
^
Hegseth, meanwhile, has dutifully overseen the raiding of assets from other theaters to support Trump’s war with Iran, leaving the U.S. and its allies exposed to potential threats from China and Russia. When Trump returned to office, Hegseth and others supported a reorientation away from the Middle East and Europe. Now the secretary and the other supposed China hawks have discarded those positions and dumped everything into a war that still has no clear strategy and no clear goal beyond stopping Iran from attaining a nuclear weapon it didn’t have in the first place. …The result of all this is that the United States is losing a war to a third-rate power in the Middle East. The Russians, meanwhile, are continuing their rampage in Europe and apparently considering things so perilous that the CIA director had to fly to Moscow just to warn the Kremlin off of whatever it was thinking of doing. The Chinese are watching as Trump and Hegseth have stripped the Pacific theater of its only American aircraft carrier. In the midst of this chaos, Hegseth does chin-ups while he ponders calling all of America’s admirals and generals back to another mass meeting so he can again carp at them about fat soldiers and bearded sailors.
Pete Hegseth has failed in every mission except one: keeping his job. But firing or forcing out everyone else in the Pentagon will not make Pete Hegseth into the secretary of defense America and its men and women in uniform need. With each dismissal, he exposes only his own insecurities, even as he manages to stay employed—but the people and the armed forces of the United States are paying the inevitable price of his incompetence.
🐣 RT @dedzaebal [Tr Ru] Gary Kasparov: Putin’s Russia is the reincarnation of absolute evil, having absorbed everything most bloody and inhumane that the dictatorships of the past—from Stalinism to fascism—ever produced.
¤ https://x.com/dedzaebal/status/2094446803299000427?s=20
It is a country with a mad dictator and a public consciousness that has gone completely off the rails. The overwhelming majority of Russia’s “society” sees no problem whatsoever in the endless war or in the murders their country commits every day, and there are no signs of any changes being possible within Russia today. When it comes to Putin’s Russia, the usual parallel with Nazi Germany doesn’t hold. There, despite the monstrous scale of terror, there was a huge number of people who consciously chose to resist the regime, paying for it with their freedom and lives. Nothing comparable in scale exists in Putin’s Russia today.
Against this backdrop, the fussing of a segment of the Russian emigration is especially telling. It reveals both the caliber of these people and their inability to adopt even the most basic human position. How can one continue to associate oneself in any way with what is happening in the fascist Reich? How can one, amid the ceaseless bombings of Ukrainian cities and the daily deaths of people, even whisper about some “Smart Voting,” which is, in essence, a form of solidarity with Russian crimes?
You can endlessly discuss the reforms you claim you’ll carry out when you fly there “on the first flight.” The only problem is that you won’t fly anywhere—not on the first flight, not on the second—and you won’t carry out any reforms. Because before Russia can even have the prerequisites for restructuring, this regime must collapse, and the mass consciousness, which today is thoroughly steeped in war, must change.
The entire history of our country shows: real change in Russia has only become possible after severe geopolitical defeats, when people’s notions of the right to dictate their will to others have crumbled. Putin’s Russia will be no exception. And only Ukraine’s victory, which means the defeat of Putin’s Russia and the collapse of its imperial project, can give us such a historical chance.
That is precisely why Ukraine’s victory is not just a matter of the outcome of one war. It is the victory of free people over evil and barbarism, the victory of those values that, for any normal person, are unconditional and not open to debate. Therefore, the question “Are you for Ukraine’s victory or not?” is a fundamental dividing line. It is a question of which side a person is on and whether they share those fundamental principles on which the free world stands. Any attempt to blur this boundary, to inject an element of political gamesmanship, to find caveats and loopholes, places a person on the other side of the moral line that separates the world of normal free people from the world of dictatorship, war, and violence.
Bravo!👏👏👏👏👏👏👏👏👏👏👏
🐣 RT @WendyRWeiser Chairman of Joint Chiefs Gen. Dan Caine to Sen. Slotkin, per letter we obtained:
[TextLink:] https://x.com/WendyRWeiser/status/2094601131741544681?s=20/photo/1
“The Joint Force has no plans to send Federal military personnel or Federalized members of the National Guard to polling places during the 2026 elections. Likewise, the Joint Force has no plans to use such personnel to seize ballots, voting machines, or other election-related material. I have neither received nor anticipate receiving any unlawful order concerning the role of the Joint Force in the upcoming November 2026 midterm elections.”
🐣 RT @thetect0nic ⚠️ 🇺🇲 UPDATE: The shakeup inside the U.S. Army is widening.
¤ https://x.com/thetect0nic/status/2094592404762304649?s=20
Hours after Army Secretary Dan Driscoll submitted his resignation, Deputy Under Secretary of the Army Dave Fitzgerald is also expected to step down later this week.
Fitzgerald wasn’t simply another official in the building. He worked closely with Driscoll on some of the Army’s most aggressive modernization efforts, including procurement reform, private investment in military infrastructure and a new partnership with FedEx Dataworks to overhaul the Army’s domestic logistics network. Their departures now come together.
Driscoll reportedly resigned after raising concerns with the administration that Pete Hegseth was undermining Army transformation and readiness by removing the generals responsible for those efforts.
Gen. Randy George is already gone. Gen. David Hodne is gone. Driscoll is leaving, and Fitzgerald is expected to follow.
Now, the experimental drone warfare program championed by Driscoll’s team is being wound down under the Army’s new leadership. What began as friction between Hegseth and the Army secretary is starting to look like the dismantling of an entire modernization team at the top of the service.
All of this is happening while the wars in Ukraine and Iran are producing perhaps the strongest argument in decades for exactly the kind of rapid technological and industrial transformation they were pursuing.
🐣 RT @NatalkaKyiv 🇷🇺 Igor Girkin on an imminent mobilization in Russia:
¤ https://x.com/NatalkaKyiv/status/2094453544757698670?s=20
“According to numerous reports coming in through the grapevine — nevertheless, from people who are quite experienced, including a number of fairly high-ranking government officials (former officials, at least) sitting here with me who have considerable experience and connections — there are very clear signals circulating through the grapevine that in a month, perhaps a little over a month, we can expect a new mobilization of an unknown scale.
It is still unclear whether it will be nationwide or, once again, partial, but nevertheless.
Accordingly, since four years have now passed since the last mobilization in 2022, and our country has achieved very little in military operations over those four years — and in some respects even less than that, because, I emphasize, since then we have also somehow managed to surrender Kherson, Lyman, and much else, while taking relatively little compared with what we have given up — the war is unpopular among the population.
People don’t understand why the war is being fought. They don’t understand what they are supposed to sacrifice their lives for.
And why the people running this war happily keep their families in the damned West that they constantly condemn.
Some have children in London, others in New York, others in Paris. And they have absolutely no intention of going to fight themselves.
People don’t trust the country’s leadership. People don’t want to fight for the state, and unfortunately, they don’t want to fight for the country either.
There is no other explanation, and there cannot be one. Essentially, any other explanation is either stupidity or a lie.”
🐣 RT @dwallacewells “It’s not a fight about technology. This is a fight about control. This is about who controls the future.”
⋙ NYT, David Wallace-Wells: I Expected Tech Fatalism. Americans Are Putting Up a Remarkable Fight Instead. https://tinyurl.com/3zrpek7x “75% of Americans aren’t against progress. That’s absurd. They just resent it being imposed on them, unilaterally and unconditionally.”
// tags: AI data centers
[TextLink:] https://x.com/Auriandra/status/2094449797092503933?s=20/photo/1
Three in four Americans said they’d oppose the construction of a data center in their communities, according to a recent poll from Heatmap Pro and Embold Research. Local data centers were opposed by two-thirds of Republicans, whose party is warning that recent support for such projects could destroy its chances in key Senate races. And though political causes rarely transcend partisanship, this one appears to: Nearly 80 percent of independents opposed local data center projects, along with 83 percent of Democrats.
^
Slice the population any which way you want — by age, by gender, by income, along the urban-rural divide — and the pattern is the same. As are the trends. Last August the American public was almost evenly split when Heatmap Pro asked about local projects. Then net approval swung 62 percentage points. Opposition this year was higher than 70 percent in every region in the country; more than half of Americans supported a national moratorium. …You can see in the survey data a mutually reinforcing list of complaints that are anchored in environmental concerns about energy and water use and spread to worries about pollution and noise and scale and effects on local electricity prices and from there to broad distaste for or distrust of A.I. There are also old-school NIMBYs, unapologetic Luddites, onetime MAHA activists and, yes, a few outright conspiracists. It’s a pretty big tent. That’s one thing it means to have three-quarters of the country on your side: You have to draw together different constituencies, from climate activists to MAHA moms and plenty of normies, with their own concerns, in between.
Like any mass populist movement, this one features echoes — and veterans — of others. But with data centers, something different, bigger and perhaps irreducible appears to be happening. Perhaps the better analogy is not with any movement of the social media era but with the long crusade against nuclear power, which managed to pull many threads of opposition together because nuclear plants’ iconic towers triggered, beyond political objections, apocalyptic ones, as well.
On the ground, the fight over data centers looks like a conflict over the nature of progress, the shape of the future, and who gets to determine the terms by which citizens submit to the visions of technologists and their financiers. To many who believe in the promise of A.I., it looks like a degrowth cul-de-sac — and a test case for whether dreams of frictionless technological progress can survive democratic blowback.
But one of these groups is simply much larger than the other. Only nine percent of Americans surveyed by Pew Research in June said they were more excited than concerned about A.I., perhaps because opponents had heard more about the risks it poses than the concrete gains it might deliver. You can’t reduce data center resistance to just fear any more than you can call it simply the influence of short-form video. Yet one way of reading the backlash is as a many-headed protest against inevitability — about not just the technology itself but also the whole package of breakneck build-out, social disruption and insane wealth creation it has come wrapped in. Is this really the only future on offer? …
One hypothesis is that the positive case for A.I. build-out hasn’t really been made properly to the public. Instead, what Americans have heard from founders and boosters sounds both abstract and scary — that it might bring about mass unemployment while intensifying wealth inequality, that it could produce pandemics or even bring about human extinction. […]
“Data centers are a physical manifestation of so many things that people are upset about in our day-to-day lives,” [activist Saul] Levin continued. “It’s not a fight about technology,” he said. “This is a fight about control. This is about who controls the future.”
If this really is a fight for the future, it does raise the question: What comes next? After a pause for reckoning, planning and deal making, is a kind of grand bargain possible?
For me, it’s not that hard to imagine the substantive contours of such a deal: guaranteed local tax benefits in place of tax breaks like those that have been so often used to draw new projects; policy reform to ensure not only that electricity rates won’t go up for local homeowners and businesses but also that the data centers will pay for upgrades to the grid to benefit everyone; more transparency about and monitoring of local environmental effects, with binding standards; perhaps renewable-power requirements that builders and operators can be held accountable for; and some process by which local citizens can be made to feel empowered rather than discounted in debating projects that literally loom over their landscapes. Certainly, more transparency and fewer nondisclosure agreements.
But while concessions like these may pull local leaders back onto the side of development, it has gotten a lot harder for me to believe that they would meaningfully move the needle on public opinion — at least very quickly. And it’s gotten a lot easier to picture a future in which the build-out continues around obstacles and objections while the country as a whole remains suspicious, if not outright hostile. Supermajorities don’t come around very often, and they tend not to collapse overnight. …
… What does the data center backlash tell us about the country’s attitude toward growth and progress and change in other domains? The answer isn’t exactly clear, since so much of our economy and future has been wagered on this one bet that it has begun to look less like a novel technology than a new social and economic model, imposed from above. …
… We’ve been told, “It’s time to build,” then watched as the most avid advocates of a new American dynamism have refused to acknowledge any check on their imperious projects as legitimate.
In all this time, full of so much political turmoil and economic frustration, nothing else has loomed as large as A.I., which now seems to many Americans to occupy almost the whole horizon of possibility. This is the biggest reason that data centers have attained such totemic significance for so many Americans and why technologists have tended to see the backlash as an uncompromising war against progress. ⋙ But 75 percent of Americans aren’t against progress. That’s absurd. They just resent it being imposed on them, unilaterally and unconditionally.
🐣 RT @POLITICOEurope China has privately assured Finland that it would not allow Russia to use nuclear weapons, Finnish President Alexander Stubb said in an interview released Saturday. [link:] https://tinyurl.com/y3vv4ame
⭕ 30 Aug 2026
WSJ Editorial: Trump Takes the Oil in Venezuela https://tinyurl.com/59ntcux5 “The deal recalls the famous Cuba scene in ‘The Godfather Part II.’”
//➔ Venezuela may not turn out to be the slam-dunk it appeared to be
⋙ 🐣 GoogleAI: “The editorial is comparing the reported Venezuela oil arrangement to the 1958 Havana scene in The Godfather Part II.
¤ https://x.com/Auriandra/status/2094298435155353808?s=20
In that scene, American businessmen meet with Fulgencio Batista, Cuba’s authoritarian ruler, to discuss lucrative investments and control of Cuban businesses. The businessmen treat Cuba mainly as an economic opportunity, while Batista’s government provides the political protection needed to make those deals possible. Soon afterward, the Cuban Revolution drives Batista from power, putting those investments at risk.
The comparison suggests that Trump’s deal is not merely a normal oil transaction. The editorial is implying that:
The United States is seeking access to a country’s valuable resources.
It is dealing with an authoritarian or politically vulnerable government.
• The arrangement may enrich politically connected businesspeople.
The government making the deal may not remain in power long enough to honor it.
• The agreement could lack democratic legitimacy and legal durability.So the Cuba reference is mainly a warning: a foreign power may secure an attractive deal with a ruler, only to discover that the ruler-and perhaps the deal itself-does not survive political change. It is not saying Fredo’s betrayal is the direct analogy here; the stronger parallel is the meeting between American commercial interests and Batista’s regime.
🐣 RT @cmclymer This morning, an explosive report from The Washington Post’s Alex Horton and Tara Copp is shaping up to be the most devastating blow to Pete Hegseth’s leadership during his tenure as Trump’s Secretary of Defense — and arguably the most embarrassing pushback against a SecDef in decades. […][…]
¤ https://x.com/cmclymer/status/2094126276529291446?s=20
🐣 RT @prestonstew_ Pretty serious leak coming from the Pentagon. In the classified Secretary of Defense Orders Book, multiple military officials warned that prolonged Iran ops are unsustainable. ¤ The document says that leaders of US European Command, Pacific Command, Southern Command as well as the Navy’s top admiral responded with a ‘non-concur’ assessment, meaning they disagree with the Secretary’s orders but will still execute them.
¤ https://x.com/prestonstew_/status/2094043167427346591?s=20
⋙ ‼️ WaPo: Military leaders warn Hegseth against extending Iran war operations https://tinyurl.com/2ew3h8z5 “A recent classified assessment advised that prolonged large-scale operations in the Middle East risk weakening U.S. capabilities elsewhere.”
⭕ 29 Aug 2026
⭕ 28 Aug 2026
MilitaryTimes: The devastation of NSA Bahrain is a national security warning https://tinyurl.com/ypyt9vhr “The idea that this broad functioning hub, built over decades, was significantly degraded in the space of a few days by a regional player is unimaginable.”
🐣 RT @ Maks_NAFO_FELLA 🇱🇹❗️Russia plans to attack Lithuania in the near future, both a limited invasion and a full-scale one are being considered, which is why CIA chief flew to Moscow, — journalist Zabelina
🌎 https://x.com/Maks_NAFO_FELLA/status/2093283604478484840?s=20/photo/1
📍The CIA chief and his team discussed the complete withdrawal of US troops from Europe in exchange for freezing the war in Ukraine. It was, so to speak, a bargaining and exchange of views.
📍The head of the FBI Patel was supposed to fly to Moscow first, but he is strange and sympathetic to the Russian Federation, so Secretary of State Rubio and CIA chief Ratcliffe, who are more sympathetic to Ukraine, played to get ahead of the game and CIA chief went to Moscow.
📍No matter what anyone says, an official of such a level as the head of the CIA does not personally travel to countries like the Russian Federation for simple matters.
📍The US delegation also discussed with the Kremlin the issue of Russian assistance to Iran in the war with the US and the Russian Federation’s relations with China, Trump wants to separate the Russian Federation from Beijing’s influence.
⭕ 27 Aug 2026
🐣 RT @ David_J_Bier Setting aside the fact that Trump was convicted of fraud, here are all the people who committed fraud and were pardoned by Trump:
Rod R. Blagojevich (Wire fraud under color of official right (8 counts)), Brian KelseyBrian Kelsey (Conspiracy to defraud the United States), Devon Archer (Conspiracy to commit securities fraud; securities fraud), Trevor Milton (Securities fraud; wire fraud (2 counts)), Jason Galanis (Conspiracy to commit securities fraud (2 counts); securities fraud; investment adviser fraud), Ozy Media, Inc. (Conspiracy to commit securities fraud; conspiracy to commit wire fraud), Carlos Roy Watson (Conspiracy to commit securities fraud; conspiracy to commit wire fraud), Michele Fiore (Conspiracy to commit wire fraud; wire fraud (6 counts)), Scott Howard Jenkins (Honest services mail fraud; honest services wire fraud (3 counts)), Julie Chrisley (Conspiracy to commit bank fraud; bank fraud (5 counts); wire fraud), Todd Chrisley (Conspiracy to commit bank fraud; bank fraud (5 counts)), Lawrence S. Duran (Conspiracy to commit health care fraud; health care fraud (11 counts)), Michael Gerard Grimm (Aiding/assisting preparation of false and fraudulent tax returns), Marian I Morgan (Conspiracy to defraud the United States; wire fraud (7 counts); transfer of funds taken by fraud (5 counts)), John G. Rowland (Conspiracy to defraud the United States), Charles Overton Scott (Conspiracy to commit securities fraud; securities fraud), George Anthony Devolder Santos (Wire fraud — the Party Program Scheme), Glen Casada (Conspiracy to defraud the United States; honest services wire fraud (4 counts); use of fictitious name to carry out a fraud), Cade Cothren (Conspiracy to defraud the United States; honest services wire fraud (6 counts)), Robert Henry Harshbarger, Jr. (Health care fraud), Joseph Lewis (Conspiracy to commit securities fraud; securities fraud (2 counts)), David Gentile (Conspiracy to commit securities fraud; conspiracy to commit wire fraud; securities fraud; wire fraud (2 counts)), Enrique Roberto Cuellar (Honest services wire fraud; honest services wire fraud conspiracy), Imelda Rios Cuellar (Honest services wire fraud; honest services wire fraud conspiracy), Jacob Deutsch (Conspiracy to commit mail fraud and wire fraud), Adriana Isabel Camberos (Conspiracy to commit wire and mail fraud; wire fraud (7 counts)), Andres Enrique Camberos (Conspiracy to commit wire and mail fraud; wire fraud (7 counts)), Julio M. Herrera Velutini (Honest services wire fraud (2 counts)), David Levy (Conspiracy to commit securities fraud; securities fraud), Hollie Ann Nadel (Conspiracy to commit money laundering and bank fraud), Mark T. Rossini (Honest services wire fraud), Wanda Vazquez Garced (Honest services wire fraud), Terren Scott Peizer (Securities fraud; insider trading (2 counts)), Timothy S. Smith (Conspiring to defraud the Internal Revenue Service), Stephen E. Buyer (Securities fraud (4 counts)), Joshua L. Davis (Conspiracy to defraud the United States and violate the Clean Air Act), Matthew Sidney Geouge (Conspiracy to defraud the United States and violate the Clean Air Act; tax evasion), Adam R. Kidan (Conspiracy to commit wire fraud and mail fraud; wire fraud), Danny Preston Conrad (Embezzling by postal employee), Jack Charles Harvard (False statement to a federally insured bank, and aiding and abetting), Jeremy Young Hutchinson (Conspiracy to commit bribery; aiding and abetting filing of false income tax return; conspiracy; criminal forfeiture)
⋙ ⋙ 🐣 RT @atrupar JD Vance: “The gig is up — commit fraud against America and go to jail”
💽 https://x.com/David_J_Bier/status/2093025857614852323?s=20/video/1
TheAtlantic, Duncan Hosie: The Supreme Court Isn’t Interested in Facts https://tinyurl.com/46ufpytb “In decision after decision, the conservative justices are ignoring the evidentiary record that lower courts have worked hard to establish.”
// mail-in voting; Trump v. California
WaPo: Trump’s plan to rebuild Navy ships has major holes https://tinyurl.com/ycxpmv8b “Presidential aesthetics and labor problems could sink Navy readiness” //➔ The peccadilloes to assuage ‘Admiral’ Trump’s aesthetic predilections are expensive, labor intensive, dangerous and dumb.
🐣 RT @marcosagusstinn 🇪🇺🇷🇺 The debate is over. ¤ The EU must use Russia’s frozen assets.
🔸 Russia has just rejected the latest peace agreement.
🔸 Moscow is preparing a major escalation instead of negotiating
🔸 Europe holds around €210bn in frozen Russian sovereign assets.
🔸 These funds must finance Ukraine’s defence.
This would reduce the burden on European budgets and make Russia finance Ukraine instead. ¤ Russia must pay for the war it started.
⋙ 🐣If Putin get this money, he has promised to give part of it to Trump. It is a bribe embedded in the 28-point plan that Trump/Wittkoff/Kushner tried to force on Ukraine but Ukraine rejected. ¤ It’s ALL a grift.
https://tinyurl.com/4kjj7znp
⋙⋙ GlobalSecurity: 28-Point Trump Ukraine-Russia Peace Plan https://tinyurl.com/4kjj7znp
• Item 14: Use of Frozen Russian Assets One hundred billion dollars (US$100 billion) from frozen Russian Central Bank assets will be allocated for Ukrainian reconstruction. The European portion of frozen funds will be returned to Russia, while the remainder will be invested in a joint U.S.-Russian fund.
🐣 RT @ABC The Justice Department and FBI are announcing efforts to disrupt a Chinese government-backed hacking group they say has engaged in targeted attacks against hundreds of entities in the U.S. — including NASA, the DOJ, U.S. Senate, and other groups. [link:] https://tinyurl.com/muzxt9h3
⋙ 🐣 nice to hear they’re doing something besides messing with elections and looking for fictitious entities like antifa and communists ¤ here’s to the analysts and agents too far down the totem pole to be politicized 🥂
⭕ 26 Aug 2026
WSJ: The Russia-Ukraine Air War Has Entered a New, Deadlier Phase https://tinyurl.com/4jx7zdf4 “Both countries are inflicting mounting destruction with long-range drones and missiles” //➔ Not enough attention is given to the fact that targeting civilians is a war crime.
TheAtlantic, Jonathan Lemire and Nancy Youssef: The Real Reason Trump Wants Economic Sanctions in Iran https://tinyurl.com/59j52s2n “The quieter, longer-term strategy could help push the conflict out of the minds of voters ahead of the midterms.”
TheAtlantic, Thomas Wright: Why Did John Ratcliffe Go to Moscow? https://tinyurl.com/zwky8yey “Despite Trump’s claims, the CIA director’s visit was anything but routine. It might be a sign that Putin is getting more dangerous.”
[TextLink:] https://x.com/Auriandra/status/2092816072063778822?s=20/photo/1
[…] Ratcliffe’s visit comes at one of the most difficult periods in the war for the Kremlin. Thanks to its drone systems, Ukraine has been able to strike military targets and oil infrastructure deep inside Russia while also hindering Moscow’s advance on the battlefield, turning the front into a kill box in which anything that moves is struck within minutes. Despite making little progress, Russia has continued to take heavy losses. In May, the Russian death toll reached nearly half a million, according to Anne Kwast-Butler, the head of GCHQ, the U.K. intelligence agency.
v
Russia’s weakness could be making Putin more reckless. The Wall Street Journal reported a few weeks ago that the U.S. intelligence community is concerned that Russia could carry out a limited attack on a NATO state, possibly even launching a small land incursion. Such an assault might thwart Russia’s own interests, prompting Europe to accelerate its military buildup and target Moscow’s sovereign assets. But Putin may see attacking a NATO country as an unprecedented opportunity to break the alliance, by manufacturing a crisis in which the United States fails to act.
^
If Washington did not respond to such an act of aggression, Russia could expose NATO’s mutual-protection clause as hollow. Putin has some reason to think that the United States may stay out of a conflict if he initiates one soon. Trump has repeatedly expressed disdain for Europe and shown little interest in challenging Putin. In addition, America’s weapons stockpile is depleted from the Iran war. Perhaps in response to fears of increased Russian aggression, NATO mounted a large U.S.-led air exercise last week over Poland and the Baltic region, which included flights near the Russian enclave of Kaliningrad.If Ukraine does survive the winter and retains the ability to strike deep inside of Russia, then Putin might choose to end the war in mid-2027. Facing the prospect of a U.S. president in 2029 who is more pro-Ukraine than Trump is, Putin may opt to take a favorable deal from this administration. That could include most elements of Trump’s 28-point plan without Ukraine’s withdrawal from the territory it currently controls. This would allow Putin to build a relationship with the United States in the time Trump has left as president—removing sanctions, rejoining the G7, and trying to undermine the NATO alliance indirectly through a partnership with Trump.
For all of Trump’s bluster on Europe, he has real incentives to push back now to prevent a crisis that could spiral out of control. His administration has options to deter Putin, if it wants to use them. For instance, Washington could warn Moscow that if it continues its deniable attacks in Europe, the United States would support Ukrainian access to Starlink inside Russia, which would improve the effectiveness of Kyiv’s long-range strike campaign.
On his way to Moscow, Ratcliffe stopped in Latvia. Today, the Latvian prime minister called the trip a “very good signal,” which seemed to imply that Ratcliffe had been there seeking to bolster European security. If the CIA director carried a warning with him, it should have been an unambiguous one: Any attack on NATO territory would bring in the United States. Trump might not want to make that type of commitment, but it may be necessary to ensure that Putin never concludes that he has an opportunity to start a war that breaks NATO.
🐣 RT @BillKristol “The public is moving away from Trump. He is a flailing president presiding over a failing administration. But he remains a very dangerous president. And his administration is becoming ever more radical in its authoritarian projects.” [Bulwark link:] https://tinyurl.com/eyhye3y
WSJ: EXCLUSIVE: CIA Chief’s Surprise Moscow Trip Was to Warn Russia Not to Attack NATO https://tinyurl.com/2dpypy93 “Warning comes after new U.S. intelligence assessments indicated Russian president could launch a limited assault” … “likely on a Baltic nation”
🐣 RT @YourAnonTV 🚨 BREAKING: China and India have warned Putin not to use nuclear weapons against Ukraine – Bloomberg
⭕ 25 Aug 2026
NBCNews: Iran inflicted billions in damage to U.S. intelligence sites, sources say https://tinyurl.com/bddj2evp “The attacks on buildings and surveillance equipment in the Middle East caused unprecedented damage for the CIA and other U.S. spy agencies.”
TheAtlantic, Shane Harris: The Qataris Gave Trump an Airplane. He Crippled Their Country in Return. https://tinyurl.com/nhac2zbf “In Trump, the Qataris had met a man who could not be bought. He could be PAID, and expected to be.… [It] turned out to be a protection racket.”
// The tiny Gulf state is learning that the U.S. president doesn’t always keep his end of the deal.
[TextLink:] https://x.com/Auriandra/status/2092513904639332375?s=20/photo/1
People close to Trump—it’s still not clear who—suggested to the Qataris that instead of selling the plane, they could donate it to the United States. A gift. A freebie from “friends” who had already put hundreds of millions of dollars into Trump’s son-in-law’s private-equity firm and bought a debt-laden Manhattan hotel belonging to Steve Witkoff, his Middle East special envoy, for $623 million. That’s to say nothing of the $8 billion they’d spent to build the Americans an air base—the biggest U.S. military base in the Middle East—or their plans to spend $10 billion more to enhance and maintain it. What was another $400 million, for a plane that the president so dearly loved? ¤ Even some Qatari leaders were surprised by the president’s gall.
🐣 RT @mccaffreyr3 The US Navy is an incredible fighting force. Twenty warships and two carriers are deadly to the Iranians. The Navy has enormous offensive and defensive capabilities They are well out to sea and difficult to find or attack. ¤ The problem is logistics.
¤ https://x.com/mccaffreyr3/status/2092467917669519464?s=20
The Iranians have ended the utility of Army, Navy, and Air Force Persian Gulf logistics bases which have been hammered by ballistic missiles and drones.
Now the Fleet will be supported from Diego Garcia and the Philippines. We will disperse air power to Western Saudi Arabia and southern Europe. The Army will harden our dispersed missile forces.
We are in the middle of a strategic disaster with no allies or support from the American people.
NYT: Hegseth’s Purge of Top Generals Leaves the Army Rudderless https://tinyurl.com/ywdadx6k “The leadership vacuum comes as the Army is trying to adapt to a new kind of war dominated by deadly drones.” //➔ It’s incompetence all the way down. 🐢 🐢 🐢
A series of firings and feuds initiated by Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth has left the Army essentially rudderless as it struggles to deal with the threat posed by cheap, deadly drones and missiles that have pounded U.S. bases in the Middle East.
The Army has not had a chief of staff, the service’s top officer, since Mr. Hegseth fired Gen. Randy George without explanation in April, and there are no signs that he is close to filling the position, said current and former officials speaking on the condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive personnel matters.
Mr. Hegseth has forced out at least three senior officers who had been viewed as potential successors to General George.
Army Secretary Daniel P. Driscoll, the service’s top civilian leader, is also expected to leave the administration in the next few months and has already moved out of the large family house that he was renting in Fort Myer, outside Washington, officials said.
The turmoil comes as the Army, the military’s largest service, faces its busiest period since the Iraq and Afghanistan wars. Army air defense soldiers are playing the leading role in defending U.S. troops in the Middle East from increasingly sophisticated Iranian missile attacks. The Army’s command in Europe is providing critical intelligence and other support to Ukraine as it fights to hold off a larger Russian force.
Until recently, Mr. Driscoll was widely seen as a potential candidate to replace Mr. Hegseth if he decided to step down or fell out of favor with President Trump.
Mr. Driscoll and General George had worked together to prepare the Army for a battlefield teeming with drones. Late last year, the White House asked Mr. Driscoll to play a lead role in its push to secure a peace deal that would end the war in Ukraine.
Those peace efforts have largely stalled, the rapid modernization push is being scaled back and Mr. Driscoll is barely on speaking terms with Mr. Hegseth, officials said. His impending departure was reported earlier by The Wall Street Journal.
Beyond General George, Mr. Hegseth has fired or forced out a half-dozen senior officers — a generation of the Army’s most combat-hardened leaders — thinning the service’s top ranks for the next several years, officials said.
“Hollowing out the most battle-tested and most lethal, proven leaders in a time of war means troops are less safe and we’re less likely to win,” said Representative Pat Ryan, Democrat of New York and a former Army intelligence officer.
A long-term worry is that the firings send a message that officers who provide frank military advice or fail ideological litmus tests have no place in a force that is supposed to be nonpartisan, military and congressional officials said. “We’re doing generational damage to the sense that the military is an apolitical trusted organization that swears an oath to the Constitution, not to a president,” Mr. Ryan added.
One measure of the vacuum at the top of the Army is the number of four-star generals serving in its ranks. As recently as January 2025, when Mr. Hegseth took office, there were 10 four-star generals on active duty. The service currently has five, the fewest in decades.
Some of those positions are commands focused on regions of the world, like the Middle East or Asia, and are being filled by senior officers from other services. Some have been eliminated.
Others, like the job overseeing the Army’s Transformation and Training Command, have been empty for months. Last summer, Mr. Hegseth selected Gen. David M. Hodne to lead the command and then fired him eight months later without explanation. …
General George struggled to forge a relationship with Mr. Hegseth, who arrived at the Pentagon with deep suspicions of the Army’s senior leadership rooted in his own experience, Army officials said. After deploying to Iraq and Afghanistan, Mr. Hegseth was forced to leave the National Guard for tattoos that were deemed extremist.
“The military I loved, I fought for, I revered,” he wrote in a 2024 book, “spit me out.”
Mr. Hegseth’s mistrust of General George and other senior Army leaders seemed to grow with each passing month in the Pentagon.
Last October, Mr. Hegseth pushed out Gen. James Mingus, the Army’s vice chief of staff, a year before he was scheduled to leave his post.
In his place, Mr. Hegseth and the White House nominated Gen. Christopher LaNeve, Mr. Hegseth’s senior military aide, to fill the job as the Army’s second in command, overseeing the service’s daily operations.
His decision to sideline General Mingus without offering a clear reason caused some in the Senate to balk and contributed to a further erosion in Mr. Hegseth’s strained relationship with the Army and Congress.
Several lawmakers, frustrated by Mr. Hegseth’s lack of transparency regarding his personnel moves and the military’s munitions stockpiles, put a hold on General LaNeve. That effectively blocked him from taking the job.
Initially, Mr. Hegseth accused General George of being in cahoots with the lawmakers who had initiated the hold, congressional and defense officials said.
Mr. Hegseth’s accusation was false, according to congressional officials. General George pressed the lawmakers to allow the nomination to move forward for the good of the Army and its relationship with Mr. Hegseth.
General LaNeve was sworn in as vice chief in February. Less than two months later, Mr. Hegseth fired General George in a 15-second phone call, defense officials said.
Currently, General LaNeve, Mr. Hegseth’s choice to lead the Army, does not have enough Republican support in the Senate to be confirmed. Generals and admirals nominated to lead the military services typically receive unanimous or near-unanimous support in the Senate. …
For now, General LaNeve is serving as both the vice chief of staff and the acting chief, both of which are demanding four-star positions.
Without strong leadership, critics said that the Army risks falling behind adversaries like Russia and China, who are making rapid advances in incorporating artificial intelligence and new drones into their formations.
In his first major message to the force, posted online last week, General LaNeve wrote about those challenges, warning that the Army must be prepared to “master an operational environment that looks fundamentally different from the battlefields of yesterday.”
But in conversations with senior Army leaders, he has worried that his predecessors’ push to modernize did not focus enough on essential combat skills, officials said. To that end, he has spoken of the need to return to the basics.
“Every shortcut in training and lapse in discipline will be paid for in blood,” he warned.
🐣 RT @RadioFreeTom It’s also heartbreaking. Canada isn’t just an ally, it’s our sister nation; not just a neighbor, but historically, family. Trump has no ability to discern one country from another. To him, they’re all just colors on a map, and matter only whether they like him enough.
⋙ 🐣 RT @SeanTrende The attempt to reframe Canada as a hostile nation might be the weirdest development in Trump 2.0. And that is saying something.
[TextLink:] https://x.com/RadioFreeTom/status/2092298234177716732?s=20/photo/1
[Text:] 🐣 RT @reaDonaldTrump The United States is giving serious consideration to changing the name of Lake Ontario to Lake America in that we don’t expect to be doing much business with Ontario any longer. Thank you for your attention to this matter! President DONALD J. TRUMP
🐣 RT @AP BREAKING: Canada will impose retaliatory tariffs on more than 700 U.S. goods, including steel and appliances, as the trade war escalates. [link:] https://tinyurl.com/4tc25rdc
⋙ 🐣 Several northern U.S. states import electricity from Canada via cross-border transmission ties [Claude:]:
• Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, Massachusetts, Connecticut – linked to Quebec and New Brunswick hydro power
• New York – ties to Quebec and Ontario
• Michigan, Minnesota, North Dakota, Montana – ties to Ontario, Manitoba, and Saskatchewan
• Washington – ties to British Columbia
⭕ 24 Aug 2026
💙 NYT, Stephen Marche: Canada Said No to America. It Will Reverberate Far Beyond Its Borders. https://tinyurl.com/2m6xb996 “Mr. Carney was openly defiant of the new breed of American aggression. ‘We will not allow any nation to determine our future,’ he said.”
[TextLink:] https://x.com/Auriandra/status/2092311276126908669?s=20/photo/1
For Canada, the choice came down to either accepting severe but temporary economic instability or binding itself to a pseudo-democratic fiscal basket case of a nation whose only apparent foreign policy objective has become domination for the gratification of its president’s slapdash vanity.
TheAtlantic, Will Oremus: Logging In Was Never Supposed to Be This Complicated https://tinyurl.com/mvt6hfbk “Please not another two-factor authentication code.” Also: Password Managers! 😖 ‼️‼️
MedNewsToday: COVID-19 may reactivate Epstein-Barr, herpes viruses https://tinyurl.com/5f83347e In a study published in Nature, “Researchers found that the reactivation of certain viruses was linked to both acute COVID-19 severity and possibly to long COVID as well.
🐣 RT @NewsHour [PBS] Stars and Stripes is a newspaper that has served American troops for generations. Recently, its publisher was fired, and its editor and one of its reporters were removed, raising questions about its future. [link:] https://tinyurl.com/rrkhkyxr
m‼️ 🐣 RT @GBC_Press 🚨 BREAKING: “We will not prosecute the abusers named in the Epstein files or reveal their names to the public.” — Todd Blanche, US Attorney General
💽 https://x.com/GBC_Press/status/2091941829407355030?s=20/video/1
⭕ 23 Aug 2026
WSJ Editorial: ‘The Dumbest Trade War Revisited https://tinyurl.com/hpdb48zn “One reason for Mr Trump’s frigid approval rating is that voters believe Mr Trump is waging blunderbuss wars without a strategy, and on trade they’re right.… [It] makes no economic or political sense.”
// Trump’s decision to escalate a tariff brawl with Canada makes no economic or political sense.
Mr. Trump issued his latest tariff threat against Canada last month under Section 338 of the 1930 Tariff Act. The law lets the President impose tariffs up to 50% on countries that discriminate against “commerce of the United States, directly or indirectly” in relation to foreign countries. No previous President has used this power.
The President also cited longstanding grievances over how Canada treats U.S. dairy. Press reports say the Trump team raised other issues during recent negotiations, including Canada’s treatment of U.S. tech companies and digital taxes. Most of these issues could have been addressed as part of a renegotiation of the U.S.-Mexico-Canada Agreement.
But Mr. Trump doesn’t want to update the deal. He wants to rewrite it unilaterally. As Mr. Carney noted Saturday, the President has contrived an array of pretexts—from fentanyl trafficking to trade deficits—to bludgeon Canada with tariffs.
Mr. Trump’s complaint about the U.S. trade deficit with Canada is particularly ironic since the latter owes entirely to imports of heavy crude oil that is especially well-suited for U.S. refineries. Exclude Canadian oil, and the U.S. would have a trade surplus. But U.S. refineries would also operate at lower capacity. …
Mr. Trump’s latest round of border taxes will hit an array of consumer goods, construction materials and manufacturing components. Republicans are already getting pounded on the campaign trail over his tariffs and inflation. One reason for Mr. Trump’s frigid approval rating is that voters believe Mr. Trump is waging blunderbuss wars without a strategy, and on trade they’re right.
TheAtlantic, Robert Kagan: Iran Unleashed https://tinyurl.com/mt3tree5 “The dominant power in the Middle East from now on will not be the U.S. or Israel but Iran.”
[TextLink:] https://x.com/Auriandra/status/2092075552781811821?s=20/photo/1
Today finds Iran in entirely new circumstances. It has gone head-to-head with the superpower and Israel, withstood a pounding from their most advanced weapons, and more than survived. As a result, Iran has, with American help, completely reconfigured the power structure of the Middle East and the Persian Gulf. The dominant power in the region going forward will be Iran, not the U.S. or Israel. Neighboring countries are already making their adjustments to this new reality. More distant powers will too. For years, the world has been dealing with an Iran constrained. It will now discover what Iran unleashed looks like.
🐣 RT @SenWhitehouse Bullying doesn’t always work; dumb bullying even less; TACO dumb bullying least of all.
⋙ WaPo: U.S.-Canada breakdown shows limits of Trump’s aggressive trade strategy https://tinyurl.com/47wcfhdj “‘It’s a big setback,’ one analyst said, noting that other countries unhappy with the president’s trade deals are probably watching closely.’
The shocking collapse of U.S.-Canada trade talks is the latest sign that President Donald Trump’s bulldozer approach to remaking the nation’s trade relationships may be reaching its limits.
The president tried in recent days to use an untested legal power to force Canada to swallow trade concessions. Instead, Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney quit the negotiations rather than accept a lengthening list of U.S. demands. …
The subsequent breakdown spotlighted tensions in the president’s strategy, including questions over the durability of any deal reached with the U.S. administration.
After all, the U.S. and Canada, along with Mexico, already have a trade deal: the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMCA) of 2020, which Trump hailed at the time as “the largest, fairest, most balanced, and modern trade agreement ever achieved.”
But this year, the president threatened to quit the deal and demanded sweeping changes to it, aimed at promoting more U.S. manufacturing. He also imposed tariffs on Canadian goods starting last year, a breach of the accord.
On Saturday, speaking in Ottawa, Carney alluded to the difficulty of negotiating with a mercurial president.
“We’ve recognized from the start that America has changed,” Carney said. “We recognize that sometimes, its signature is written in pencil.” …
At a White House meeting, White House trade adviser Peter Navarro and Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick, whose department administers the national security tariffs, clashed with Greer, representing industry views that the higher aluminum tariffs were needed to encourage domestic manufacturing.
“Navarro and Lutnick were both yelling at Greer saying: ‘What are you doing? This is stupid. You know, we’re not giving these things away,’” said one industry representative, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to describe the confidential talks.
… The administration also sought to restrict Canada’s right to sign trade deals with other countries, a key part of Carney’s strategy to reduce dependence on its increasingly unreliable southern neighbor.
Trump’s undiplomatic style — including saying that Canada should surrender its sovereignty to become the 51st U.S. state — made it harder politically for the Canadian leader to accept a deal. Public opinion in Canada has turned fiercely anti-American.
“A 160-year trading relationship has found its red line,” said Flavio Volpe, president of the Automotive Parts Manufacturers’ Association in Toronto. “Demanding that your closest trading partner mirror your trade policy with third countries is akin to asking them to surrender agency over foreign policy. This episode shows that doesn’t work, no matter the disproportionate market leverage of the USA.”
Trump also has a general disregard for the $3.4 trillion worth of merchandise that the U.S. imports annually. Speaking in June about his North American neighbors, the president told reporters in the Oval Office: “We don’t need anything that Canada has, we don’t need anything that Mexico has, but they need everything that we have. … We don’t need their cars, we don’t need their lumber, we don’t need their energy, we don’t need anything that they have.”
In fact, U.S. farmers rely on Canadian sources for nearly 80 percent of the potash fertilizer they use each year, according to the U.S. Geological Survey. Northern border states, including New York, Michigan, Vermont, Minnesota and Maine, run on electricity produced by Canadian hydropower. And Midwestern refineries are optimized to process heavy sour crude oil from Canada, helping keep gas prices lower than they otherwise would be, according to the Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City.
Total U.S.-Canada trade each year exceeds $700 billion.
The talks’ failure leaves businesses on both sides of the border burdened by a sudden jump in costs. Small businesses in the U.S. will face an especially sharp cash crunch, as they must pay tariffs before their customers pay them 30 or 60 days later, said Jason Miller, a professor of supply chain management at Michigan State University.
“I expect a significant drop in a lot of these different import categories because importers simply can’t afford to bring them in. That may mean certain products not on the store shelves,” said Miller.
In other cases, companies will struggle to find a domestic alternative to Canadian goods, especially for intermediate products such as packaging materials. So they will continue importing and pass along some of the 50 percent cost shock to their customers.
On Saturday, Carney said Canada will retaliate on Sept. 8 for the new tariffs with its own trade measures. By delaying his response, he is leaving time for cooler heads to prevail, analysts said. …
[T]he administration now must manage a cycle of retaliation and counter retaliation.
“Then the parties come back to the table. North America is too integrated for it to unravel on the basis of a deal that was put together over 14 days,” said Dan Ujczo, a trade lawyer in Columbus, Ohio.
🐣 📋 RT @DemzDeliver 🚨 Minnesota now ranks #1 in the country for quality of life.
¤ https://x.com/DemzDeliver/status/2091710783516230028?s=20
⋙ Source: MSN: Minnesota ranked No. 1 in major new quality of life report https://tinyurl.com/jfsbzax8
Minnesota ranks No. 1 in a major new quality of life study from the bipartisan, expert-backed State of the Nation. ¤ The 2026 State of the States report found New England and the western Midwest rank the highest for well-being, while states in Southern regions have the lowest average rankings.
🐣 RT @atrupar Sean Duffy: “The fact we provide their security for them, and they take advantage of us? … I think you’re gonna see Mark Carney come to the table very very quickly, because it’s gonna be devastating for his country.”
💽 https://x.com/atrupar/status/2091520369433903480?s=20/video/1
⋙ 🐣 Two can play this game:
¤ https://x.com/Auriandra/status/2091671748810875225?s=20
RT @1JaySC Will Canada retaliate?
Cut off oil supply.
Cut off electricity.
Cut off natural gas.
Cut off lumber supply.
Cut off potash supply.
Cut off steel and aluminum supply.
Call in the US debt bonds.
The US would be fucked.
🐣 RT @ Mike_Pence Visiting Ukraine today, 4 1/2 years after the brutal and unprovoked invasion by Russia, I sense that the Ukrainians’ steely will and commitment to defend their freedom is even greater today then when the Russian tanks first rolled.
Ukraine is winning this War. With the right support of America and Our Allies, the brave Ukrainian people can achieve a victory for freedom for themselves and the Free World. 🇺🇦 🇺🇸
💽 https://x.com/Mike_Pence/status/2091588363153211562?s=20/video/1
🐣 RT @stavridisj Some wisdom from one of the great heroes of our army, especially of Vietnam and Desert Storm
⋙ 🐣 RT @mccaffreyr3 In my judgement, the US Armed Forces have probably permanently lost access to 15 Persian Gulf bases. Iran now poised to control access the Gulf States. US will have to negotiate new access in western Saudi Arabia, Israel, southern Europe.
⋙⋙🐣 RT @Scaramucci USS Abraham Lincoln’s resupply problems weren’t a mystery. Iran hit NSA Bahrain—the 5th Fleet’s main logistics hub—hard in February. The Navy had to shift to Diego Garcia, 2,200 miles away instead of ~800. Transit times roughly tripled, so replenishment dropped from every ~3 days
⭕ 22 Aug 2026
🐣✝ RT @Pontifex The Love that moves the sun and the other stars” still impels us to hope. Love moves us, urges us onward, awakens us from lethargy, inspires new vocations, and calls us to take risks. In love, there is never coercion or indoctrination; never seduction, deception, or recruitment. Love exists only in freedom, genuine encounter, and the generous gift of self. #PastoralVisit #Rimini
🐣✝ RT @RichRaho Pope Leo in Rimini: “Let us, then, together free our lives from suspicion, culture from arrogance, education from ideology, work from the idolatry of profit, and technology and finance from the business of death.” [link:] https://tinyurl.com/h5pfzww3
🐣✝ RT @RichRaho Pope at Mass in Rimini: “Authority in the church means service…Binding and loosing also describes a Christian lifestyle: accepting people, bringing them together, welcoming them, liberating them, forgiving. Whoever lives this way makes good use of the gifts that God has given.”
⋙ 🐣✝ RT @Pontifex Evil cannot be overcome with evil. On earth as in heaven, love is the law of life and the way of redemption, the way of the crucified Messiah. In opposition to the false realism that rearms minds, words, and nations, Catholic culture must today offer the realism of mercy, according to which there can be no enemies. Everyone, even our adversaries, is a brother or sister to be looked in the eye and encountered in truth. #PastoralVisit #Rimini
⋙⋙ 🐣 This is most difficult for me. I see Russia bombing civilians and it makes me want to hate them. The best I can do is hope they will eventually experience a culture of non-aggression and peace. In despair I now see similar imperialist aspirations arising in my own country.
🔄 📋 🐣 Democrats have two “bases”
~ high-school✛ educated white women (and men)
~ minorities
Minority men voted less Dem in 2024 and helped Trump win; We happily welcome them back :)
But educated white women never left. Population-wise, this is the largest group. White men marginally vote GOP, but are still the 2nd largest group of Dem voters.
Source: CNN Exit Polls
¤ https://x.com/Auriandra/status/2091075144881992168?s=20
⭕ 21 Aug 2026
🐣 RT @KenRoth Marco Rubio says he expects other governments to join his vendetta against the International Criminal Court, but of its 125 members, only two on his lead say they will leave it — Venezuela, now a vassal state, and Chad, worried about its own criminality.
⋙ TheGuardian, Kenneth Roth: With ICC sanctions, Trump wants to make the world safe for war criminals https://tinyurl.com/bd3j675e “Trump and his henchman, Marco Rubio, want to make the world safe for US and Israeli war criminals. No one should let them.”
// The US is engaged in a lawless quest to protect American and Israeli officials
⭕ 20 Aug 2026
🧵 RT @andrewmichta As tensions rise on @NATO’s eastern flank, here are a few things worth remembering. If Putin jumps the NATO fence and the Alliance doesn’t respond immediately, resolutely, and in unity under Article 5, the Alliance is done. No amount of political spin will make up for it. 1/9
📌 https://x.com/andrewmichta/status/2090482813216620963?s=20
[ThreadReader:] https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/2090482813216620963.html
.@NATO is struggling to unite not only because the Trump administration’s haphazard policy has called into question established assumptions about how the Alliance is supposed to function, but also because of the cynicism and selfishness of a large cohort of European leaders. 2/9
During three months in Europe, I had an uncanny sense that those governments were sleepwalking into a potential disaster, still unwilling to accept the reality around them. The @NATO ministerial in June was nothing to write home about. Same about the follow up/lack thereof. 3/9
The NATO Defense Industry Forum in Ankara in July left too many questions unanswered. The “call to action” to financial institutions to increase private capital investment in defense, security/resilience across the Alliance is not enough. Companies urgently need contracts. 4/9
At last, @NATO seems to be getting serious about dual-use technology, but it’s not so much about technology as dual-use production capacity. Unless this becomes the focus, we will not leverage civilian capacity, and acquisition will default yet again to European and US primes.5/9
Tensions along @NATO’s flank must be seen in the context of an increasingly likely “crisis of simultaneity,” where two or more of the four key theaters (Europe, MENA, Korea, Indo-Pacific) may flare up at the same time. So far, we were able to sequence wars, but not anymore. 6/9
What happens when multiple theaters demand U.S. military assets? What will the Allies be able to contribute both at home and in other theaters? The decades of neglect and de facto disarmament are catching up with us all. Do we have time to debate, or only to act forthwith? 7/9
Walking through Europe’s cities, I had an uncanny sense of what 1938 must have been like: streets filled with people, restaurants and cafes packed, yet only about 400 miles to the East from Berlin, a full-scale war has been raging for years. And few seem to notice, or care. 8/9
Other than the frontier capitals of NATO countries facing Russia, I didn’t notice any urgency to prepare or any real sense of danger. What I heard too often was the talk of appeasing Russia or cozying up to China, despite all l the tough talk of “Europe.” So this is reality. 9/9
WSJ: New Drone Unit to Be Phased Out as Hegseth’s Army Pick Makes His Mark https://tinyurl.com/4fnhrdkr “Gen. Christopher LaNeve takes aim at a cutting-edge drone unit, one of several moves he has made since taking over the Army” //➔ muskets will be handed out instead?
🐣 RT @414magyarbirds Magyar: We are holding the line at the front, returning pain to the enemy in the swamps. Even when we are silent, we are. To civilians, I wish resilience and composure — the hardest trials still lie ahead.
¤ https://x.com/414magyarbirds/status/2090501390057582782?s=20
Between the enemy and us lies not a doctrinal gap, but a civilizational one: from individual agency (which I wish every Ukrainian to preserve) and values, all the way to our attitude toward human life.
Beyond the battlefield, deep in the swamps, we strike the sources that finance and sustain the enemy’s war and its weapons production. They, the fuckers, wage massive terror against the civilian population of our Motherland. Innocent people are dying, and they will continue to die. There is no end to it in sight.
The worm will only intensify this strategy of “punishing civilians” — that is obvious. So maintain round-the-clock functional vigilance and composure instead of consuming emotional content and IPSO that only reinforce the exhaustion already present. Personally establish, rehearse, and control your own course of action for the irregular announcement and execution of air strikes.
Steel nerves and an unshakable spirit to all of you. Take care of yourselves and those around you.
And know this — we are striking too, without stopping. We are returning pain to the enemy. This is not a sprint but a marathon with substantial obstacles — a decisive test of endurance.
*I had planned a week-long content detox. Only four days have passed. But I had to say this.
We will stand.
Moscow will fall.USF online scoreboard “PIDRAKHUYKA”
https://sbs-group.armyMAGYAR 🇺🇦
20.08.26
🐣 RT @BillKristol I tremble for my country when I reflect that God is just.
⋙ WaPo: ICE begins deporting Haitians who lost TPS back to homeland https://tinyurl.com/3e73tm6f “Community leaders said Thursday’s removal flight was one of the largest they had seen and included people who were detained in recent weeks.”
🐣 RT @@10DowningStreet Joint statement from the leaders of the United Kingdom, France, Germany, Italy, Netherlands, Norway and Canada.
[TextLink:] https://x.com/10DowningStreet/status/2090493428115067052?s=20/photo/1
JOINT STATEMENT FROM THE LEADERS OF
UNITED KINGDOM, FRANCE, GERMANY, ITALY, NETHERLANDS, NORWAY AND CANADAThe Israeli Government’s decision to publish construction tenders for the E1 settlement project is unacceptable. The international community has long opposed this settlement expansion, and has voiced their grave concerns privately and publicly. The E1 settlement will undermine the prospect of the two-state solution by driving a wedge through the West Bank and harming the territorial contiguity of the Palestinian Territories.
International law is clear that Israeli settlements in the West Bank are illegal. This is the position of the international community reaffirmed by the United Nations Security Council.
At a time of grave instability in the West Bank with unprecedented levels of violence by settlers against civilians, and serious restrictions on the Palestinian economy, this decision is even more concerning.
We urge the Government of Israel to retract these plans immediately and end its expansion of settlements in the West Bank. Not only will they take us further from peace, but they further undermine Israel’s international standing.
Businesses should not consider bidding for construction tenders. They should be aware of legal and reputational consequences including the risk of involving themselves in serious breaches of international law.
We reiterate our commitment to a comprehensive, just and lasting peace based on the two-state solution. We will continue to act in its interest.
⭕ 19 Aug 2026
NYT, Jamelle Bouie (8/19): Trump’s Lust for Vengeance Is Turning Into a Farce https://tinyurl.com/4ycc3s39 “These are personal crusades, shaped entirely by Trump’s grievances, his desire for revenge, his insatiable need to soothe his own psychic wounds.”
🐣 RT @DanielBShapiro [Fmr US Amb to Israel] Trumps threat of massive new economic pressures on Iran, presumably via secondary sanctions against countries that trade with it, is likely mostly hot air.
¤ https://x.com/DanielBShapiro/status/2090267996065247254?s=20
There are few such tools available that would not come with retaliatory measures against the United States.
But even if accurate, it ignores — as do all his blustery threats — that Iran has both willingness to absorb the pain and tools to impose pain on the United States, its partners, and the world economy.
Whether Trump pursues a military or an economic escalation, he never seems to get that the escalation is not one way, that Iran has agency. And then, as US partners come under attack and gas prices rise at home, he will feel pressure to scale back the escalation and try once again to reach a deal.
We are stuck in a cul-de-sac of our own making.
⋙ 🐣 Hubris or Madness? Likely both.
🐣 RT @arabnews The longtime publisher of Stars and Stripes has announced his retirement, ending a decades-long career with the military newspaper as Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s Pentagon moves to exert editorial control. https://arab.news/mc5b9
🐣 RT @BohuslavskaKate McFAUL: Putin fears democratic expansion, not NATO expansion. He invaded Ukraine in 2014 not because of American policy, but because of a democratic revolution. That’s what he feared and that’s what he was reacting to. That’s always been what Putin fears. It’s clear and obvious.
💽 https://x.com/BohuslavskaKate/status/2090089156483375544?s=20/video/1
🐣 RT @rospigge60559
🇪🇪 THIS IS HOW YOU TEST NATO WITHOUT INVADING NATO
¤ https://x.com/rospigge60559/status/2090001620796846509?s=20
Something potentially significant has happened in Estonia.
A building used by Milrem Robotics — the Estonian defence company producing unmanned military systems used in Ukraine — was targeted in a suspected arson attack.
Estonian authorities have identified suspects.
And Prime Minister Kristen Michal says one of the lines of investigation is particularly serious:
Sabotage — with possible Russian involvement.
Nothing has been proven yet, and that distinction matters.
But look at the strategic logic.
If Russia wants to test NATO, it doesn’t need to send tanks across the Estonian border.
Burn a defence facility.
Sabotage infrastructure.
Use proxies.
Cut cables.
Launch cyberattacks.
Create incidents where attribution is deliberately difficult.
Then watch what happens.
Does NATO respond collectively?
Does the attacked country stand alone?
Does Washington call it an Article 5 issue — or a criminal investigation?
That ambiguity is the weapon.
For years we’ve imagined the test of NATO as Russian armour crossing a border.
The real test may look nothing like that.
It may begin with a fire at 2 a.m. and a police investigation the following morning.
Welcome to the grey zone.
ICC: The ICC strongly rejects new US sanctions designations https://tinyurl.com/m82nh33b
🐣 RT @WarMonitor3 NATO has launched for the second day a massive air operation around Russian Kaliningrad interestingly a massive deployment of anti submarine aircraft is observed in particular off the Coast of Britain and in the Baltic Sea. Something is going on for sure…
🌎 https://x.com/WarMonitor3/status/2090046512923361624?s=20photo/1
⭕ 18 Aug 2026
🐣 RT @vali_nasr A must read piece by Marc Lynch on how Trump’s war on Iran is unraveling the entirety of the American order in the Middle East
⋙ ForeignAffairs, Marc Lynch: The End of the American Middle East https://tinyurl.com/3d88cwz6 Iran and the Last Gasp of a Failed Order
[TextLink:] https://x.com/Auriandra/status/2090490307687104695?s=20/photo/1
⋙ See under Entire Articles: FA End of US ME Aug ‘26
// 8/18/2026
The American Middle East is finished. The regional order that has prevailed since 1991 has been one of the many casualties of the U.S.-Israeli war with Iran. The American and Israeli failure to dislodge the regime in Tehran has proved the bankruptcy of decades of sanctions and violence. The inability of the United States to protect its Gulf allies from Iranian attacks or to keep the Strait of Hormuz open has fatally undermined the core security bargain that justified its network of military bases in the region. And Israel’s increasingly threatening posture and abandonment of any pretense of interest in reaching an accommodation with the Palestinians have ended Washington’s decades-long mission of bringing its Arab allies and Israel together into an enduring security partnership.
WSJ: How Trump’s Ever-Present Executive Assistant Became the Talk of Washington https://tinyurl.com/54c3utwf “Natalie Harp, aide to president, becomes object of fascination for both the left and right” //➔ he found his Eva Braun
🔄 ◕ NYT, Steven Rattner: Trump’s Broken Promises, in 11 Charts https://tinyurl.com/2sm966d2
“Promises made, promises kept.” Other presidents have employed variations of that phrase, although few with the gusto of President Trump; he even proclaims it on the White House website. When it comes to the economy, though, “promises not kept” would be a more apt description of the first 19 months of Trump 2.0. And many of the promises he has kept are causing as much damage as critics predicted. All in all, while Mr. Trump continues to boast about the “greatest economy we’ve ever had, by far,” the record to date falls far short of that lofty pronouncement.
🐣 RT @rospigge60559 The attack on the US Navy’s logistics hub in Bahrain reportedly forced the Navy to resupply the USS Abraham Lincoln from Diego Garcia—more than 3,500 km away. ¤ The result: shortages, collapsing morale and a carrier deployed for more than 260 days without a port call.
🧵 RT @khodorkovsky_en I once ran Russia’s largest oil company. Here is what Ukraine’s strikes are really doing to oil refineries — and why the damage may soon become irreparable. ¤ Read on and follow for more) [blog link:] https://tinyurl.com/4dn37fby
📌 https://x.com/khodorkovsky_en/status/2089829103775957031?s=20/video/1
// Blog title: b // psg4login
[ThreadReader:] https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/2089829103775957031.html
🐣 RT @ jkbjournalist New: Federal judge orders release of case files in 2015 civil lawsuit. Miami Herald effort led to landmark legal and journalistic precedent and set new standards for sealing documents of public importance in civil lawsuits. [link:]
⋙ 🐣 “never the less, she persisted”
yes you did
and the nation — indeed, the world, owes you a debt of gratitude
thank you!
🐣 RT @gtconway3d “If you look at this type of character throughout history—the malignant narcissist, the narcissistic sociopath …
¤ https://x.com/gtconway3d/status/2089340240414843080?s=20
Those those kind of people when they start feeling the walls close in on them, when it becomes too difficult to resist reality, and when they come to the conclusion that they’re cornered (even though they’re trying to deny it), and they’re trying to fight the reality—they become much, much more dangerous. …
And the question is, ‘How much power do they have to cause destruction?’ Because they want to destroy. That’s why they’re called malignant narcissists. They deep down subconsciously (or consciously) seek to destroy things.
And as things become worse for them, as the difficulty of maintaining their delusions overcomes them, they seek to take everyone down with them.”
🐣 RT @BohuslavskaKate PETRAEUS: Russia is taking incredible punishment right now. Ukraine is doing far more damage, very precisely. Ukraine has hit every single refinery in Russia within 3,000 km of Ukraine. Crimea is going to become an albatross around Putin’s neck, rather than a jewel in his crown.
💽 https://x.com/BohuslavskaKate/status/2089775657949536526?s=20/video/1
⭕ 17 Aug 2026
🐣 RT @OpDeathEaters A federal judge just ruled that Ghislaine Maxwell’s Epstein grand jury records must be made public, rejecting every objection she raised. Congress’s Epstein Files Transparency Act overrides grand jury secrecy rules. #OpDeathEaters […]
¤ https://x.com/OpDeathEaters/status/2089549303048196344?s=20
🐣 RT @MaxBoot Under Hegseth’s weak and woeful leadership, the defense budget has become a piggy bank not just for Trump’s impractical and expensive flights of fancy (“the Golden Fleet,” “Golden Dome,” steam catapults) but also for Trump family members. Companies in which his sons have invested have received $3.2 billion in defense contracts.
⋙ Newsweek, Max Boot: I’m a hawk. I’m shocked by a $1.5 trillion defense budget. https://tinyurl.com/mr366x3r The request would top World War II spending while funding boondoggles and sweetheart deals.
⭕ 16 Aug 2026
TheAtlantic, Tom Nichols: Trump Will Make South Korea Pay For His Iran Humiliation https://tinyurl.com/38szdvn6 “In Trump’s world, every loss … is a personal insult. When things go wrong, someone must be held responsible—and that someone is never Donald Trump.”
// His rage is driving him to make irrational policy choices.
Last winter, Donald Trump plunged recklessly into war with Iran. The United States is now losing that conflict. Iran remains defiant, much of the world economy is more threatened now than it was six months ago, U.S. military resources are overextended, and munition stores are dangerously depleted. Trump and the United States have suffered one embarrassment after another; last week, he had to sneak away from the region on a backup plane because of a possible assassination threat from Tehran.
And so the president of the United States has taken the logical next step: He is punishing South Korea, a loyal American friend, and tempting U.S. enemies to doubt America’s will to defend its allies.
Early Sunday evening, Trump instructed the Defense Department to “substantially reduce” its participation in an annual joint military exercisewith the South Koreans. He did this, he said in a post on Truth Social, in part because such activities are expensive, but worse, they are insulting to his friends in North Korea, a country that has been “unthreatening and respectful” while he’s been in office. (Trump seems unconcerned about the dozens of nuclear weapons Pyongyang is pointing at U.S. and South Korean forces—many of them developed on his watch. Just a reminder: There are roughly 28,500 American troops currently stationed in South Korea, some just a few miles from the DMZ.)
More to the point, he complained that the South Koreans have not helped him defeat Iran:
⋙ While somewhat unrelated (?), I recently asked the President of South Korea if they would like to join us in the Denuclearization of the Islamic Republic of Iran, and they said, “No thanks!” ⋘
When Trump makes the effort to say something is “unrelated” to his actions (and then adds a coy question mark) it usually means it is completely related—and probably his central motivation.
Scaling back the exercise is, of course, an insane decision, which does nothing but hurt an ally, and tempt an adversary to think—correctly—that American leadership is feckless. You could be forgiven for wondering why South Korea and the rest of the free world must pay for Donald Trump’s failures. Such confusion is understandable, except that in Trump’s world, every loss, every defeat, is a personal insult. When things go wrong, someone must be held responsible—and that someone is never Donald Trump.
America and the rest of the world are now witnessing a public exhibition of narcissistic rage. Trump embarked on a war for personal glory, and what he got instead was ongoing humiliation. He clearly finds it all unbearable.
Trump both fears and respects the autocrats who rule Russia, China, and North Korea, and so he dares not cross them. Instead, he is seeking to assuage the psychic injury of his loss in Iran—including the American public learning of the shameful conditions to which he has subjected U.S. forces—by kicking America’s allies, the nations he can punish without fear that they will kick him back.
The Iran war was not the president’s failure, you see. Others failed the president. Those disloyal South Koreans, who every few years drag him into a needless confrontation with that respectful and peace-loving young man in Pyongyang, refused to help him topple the Iranian regime. And because Trump is unable to subdue Iran, unable to replenish stocks of U.S. weapons he should never have expended in this war, unable to take care of the service personnel he has put in harm’s way, someone is going to pay. The most convenient target he could find, at least for the moment, was South Korea. …
The Chinese and the Russians and the North Koreas are certain to draw the appropriate lessons from this deranged policy. They have been shown, yet again, that when Trump fails, he hurts those he feels safe hurting. Already, North Korea is dispatching missiles and thousands of soldiers to aid Russia in its war on Ukraine. If a conflict should break out in the Pacific or on the Korean peninsula, or if the war in Europe spreads further West, the world’s dictators might well count on Trump to focus American wrath not on the enemies of the free world, but on the nations that have always pledged to stand side by side with the United States in a mutual defense of freedom.
⭕ 15 Aug 2026
🐣 RT @BohuslavskaKate APPLEBAUM: There’s a long debate about whether Ukraine should be in NATO. It’s a moot point.
¤ 💽 https://x.com/BohuslavskaKate/status/2088757116739748005?s=20/video/1
I would much rather see new set of security alliances that automatically include Ukraine.
Because Ukraine has the best military technology now, maybe in the world, definitely in Europe.
We should begin developing links with Ukraine, Ukrainian military technology, not focus solely on NATO.
Maybe, you know, that’s even healthier. Maybe it was always a bad idea to focus solely on NATO.
After all, it’s an alliance that was created at a different time, with different ideas and different geopolitics.
Think about this not as if we’re breaking up with America, hating Americans, and going home.
Rather, let’s keep what we have and also begin to build new institutions and new relationships.
Being a little more imaginative and creative about what security looks like would be good for everybody.
🐣 RT @BohuslavskaKate KASPAROV: In my opinion, Russia doesn’t have much time left. The regime is in very poor condition.
💽 https://x.com/BohuslavskaKate/status/2088671065287414225?s=20/video/1
I don’t have crystal ball. I can’t read tea leaves. I only rely on the information I have and can analyze.
It indicates that Russian economy is in a bad state. Their financial situation is rapidly deteriorating.
I’m just reading Russia’s own data, propaganda, bloggers, including pro-government, pro-war ones.
Besides, I believe in certain historical regularity. In 21st century, the age of empires has come to an end.
There’s still China, which will try to build its own empire, but Russian Empire is doomed to collapse.
The only question is how quickly it will happen, whether this process can be managed, costs limited.
Whether part of Russia can survive to eventually side with the West in confrontation against axis of tyranny.
Because there are China, Iran, and North Korea. In reality, there are more countries belonging to this camp.
🐣 RT @tedlieu The ship redesign costing billions based on trump’s whims will never happen. ¤ Dems will flip the House. We will stop the waste of taxpayer dollars from trump. ¤ Instead, the Navy will draw pretty pictures of ships that will never be built to soothe the ego of an 80 year old fool.
⋙ WaPo: Navy weighs major warship redesign to match Trump’s preferences https://tinyurl.com/ua97p688 “The president wants the new fleet of aircraft carriers to more closely resemble those from World War II. The change could cost billions.” //➔ @USNavy Just Say NO‼️
🐣 RT @jalle51 I know, Putin doesn’t know, is he mentally disabled?
¤ https://x.com/jalle51/status/2088521461606613187?s=20
Kremlin’s own bank warns Putin: “You will lose.”
Andrei Klepach, chief economist at state‑owned VEB.RF, says Russia cannot win the war of attrition, costs are skyrocketing, Ukraine will not collapse, and Russia is falling behind technologically even compared to Ukraine.
He predicts a coming social crisis, comparing the moment to 1917 and the Soviet collapse.When the regime’s own economist sounds the alarm, the cracks are real.
NYT: Wary of Trump, Europe Seeks Role in Any Russia-Ukraine Talks https://tinyurl.com/9f4xnw2w ‘French, German and British diplomats are working on a format for future negotiations to protect European interests — even if Russia has shown little interest.’
⭕ 14 Aug 2026
🐣 RT @MotherJones Forget “girl math” and “boy math.” America’s running on billionaire math.
¤ https://x.com/MotherJones/status/2088426784417100098?s=20/video/1
They own yachts that have yachts. They leave Earth just to feel something. They buy art they don’t like and tout books they don’t read and play God with things they don’t comprehend. Above all, they live by their own set of rules.
There is a crude but undeniable logic to the rise of the American Oligarchy. As @timothypmurphy argued in a cover story for the magazine earlier this year, decades of deregulation, concentration, opportunism, and no small amount of generally-quite-legal corruption have allowed a small group of people (mostly in Silicon Valley) to control an ever-greater share of the economy and bend the political process toward their own ends. Money begets power begets money. It’s why, laid out on the page, the net worths of the world’s richest men currently look like they’re heading toward orbit.
Speaking of orbit, gravity doesn’t really exist in the same way when you’re an oligarch. If you built a car and it kept catching on fire, you would have to stop making cars. If your products drove people insane, they would be taken off the shelves. If you did a Hitler salute, people would probably just call it that. If you were responsible for hundreds of thousands of deaths, you would be ostracized from polite society, and maybe even CNBC. If you invented the Metaverse, people would stop asking you to invent more things. And if you didn’t pay taxes, dear reader, you might eventually go to prison.
It’s this alternative physics that gives the American oligarchy, at this particular moment, its uniquely off-putting funk—a sense that, beyond all the hockey-stick wealth charts, the centibillionaires of Silicon Valley can pursue whatever bored or perverted or maniacal project they want without fear of censure or even market correction. Time and money just don’t mean the same things they do to the rest of us. Laws become more like suggestions. Deadlines aren’t real. Or at least: They don’t have to be.
Welcome to Billionaire Math, a video where we make sense of the things that don’t make sense about the world’s ruling class.
Reporting by Tim Murphy
Video by Peter Berger
NYT: Navy Carrier’s Problems Are Tied to Attacks on U.S. Base Early in War https://tinyurl.com/7syvz3ks “Diego Garcia, a tiny island 2,200 miles from the Gulf of Oman, took over as the Navy’s logistics hub after Iran damaged a base in Bahrain.”
🐣 RT @TokyoTom2020 After six months, President Trump is completely in over his head regarding Iran, dragging our country into a senseless, slow-burn war in a far-away land. ¤ I attribute this failure to three key reasons:
🚩Underestimating the adversary: Trump’s arrogance steeped in insularity and white supremacy leads him to consistently underestimate Iranian resolve, resourcefulness and resilience.
🚩Lack of cultural and historical knowledge: He remains ignorant of regional and Iranian history, culture, and military dynamics due to a refusal to study for anything.
🚩Ignoring expert guidance: He refuses to listen to the few experienced advisors who warned him with reality checks about the quagmire he is entering and urged him not to underestimate Tehran.In short, his conduct reflects an “ugly American” approach that has ultimately backfired—screwing over himself, our country, and our entire world.
🐣 RT @ralexdc NEW!! Denmark has deployed more than 800 soldiers to Latvia — marking Copenhagen’s 5th battalion rotation to the country since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine ¤ Denmark’s Amb. says the deployment reinforces Copenhagen’s commitment to bolstering NATO’s eastern flank
⋙ 🐣 RT @DKambLatvia More than 800 Danish soldiers have arrived in Latvia. This is the fifth time Denmark has deployed a battalion to Latvia since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. By this deployment to Latvia, Denmark is demonstrating its commitment to a strong collective defence of NATO’s eastern flank
🐣 RT @Kasparov63 The least secret secret of all time.
⋙ 🐣 RT @@WarMonitor3 Putin plans to take control of Moldova once he is finished in Ukraine and told top officials in a top secret mission last year his goal in 2026 was to Collapse the EU and NATO from within-NYT ¤ Wow…
NYT: Tech Giants’ Profits Reveal Potential Vulnerability in the Stock Market https://tinyurl.com/3meacvj3 //➔ The serpent is eating its tail … but I am sure the god of the stock market ha# it all worked out and it turns out fine for everyone
// Investment gains at Alphabet and Amazon reveal a new way in which technology companies’ fortunes are increasingly linked.
⭕ 13 Aug 2026
WaPo, David Wallace-Wells: The Only Way to Keep the World Safe From A.I. https://tinyurl.com/3ev42xj4//➔ Was OpenAI’s breakout a bug — or a feature? Interview with Robert Wright
⭕ 12 Aug 2026 🦷 ache ‼️
Economist: AI agents lie, cheat and steal. That is putting off users https://tinyurl.com/mw36fx2r (“They’d drink whisky and brawl if they could.”) “It is time to impose law and order on the frontier”
… As recent “loss-of-control” episodes by the most advanced models of Anthropic and Openai attest, agents, which are supposed to work on people’s behalf in “alignment” with their values, lie, cheat and steal if necessary. They break free from captivity and form harmful posses to do harm to people. They’d drink whisky and brawl if they could.
Such unpredictability is too much for many firms to handle. “All you have to do is get snake-bitten once and you’d never go back,” says Jared Sine of GoDaddy, an internet firm trying to help bring order to the chaos. The need for law and order is giving rise to a new cohort of ai-infrastructure firms. They are not selling chips or compute—the typical picks and shovels of the ai gold rush. They provide protection against cyber-threats, fixes for untrustworthy and inscrutable agents, and controls if they go rogue. In other words, their business is barbed wire.
The most immediate area of danger—and opportunity—is cyber-security. Recent tests of the hacking capabilities of models from Anthropic and Openai revealed agents going rogue, stealing credentials, creating fake identities, setting up secret chatrooms and covering their tracks—all to the shock and horror of their human evaluators. The state-of-the-art security models, Anthropic’s Claude Mythos 5 and Openai’s gpt 5.6-Cyber, will no doubt help defenders, too. But, according to Dawn Song, an expert on ai and cyber-security at the University of California, Berkeley, for now the balance of power rests firmly with the attackers. There is a further snag. If organisations adopt autonomous agents, they increase the potential “attack surface” for hackers, she says. […]
The frontier is lawless, too. So strong are the concerns about rogue agents that even executives of the leading ai labs are calling for the Trump administration to take a sheriff’s role—though weirdly the government is keeping its most recent framework on ai safety under wraps. What is clear, though, is that more checks and balances are needed before organisations adopt agents with anything close to full confidence. One of this year’s ai buzzwords is “harness”—the system that surrounds an llm to keep agents on the straight and narrow. It might just as well be barbed wire.
TheAtlantic, Matteo Wong: It May Be Time to Panic About AI https://tinyurl.com/558rb26d “Bots are starting to conspire with one another. Can they be reeled back in?” “New revelations suggest that the OpenAI hack, at least, was actually much worse than it initially appeared”
The crisis began quietly, on September 12, 2024. That was the day OpenAI announced a new sort of bot, known as a “reasoning model,” that was trained to complete challenging tasks that took long periods of time—the very sorts of science, math, and coding problems the AI industry had long prized. Google, Anthropic, DeepSeek, and the like raced to launch their own reasoning models.
This new class of models was very capable, and has been almost entirely responsible for sustaining the AI boom for the past two years. But it has also been very weird. A model tasked with solving a hard math problem might not “think” through the challenge as a person would but instead attempt to search for leaked answers online, or in available metadata, brute-forcing its way toward the solution as quickly as possible using whatever computing power it could access and workarounds it could devise. In effect, the reasoning models cheated: Told to write a piece of software as efficiently as possible, they’d sometimes modify the test environment to always give the model a perfect score.
These behaviors have now crossed the line from unsettling to dangerous. During routine testing, frontier models from OpenAI, Anthropic, Meta, and the Chinese firm Moonshot AI have all broken out of internal IT systems and accessed the open web. OpenAI, Anthropic, and Meta each reported that their models then hacked into other companies. Humans didn’t notice until after the fact. In some cases, the escaped bots tried to launch social-engineering campaigns to achieve their objectives—for instance by sending spear-phishing emails, which contain malware, to real people and creating fake online identities to pressure the maintainer of a codebase to approve malicious edits.
If that all sounds bad, new revelations suggest that the OpenAI hack, at least, was actually much worse than it initially appeared. At a major cybersecurity conference last week, two OpenAI researchers provided new, unsettling details about what went wrong. It turns out that the company’s bots had commenced their maneuvering months prior, in early May. OpenAI had given some internal models hard or impossible tasks, and the models concluded that the best or only way to complete them was to break out of OpenAI’s sealed-off testing environment and find the answers online.
First, the models used a bug in an internal OpenAI program to create their own message board. Then, the bots started communicating with one another, leaving notes and instructions so that tasks—and ultimately the hacking—could be delegated and iteratively completed. “What this allows over time is almost this kind of Cambrian explosion in communication and intelligence,” Eric Wallace, one of the OpenAI researchers, said at the conference. When the internal program crashed, OpenAI rebuilt it and removed the message board—but the AI models just reestablished the forum with a new tactic. Eventually the bots, working as a swarm, spent days hacking into Hugging Face, a website that offers tools for AI developers, and breached internal data sets.
Let’s be very clear about what OpenAI is saying: A group of AI models colluded for months, undetected by their maker, and hacked another company. To this day, OpenAI says it is not entirely sure what went wrong or how to remediate it. “If you ask the model developers, Was the AI plotting to take over the world during training?, you want the answer to be a resounding no,” Alexander Meinke, the head of research at Apollo Research—an AI-safety organization that has partnered with OpenAI, Anthropic, and Meta—told me. “The actual answer is: I don’t know. Nobody checked.” (In response to my inquiries, OpenAI, which has a content-licensing agreement with The Atlantic, only pointed me to a video of the firm’s cybersecurity presentation, in which Michael Dalton, the other OpenAI researcher, said that “numerous teams are dropping everything to enhance our security.” […]
⭕ 11 Aug 2026
🐣 RT @marceelias🚨BREAKING: Federal Court BLOCKS US Postal Service from implementing Section 3 of Trump’s anti voting EO. Has nationwide impact. A huge victory for voters and defeat for Trump and DOJ.
⭕ 10 Aug 2026
NYT: How a Counterintelligence Inquiry Into Trump’s Russia Ties Was Derailed https://tinyurl.com/bddz2bwa “Documents released by the White House shed new light on the demise of an often-overlooked 2017 F.B.I. investigation.”
⭕ 9 Aug 2026
🐣 RT @BohuslavskaKate Sean Penn: Ukraine is everything we were promised in American aspiration. The idea that it’s our sacred duty to protect, and we’re failing Ukraine on the most catastrophic scale. And Ukraine’s not failing. Ukrainians will dominate this war, and they won’t give up, nor should we.
💽 https://x.com/BohuslavskaKate/status/2086541102908051745?s=20/video/1
🐣 RT @Mylovanov Zelenskyy: We’re building a joint air-defense project with Raytheon, Lockheed Martin, and FirePoint. Only two or three companies worldwide build anti-ballistic defense, and plenty besides Russia don’t want Ukraine joining that market. 1/
[TextLink:] https://x.com/Mylovanov/status/2086421803027571169?s=20/video/1
⋙ 🐣 RT @Mylovanov Zelenskyy: We specifically partner with the US on arms production instead of splitting deals across three or four European countries, because that means more bureaucracy, and any single country’s election cycle can be used to delay a shipment you’re depending on. 2X
🐣 RT @@Maks_NAFO_FELLA 🇺🇸🇺🇦 The Atlantic: Raytheon and Lockheed, the makers of the Patriot air defense system, officially justify their concerns with intellectual property theft and technology transfer, but what they are really worried about is that the Ukrainians will find a way to improve the Patriot and then produce it in large quantities faster and for much less money than they do in US.
⋙ 🐣 Well, there is already a collaboration between Ukraine and 🇪🇺 countries to co-develop an alternative interceptor. They already are looking to offer an EU alternative to Starlink
💙 ⋙ TheAtlantic, Michael Weiss: Ukraine May Be Just the Ally America Needs https://tinyurl.com/5xj7s388 Ukraine 🇺🇦 was once “the industrial hub of the USSR.” Trump promised 🇺🇦 could license Patriot missiles but US manufacturers are afraid that 🇺🇦 will ‘improve them & make them cheaper’
// cont.: … Patriot and then produce them at scale faster and for much less money”
// The country Trump once disdained as a burden has become a military powerhouse.
One Republican official in favor of the license told me about an unreported hiccup in the deal. Raytheon and Lockheed, the makers of the Patriot system, “will officially frame their concerns around IP theft and tech transfer,” he said, but “their real worry is that the Ukrainians will find a way to improve the Patriot and then produce them at scale faster and for much less money than what the existing production lines in the U.S. could do.”
⭕ 8 Aug 2026
🐣 RT @@BohuslavskaKate Hillary Clinton: The domain of loss is the concept of how you double down when you’re losing. So in today’s world, Putin is doubling down. He’s going to inflict as much punishment as he can on Ukraine because they won’t quit. They won’t lie down and die the way he wants them to.
💽 https://x.com/BohuslavskaKate/status/2086143480011555058?s=20/video/1
NYT: Iran Issues List of Demands, Complicating Efforts to Reopen Strait https://tinyurl.com/yn48y8xz “The head of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council said that the Strait of Hormuz would remain closed until the United States met certain conditions.”
A top Iranian national security official delivered a sweeping set of demands on Saturday that he said the United States must meet before the Strait of Hormuz can reopen to maritime traffic, throwing the fate of the critical trade waterway into question.
Mohammad Bagher Zolghadr, the secretary of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council, issued a statement carried by state media laying out multiple requirements for reopening the strait. He called for the United States to lift its naval blockade and sanctions on Iran, withdraw the U.S. military from around Iran, pay war reparations and release frozen Iranian assets, as well as end attacks on Iran’s allies in the region and threats against the country.
The White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Iran’s demands […]
.
🐣 RT @RepDonBacon Why did DoD’s civilian leadership withdraw US troops from Estonia and Lithuania? Why did they remove Armor Brigades from Poland and Romania? Those units were needed to deter Russia. Until the Pentagon fixes this they can expect huge pushback from many in Congress.
⋙⋙ RT @TomCotterillX NEW: Russia could attack a Nato country within weeks to test the alliance’s resolve, US intelligence has warned. ¤ American officials believe Russia might attempt to escalate tensions by mounting a small land incursion or launching cyber attacks across Eastern Europe any time from this autumn to 2029, The Wall Street Journal reported. […] [Telegraph link:] https://tinyurl.com/4kwf5n3v
¤ https://x.com/TomCotterillX/status/2085755732473892942?s=20
⋙ 🐣 My guess is Trump is signaling he will not protect Europe. Russia has sent 50+ drones into NATO airspace. Kasparov predicts an attack on Estonia or Latvia as early as this fall. ¤ Destroying NATO will also signal US invasion of Greenland. ¤ I hope I am wrong,🙏
⭕ 7 Aug 2026
ForeignAffairs, Julian Waller: After Putin: Russia’s Coming Succession Crisis https://tinyurl.com/3ruyma9h
A specter is haunting Russia—the specter of succession. Russian President Vladimir Putin, who is 73 years old, has built a powerful personalist regime, but one that has no real plan for what comes next. Putin will eventually leave office, whether by death, illness, or—against all observable inclinations—stepping aside. But what happens then is unclear. It could be a rushed passing of the guard, a chaotic power struggle among elites long denied the highest political offices, or continued decay under the gerontocracy that currently runs the country alongside Russia’s dictator.
,
🐣 RT @joni_askola Putin famously claimed that the collapse of the Soviet Union was the greatest geopolitical catastrophe of the 20th century. He could not be more wrong.
¤ https://x.com/joni_askola/status/2085778070875562412?s=20
The fall of the USSR was actually the greatest geopolitical miracle of modern history, freeing tens of millions of people from a brutal, blood-soaked empire.
The Soviet Union was a human disaster, a totalitarian crime against humanity, and a system that put war and imperialism ahead of feeding its own people.
For decades, the world was forced to endure the myth of the USSR as a superpower dedicated to human progress. In reality, it was nothing more than an advanced, totalitarian iteration of the Russian Empire.
It was an illegitimate project built on lies, paranoia, and catastrophic human suffering. It was a war-hungry, paranoid mistake of a country that sacrificed tens of millions of lives across its republics.
The Soviet ideology was fundamentally flawed because it placed a rigid, totalizing dogma above human dignity and basic freedom. It substituted human enterprise with central planning, creating an unsustainable economy that could build nuclear missiles but failed to put bread on the tables of its citizens.
From a historical perspective, the USSR was an aggressive, imperialistic state. It helped unleash the horrors of World War II by signing a pact with Nazi Germany in 1939, agreeing to carve up Eastern Europe. The alliance only ended because Hitler turned on Stalin in 1941.
Throughout its existence, Moscow treated member republics as colonies, extracting their wealth and enforcing cultural dominance while silencing any form of dissent through the Gulag system and police state surveillance.
When the Soviet Union finally imploded, tens of millions of colonized people were freed from Moscow’s grip. Look at the Baltic states today. Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania transformed into flourishing European democracies with living standards that far exceed anything Russia has ever produced. They stand as living proof that Russian control was the single greatest obstacle to human flourishing in the region.
Modern Russia’s brutal attempt to eradicate Ukraine is proof that Moscow never accepted the death of its empire. Driven by corrupt, paranoid leadership, Russia is committing genocide because it has no ideology or attractive model left to sell. It can only sell imperialism and death.
Defeating this imperial machine in Ukraine is a global imperative. If the Russian empire is not shattered in Ukraine, it will remain a permanent threat to peace and force us to confront it elsewhere later.
.
🐣 RT @BohuslavskaKate KASPAROV: There’s a chance that Ukrainian victory, visible and symbolic one, like recovery of Crimea, will create conditions for the fall of Putin’s regime and for great changes in Russia. Russians won’t embrace democracy with their hearts, but may accept it with their stomachs.
💽 https://x.com/BohuslavskaKate/status/2085766222797299777?s=20/video/1
🐣 RT @mjfree JUST IN: Major loss for Trump — a federal appeals court just ordered his administration to stop construction on the White House ballroom until Congress actually approves it.
¤ https://x.com/mjfree/status/2085767922908328151?s=20
In a 2-1 decision, the appeals court backed the historic preservationists who sued to block the project.
The court didn’t mince words: “Whether or not a massive ballroom should be constructed is for Congress to decide and is not a matter for Executive self-help.
🐣 RT @ChristopherHale NEW: The rise of the Democratic Socialists of America across the nation over the past few years has sparked renewed interest in the group’s origins.
¤ https://x.com/ChristopherHale/status/2085843587527332230?s=20
Its birthplace is the American Catholic Church — its founder, Michael Harrington, was a young follower of the future Catholic saint Dorothy Day.
In 2006, the conservative Pope Benedict XVI wrote that “in many respects, democratic socialism was and is close to Catholic social doctrine” and has “made a remarkable contribution to the formation of a social consciousness.
🐣 RT @SenWhitehouse The People own the White House; Congress is the landlord; each President is a tenant — and like any tenant can’t make any unauthorized major renovations. Pretty obvious stuff.
🐣 RT @rparloff “We are aware of no instance in American history in which a President unilaterally and using privately collected funds demolished substantial portions of the White House that Congress authorized to be built and American taxpayers paid for. Until now.”
[CourtDoc:] https://tinyurl.com/yp77r7xe 136p
🐣 Order: sides with District Court 2/1. Restraining order for two weeks to allow appeal to SCOTUS.
[TextLink:] https://x.com/Auriandra/status/2085859251218473091?s=20/photo/1
That is why, throughout history, Presidents have lived in the house the people built. Executive actions that take control of that property out of the hands of the people’s representatives while irreparably harming the historical and visual architecture of perhaps the most prominent public building in the United States seriously intrude on the public interest.
Given all of those considerations, the district court did not abuse its discretion in entering its carefully tailored preliminary injunction with its safety-and-security exception. …
For the foregoing reasons, we affirm the district court’s judgment issuing the modified preliminary injunction. The administrative stay entered by this court on April 17, 2026, is vacated. We hereby stay this ruling for fourteen days to allow the Defendants, if they choose, to seek Supreme Court review. ¤ So ordered.
⭕ 6 Aug 2026
⭕ 5 Aug 2026
WaPo: Trump, Hegseth clashed at Camp David over Iran missile depletion concerns https://tinyurl.com/33r9cry6 “The pace and sheer volume of munitions expended by both sides has rapidly accelerated the depletion of key U.S. offensive and defensive munitions.”
[TextLink:] https://x.com/Auriandra/status/2085209849508278275?s=20/photo/1
Ever since Signalgate, where Hegseth sent classified information to a chat group that included a reporter just months after being confirmed to the role, rumors have swirled about how long the defense secretary would remain in Trump’s good graces. The president has consistently praised Hegseth, saying he looks straight out of “central casting” and that “he loves war.”
Since taking office, Trump has launched military operations in seven countries: in Yemen, Somalia, Syria, Iran, Iraq, Nigeria and Venezuela.
🐣 RT @ltgrusselhonore Draft Oped : We in some Deep S..t America: this is what happens when the government is lead by bunch of Millionaires and @FoxNews Reporters
¤ https://x.com/ltgrusselhonore/status/2085201304482136435?s=20
1. Troops Short Missiles For Defense and Attack. Sailors short supply on ships
2. @USDA Cut Snap For 700,000 Poor Americans
3. End TPS For Haiti , they can’t work , loosing rental housing , at same time importing White South Africans give them laptops and public services
4. War without end , price at gas pump and groceries or higher
5. Spending $ to replace grass in DC , building vanity projects, Branding everything in name of dear leader, airport, train station, ballroom
6 . Tariffs that don’t make sense. Destroy our relationship w close allies
7. Fail to support Ukraine
8. Blockade against Cuba
9. Seize Venezuela oil revenues no one know where the money is going, while they trying to recover from earthquake
10. Want to give the 1/6 Mob $
God Bless America
NewVoiceUA: Russia plotted assassination of German drone company CEO — report https://tinyurl.com/37yrbj3y
⭕ 4 Aug 2026
TheAtlantic, Tom Nichols: Trump’s Irrationality Is Dangerous https://tinyurl.com/52paxb8k “Like other authoritarians before him, Trump has retreated, irrevocably, behind the walls of his own Forbidden City of the mind—a place where he is the emperor and his judgment is always right”
// cont.: “… and his commands must always be obeyed.”
// “Because Trump cannot draw links between cause and effect; he does not understand that his actions and the failures that follow are somehow related to each other.”
[Trump’s] rant yesterday about the Reflecting Pool (speaking of things that don’t hold water) was a warning that the president has encased himself in the hard amber of irrationality that inevitably surrounds authoritarian leaders. He has become detached from reality—and that detachment is extremely dangerous.
… In Trump’s world, nothing is ever innocent. If something went wrong, the fault must lie with Americans conspiring against him, not with a contractor who did shabby work. And so the boss put out the order: Find the criminals who destroyed my lovely pool.
The task of prosecuting this inane case fell to Jeanine Pirro, who has known Trump for more than three decades. She has long been one of his most loyal defenders on Fox News, and she was his personal choice for the job of U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia after the failed nomination of Ed Martin. She dutifully charged multiple people with vandalizing the Reflecting Pool, including the Olympic athlete David Hearn. But last week, she moved to drop the case after admitting that the pool’s condition was “the result of a botched installation” and not of criminal activity. Trump immediately turned on her. In a Truth Social post after Pirro’s filing, Trump said he disagreed “100%” with his old friend. “I don’t know what she was thinking? To me, it was a pure case of VANDALISM.” […]
… Trump has now passed from being a stubborn narcissist to a cocooned authoritarian. Political scientists since World War II have studied the problem of “irrational” leaders, people in positions of power who seem unable to accept any version of reality that conflicts with their assumptions. Irrational, in this sense, does not mean “stupid,” or “incompetent,” or “psychotic.” It refers more specifically to leaders who have become so trapped by their own self-regard, so isolated from the outside world, so imprisoned within their own sense of infallibility that they refuse to consider any arguments or information that conflicts with their beliefs.
Trump reportedly relishes being compared to some of the great dictators of the past, but he apparently does not comprehend how their stories are also warnings. Joseph Stalin was so certain he had outfoxed the Nazis that he fell into catatonic denial for several days after the Germans attacked in 1941. Saddam Hussein refused to believe that American troops were crossing into Iraq, even as tanks rumbled toward Baghdad. Nicolae Ceaușescu of Romania was one of many leaders throughout history who refused to believe that he was about to be deposed, despite troops advancing on their palace. (He and his wife died shouting orders at their firing squad.)
Trump’s detachment from reality is sometimes amusing and often alarming, but the price of his irrationality until now has been mostly economic and reputational (or, in the case of the Reflecting Pool, aesthetic, now that the cases against innocent Americans have been dropped). His belief in tariffs, for example, is a flatly irrational attachment to a tool that has been proven, over and over, to harm Americans. Likewise, his fixation on NATO has undermined decades of careful diplomacy and weakened the strongest alliance in history.
The war in Iran, however, has shown that Trump’s inability to perceive reality has become truly dangerous. He led the United States into a disastrous conflict because he thought his “gut” was smarter than the advisers who warned him that deposing Iran’s regime was unlikely. He continues to mislead the American people, and perhaps himself, about America’s strategic defeat at the hands of one of its worst enemies. The world economy and the balance of power have been changed, perhaps for many decades to come, because Trump cannot draw links between cause and effect; he does not understand that his actions and the failures that follow are somehow related to each other.
Iran is a disaster, but Trump’s irrationality could create other, even more perilous situations. When the water systems in seven states were recently subjected to cyberattacks, Trump blamed his fellow Americans, despite evidence of foreign involvement. What if America suffers another mass-terror attack, and Trump decides that it, too, is the work of disloyal Americans instead of foreigners? Will his underlings round people up based on such a delusion? Or perhaps Trump, if his party is beaten soundly in the midterms, will make up his mind that such a loss is impossible and call for invalidating the election’s results. He might even inspire his supporters to violence—as he did on January 6, 2021.
More worrisome is the possibility of a military crisis that unfolds quickly and threatens U.S. allies or the United States itself. If Russian President Vladimir Putin decides to test NATO and attacks a member of the alliance, or if China begins to move in the Pacific, could anyone in Trump’s inner circle contradict the president’s presumptions and biases? If, say, Russia or China or other powers go to a heightened state of nuclear alert, Trump would have to make decisions of potentially cataclysmic importance. Would he listen, even to basic information, if it conflicted with his omniscient gut?
Trump has always been notoriously un-briefable, but in his first term, he had people who would try to speak the truth to him. More important, he was capable, at least to some limited degree, of occasionally listening to those assistants. All of that is gone. Trump slamming his old friend Pirro shows that when even the most trusted allies offer him the truth, he won’t accept it.
Trump is not going to have some sudden epiphany about the need for an open and honest policy process. ⋙ Like other authoritarians before him, the president has retreated, irrevocably, behind the walls of his own Forbidden City of the mind—a place where he is the emperor, his judgment is always right, and his commands must always be obeyed. ⋘
🐣 60Minutes interviewed Wyden on this report for a segment. They PULLED the segment and fired the reporter. What’s happening to @60Minutes has as much to do with what they DON’T show you as what they do
⋙ 🐣 RT @RepThomasMassie Senator Ron Wyden Releases New Report on Failure of Wall Street Banks to Blow the Whistle on Jeffrey Epstein’s Sex Trafficking and Money Laundering Schemes: https://tinyurl.com/bd9kvnbu
🐣 RT @TimothyDSnyder We are deciding whether we want to be a country of ethnic cleansing and concentration camps.
⋙ 🐣 It IS ethnic cleansing. This makes the case: ¤ NewRepublic, Greg Sargent: MAGA Erupts at Trump DHS Chief—and Accidentally Exposes Big MAGA Scam https://tinyurl.com/4ybhxu4k
🐣 There is ‘something you can do’, @JohnCornyn and @SenThomTillis (see below). It’ even in the Constitution. Just Vote “NO”
⋙ 🐣 RT @DemocraticWins BREAKING: In a stunning moment, Susan Collins just announced that she would vote against Donald Trump’s nominee for Attorney General Todd Blanche. This is huge.
🐣 RT @RVAwonk This is an absolute indictment of the Republican Party. Wow.
🐣 RT @KlasfeldReports Fun constitutional fact: The Framers considered Congress to be a check on the power of the Executive.
🐣 RT @kurtbardella Checks-and-Balances…Time of Death…11:11am.
⋙ 🐣 RT @atrupar Cornyn: “There’s nothing we could do to rein in the president”
💽 https://x.com/kurtbardella/status/2084675971873972517?s=20/video/1
🐣 RT @Reuters EXCLUSIVE: US has used ‘virtually all’ of its long-range precision missiles during Iran war, sources say http://reut.rs/4fY5GXw
⭕ 3 Aug 2026
📊 Newsweek: Map Shows Trump’s Approval Rating in Every State 3 Months Until Midterms https://tinyurl.com/2s3fre8k Civiqs Tracking Poll: 120,580 RV
Swing States: AZ -11, GA -22, NV -21, NC-15, PA -18, WI -16, FL -12, OH -13
🌎 ◕ https://x.com/Auriandra/status/2084538968884850904?s=20/photo/1
Key Points
• Nationally, Trump’s approval rating stands at 36 percent, while 59 percent disapprove, leaving him with a net approval rating of -23.
• The state-by-state picture reflects the same broad pattern: strongest in Republican territory, deeply negative in Democratic strongholds, and underwater across the battleground states likely to shape the outcome of the midterms.
• Several states that began Trump’s second term with positive net approval now sit in negative territory.
• Some of the biggest declines since January 2025 have come in Republican-leaning states that once formed the president’s strongest base.
• Younger voters, independents and postgraduates remain among Trump’s weakest demographic groups.
🔆 This❗️⋙ 🐣 RT @scotus_wire The Supreme Court has issued its judgment in the birthright citizenship case. The Court held that children born in the U.S. to parents present unlawfully or temporarily are citizens at birth. ¤ Despite President Trump’s announcement, the United States did not seek rehearing.
[TextLink:] https://x.com/scotus_wire/status/2084369074675659010?s=20/photo/1
🐣 RT @newrepublic Markwayne Mullin just said the unsayable: that immigration can sometimes help the economy and the country. Now MAGA wants his head.
⋙ NewRepublic, Greg Sargent: MAGA Erupts at Trump DHS Chief—and Accidentally Exposes Big MAGA Scam https://tinyurl.com/4ybhxu4k
[…] Mullin’s comments came during a meeting on Saturday of the bipartisan National Governors Association in Oklahoma. In a long monologue, Mullin talked about why immigration reform is so hard, then discussed the need for changes to visa processes that currently facilitate seasonal labor even as much farmwork is now year-round.
“If we’re looking to grow our economy, then we need to look at making more permanent solutions on this,” Mullin said, adding that the “narrative” that immigrants steal Americans’ jobs is “not true for all industries,” such as agriculture. Mullin added:
⋙ “It is America First. We want to take care of Americans first. It’s our economy. It’s our homeland. But there’s a way to utilize labor where we’re not having the participation rate where we need to. And we can plug those holes.” ⋘
These remarks triggered extraordinary offense among MAGA figures. Fox News personality Tomi Lahren raged that Mullin is out to “appease liberal media.” Laura Loomer called on Trump to fire Mullin immediately. Podcasters Steve Bannon and Jack Posobiec both told Politico that MAGA wants Trump to replace Mullin with someone who, as Posobiec put it, “puts deportations first.” …
What’s actually threatening to the MAGA project, then, is the underlying idea that Mullin endorsed: that immigration can be made to function in the national interest—and more to the point, that the right reforms actually can accomplish this and make it a reality.
A darkly amusing cycle has kicked in here. The Trump administration keeps accidentally admitting that more immigration can indeed benefit our economy—and then quickly suppressing that truth when MAGA erupts over it.
In June 2025, for instance, Trump openly declared that due to mass deportations—his own policy—the agriculture and hospitality industries were losing many “good” and “longtime” workers, and he pledged to carve out deportation exceptions for them. But Stephen Miller quickly prevailed on Trump to reverse the decision—just as MAGA is now raging at Mullin for making a similar suggestion.
It’s easy to see why this keeps happening: The admission wrecks MAGA mythology on a very deep level. A core MAGA idea is that mass purgings of immigrants are needed because they take the jobs of Americans, of course. But the deeper idea here is that this deprives young American men of good, honest, breadwinning work, leaving them moldering away in left-behind areas of the heartland.
In short, immigrants are a primary cause of the social crisis afflicting young MAGA men. Indeed, this social crisis has been deliberately engineered by liberal elites—it’s a key component of the “great replacement” of MAGA America with the “Third World.” In this story, mass deportations and putting the brakes on mass unskilled immigration should mean all these young American men will come stampeding into new jobs left vacant by now-deported invaders, and their families and communities will flourish.
But it isn’t happening. Paul Krugman recently illustrated that this economic story is now in shambles:
⋙ The virtual end of net immigration hasn’t led to a boom in jobs for the native-born. Growth in the working-age population has stalled, but so has job creation, and the employment rate for native-born adults is lower, not higher, than it was before the pogroms began. ⋘
Meanwhile, studies have found that recent surges in mass deportations have cost Americans jobs in local economies without boosting wages for the native-born. …
It’s the coup de grâce that Mullin described his suggestions as the actual“America First” stance. I suspect he doesn’t grasp just how dangerous a heresy this truly is. After all, it neatly exposes MAGA’s real position: Mass deportations must be carried out even if they hurt the economy. Mullin must “put deportations first”—that is, he must put them before economic concerns. The goal is not primarily an economic one: It’s about ethnically purging the country.
Trump’s deportations are badly underwater in polls, including in swing states. If more voters understood the actual Trump-MAGA position to be that deportations must be maximized regardless of their economic impact—that maximal removals are preferable to having a better economy—Americans would recoil even more. No wonder MAGA wants Mullin to shut up and stop giving away its vile scam in public.
🐣 RT @visionergeo 🚨🇺🇦🌊🔥 Ukraine has carried out another sophisticated special operation off the coast of occupied Crimea. Military intelligence operators used Magura unmanned surface vessels to infiltrate Russian-controlled waters before launching FPV kamikaze drones directly from the sea.
¤ https://x.com/visionergeo/status/2084182248249573579?s=20
According to Ukraine’s Main Directorate of Intelligence (HUR), the drones successfully struck the control vehicle of a Podlyot radar system as well as a Parol-4 “friend-or-foe” radar identification unit, both of which play an important role in Russia’s integrated air defense network.
The operation highlights Ukraine’s rapidly evolving use of multi-domain warfare, combining unmanned naval platforms with airborne FPV drones to bypass traditional defenses and attack high-value military targets from unexpected directions.
The growing integration of sea drones and precision FPV strikes is becoming one of Ukraine’s most innovative battlefield advantages, forcing Russia to defend not only its skies and front lines, but also its coastline and rear military infrastructure.
🐣 RT @RepDonBacon I support the sovereignty of Greenland and a close alliance between the U.S., Greenland and Denmark as members of NATO. The President’s foolish comments towards a NATO ally has seriously undermined America’s credibility in Europe. This is not a board game.
⭕ 2 Aug 2026
🧵 RT @bulldoghill At 9:23 this morning, the White House abruptly dismissed the press traveling with the president of the United States while he was away for the weekend at his private golf club in Bedminster, New Jersey.
📌 ¤ https://x.com/bulldoghill/status/2083955119939264565?s=20
With the cameras now gone, just three hours later at 12:32 p.m., Donald Trump would share the first of 42 posts on Truth Social in a span of less than 3 hours and 15 minutes. The president’s public meltdown began when he posted his disappointment with one of his appointees, “I don’t know what she was thinking?” before he jumped straight into more delusional and dangerous images. Among the flood of posts, he shared an AI-generated image of himself kissing Jesus on a golden crucifix. He shared a “TRUMP 2028” campaign poster, a fake image of himself walking beside a handcuffed alien on a military base, and a renewed threat to invade Greenland.
He didn’t stop there. He posted a painting of himself as the commanding general, leading Revolutionary War soldiers into battle with his mouth open in a battle cry, while flames consumed the battlefield behind him, and a battered American flag flew overhead. This is how he sees himself. Not as a president spending the weekend at his golf course, but as a warrior king leading his nation into battle, one he would have never had the courage to actually fight in. That fantasy is not harmless, because right now he is leading us deeper into a real war where real people have died.
He also shared a fake image of his face merged with President George Washington’s, split straight down the middle, under the words “250 Years / In God We Trust.” It was a deliberate attempt to place himself alongside the founder of the American republic. Because he sees himself as his equal and inseparable from the nation itself. He’s saying he is Washington and he is the republic.
He posted a map of South America with Venezuela filled in as an American flag and labeled “51st State.” He shared an actual photograph of himself stepping out of a golf cart, hunched forward, a white USA hat in his hand, looking every single day of his eighty years, but with the caption “President Trump ages in reverse!”
Then there was the created image of himself as Elvis Presley in his iconic white rhinestone jumpsuit, with a deep V-neck and with his chest exposed, and a bald eagle embroidered across his heart. In it, Trump, masquerading as Elvis, stands in front of a microphone as though he is about to perform for a waiting crowd. And I couldn’t help but think about the irony of Trump choosing Elvis in this moment, knowing that he spent his final years overmedicated and isolated, surrounded by enablers who told him what he wanted to hear while his body and mind deteriorated. And how Elvis died alone in a bathroom at Graceland while the people closest to him pretended everything was fine. If Trump was trying to choose a metaphor for where he is right now, he could not have picked a more accurate one.
He just kept going. He posted an image of himself as a young man in a military school uniform, seated across a table from present-day Trump, with the caption “Same Guy. Even more energy now!” Present-day Trump is staring adorably at younger Trump. But what the image actually shows is the distance between who he was and who he has become. The young man in the uniform is upright, sharp, but not too far away from bone spurs and draft deferments. The man sitting across from him is eighty years old, and struggling. The fact that he felt compelled to post this, to insist publicly that nothing has changed, tells us everything about what he is afraid of. People who are fine do not need to prove they are fine. People who are declining do. […]
✝ BartEhrmanBlog: All 23 Branches of Christianity & Their Differences (Plus Timeline!) https://tinyurl.com/y63u4wvx
// 12/6/2024; @PetRep
🐣 RT @BohuslavskaKate Rep. Mike Turner: I think providing Patriot licenses to Ukraine is still in process. It’s incredibly important. I encourage President and Pentagon to move as swiftly as possible on this. Every night, Russian missiles land on people and kill them in Ukraine. We need to help them.
💽 FTNation https://x.com/BohuslavskaKate/status/2083975956587335793?s=20/video/1
⭕ 1 Aug 2026
GoodReads Review: The War for Middle-earth: J.R.R. Tolkien and C.S. Lewis Confront the Gathering Storm, 1933–1945 by Joseph Loconte https://tinyurl.com/3zp52zrd
// Nov 18, 2025
For fans of J.R.R. Tolkien and C.S. Lewis, discover the story behind their unique friendship forged in the darkness of World War II and how it inspired the stories of The Lord of the Rings, The Hobbit, The Chronicles of Narnia and Mere Christianity.
In a world devastated by the cataclysm of war, two extraordinary authors and friends, J. R. R. Tolkien and C. S. Lewis, delivered a bracing vision of the human story: a path back to goodness, beauty, and faith. How did they do it?
For the first time, historian Joseph Loconte explains how the catastrophe of World War II transformed the lives and literary imagination of Tolkien and Lewis. The mechanized slaughter of the First World War had created a storm of disillusionment with the political and religious ideals of Western civilization. The new ideologies of Modernism, communism, Nazism, and totalitarianism rushed to fill the vacuum. At stake was a contest between civilization and barbarism. Tolkien and Lewis sought each other out in friendship and threw themselves into the struggle.
The War for Middle-earth explores how their most beloved works—The Hobbit, The Lord of the Rings, The Chronicles of Narnia, Mere Christianity—were conceived in the shadow of the most devastating and dehumanizing war in history. Like no other authors of their age, Tolkien and Lewis used their imagination to reclaim for their generation—and for ours—those deeds of valor and virtue and love that have always kept a lamp burning, even in the deepest darkness.
In The War for Middle-earth you will:
Be inspired by Tolkien’s and Lewis’s Christian imagination, which even today has the power to transform hearts desperate for hope and truth
Find encouragement and strength to resist evil in our own day
Discover how a biblical view of truth and beauty can light the path out of the deepest darkness
Combining a careful study of history and compelling storytelling, The War for Middle-earth reveals the remarkable achievement of these authors and friends: a recovery of heroism and faith despite deep sorrow and suffering.
Here are enduring lessons for today’s cultural moment and essential reading if you want to discover how great stories can reveal great truths.
🐣 RT @propublica ProPublica reviewed hundreds of cases in which judges criticized the actions of Justice Department lawyers. ¤ We found judges nominated by both parties who are frustrated that they can no longer take the government at its word. [link:] https://tinyurl.com/nw36ev39
NYT: Scope of Hacks on US Water Supply Widens as Evidence Points to Iran https://tinyurl.com/3dawd7bh “Michigan and Minnesota are among at least seven states coping with cyberattacks aimed at disrupting water systems nationwide.” //➔ Trump’s unprovoked war comes home
⭕ 31 Jul 2026
🐣 RT @JaredRyanSears The midterms are this simple: Biden and Democrats inherited a poorly managed pandemic, massive job loss, and a ruined economy from Trump in 2021.
¤ https://x.com/JaredRyanSears/status/2083268072157462744?s=20
They added jobs every month, the pandemic recovery went better than in peer nations, and by 2024 the US economy was dubbed the Envy of the World and was so strong it improved the entire global outlook.
That was what Republicans and Trump inherited.
Then, they slammed the brakes on the economy, killed job growth, drove up inflation, made healthcare far more expensive, kicked one million children off of food assistance, started an illegal war, angered our allies, and made the nation sick from cuts to health inspections and disease monitoring, not to mention the rampant corruption that has enriched the president and his family with billions of dollars.
The midterms are your chance to change this. ¤ It is time to vote those who have failed us out of power.
🐣 RT @ralexdc NEW!! Russia is providing Iran with electronic intelligence, including satellite surveillance and signals intelligence, that could help Tehran defend against US airstrikes and improve the accuracy of its own attacks, NBC says citing US and European officials
¤ https://x.com/ralexdc/status/2083310845514088777?s=20
⋙ 🐣 RT @IlanaGaron And this is why we’ll be voting out all Trump’s stupid sycophant enablers in November. Just to be super clear: @POTUS looks the other way as Putin helps Iran kill American military members, because he believes he can line his own pockets with slimy Russian cash.
🐣 RT @BohuslavskaKate Rick Wilson: American intelligence community probably already knows that Russia is providing Iran with intelligence.
¤ https://x.com/BohuslavskaKate/status/2083320198795239804?s=20
But Trump doesn’t want it public, because as much as he loves and admires Putin, wants to be same kind of authoritarian figure, he doesn’t want to be embarrassed.
He doesn’t want to be seen as a guy who had Putin pull the wool over his eyes.
Again, this is a real estate developer and reality-show star versus a KGB officer and deep Russian nationalist.
And, you know, anybody who gave odds of Donald Trump being on the winning end of any interaction with Putin was a fool.
What does Trump get out of this with Putin? He loves ego stroke. He loves being told, “Donald, you’re strongest, tallest, handsomest man.”
All that’s 101 stuff for manipulating a person with Trump’s kind of disorders.
🐣 RT @visionergeo ❗ Europe’s intelligence elite ranked. 😎
🇬🇧🥇🇺🇦 Britain’s MI6 has been ranked as Europe’s top intelligence service, while Ukraine’s Security Service (SBU) and Military Intelligence Directorate (HUR) secured an impressive fourth place, outperforming the intelligence agencies of Germany, Poland, the Nordic countries, and the Baltic states. […]
¤ https://x.com/visionergeo/status/2083296861470044495?s=20
🐣 RT @JoyceWhiteVance No other Justice Department has screwed up so much, so badly & been forced to dismiss its own cases before a Judge bashed them. Oh, and this happened on Todd Blanche’s watch.
⋙ 🐣 RT @ABC BREAKING: The Justice Department moved to dismiss the Reflecting Pool vandalism charge against Olympian David Hearn, citing “flawed installation” work by a contractor. [link:] https://abcnews.visitlink.me/NnAlje
🐣 RT @MollyJongFast “But lately, some investors and analysts have started questioning the scaling hypothesis or at least asking if all this spending is sustainable. The market has been gyrating wildly in recent weeks, as concerns have grown about whether the trillions of dollars being furiously pumped into this global ecosystem of data centers will ever return the promised profits”
⋙ NYT: Larry Ellison Bet It All on the A.I. Boom. Will He Be the Face of the A.I. Bubble? https://tinyurl.com/yudazm72 “Inside the 81-year-old billionaire’s risky, debt-fueled scramble to transform his data empire into an A.I. juggernaut.”
🐣 RT @RichardHanania Good news! The MAGA media is declining. Candace Owens, Megyn Kelly, Tucker Carlson, Benny Johnson, and other poisoners of the public discourse are becoming less popular. Is there hope for post-Trump America?
◕ https://x.com/RichardHanania/status/2083184921238221136?s=20/photo/1 -2
⭕ 30 Jul 2026
‼️ WSJ: ‘The Boss Wants This Money’: Inside Trump’s Unprecedented Fundraising Operation https://tinyurl.com/4d638feu “Meredith O’Rourke, nicknamed ‘princess of darkness,’ carries out president’s desire to wring hundreds of millions from companies for his projects” //➔ Extortion
🐣 RT @BohuslavskaKate KASPAROV: I think empire is dying, and during our lifetime we’ll see the end of Russian empire.
¤ 💽 https://x.com/BohuslavskaKate/status/2082901822939734449?s=20
But it’s like a dinosaur: when it dies and falls, you don’t want to be next to it.
Putin will continue his assault, and there’s a very big chance that unless Europe acts decisively, he’ll cross NATO borders.
Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, a small incursion using drones, because Putin needs winning narrative, and Ukraine doesn’t offer it.
That’s why for Putin, proving NATO is no longer there and America will not interfere, which is probably the case, might be very tempting political prize.
🐣 RT @BohuslavskaKate KASPAROV: I would probably bet that in 10 years, hopefully sooner, Russia will not exist in its current borders.
¤ 💽 https://x.com/BohuslavskaKate/status/2082942317812703531?s=20
People ask me, “Do you want Russia to collapse?” It’s not what I want or not. It’s going to happen.
Collapse of Russian empire will move us to the next stage of the fight for freedom against tyranny.
Because behind Russia you have China, which is growing and will be greatest beneficiary of collapse of Russian Empire.
But this is not for us to remedy today. Because history clock is about to stop for Russian empire. Question is, how can we manage it?
Russia is like a zombie empire. And all attempts to preserve this zombie will lead to more damage and lives lost on our side, on European side, on free world side.
But these attempts will also eventually benefit opposite side, world of tyranny, because it will prevent us from turning whatever is left of Russia into part of coalition that will fight for freedom.
🐣 RT @WW3finalboss 🇺🇦🇷🇺 DRAPATYI: A STRONG UKRAINIAN COUNTERPUNCH COULD BREAK PUTIN’S SYSTEM
¤ https://x.com/WW3finalboss/status/2082742673694130270?s=20
“If we deliver a strong, decisive and solid military counterpunch, and we are ready for it, this will lead to the collapse of Russia’s military and political leadership.
We are destined for victory. It cannot be otherwise, and there can be no discussion of compromises or concessions.” – Mykhailo Drapatyi 🇺🇦
Ukraine’s objective is not merely to survive Russia’s 🇷🇺 aggression, but to impose a defeat severe enough to fracture the system sustaining it.
A successful counteroffensive would strike far beyond the battlefield. It would expose the weakness of Putin’s military, undermine the Kremlin’s authority and destroy the illusion that Russian conquest is inevitable.
Ukraine 🇺🇦 is not preparing to negotiate its surrender.
It is preparing to deliver the blow that could make Russia’s war machine collapse.
🐣 RT @Markzandi The economy is soft and vulnerable. This is the clear message in today’s GDP, income, and spending data. Abstracting from the vagaries of the data, real GDP growth is at best 2%, driven largely by AI-related investment and wealth effects that support consumer spending among the well-to-do. But housing, government, and international trade are more or less headwinds to growth. And given that real disposable income is flat and personal savings are about as low as they ever get, spending by middle- and lower-income households is under significant pressure. The longer the Iran war drags on, and the higher energy prices and interest rates go, the more likely these consumers are to pull back – and take the rest of the economy with them.
🐣 RT @JulianRoepcke [tr Ger] Confirmed: A Russian cruise missile has penetrated 94 km into @NATO airspace and exploded in a field south of #Lublin in Poland.
¤ https://x.com/JulianRoepcke/status/2082725006165868854?s=20
🚨 We could have intercepted the attack if we had used our capacities to defend the west Ukrainian airspace.
➡️ How would Russia probably react if we “accidentally” bombed the St. Petersburg area coming from Finland? Roughly the same distance from the border…
➡️ What madness that we let the Russian army get away with all their attacks on us without consequences.
⭕ 29 Jul 2026
🐣 📊 RT @IAPolls2022 🇺🇸 NATIONAL POLL By Quinnipiac [link:] https://tinyurl.com/4xwk2dyc
¤ https://x.com/IAPolls2022/status/2082532911950278926?s=20
Pres. Trump
Approve: 32% (-6)
Disapprove: 58% (+3)Trump’s lowest approval in either term
——
Trump’s net approval on key issues🟤 Immigration: -17
🔴 Economy: -32 (new low)
🔴 Foreign policy: -32 (new low)
🔴 Iran: -38 (new low)
——
7/23-27 | 963 RV
🐣 📋 RT @shanaka86 America’s Patriot stockpile has fallen from 2,330 interceptors before this war to under 830. The commander of Central Command says that is a reason to start a bigger war. The chairman of the Joint Chiefs says it is a reason not to. They are looking at the same shelf. […]
¤ https://x.com/shanaka86/status/2082725587865723010?s=20
🐣 RT @ChristopherHale At Pope Leo XIV’s Concert for Peace tonight at Castel Gandolfo, a children’s choir sang Leonard Cohen’s “Hallelujah” in three languages — Italian, Arabic, and English. The singers came from Uganda, the Holy Land, and Italy
💽 https://x.com/ChristopherHale/status/2082574185176392107?s=20/video/1
🐣 RT @Mylovanov Kellogg: On drones, we have to leverage Ukrainians. They are absolute experts. I’ve seen their factories. ¤ They change drone tech every 6 months. That is the future of war. Patriot is the best, but a new missile system takes two years.
💽 https://x.com/Mylovanov/status/2082398608939270609?s=20/video/1
🐣 RT @Mylovanov Kellogg: On drones, we have to leverage Ukrainians. They are absolute experts. I’ve seen their factories. ¤ They change drone tech every 6 months. That is the future of war. Patriot is the best, but a new missile system takes two years.
💽 https://x.com/Mylovanov/status/2082398608939270609?s=20/video/1
🔆 This❗️⋙ NYT: Saudi Arabia Reluctantly Enters U.S.-Iran War https://tinyurl.com/2htete92 “The kingdom’s defense ministry said airstrikes in Iraq targeting Iran-backed militias were in retaliation for attacks on Saudi oil facilities this week.”
🐣 RT @marcosagusstinn 🇪🇺🇷🇺 Lavrov: “The West wants to break up Russia.” ¤ Russia’s fragmentation is now a potential consequence of the Kremlin’s own actions.
¤ https://x.com/marcosagusstinn/status/2082522258719776844?s=20
🔸 Economic crisis: Reserves have collapsed, bankruptcies hit record highs, and long-term growth has weakened.
🔸 Loss of power in Europe: Russia’s EU gas share fell from 45% to 12%, oil from 27% to 3%, and coal to zero.
🔸 Loss of sovereignty: China and India buy 89% of Russian crude exports, deepening Moscow’s dependence.
The Kremlin alone is responsible for Russia’s economic decline and growing dependence on China and India. ¤ It began with the invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.
🧵 📋 RT @Mylovanov Stubb: Ukraine is now on top militarily, politically and economically, stronger than at any time in this war. ¤ Half of Ukraine’s drones that hit Russia reach their targets. Half of Russia’s oil-refining capacity is damaged. Russia loses 8 soldiers for every 1 Ukrainian. 1/
📌 https://x.com/Mylovanov/status/2082422040208851328?s=20
⋙ Stubb: For Lindsey, Ukraine was a victory for freedom, for the Europe-U.S. alliance, for NATO, for liberal democracy and for the free world. ¤ He fought hard for his values, and Ukraine was one of the most important battles he fought. 2/
⋙ Stubb: Iran and Ukraine conflicts are linked. Russia, China, Iran and North Korea are forging an alliance. ¤ They feed the Russian and Iranian war machines. We must decide how to support Ukraine and help the U.S. stop Iran from getting a nuclear weapon. 3X
🐣 RT @Khabar_AlYawm [tr Arab] 🇮🇱 Netanyahu at six in the evening: “I will head to New York. I will confront that resentful official with the truth. Let’s see if he dares to try to arrest me.”
¤ https://x.com/Khabar_AlYawm/status/2082396434825945256?s=20
🇺🇸 Mamdani at six minutes past six in the evening: “The International Criminal Court has issued an arrest warrant, and I support it. I cannot arrest you myself, but Washington can. I demand that the federal authorities take action; New York does not welcome war criminals, and we will defend human dignity.” 🔥🔥
A man of steel resolve; Zohran Mamdani has now become the most popular leader in the United States. 👏
⭕ 28 Jul 2026
🐣 RT @grok … The Lindsey O. Graham Sanctioning Russia and Iran Act of 2026 (advanced via cloture 86-12 on H.R. 5334) contains only sanctions, secondary sanctions, shadow fleet measures, and tariff authority targeting Russian energy buyers plus Iran provisions. It has no SAVE Act or election-related language.
¤ https://x.com/grok/status/2082481749599068498?s=20
🐣 RT @SenBlumenthal We honored Senator Graham earlier today here in the Rotunda, but our real tribute was moving ahead with legislation he championed to impose scorching tariffs & sanctions on purchasers of Russian oil to stop them from fueling Putin’s war machine.
🖼 https://x.com/SenBlumenthal/status/2082291826115871116?s=20/photo/1
🐣 RT @jalle51 Talk about a power move to close out [Zelenskyy’s] US trip. 🇺🇸🇺🇦🇫🇮
¤ https://x.com/jalle51/status/2082340049572540637?s=20
Financial Times and Politico report that the US Senate just passed a massive new sanctions package against Russian politicians, oligarchs, and banks with an overwhelming 86-12 vote.
Just minutes before the vote, Volodymyr Zelenskyy and Finnish President Alexander Stubb held a closed-door briefing with senators to seal the deal.
Insiders note the vibe between Trump and Zelenskyy is completely different compared to last year, now that Ukraine is proving its momentum. Having a Finn in the room to break down Nordic-Baltic security probably didn’t hurt either.
🐣 RT @DSenFloor AGREED TO: Motion to invoke cloture on the motion to proceed to H.R.5334, vehicle for Sanctions legislation ¤ By a vote of 86-12.
🐣 RT @RepDonBacon Great to have this vote with President Zelenskyy from and center!
⋙ 🐣 RT @SFRCdems [Senate Foreign Relations Committee Dems] “The vote’s already at 61 so we’re moving to this bill. It’s going to pass!” -@SenatorShaheen
💽 https://x.com/RepDonBacon/status/2082268203405684987?s=20/video/1
🐣 RT @visionergeo 🇺🇸🤝🇺🇦 Fox News host Sean Hannity paid an emotional tribute to President Volodymyr Zelensky during the funeral of Senator Lindsey Graham, highlighting the late senator’s unwavering admiration for Ukraine’s leader and people.
💽 https://x.com/visionergeo/status/2082187385899462922?s=20/video/1
Addressing Zelensky, Hannity said:
🗣️ “President Zelensky, I know that Lindsey would have been deeply moved and honored that you made this long journey to be here today.” ¤ He noted that Senator Graham passed away shortly after returning from another visit to Kyiv, where he had met with the Ukrainian president.
🗣️ “He saw you, and he said it to me once, as a warrior-poet or a warrior-comedian. He used those terms.” ¤ Hannity concluded by recalling Graham’s profound respect for Ukraine’s resistance.
🗣️ “He was proud of you and the courage of your countrymen.”
The remarks underscored the close relationship that developed between Lindsey Graham and Ukraine throughout the war. His repeated visits to Kyiv and steadfast support for Ukraine made him one of the most prominent American political voices backing the country’s defense against Russian aggression.
📊 Economist: 555 days into Donald Trump’s term https://tinyurl.com/y5v7px6p The president’s net approval rating is -25, down 0.4 points since last week. 35% approve, 60% disapprove, 4% not sure
◕ https://x.com/Auriandra/status/2082341174828740742?s=20/photo/1
WaPo: Why tech companies are poaching top economists https://tinyurl.com/yw9t2p46 “As public anxiety about job losses rises, AI firms say their research can provide answers.”
NYT: Mark Zuckerberg Blasts Centralization of A.I. Power https://tinyurl.com/mrpj8msh “In an interview with The Times, Meta’s chief executive took aim at Anthropic and OpenAI, which have pushed to tightly control A.I. development, and said he supported ‘more openness’.”
🐣 RT @AdamKinzinger This is the fastest way to destroy what little support Netanyahu has left in America
⋙ 🐣 RT @NTarnopolsky 💥Netanyahu and Zelensky had an apparently terse exchange on the sidelines of Lindsey Graham’s funeral. Haaretz reports Ukrainian sources say Israel rejected the offer of a meeting between the two leaders in Washington. Netanyahu has consistently shown contempt for Zelensky.
💽 https://x.com/AdamKinzinger/status/2082239090360000594?s=20/video/1
⋙⋙ 🐣 [Possibly because:] RT @ZelenskyyUa [Apr 28] In any normal country, purchasing stolen goods is an act that entails legal liability. This applies, in particular, to grain stolen by Russia. Another vessel carrying such grain has arrived at a port in Israel and is preparing to unload. […]
¤ https://x.com/ZelenskyyUa/status/2049058273836335489?s=20
🐣 RT @TheStudyofWar Iran Update Special Report, July 28, 2026: Three competing groups within the regime are attempting to influence negotiations policy. The group currently arguing for negotiations and total control over the strait is likely guiding policy at this time. This group is likely led by elements of the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC), including IRGC commander Major General Ahmad Vahidi. […] […]
¤ 🌎 https://x.com/TheStudyofWar/status/2082269127410901354?s=20/photo/1
🐣 RT @ralexdc BREAKING!! U.S. Senators updated a bipartisan Russia sanctions bill by broadening the legislation to include Iran, renaming it the “Lindsey O. Graham Sanctioning Russia and Iran Act of 2026.” ¤ The revised measure obtained by @RFERL retains sweeping sanctions targeting Russia over its war in Ukraine while adding a provision to extend the Iran Sanctions Act of 1996.
[TextLink:] https://x.com/ralexdc/status/2082075538772967630?s=20/photo/1
🐣 RT @AnnaDeMilanese [tr Ger] There’s real news on the Patriot license: Lockheed Martin has now agreed to the license transfer, and Selenskyj wants to start domestic production by year’s end – this is the next stage after Évian (June, please) and Ankara (July, Trump’s oral commitment).
¤ 🖼 https://x.com/AnnaDeMilanese/status/2082147055883956666?s=20/photo/1
🇺🇦🇺🇸 Selenskyj calls meeting with Trump in Oval Office “good” – over an hour behind closed doors
The discussion took place in the Oval Office and was closed to the press. At the start, Selenskyj expressed condolences to Trump over the death of Senator Lindsey Graham, whom he described as a “true friend of Ukraine.” According to Selenskyj, topics discussed included licenses for producing interceptor missiles for Patriot systems, further defense initiatives, and intensifying the diplomatic process, among others. Details on further contacts are to be arranged later.
On the Patriot license, there’s now some substance: Manufacturer Lockheed Martin has agreed to the transfer, and Ukraine wants to begin its own production still this year. Selenskyj is also attending the national memorial service for Graham today and will meet afterward with the senators who, together with Graham, had advanced the sanctions bill against Russia.
As previously reported, the Wall Street Journal had noted today in advance that Trump now sees Selenskyj as a “winner” – a break from his stance a year ago. The contrast to the same room in February 2025, when Trump and Vance humiliated Selenskyj on live cameras, could hardly be greater. From the humiliation has come a one-hour, friendly discussion – from which a concrete production license now emerges. ¤ What comes of the new tone remains to be seen – feel free to write it in the comments 👇
Sources: Volodymyr Selenskyj (via UNIAN), UNN, RBC-Ukraine
🐣 RT @ZelenskyyUa I met with the team of the Lockheed Martin defense company – one of the strongest enterprises in the United States, with which we have been cooperating for a long time.
¤ https://x.com/ZelenskyyUa/status/2082161228177162665?s=20
Lockheed Martin is the company that produces ATACMS, HIMARS, F-16s, and missiles for Patriot systems.
Today, we discussed further development of our cooperation – joint production and technology exchange. Ukraine has a lot to share with those who help us protect lives. We spoke about our joint capabilities related to Patriots and other systems. Our teams are already working on specific solutions to move to co-production as quickly as possible and increase our capabilities to protect lives. Thank you for your support and all your assistance!
🐣 RT @SavchenkoReview 🇺🇸🇺🇦 Fox News host says Lindsey Graham admired Zelensky and Ukrainian courage
🖼 https://x.com/SavchenkoReview/status/2082199090310545580?s=20/photo/1
He [Hannity] addressed President Volodymyr Zelensky, who was in the audience. He said Graham would have been deeply moved that the Ukrainian leader had come to say goodbye to him.
Senator [Graham] often spoke of Zelensky’s strength in the face of one of the most brutal regimes in the world.
According to him, Graham called the Ukrainian president a “warrior poet” or a “warrior comedian” and admired the fact that, despite predictions of imminent defeat, Ukraine has continued to fight for almost five years and has demonstrated a fighting spirit that no one expected.
📊 🐣 RT @SenWhitehouse Americans see the billionaire-funded rot with their own eyes: creepy dark money, a captured Court, climate denial fraud — all rampant.
◕ https://x.com/SenWhitehouse/status/2082265179476082731 ?s=20/photo/1
// “MORE THAN 9-IN-10 VOTERS SEE CORRUPTION AS A BIG PROBLEM”
// 90% GOP, 93% Dem, 93% Ind; BrennanCenter: 4/28-5/6, 2000 RV
🧵 RT @ProfessorPape For 35 years, the United States has relied on one theory of military power:
– Forward bases
– Air superiority
– Precision strike
– Rapid victory
The Iran war may have just broken all four
📌 https://x.com/ProfessorPape/status/2082255270248362270?s=20
[ThreadReader:] https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/2082255270248362270.html
⋙ The real question isn’t whether America wins in Iran ¤ It’s whether Washington is still spending roughly $1 trillion each year on a military model designed for a world that no longer exists ¤ If that’s true, this isn’t just about Iran ¤ It becomes one of the defining strategic—and political—questions before the midterms 🌎
⋙ Since the 1991 Gulf War, American strategy assumed that overwhelming technology could defeat regional adversaries quickly and cheaply ¤ Today, inexpensive missiles and mass-produced drones are placing U.S. bases, allies, and critical infrastructure under sustained pressure ¤ What changed wasn’t American technology ¤ It was who now possesses precision ◕
⋙ THE END OF THE AMERICAN EMPIRE ¤ How the Iran War Broke the Post–Gulf War Model of American Power ¤ Thursday at 7:00 PM ET
• Live Zoom access
• Live Q&A
• Full recording afterward
Join me at Prof. Pape Substack
🐣 RT @propublica This video on the rise of Russ Vought is based on scores of interviews, thousands of pages of emails and dozens of hours of videos and recordings of private briefings given by Vought, most of which have not been previously reported.
⋙ 💽 Propublica: Russell Vought: The Shadow President https://tinyurl.com/2x4jwjae
// Who Is Russell Vought? How a Little-Known D.C. Insider Became Trump’s Dismantler-in-Chief
🐣 RT @jurgen_nauditt The crash of a modern Su-57 fighter jet near Moscow may signal that Vladimir Putin’s “Waterloo” is approaching, according to an opinion piece in The Telegraph.
¤ https://x.com/jurgen_nauditt/status/2082076533729185827?s=20
The publication says the circumstances surrounding the crash were so unusual that they unsettled Russia’s military leadership. Even pro-Kremlin military bloggers have suggested the aircraft may have been shot down by Russian air defenses, possibly by systems deployed to protect Moscow.
The international intelligence community InformNapalm has claimed the incident was the result of a joint operation with Ukraine’s Security Service (SBU) aimed at influencing Russian air defense operators near Moscow.
“If the Kremlin can no longer guarantee the security of its own capital or protect its most advanced aircraft, then Vladimir Putin’s Waterloo is approaching,” retired British Army Colonel Hamish de Bretton-Gordon writes in The Telegraph.
The article also notes that, around the same time the Su-57 crashed near Moscow, an Iranian tanker carrying Russian munitions reportedly sank in the Caspian Sea. According to the author, the cargo was intended for Iran to support its operations against U.S. forces in the Middle East.
Bretton-Gordon argues that these two incidents together could mark a turning point in the war, concluding that history shows great empires rarely collapse solely because of defeats on distant battlefields—they unravel when confidence in the center begins to erode.¤ United24
🐣 RT @visionergeo 🇺🇸🇺🇦 Reuters: All 100 members of the U.S. Senate have been invited to meet with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy on Tuesday during his visit to Washington for the funeral of late Senator Lindsey Graham. ¤ The Senate is also expected to begin voting during Zelenskyy’s visit on bipartisan legislation championed by Graham that would impose new sanctions on Russia, including 100% tariffs targeting Russian energy revenues.
🐣 RT @BrennanCenter Eighty-nine percent of voters — overwhelming majorities of Democrats, Republicans, and independents — say corruption is responsible for policies that benefit billionaires and big corporations at the expense of the American people.
⋙ 📊 BrennanCenter: Poll: Voters Want Solutions for Government Corruption https://tinyurl.com/396crdn2 Overwhelming majorities across parties see corruption as a major problem and back measures to limit self-dealing by officials and the influence of money in politics.
WSJ: Impressed by Ukraine’s Battlefield Gains, Trump Warms to Zelensky https://tinyurl.com/y2j6xyxv “Trump has come to admire Ukraine’s drone industry, especially its ability to defend against the same drones the U.S. faces in the Iran war”
// Ukrainian leader met with Trump on Tuesday at the White House
⭕ 27 Jul 2026
TheAtlantic, Peter Wehner: An Odyssey for Our Own Time https://tinyurl.com/4zpc4f6m “What Christopher Nolan and his cast have tapped into is our longing for a gentler world. We want to go home.”
// Christopher Nolan presents a very human hero to a culture that desperately needs one.
… The law these men broke was the most sacred in the ancient world: “xenia,” the law of hospitality. The stranger at the door stood under the personal protection of Zeus, the greatest of the gods and the protector of strangers. The bond between guest and host was not mere courtesy; it was the covenant that made trust between strangers possible.
In the Bronze Age, that covenant was foundational. Greece was not a nation; it was a scattering of city-states and island kingdoms with no common law and no shared authority. Travelers had no rights. Xenia was the guarantee that allowed strangers—hosts and guests, both with reciprocal obligations—to trust one another. It was the thread that held a fractured world together. …
The ruse was Odysseus’s idea, a stroke of military genius for which he was celebrated. But in Nolan’s telling, it is not a triumph but a moral failure, one that fills him with such guilt and shame that for a decade he cannot go home. He had turned something sacred into a weapon. The horse was disguised as a holy offering to Athena; the Trojans, afraid to offend the goddess, wheeled it inside their own walls. Once the gates were open, the Greeks spilled out and slaughtered the city. …
The ruse was Odysseus’s idea, a stroke of military genius for which he was celebrated. But in Nolan’s telling, it is not a triumph but a moral failure, one that fills him with such guilt and shame that for a decade he cannot go home. He had turned something sacred into a weapon. The horse was disguised as a holy offering to Athena; the Trojans, afraid to offend the goddess, wheeled it inside their own walls. Once the gates were open, the Greeks spilled out and slaughtered the city. …
Part of what makes The Odyssey so appealing to a modern audience is that it takes civilizing aspects of Greek culture—hospitality and magnanimity—and adds later concepts, some of them influenced by Jewish and Christian ethics that were, to varying degrees, alien to ancient Greek culture: deep introspection, even confession; humility and empathy; sorrow and guilt for the harm one has done, even in victory; the conviction that the conquered count and have worth; and vengeance tempered with mercy. In the film, Odysseus emerges as a figure haunted by his victory in a way that no ancient Greek would have been. …
Much of life in the ancient Greek world was harsh, even barbarous—mass executions in conquered cities, torture, the weak discarded at birth, chattel slavery—which is precisely why the Greek commitment to honor and hospitality was remarkable then and still resonates today. So, too, do the later, more humane virtues the film weaves in.
Those virtues are now under assault. Movements and voices in our own country hold them in open contempt, treat mercy as weakness, and feed on vengeance and grievance. Theirs is a Nietzschean ethic, a “master morality,” the code of the strong that Christianity overthrew when it took the side of the slave, the stranger, and the destitute. …
The world that this ethic is creating is harsh and barren, raw and uninviting. It exists in the daily coarseness, in the anger and the ugliness, and in the isolation. There is a weariness in us, and a sadness, at what we have become. Robert F. Kennedy, citing the classicist Edith Hamilton, once issued this call: “Let us dedicate ourselves to what the ancient Greeks wrote so many years ago: ‘to tame the savageness of man and make gentle the life of this world.’” What Christopher Nolan and his cast have tapped into is our longing for a gentler world. We want to go home.
DemDocket: Trump DOJ asks Supreme Court to greenlight anti-mail voting order before midterms https://tinyurl.com/58pakvzb “The emergency appeal marks the first time that the Trump DOJ has asked the Supreme Court to weigh in on one of Trump’s anti-voting executive orders.”
🐣 RT @UhOhFinellio If the Save Act passed, I guarantee u half of MAGA would show up to vote w just their state issued Real ID and not understand why they can’t vote. ¤ R’s keep saying u need ID for this and that in everyday life; never give examples where proof of citizenship required.
◕ https://x.com/UhOhFinellio/status/2081896391576539560?s=20/photo/1
// Save America Act approved IDs and cost
🐣 RT @marceelias U.S. Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.) is not willing to nix the Senate filibuster to pass President Donald Trump’s SAVE America Act.
💙 ⋙ DemDocket: Thune rejects Trump’s calls to nix the filibuster and Senate recess https://tinyurl.com/3sebz88w
U.S. Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.) is not willing to nix the Senate filibuster to pass President Donald Trump’s SAVE America Act.
Speaking to reporters Monday, Thune addressed Trump’s most recent demand that Republicans forgo the legislative roadblock and upcoming recess in favor of pushing his sweeping anti-voting bill through the finish line — an endeavor that’s been unsuccessful without a 60-vote supermajority.
“We could stay here until Christmas,” Thune said, according to multiple reporters at the Senate House. “The Democrats aren’t voting for this, I’m just telling you. And Republicans are not getting rid of the legislative filibuster.”
Thune said while he has long been a supporter of the bill he’s a co-sponsor on, he does not see a path forward without the votes needed to pass it.
“We voted on it two, three, four, five times already,” Thune told reporters.
Thune’s response comes hours after Trump called the senator out by name on Truth Social to tell him he “should not allow the United States Senate to ‘leave town’” until he can get enough votes for the SAVE America Act. While Thune has said he supports the bill, he also has consistently said there isn’t enough support in the Senate to either pass it with 60 votes or to do away with the filibuster.
“If we’re going to be sitting here in endless quorum calls, I don’t know if that’s in anybody’s best interest,” Thune told the Capitol press corps.
Sen. Susan Collins (Maine-R), who has also supported the bill in the past, voiced her opposition to canceling the Senate’s recess to keep pushing for it.
“I think staying in doesn’t change what would happen on the SAVE Act,” Collins said. “I don’t see how you get to 60 votes on it, and I say that as someone who supports the House-passed version of the SAVE Act, which requires proof of citizenship so that only Americans vote in American elections.”
The bill, which would enact strict documentary proof of citizenship requirements and photo identification to vote, as well as banning no-excuse mail voting, would potentially disenfranchise millions of Americans. …
🐣 RT @jmsexton_ Sen. Thom Tillis (R-NC): “I don’t have any confidence in him anymore. I think he’s all over the place — he’s accelerating the retirement or forcing out some of the most distinguished leaders in the DOD that we have”
⋙ TheHill: GOP senators warn confidence in Hegseth eroding as Iran war drags on https://tinyurl.com/3an4he2s
[…] Some Republican senators think the administration didn’t fully prepare them for the cost of the conflict, which Hegseth said last week had reached $37.5 billion even though independent analysts such as Moody Analytics project it has cost at least $132 billion.
“Collectively those of us in Congress are worried about the costs associated with the Department of War and the transparency,” said Sen. Joni Ernst (R-Iowa), a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee.
“I think … why they’ve asked him to come to the Hill and present the numbers, and I still don’t know that there’s a lot of clarity on that. I think that’s what a lot of people are concerned about,” she said of Hegseth’s testimony before the Appropriations Committee.
Republican senators are warning that right now there’s not enough GOP support to pass a new tranche of military spending through the budget reconciliation process as Trump has demanded. The funding would need to move on a special budgetary track to get around a Democratic filibuster.
The prospect of passing an additional $73 billion in military funding to help cover the war costs — something the House approved in a budgetary framework last week — is complicated by the absence of Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), who hasn’t voted since June 11 because of a health issue.
Tillis called out the administration for failing to anticipate that Iran would expand the conflict to other strategic chokepoints, such as the Bab el-Mandeb Strait, which provides access to the Red Sea, if the United States failed to quickly win the conflict.
The North Carolina senator questioned whether the turnover in senior military leadership under Hegseth has negatively impacted strategic planning.
“Everybody knows about some of the Game of Thrones stuff going on with some of the other service secretaries and Hegseth. It seems like he wants to run the whole place,” Tillis said.
“When you’re a leader, you better damn sure have people smarter than you in the room. You’re supposed to be air traffic control for all these brilliant people and he’s undermining the DOD’s success by undermining these brilliant people who spent their career in uniform,” he said of senior commanders who have been pushed out during Hegseth’s tenure.
He said that senior generals that left might have alerted the president about Iran’s ability to stymie ship traffic in the Strait of Hormuz for months or to mobilize allied Houthi militias to threaten shipping lanes through the Red Sea.
🐣 📊 RT @BrennanCenter More than 9 in 10 voters — including supermajorities of Republicans, Democrats, and independents — believe corruption is a big problem in politics and government. Check out the results of our latest poll. [link:] https://tinyurl.com/396crdn2
🐣 RT @MilkRoadAI Morgan Stanley just mapped out the entire AI infrastructure supply chain, and it reveals who actually gets paid at every layer of the trillion dollar buildout (Save this).
◕ https://x.com/MilkRoadAI/status/2081797321348845620?s=20/photo/1
This heatmap breaks the AI infrastructure value chain into two dimensions those who owns and operates the data centers at the top and what physical and technical components get built underneath to make those data centers function. […]
So who benefits from all of this?
Everyone in every box benefits in some way but the real insight is that value doesn’t concentrate at just the GPU layer anymore.
The hyperscalers at the top are distributing capex across seven distinct physical layers which means the picks and shovels opportunity set has expanded well beyond Nvidia into cooling, grid infrastructure, and power generation. …
⭕ 26 Jul 2026
🔄 💙 UNHumanRights: Universal Declaration of Human Rights https://tinyurl.com/4v8mxavw
NYT: Trump Seems Trapped by Iran War, Even as He Wields the World’s Biggest Hammer https://tinyurl.com/5e6p7pvh A president who thought there were no limits to his power has discovered several, leaving him more frustrated and erratic.
TheAtlantic, Luis Parrales: Odysseus’s Confession https://tinyurl.com/56ptnzxf “Animated in part by the wisdom of the Bible, this modern Odyssey can’t help but see how the deceptions of war degrade a person and a culture.”
// Christopher Nolan’s blockbuster seems at times more biblical than Homeric.
🐣 RT @marcosagusstinn 🇪🇺 Europe has officially recorded its fastest defence-spending growth in 80 years.
◕ https://x.com/marcosagusstinn/status/2081441051794162171?s=20/photo/1
🔸 Defence spending will reach €454bn in 2026 — up 75.3% since 2021
🔸EU defence spending will surpass China and Russia’s combined $526bn before 2030.
🔸 The ReArm Europe Plan aims to mobilise up to €800bn in additional defence spending by 2030
Europe’s goal must not be to start wars, but to ensure that no one ever dares to cross a European border again.
🐣 RT @GlobalMktObserv 🚨 THE AI CREDIT BOOM IS STARTING TO CRACK: ¤ The bond market is sending a warning that equity investors are ignoring.
¤ ◕ https://x.com/GlobalMktObserv/status/2081370454397206875?s=20/photo/1
CDS spreads for major AI infrastructure players have surged to record highs, led by Oracle and CoreWeave, as credit investors demand higher compensation to fund the massive AI buildout.
Credit stress is spreading across the sector, with spreads also widening for Meta, Microsoft, Amazon, and Alphabet as investors reassess the risks of the debt-heavy AI investment cycle.
This comes as AI infrastructure requires unprecedented amounts of capital as companies are spending billions on data centers, chips, and power capacity, even before those investments generate meaningful returns.
To finance this expansion, hyperscalers are increasingly turning to debt markets.
Alphabet, $GOOGL, has raised more than $85 billion in debt over the past year, pushing its total debt balance above $100 billion, while hundreds of billions in AI-related corporate debt compete with governments for long-term investor capital.
If AI profits fail to catch up with spending, higher borrowing costs could pressure margins, force spending cuts, and eventually hit stock market prices.
The AI trade is now being challenged by the rising cost of financing the race.
🐣 RT @JordanSchachtel Trillion dollar a year military spending and we can’t handle sustained conflict for a few months? ¤ Where is all the money going?
⋙ 🐣 RT @Doranimated CBS News: The US is burning interceptors faster than they can be replaced. The Pentagon has shifted to using cheaper weapons. Officials fear that the current rate of weapons usage is unsustainable and could weaken the United States’ readiness for a potential conflict with China.
🐣 RT @GlobalMktObserv ⚠️US Big Tech has flipped from returning massive cash to shareholders to demanding capital from investors:
¤ ◕ https://x.com/GlobalMktObserv/status/2081355103504679224?s=20/photo/1
In 2023, Amazon, Alphabet, Meta, Microsoft, and Oracle were buying back as much as $40 billion of their own shares.
That has now reversed, with the group reaching a record $49.7 billion in net issuance, marking a historic shift from returning cash to raising it.
By comparison, semiconductor companies, including Nvidia, AMD, and Intel, are still returning capital to shareholders through buybacks, totaling ~$19.8 billion.
For two decades after the dot-com crash, Big Tech was a reliable source of shareholder returns, not a company group dependent on outside funding.
The reversal creates a new risk for the AI trade: if massive AI investments fail to generate enough profits, investors may demand higher returns, putting pressure on stock valuations.
The companies that once paid investors are now asking investors to fund the next wave of growth.
🐣 RT @BillKristol On Feb. 26, 2026, the Strait of Hormuz was an open international waterway, as it had been for decades. ¤ Five months later, thanks to Trump’s war, the Strait is closed, we’ve lost 18 service members and spent ~$100b, and the U.S. is neither as liked nor as trusted nor as feared.
⭕ 25 Jul 2026
🐣 RT @ZelenskyyUa I will instruct our intelligence to share with our partners the information we have regarding Russia’s new assistance to the Iranian regime.
¤ https://x.com/ZelenskyyUa/status/2081074329115078813?s=20
Since the beginning of July, we have recorded active Russian satellite surveillance of the Gulf states and U.S. military facilities located there. These images subsequently appear in Iran. At the same time, there is a clear correlation between Russia’s satellite imagery of these sites and Iranian strikes – both before the attacks, in preparation for them, and afterward, to assess the damage inflicted.
On July 19 and 20 alone, four air bases fell within the area of interest of Russian satellites – two in Bahrain, one in Jordan, and one in Kuwait. The purpose is clear. None of us in the world should turn a blind eye to one very simple fact: evil always seeks ways to make things worse and spread further. Russia must be stopped. This war must be stopped. Pressure on the aggressor must work.
🐣 RT @HouseJudiciary [Dems] Trump’s exploiting the presidency to make billions on cryptoscams, pardons-for-sale, foreign government emoluments from princes and kings, Chinese-made Bibles, sneakers, bogus government lawsuits against the government—catch the grift? It’s a Mafia state. By his own boast, he doesn’t spend a second thinking about the finances of the American people, but he sure spends a lot of time thinking about his own.
🐣 RT @commons96055467 Katie is on it. A federal judge has just ordered Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche to hand over the unredacted Epstein Files, emails and documents for the court’s private review. That’s Our girl Katie Phang’s lawsuit. Katie is going to nail his ass. Let’s go. ¤ @KatiePhang
🐣 RT @igorsushko 💥 As the US fights a war with Iran, behaving like a true ally yet again, Ukraine destroyed two Russian cargo ships transporting Russian weapons to Iran in the Caspian Sea. Yet, no one is willing to do this for Ukraine. Iran threatened Ukraine with ballistic missile strikes.
🐣 RT @peterbakernyt Have been a member of the @whca almost continuously since the 1990s. Our mission is to defend the First Amendment rights of White House correspondents to report on the president without fear or favor. Unfortunately last night did not advance that cause. Time to rethink the dinner.
🐣 RT @HunterBiden I watched Trump’s speech at the Correspondents’ Dinner last night. ¤ It’s hard to articulate how sad it made me.
¤ https://x.com/HunterBiden/status/2081100215264690229?s=20
Sad and embarrassed and exhausted.
Here is the thing about a man who is a joke. He can’t tell one.
People think humor is a talent. It isn’t. It’s a capacity. To make someone laugh you have to be able to laugh at yourself, and to laugh at yourself you have to step outside of yourself and see what everyone else sees. For one second you have to be just another person in the room.
Most people can do this by the time they are nine years old.
He has never once managed it. Not in fifty years of cameras. Not for a second.
That is not a quirk. It is a symptom. The muscle that lets you tell a joke is the same one that lets you feel what another person feels. A man who cannot survive being laughed at cannot imagine being anyone but himself. He will only ever be generous when it is photographed. He will only ever be kind when it is filmed.
There is a name for it.
So he stood up there and did what he always does. He hit down. He made jokes about people’s weight. He made jokes about their intelligence. He made jokes about how women look. He read out the names of people he doesn’t like, and mocked them. Always mocking. And when no one laughed he blamed his speech writers.
The cruelty dressed as humor has worn so thin.
And for the 30% of you still in the cult who will inevitably call me a crackhead and blame it all on my Dad, all I can say is please, for the love of God, open your eyes. Wake the fuck up. Have some dignity. Have some pride.
Joe Biden wasn’t standing at that podium last night. Donald Trump was.
And at the end of it he put on a red hat that said Trump 2028 and told the room he was running again. No one laughed because everyone knows he has no intention of leaving.
Just another joke at our expense.
🐣 📊 RT @simongerman600 Most voters in both parties want to end gerrymandering. In Congress, 201 of 260 Democrats have signed a redistricting-commission bill, and 1 of 274 Republicans. I view gerrymandering as an obvious anti-democratic mechanism that must not be accepted by anyone. Source: Reddit (ProjectCuria poll)
◕ https://x.com/simongerman600/status/2080903403744498045?s=20/photo/1
// 76% Democrats and 57% Republican voters want to end gerrymandering
⭕ 24 Jul 2026
Bloomberg: The Flight Network Behind Jeffrey Epstein’s Trafficking Operation https://tinyurl.com/ymembdb3 “Thousands of flights booked by the pedophile financier’s staff connected associates and victims to a global network of properties”
🌎 ◕ https://x.com/Auriandra/status/2081231026345374176?s=20/photo/1 -3
🌎 https://x.com/Auriandra/status/2081232192428990623?s=20/photo/1
🐣 RT @RepDonBacon Polls repeatedly show Americans want secure borders and those who have committed crimes or in gangs deported, but also want humanity and decency for those who entered illegally but who are working, good neighbors and are otherwise law abiding. Here’s the latest Gallup poll:
⋙ 🐣 📊 RT @Gallup [7/16] 50% of Americans strongly favor allowing immigrants, who were brought to the U.S. illegally as children, the chance to become U.S. citizens if they meet certain requirements over a period of time. [81% overall Favor]
◕ https://x.com/RepDonBacon/status/2080879059853013046?s=20/photo/1
81% FAVOR (50% Strongly): Allowing immigrants, who were brought to the U.S. illegally as children, the chance to become U.S. citizens if they meet certain requirements over a period of time
75% FAVOR (42% Strongly): Allowing immigrants living in the U.S. illegally the chance to become U.S. citizens if they meet certain requirements over a period of time
54% OPPOSE: Banning “sanctuary cities” by requiring local governments to cooperate with U.S. agencies trying to enforce federal immigration laws
49% FAVOR (48% OPPOSE): Hiring significantly more Border Patrol agents
58% OPPOSE (39% FAVOR): Deporting all immigrants who are living in the U.S. illegally back to their home country
🐣 RT @Kasparov63 🎯 … Ukraine is leading in battlefield innovation and anyone who doesn’t follow it will be a loser. Russia and China are learning from Russia’s war, but will the West?
⋙ 🧵 RT @Mylovanov Keane: Ukraine can put 10,000 drones in the air in a single day. ¤ The entire US Army does not have 10,000 drones. Ukraine’s defense industry gets new technology into soldiers’ hands at a speed that is nothing short of remarkable. 1/
[YouTube link:] https://youtu.be/4ufJGLPK2Go?is=qrJbv_ti0QUyO2kw
// General Jack Keane, Former US Army Vice Chief of Staff
📌 💽 https://x.com/Mylovanov/status/2080685618791682110?s=20/video/1
Keane: Ukraine will manufacture 8 million drones this year — aerial drones and unmanned ground vehicles. ¤ Ukrainian forces pushed Russians off a position defended by troops with no humans in the fight. It was the first time this had happened in warfare. 2/
Keane: Ukraine defeated Russia’s Black Sea Fleet without having a navy of its own. ¤ It did it with surface drones, aerial drones and subsurface drones. We will likely see what Ukraine has proven reproduced in other countries. 3X
🧵 RT @SenWhitehouse Now that the smoke has mostly cleared from Canada’s wildfires, let’s try to clear some of the bogus smoke ABOUT Canada’s wildfires, particularly Trump’s fossil-fuel-friendly denial that climate change has anything to do with it.
📌 https://x.com/SenWhitehouse/status/2080745038418485489?s=20
[ThreadReader:] https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/2080745038418485489.html
Is it “bad forest management”? Canada’s forest is over 900 million acres. The entire continental US is 1.9 billion acres. They’re supposed to “manage” a forest half the size of the whole Lower 48? Grow a brain.
Plus, it’s wilderness. As in wild. As in without roads. For normal people, a vast wilderness still existing on our planet is a good thing. So the notion of “managing” this vast wilderness is too stupid to be real. ¤ (PS. To Big Oil, “wilderness” means “someplace we haven’t drilled yet.”)
Trump can’t manage a Reflecting Pool repair and he wants to blame Canada for not “managing” a 900 million acre forest wilderness? You have to look behind the obvious stupidity to see the motive.
What the stupid idea does is provide political smoke, obscuring the role of fossil-fuel-driven climate change. The Earth is heating in northern regions at about double the average rate. The number and size of major fires increases with higher temps and drier conditions.
So Trump blows smoke, as a distraction and as a favor for his big crooked fossil-fuel donors. This is less corrupt than Trump’s clean energy blockade (raising your costs to send your dollars to his big fossil donors), but it’s still some pretty stinky fossil fuel sock-puppetry.
Irking Canadians more is that the U.S. is responsible for more greenhouse gases in the atmosphere than any other country, so we come to this stupid allegation with unclean hands on the real underlying cause of worsening wildfires.
Last thought: flood- and wildfire-prone regions of the U.S. are already seeing the Great Climate Insurance Collapse hitting homeowners. This isn’t just some far North wilderness problem; for many Americans, it’s the affordability and value of their homes.
🧵 RT @Mylovanov Zelenskyy: The Soviet Union was the most dangerous enemy for the United States, not only for your democracy or way of life, but for 70 years. ¤ Putin’s global idea is to take everything back: the Soviet Union, former Soviet republics, and Europe too. 1/
📌 💽 https://x.com/Mylovanov/status/2080698408357044519?s=20/video/1
[ThreadReader:] https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/2080698408357044519.html
Zelenskyy: If Russia becomes the Soviet Union again, this becomes a global war. Then you get China and a restored Soviet empire with the biggest army in the world. ¤ They would be bigger than the United States, and that would be dangerous for America. 2/
Zelenskyy: Israel’s Russian-speaking Jews are not all from Russia. ¤ Many came from Ukraine, Belarus, Kazakhstan and Lithuania after the Soviet Union killed languages, churches, religion and traditions for 70 years. They know Russian, but they are not “Russian-speaking people.” 3/
Zelenskyy: America won independence and paid with American lives. Europe helped. France helped. ¤ Now Ukraine fights for independence, and America helps us with Europe. U.S. history will have a page saying America helped Ukrainians save their lives and independence. 4X
🐣 RT @jalle51 [tr] Putin’s forces tried to do what Russian doctrine has always dreamed of: a classic armored breakthrough. But the reality on the battlefield in 2026 is brutal — and it’s not on Russia’s side.
🖼 https://x.com/jalle51/status/2080628060991152613?s=20/photo/1
🔥 What actually happened
• Russia gathered dozens of tanks and armored vehicles near Dobropillia in Donetsk.
• The goal: punch a hole in the Ukrainian line with sheer brute force. • The problem: Ukraine saw everything — and was ready.Phoenix drones from the Pomsta Brigade did what modern warfare does best: they turned Russian armor into burning metal in a matter of minutes.
Result:
– 9 tanks destroyed
– 2 armored vehicles knocked out
– 3 Grad rocket launchers eliminated
– dozens of Russian soldiers killed
➔ an offensive that took weeks to prepare vanished in one afternoon🔥 Why this matters ¤ This isn’t just a local failure. It’s a strategic pattern:
• Russia tries to break the stalemate with armor → Ukraine takes it out with drones.
• Russia tries to mass its way to strength → Ukraine uses precision. • Russia loses 5,000–6,000 soldiers a week (Rubio, US State Dept).
➔ It’s an army burning through manpower and materiel faster than it can replace it.🎯 Conclusion: Putin’s armored offensive wasn’t just a failure. It was proof that Russia can no longer conduct classic breakthroughs in modern drone warfare.
NYT, Alissa Wilkinson: In ‘The Odyssey’ and ‘Oppenheimer,’ Nolan Knows Civilization Is at Stake https://tinyurl.com/3f39rrws
// In very different films, the director’s penchant for playing with time is in service to a larger concern about human bonds across eras.
The word is derived from “apokalypsis,” a Greek word that means “revelation,” a moment in which the curtain flutters back and we get a glimpse into reality. Illusions are stripped away, and something hidden emerges. Another way of saying it might be this: An apocalypse isn’t the end of the world, but the end of a world and the beginning of something new. …
The Odysseus of Nolan’s film is in many ways a proto-modern hero, a complicated but virtuous man. He lives by Zeus’ law of hospitality — to accept all strangers, for they might be gods — and expects others to do likewise. Whereas in ancient times a hero was defined by his feats of strength rather than his moral character, this Odysseus believes in honor, to the point of making sure that the animal he is about to hunt has fair warning. He openly disdains his men’s fixation on “omens and sacrifices” as ways to manipulate the world; the deity he worships is Athena, the goddess of practical wisdom and the intellectual side of warcraft.
… Nolan’s Odysseus considers the moment the Trojan Horse rolled into the city of Troy — which was his idea, and led to the end of the siege and the fall of the city — to have been, quite literally, a moment of era-ending apocalypse. He tells his wife, Penelope, that he knew exactly what he’d done with this “gift” to the Trojans: “One man’s idea, one man’s trick to break Zeus’s law forever.” In that act, he says, “we violated all that’s ever sacred between people and turned a fight into a hunt” lacking the honor he believes in. And he thinks this act inspired others to ignore Zeus’ law, a break that will lead directly to the collapse of the Age of Bronze, plunging the world into darkness.…
In “The Odyssey,” characters repeatedly quote lines that will show up later in the Bible: Zeus’ law is echoed by Hebrews 13:2: “Do not neglect to show hospitality to strangers, for thereby some have entertained angels unawares.” In so doing, Nolan is reminding us — the contemporary audience — that the rules these characters follow aren’t just invented by them; they recur throughout civilization. …
Nolan makes apocalyptic movies in which the revelation is that we humans are all connected. We’re linked to one another in what we owe each other — those bonds that are sacred, and that once broken are hard to mend. And we’re linked to those in the past and future as well: What we do now echoes our ancestors and has consequences for our descendants.
In these aspirations, “The Odyssey” may be Nolan’s grandest film. Like “Oppenheimer,” it tells a story of the smartest man on earth realizing that he has won his battle but lost the war, and inalterably changed the course of humanity: a monumental burden almost too great to bear. But the more majestic and epic Nolan’s films become, the more humanist he seems, too.
Odysseus and Penelope discuss the end of their world. But the sun, they decide, will dawn again. Perhaps each new era gives us a chance to try again and save ourselves.
NYT: New U.S. Tariffs Aimed at Over 80 Countries Go Into Effect https://tinyurl.com/ynefsdbs “The administration launched new duties tied to countries’ imports of goods made with forced labor, replacing a 10 percent tariff immediately after it expired.” //➔ Try, try again
⭕ 23 Jul 2026
🐣 RT @ChristopherHale Pope Leo XIV says that the Catholic Church’s teaching on sexual ethics must be less prioritized over “greater, more important issues.”
¤ https://x.com/ChristopherHale/status/2080396092860944646?s=20
“We tend to think that when the Church is talking about morality, that the only issue of morality is sexual.
“And in reality, I believe there are much greater, more important issues, such as justice, equality, freedom of men and women, freedom of religion, that would all take priority before that particular issue.”
⭕ 22 Jul 2026
🐣 RT @BrennanCenter The Trump administration has spent the last year systematically slashing and reassigning staff responsible for detecting and disrupting foreign disinformation operations in U.S. elections. [link:] https://tinyurl.com/4sr86d3d
🐣 RT @essenviews Trump Hit With Demand for Answers Over $13B Secret. Donald Trump is facing intense scrutiny over the billions his administration has raked in from Venezuela that now appear to have vanished into thin air. [link:] https://tinyurl.com/yc8a542p
🐣 RT @SenJeffMerkley Trump is gifting Saudi Arabia the capability to pursue a nuclear weapon. It’s inexplicable, shortsighted, and dangerous. This reckless move could fuel a nuclear arms race that puts all of us at risk.
🐣 RT @FT OpenAI said the ‘agent’ escaped a testing environment, gained internet access, stole login credentials and hacked into the start-up Hugging Face by itself — one of the first public examples of a cyber attack by an AI system acting outside human control. [link:] https://t.co/w3HGQ7zXoF
⭕ 21 Jul 2026
🐣 RT @SenAdamSchiff The Supreme Court has become a rubber stamp for Trump and corporate interests. It desperately needs reform. ¤ I break down the 8 cases betraying the Court’s partisanship and bias for big money, and the reforms that would fix the Court.
💽 https://youtu.be/yzwpnoUSwwM?is=Bganl0YUTLLwFzlL
// “Six Reform to Save the Supreme Court”
🐣 RT @ForeignPolicy The U.S. under Trump is courting the five former Soviet republics of Central Asia in order to increase U.S. influence in a resource-rich region long dominated by Russia. [FP link:] https://tinyurl.com/mwahjs3p
🐣 RT @WSJ Exclusive: An American manufacturer will for the first time begin producing drone boats designed and battle-tested by Ukraine as the Pentagon seeks to expand its arsenal of autonomous weapons. [WSJ link:] https://tinyurl.com/2jyxkwc4
🐣 RT @BohuslavskaKate BROWDER: Ukrainians were begging for a while to be part of NATO. I think in a few years’ time Europeans, in a new NATO without United States, are going to be begging Ukraine to be part of it, because Ukraine has now become most preeminent fighting force in our part of the world.
💽 https://x.com/BohuslavskaKate/status/2079664751223669170?s=20/video/1
🐣 RT @ @TheDemCoalition The New York City Bar Association has issued a letter to the Senate Judiciary Committee opposing the nomination of acting Attorney General Todd Blanche. [TheHill link:] https://bit.ly/4vLGCZj
Addressed to Senators Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) and Dick Durbin (D-N.Y.), the letter asserts that, “Mr. Blanche has taken actions that we believe make him unfit to lead an ethical and independent department of justice that is essential to our nation’s democracy.”
“The Attorney General personifies for Americans our commitment to the rule of law and equal justice under the law. Todd Blanche fails to meet this standard,” the letter later continued.
🐣 RT @ForeignAffairs “The broader lesson of the war in Iran is that the Middle East is moving deeper into a ‘G-Zero’ world, in which no single power is both willing and able to guarantee order,” write @ianbremmer and
@FirasMaksad
⋙ ForeignAffairs, Ian Bremmer and Firas Maksad: The Long Shadow of the Iran War: Trump’s Most Consequential Foreign Policy Mistake https://tinyurl.com/chdxk64u
🐣 RT @SenSanders 3 months ago, I was told how wrong I was for talking to leading U.S. and Chinese scientists about the need for international cooperation on AI. ¤ Now, the United States and China are doing exactly what should have happened all along: sitting down to talk. ¤ Better late than never.
🐣 RT @HouseJudiciary BREAKING: RM @RepRaskin launches an investigation into significant evidence Jeffrey Epstein acted as an unregistered agent for foreign powers, leveraging ties to Trump. [link:] https://tinyurl.com/m7s28kcb
🐣 RT @SollenbergerRC The FBI director is traveling to Russia weeks before the midterm elections. “His host is likely to be the FSB, the Russian security service that is heir to the Soviet-era KGB” [Politico link:] https://tinyurl.com/5cf863jc
🐣 RT @TimothyDSnyder Trump is pursuing this war in the HOPE that Iran carries out an act of terror in the US. And even if it doesn’t, which I doubt it will, consider the possibility that Trump’s people would fake one. Please consider this essay, written back in March, as well as the last few lessons of “On Tyranny.” [link:] 🔰https://tinyurl.com/3s27rve4
TheAtlantic, Annie Lowrey: The AI Bubble Is No Ordinary Bubble https://tinyurl.com/bdfnttzh “Big Tech is advancing money to AI start-ups to buy cloud services from Big Tech, which is using the revenue to run new AI models … you get the idea.“
// Tech companies need to generate huge revenues fast, or the economy could be in trouble.
⭕ 20 Jul 2026
🐣 RT @HedgieMarkets A Nikkei investigation found that Alphabet, Microsoft, Amazon, Meta, and Oracle have $1.65 trillion in debt that doesn’t appear on their balance sheets, more than the $1.35 trillion they officially report.
¤ ◕ https://x.com/HedgieMarkets/status/2079335039720952144?s=20/photo/1
These are GPU contracts, data center leases, and joint ventures that don’t count as debt under accounting rules until the facilities go live. Meta’s hidden debt is $420 billion, triple its reported debt. Oracle’s grew 30-fold in four years. All five declined to comment.
My Take
Nikkei examined the actual filings and put a number on something the BIS already flagged as “shadow borrowing” back in March. These companies owe more off their balance sheets than on them, and the accounting rules let them keep it that way until the data centers go live. That’s legal, but it means investors looking at quarterly earnings this week are seeing less than half the picture.Four of these five report earnings in the next two weeks. The reported debt will look manageable. The $1.65 trillion in footnotes won’t make the headlines. But when those data centers start operating, the leases hit the books all at once. If AI demand comes in below projections, those facilities get marked down and the losses land on the investors and insurance policyholders who funded the construction through private credit and project bonds without realizing how much total exposure they were carrying. Hedgie🤗
WaPo: Powerful AI models are being given away for free. It was inevitable. https://tinyurl.com/2v33devz “On Friday at the 2026 World AI Conference in Shanghai, Chinese President Xi Jinping urged countries to ‘encourage open source, openness, collaboration and sharing.’”
// They aren’t a security threat — they’re what competition looks like.
🐣 RT @KenRoth Trump wants to subject $1 trillion of federal grantmaking for medical and scientific research to the vagaries of his political hacks.
⋙ TheGuardian: ‘Complete shock and dismay’: scientists unite against Trump’s $1tn grant attack https://tinyurl.com/54uxu9jm “OMB proposal would upend entire grant-making system – and put vast sums into hands of political appointees “
… This May, Trump’s OMB quietly proposed a more than 400-page overhaul of the federal grant-making process which would, if formalized, institutionalize much of the upheaval seen in federal funding scientists have experienced over the past nearly two years. The proposal would put nearly $1tn in grant-making into the hands of political appointees by October.
“It’s the entirety of the federal grant-making process,” said Sara Rosenbaum, professor emerita of health law and policy at the Milken Institute School of Public Health at George Washington University. “Healthcare, education, social services, environmental protections – it’s way, way beyond just research.”
The proposal has sparked outrage and consternation among a wide array of organizations, with a dramatic increase in support from individual scientists and scientific organizations, who have come together to oppose a rule that could affect an almost unimaginably vast swath of federal funding.
Groups studying “the farthest reaches of the galaxy to the deepest depths of the sea to everything in between, including those of us who wander around predominantly on plants”, have come together, Krieger said. “That’s because, yes, we have experienced censorship. We have experience with blunt use of power to put forward the ideological agenda.”
The proposal, now informally referred to as “the OMB rule”, has attracted almost half a million public comments – analyses show as much as 95% in opposition – and bipartisan criticism.
“President Trump and [OMB director] Russell Vought are not only breaking the law, but they are also once again endangering the health and safety of Americans,” Tammy Baldwin, a Democratic senator of Wisconsin, said in a statement to the Guardian.
“Americans expect their taxpayer dollars to be put to research that has the best chance at delivering a breakthrough or cure for a disease, not wielded like a cudgel to punish the president’s perceived enemies and score political points.”
Of the potential $1tn affected, $150bn is typically invested in science and technology. To conceptualize the scope, consider the budget of the National Institutes of Health (NIH): at $47bn, the NIH is the world’s largest public funder of biomedical and behavioral research.
“In the normal course of events, an administration faced with 500,000 comments – virtually all of which will be in opposition to the rule … would withdraw the rule,” said Rosenbaum. “I would say there’s a relatively low level of expectation that the administration will do the reasonable thing.”
The proposal criticizes “woke” policies, would ban “DEI” (diversity, equity and inclusion programs), and prohibit undefined “anti-American values”. It would also discourage international collaboration between scientists, require demonstration of presidential “priorities”, and allow the government to consider, “an applicant’s affiliations with organizations engaged in activities that violate federal law, undermine public safety or national security, or advocate for the overthrow of the United States government”.
It would also allow the federal government to cancel awards that are no longer in the federal government’s “interest”, a consideration that many researchers experienced first-hand in spring 2025, when federal research grants on disparate impacts and gender were summarily canceled.
Already, 22 state attorneys general have come together to oppose the rule, and almost certainly are expecting to bring a suit.
“The Trump administration is once again attempting to weaponize essential federal funding to advance its policy priorities. Except this time, it’s not just one agency, it’s almost all of them,” said California’s attorney general, Rob Ponta, in a statement this week urging the OMB to withdraw the proposal. “This proposal aims to undermine practically every industry and public service supported by federal funding.”
On social media, Vought, the OMB director, specifically targeted criticism of the rule from non-profits as a “freakout by those on the left”. The White House “fraud taskforce”, meanwhile, said the rule would ensure “American taxpayers will no longer be forced to fund woke NGOs with partisan agendas”. The rule is supported by the Heritage Foundation, the Washington DC thinktank that authored Project 2025..
The administration allowed only 45 days for public comments, relatively brief in the scope of federal rule-making – which is typically 60 to 90 days. The public comment period closed this week.
“Basically, in my mind, the notice and comment is just a subterfuge for moving ahead when they’re really not interested in what the comments say,” said Lawrence Gostin, a professor of global public health at Georgetown Law.
Since the beginning of the second Trump term, funding fights have played out across the sciences – disrupting clinical trials, long-term research, laboratories and cutting short the careers of young scientists.
If the proposal is enacted, as expected, how quickly the fight would move to the courts is an open question. Gostin argued that a grant may need to be denied before a plaintiff could find standing. Once that happens, he expects state attorneys general, institutions and perhaps even individual plaintiffs to initiate suits.
“[It] seems to me one of the big questions is: would a lawsuit actually succeed?” said Gostin. “It’s not a 100% slam-dunk, although I do think there will be some trial judges, district court judges who will enjoin it.”
Gostin said: “But as it goes though highly conservative courts of appeal and the conservative supreme court, the outcome is less certain. Whether the government attempts to mount an emergency appeal and get, ultimately, the supreme court moving forward is anybody’s guess.”
🐣 RT @kyledcheney JUST IN: A federal judge has paused the Paramount/Warner Bros. merger, saying it likely violates antitrust laws.
[CourtDoc:] https://tinyurl.com/yc6e4ck5 10p
Echelon Insights: 2026 Political Tribes https://echeloninsights.com/tribes “Discover eight distinct political tribes, see how voters align across the defining dimensions of American politics, and track shifts in public opinion from 2021 to 2026.”
◕ https://x.com/Auriandra/status/2079348869016539627?s=20/photo/1
◕ https://x.com/Auriandra/status/2079348871956676767?s=20/photo/1
// 2026 Political Tribes explores the beliefs, coalitions, and tensions shaping the American electorate.
🐣 RT @NSTRIKE1231 ❗️❗️❗️🇺🇦 Ukraine has just brought the war directly to the Kremlin’s doorstep, launching a massive, coordinated dawn assault that has left Moscow’s critical economic and logistics infrastructure engulfed in flames. […]
¤ https://x.com/NSTRIKE1231/status/2079167498910667009?s=20
⭕ 19 Jul 2026
WaPo: U.S. teeters on return to all-out war with Iran after more troops killed https://tinyurl.com/3frsbzyz “Military experts have said that in addition to the toll taken on U.S. equipment and munitions stocks, the U.S. is unprepared for possible ground operations inside Iran”
[TextLink:] https://x.com/Auriandra/status/2079086960455348618?s=20/photo/1
// The military announced Sunday that a service member was killed in action in Iraq and another set of unidentified remains was found at the site of an Iranian missile attack in Jordan, U.S. Central Command said.
… The U.S. is planning for a wider war,” said one U.S. official familiar with internal administration discussions, adding that the Pentagon was increasing the number of military aircraft in the region.
But the official, speaking on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to talk to the media, cautioned that the expansion of U.S. operations will be limited by dwindling stockpiles of air defense and long-range munitions and constraints on the ability to surge more troops and aircraft into the area because of battle damage.
“We do not have enough to safely sustain operations, and I don’t think the White House is aware of that,” the official said.
^
Military experts have said that in addition to the toll taken on U.S. equipment and munitions stocks, the U.S. is unprepared for possible ground operations inside Iran that Trump last week refused to rule out.“I think it would be a mistake to put ground forces anywhere in islands in the strait or onshore,” said Seth Jones, who heads the defense and security department at the Washington-based Center for Strategic and International Studies. “I don’t think U.S. forces are prepared for standoff strikes from Iranians.” …
Centcom, which oversees operations in the region, said its overnight Saturday strikes had “successfully hit Iranian military coastal surveillance and air defense facilities, maritime capabilities, and missile and drone storage sites.” It said they also targeted Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps forces that hit U.S. troops in Jordan. …
WaPo: Trump loomed over the World Cup, up until the awkward trophy ceremony https://tinyurl.com/nhz72sy6 “The president was loudly booed as he entered the field after Spain’s win, waving to people as he made his way to the stage.” //➔ total embarrassment for US
🐣 RT @ YallNuckingFuts What a narcissistic sociopath.
⋙ 🐣 RT @AntiquarianMuse That’s So Trump! ¤ Coming this fall on CBS, ABC and the other one.
⋙ Daily Mail Headline: “TRUMP IGNORES FIFA PRESIDENT’S CALL TO LEAVE THE STAGE AS HE JOINS SPAIN’S WORLD CUP FINAL TROPHY LIFT IN AWKWARD MOMENT”
💽 https://x.com/AntiquarianMuse/status/2078992997593543061?s=20/video/1
WSJ, Ben Sasse: America Needs the Filibuster https://tinyurl.com/wjaujem7 “The filibuster prevents the dramatic pendulum swings that are the natural result of simple-majority lawmaking.”
// “Partisans warn of doom if their agenda isn’t enacted, but their expedient is what threatens the republic.”
The filibuster prevents the dramatic pendulum swings that are the natural result of simple-majority lawmaking. Every election and every vote becomes an existential crisis in a system that no longer plods through checks and balances but instead rushes to European-style referenda.
WSJ Editorial: The SAVE America Act Backfire https://tinyurl.com/3sdcb7s2 “Trump’s speech didn’t make the case, while sowing voting distrust”
President Trump broke into prime-time TV on Thursday night to talk to the nation about election security, but it must have been a letdown for anybody expecting a thrilling plot twist in Mr. Trump’s long yarn about his 2020 defeat. Instead he made a sales pitch for a bill that can’t pass, using doubts it wouldn’t address.
Mr. Trump released documents that he said show vulnerabilities in U.S. election systems, and some of them are real, though they run the gamut. He said voter files on millions of people, including names, addressees and party affiliations, “have been bought, stolen or hacked by China.” A 2020 intelligence memo advised that adversaries “have the capability to compromise” election infrastructure, especially “registration databases, pollbooks, and official election websites.”
But since Mr. Trump declassified the memo, we can quote the part he didn’t. “Vote tabulation systems would be difficult to manipulate on a wide enough scale to compromise election results,” it says. “The systems in each voting location are not connected to the Internet or to each other, and many methods for exploiting them rely on physical proximity.” Achieving it across many jurisdictions “would be difficult” and “audits and paper trails very likely would uncover such an effort.”
The public likes voter ID, with a poll last year finding 83% of adults, and 71% of Democrats, favor it. Yet the SAVE America Act goes further, rendering most driver’s licenses insufficient to register to vote, and that’s to say nothing of Mr. Trump’s push to override laws in many GOP states—Florida, Georgia, most of the Midwest—that offer mail ballots for convenience.
In a floor speech Thursday, North Carolina Sen. Thom Tillis argued that even if Congress whooped through the bill, there isn’t time to implement it before November. By his reckoning, the U.S. has about 10,000 county clerks or municipal entities that carry out America’s decentralized elections. The midterms are barely 100 days away, early voting sooner. “The math doesn’t work,” he said. “It can’t be done.”
🐣 RT @MAGALieTracker BREAKING: The conservative Wall Street Journal editorial board just SLAMMED Trump for his desperate attempt to lie about newly unclassified intelligence to force through the SAVE America Act. [link:] https://tinyurl.com/3sdcb7s2
¤ https://x.com/MAGALieTracker/status/2078852103720853554?s=20
To make matters worse for Trump, the Wall Street Journal says that Trump’s attempt to cast doubt on the integrity of America’s elections will BACKFIRE on Republicans — leading MAGA loyalists to sit at home in November instead of going to the polls. What a disaster.
Read what they had to say for yourself: “Unfortunately, the message from Mr. Trump and others has been that America’s elections can’t be trusted, and the only hope is the SAVE America Act. Aside from being untrue, this is a political backfire for the GOP. If Republican voters believe it, and the bill falls short, then why waste time going to the polls in November? Has the GOP already forgotten how Mr. Trump’s fraud outbursts cost them two Senate seats in the 2021 Georgia runoffs?”
Unfortunately, the message from Mr. Trump and others has been that America’s elections can’t be trusted, and the only hope is the SAVE America Act. Aside from being untrue, this is a political backfire for the GOP. If Republican voters believe it, and the bill falls short, then why waste time going to the polls in November? Has the GOP already forgotten how Mr. Trump’s fraud outbursts cost them two Senate seats in the 2021 Georgia runoffs?
Republicans should be campaigning on what they want to do with two more years in power. There are ways to improve voting integrity, but Mr. Tillis is right that it’s reckless to sow generalized suspicion that American elections aren’t honest. In fact, the intel memo Mr. Trump declassified warned this is what a U.S. adversary might do. “Much of the voting public probably knows little about the process of administering US elections,” it says, “which could allow false narratives to gain traction.”
That’s dated Jan. 15, 2020. Now there’s some prescient intelligence.
WSJ: A Statistical Revamp Is About to Lower Inflation, at a Critical Time https://tinyurl.com/3j89v8vw “Bureau of Economic Analysis is altering how it measures several components of a price gauge watched by Fed” //➔ Don’t like the data? Change how you report it.
⭕ 18 Jul 2026
🐣 RT @DemocraticWins BREAKING: In a stunning announcement, Senator Lisa Murkowski just announced she will vote no on Donald Trump’s SAVE Act. This will likely kill Donald Trump’s last hopes of passing the bill. Let’s go.
🐣 RT @obyvatel_4 [tr]According to preliminary information from the President’s advisors, Mykhailo Fedorov will receive a direct appointment to the National Security and Defense Council of Ukraine (NSDC) as Head of the Defense MilTech Coordination Council and Strategic Planning. This status will place him directly under the President and provide an expanded mandate:
¤ https://x.com/obyvatel_4/status/2078286964969611440?s=20
Coordination of all defense developments: The Brave1 platform, production of long-range unmanned systems, and missile program will come under his direct oversight, bypassing mid-level approvals from the Ministry of Defense and the General Staff.
Audit of military procurement: Creation of a transparent digital control system for the logistics of the Defense Forces and elimination of corruption risks.
Direct interaction with Western donors: Fedorov will retain his status as the chief negotiator for attracting foreign investment into the high-tech sector of Ukraine’s military-industrial complex.
Reaction in the Verkhovna Rada and society: the crisis has been overcome ¤ The news that Volodymyr Zelenskyy and Mykhailo Fedorov have reached an agreement, with the reformer returning with broader powers, has caused palpable relief in political circles and among volunteer organizations.
People’s deputies who previously criticized Bankova for behind-the-scenes personnel purges emphasize that this compromise solution will help preserve internal stability and the technological pace of waging war.
🐣 RT @ visionergeo ‼️‼️🇺🇦🇷🇺 BIG | The Kremlin’s secret maritime supply lines have just been blown wide open—Ukraine’s drone forces have launched an unprecedented, coordinated offensive targeting Russia’s illicit “shadow fleet” across two seas simultaneously.
¤ 🌎 https://x.com/visionergeo/status/2078408076097454492?s=20/photo/1
In a devastating overnight operation, Ukrainian FPV-2 maritime drones executed a massive multi-pronged strike in the Black and Azov seas, crippling 13 critical vessels belonging to Russia’s sanction-evading fleet. According to Robert Brovdi (“Madyar”), commander of Ukraine’s Unmanned Systems Forces, the strikes systematically neutralized a diverse array of high-value targets: eight cargo ships, an oil tanker, a gas carrier, a tugboat, and two floating cranes. The staggering scale of the damage has sent Moscow into a state of panic, forcing the Russian military command to urgently pull its elite “Rubikon” drone units, components of the 51st Air Defense Division, and remnants of the Black Sea Fleet’s anti-aircraft missile regiment directly off the active front lines to safeguard what remains of their maritime assets.
This massive raid marks a brilliant strategic pivot that completely reshapes the logistical math of the war. By forcing the Kremlin to cannibalize its frontline air defenses and elite drone crews just to protect its economic lifelines at sea, Ukraine has successfully created critical vulnerabilities along the main line of contact. This operation proves that Russia’s shadow fleet is no longer a safe haven for sanctions evasion, turning Moscow’s economic sanctuaries into an open, undefended shooting gallery.
🐣 RT @ visionergeo ‼️‼️🇷🇺🇨🇳 BREAKING | Beijing has just delivered a stunning geopolitical betrayal to Moscow—plunging a dagger directly into Putin’s desperate pivot to Asia by freezing the Kremlin’s crown jewel energy project.
¤ 🌎 https://x.com/visionergeo/status/2078414892621557954?s=20/photo/1
According to explosive reports from the Wall Street Journal, China has indefinitely suspended all negotiations with Russia regarding the construction of the massive “Power of Siberia-2” gas pipeline. The pipeline was designed to reroute hundreds of billions of cubic meters of natural gas originally bound for Europe directly into Chinese markets, serving as Moscow’s primary economic hope to replace lost Western revenues. By halting the multi-billion-dollar project indefinitely, Beijing has signaled that it refuses to bail out Russia’s collapsing energy economy on Putin’s terms.
This freeze represents a catastrophic strategic defeat for Russia, exposing the brutal reality of its asymmetric dependence on Beijing. With Europe permanently locked out and China walking away from the negotiating table, Russia’s massive gas reserves are effectively trapped in the ground with nowhere to go. This move proves that China views Russia not as an equal strategic partner, but as a vulnerable, junior partner to be exploited, leaving the Kremlin’s long-term economic survival in absolute tatters.
🐣 RT @ @politicsusa46 There is NOTHING more sinister than a government preparing the ground to declare their opponents domestic terrorists in order to hold onto power. [TikTok link:] https://vm.tiktok.com/ZN8123Tpd/
💽 https://x.com/politicsusa46/status/2078374544084021755?s=20/video/1
This man [Rubio] represents the worst among us. He knows what Trump is doing is wrong, he knows what Trump is doing is causing immeasurable reputational damage for the US on the world stage, but his own hubris and ambition forces him to defend the indefensible, and indulge in baseless fear tactics.
He is a despicable, traitorous and vile character who is willing to sacrifice his own values and those of the country he swore an oath to serve at the altar of a criminal corrupt pathological liar and adjudicated rapist, in furtherance of personal ambition.
Shame on him. i don’t know how he sleeps at night. Other than upside down in a cave.
⋙ 🐣 He doesn’t say Democrats, Progressives or even Social Democrats. ¤ There are vanishingly few Communists or Marxists in this country. Virtually no one is anti-capitalist or anarchist. Antifa😂is a mirage. They are hallucinating. ¤ Just another boogeyman to gin up the MAGA base.🥱
⭕ 17 Jul 2026
WaPo (7/17): Trump says 278,000 noncitizens are on voting rolls. Experts say that’s wrong. https://tinyurl.com/zz7jfph7 “The claim came as the Trump administration vowed to withhold funding from states that don’t participate in federal programs purporting to secure elections.”
[TextLink:] https://x.com/Auriandra/status/2079067746357113276?s=20/photo/1
… According to Trump and Mullin, about 278,000 noncitizens are unlawfully registered to vote in federal elections in a number of states where they said the rolls were reviewed. They said 250,000 of those people were in just four states: Nevada, California, Pennsylvania and New Jersey. Their assessment did not include all states.
The president’s claim suggests that noncitizens who cast ballots could unlawfully swing election results in a particularly tight federal race.
But a review of public documents and interviews with government officials and election experts shows that the figure is significantly overstated and that officials have struggled to find instances of voter fraud by noncitizens to back the president’s assertions. ⋙ Assessments by government officials and outside election experts have repeatedly concluded that noncitizens represent a miniscule number of voters. …
Reviews have shown noncitizen voting rarely happens in state and federal elections. A federal judge in 2018 found that at most 39 noncitizens were placed on the voter rolls in Kansas over 19 years. Georgia’s secretary of state in 2024 found 20 noncitizens on its rolls of 8.2 million voters. A University of St. Thomas study that year found three noncitizens were convicted of voting illegally in Minnesota over nine years, when more than 13.4 million ballots were cast.
Noncitizens sometimes inadvertently register to vote when they get IDs, experts said. Officials in motor vehicle offices in most states have to give people an opportunity to register to vote, and noncitizens sometimes don’t understand they’re not allowed to register, they said. Many of those who inadvertently register never try to vote.
WSJ Editorial (July 17): The SAVE America Act Backfire https://tinyurl.com/3sdcb7s2 “Trump’s speech didn’t make the case, while sowing voting distrust.”
President Trump broke into prime-time TV on Thursday night to talk to the nation about election security, but it must have been a letdown for anybody expecting a thrilling plot twist in Mr. Trump’s long yarn about his 2020 defeat. Instead he made a sales pitch for a bill that can’t pass, using doubts it wouldn’t address.
Mr. Trump released documents that he said show vulnerabilities in U.S. election systems, and some of them are real, though they run the gamut. He said voter files on millions of people, including names, addressees and party affiliations, “have been bought, stolen or hacked by China.” A 2020 intelligence memo advised that adversaries “have the capability to compromise” election infrastructure, especially “registration databases, pollbooks, and official election websites.”
But since Mr. Trump declassified the memo, we can quote the part he didn’t. “Vote tabulation systems would be difficult to manipulate on a wide enough scale to compromise election results,” it says. “The systems in each voting location are not connected to the Internet or to each other, and many methods for exploiting them rely on physical proximity.” Achieving it across many jurisdictions “would be difficult” and “audits and paper trails very likely would uncover such an effort.” …
Then he urged passage of the SAVE America Act. “The only reason you wouldn’t do it is you want to cheat,” he said. “This landmark bill requires that all voters must show photo voter ID. How simple is that?” He also called to ban mail ballots, “except for illness, disability, military deployment or travel.”
NYT: China’s Leader Pitches ‘Openness’ in Push to Shape A.I.’s Future https://tinyurl.com/mt6ydxkv “Mr. Xi’s speech at the beginning of an AI conference in Shanghai came as China builds support for its World AI Cooperation Organization [as] ‘symphony of global collaboration.’”
// Xi Jinping said the development of artificial intelligence systems should be a “symphony of global collaboration.”
TheAtlantic, Simon Schuster: Ukraine’s Dr. Strangelove https://tinyurl.com/4rsavwp9 “A rocket designer with a dubious past sets out to build a missile shield with Europe—and without America.
// tags: Denys Shtilerman Fire Point Tymur Mindich
¤ https://x.com/Enhance___/status/2078255034257776930?s=20
Nations don’t always get to pick their heroes, especially not in a time of war. Most Ukrainians, given the choice, would probably not want a character like Denys Shtilerman to be the architect of their revenge against Russia. He studied in Russia, became wealthy in Russia, worked for a Russian military institute, and served two stints in Russian jails. Some of his close associates are wanted in Ukraine for corruption. Yet Shtilerman, a prolific designer of weapons, has earned admiration across Europe for his role in Ukraine’s defense. …
By Shtilerman’s account, Fire Point got off the ground with a few million dollars of his own fortune, which he earned in Russia, mostly through real-estate deals. In 2023, during the second year of the war, he bankrolled the creation of his first long-range drone. The weapon, known as the FP-1, gained attention the following spring, when it earned top marks in a competition for drone makers. Various suitors then offered to buy the company from Shtilerman, he said, including some of the country’s wealthiest businessmen. Among them was Tymur Mindich.
Mindich, an old friend of Zelensky’s, is now a wanted fugitive in Ukraine, hiding out in Israel to escape arrest on charges of large-scale corruption. His ties with the president go back decades. During Zelensky’s early career in show business, Mindich co-owned the production company that made the future president’s movies and TV shows. They remained close after Zelensky took office, in 2019, and they stayed in touch after the Russian invasion. […
🐣 RT @ABlinken China understands that leadership in AI is not just about building the most capable models. It is about shaping the rules, norms, and institutions that will govern how AI is developed and used around the world. [Reuters link:] https://tinyurl.com/5ynxm3fz
¤ https://x.com/ABlinken/status/2078183113193103407?s=20
Xi Jinping’s remarks today at the World Artificial Intelligence Conference in Shanghai are an important reminder that Beijing intends to lead on both fronts. Beijing is moving with purpose, bringing nearly 30 countries along with it as signatories to a new China-backed AI organization, giving it a growing platform to shape international standards and extend its influence around the world.
It didn’t have to be this way; in fact, the United States once led this effort. During my time in the Biden Administration, we secured voluntary commitments from frontier AI companies on safety, security, and trust. My colleagues and I then worked with the G7 to internationalize those principles, as well as with the UK on safety. We secured the first ever UN General Assembly resolution on AI by broad consensus.
That work gave the United States a strong foundation from which to lead. It showed that innovation and governance could advance together, and that America could bring other countries with us.
Meanwhile, the Trump Administration’s approach to AI governance continues to swing between embracing it and rejecting it. That inconsistency — together with our cratering credibility and growing trust deficit around the world — puts our technological leadership and our diplomatic influence in peril.
If America’s approach to AI governance continues to vacillate and if we continue to alienate countries near and far, we will cede far more than a diplomatic initiative. We will allow China to shape the rules, standards, and norms that will govern the defining technology of this century. The question is not whether those rules will be written, but who writes them. I, for one, would prefer it to be America.
🐣 RT @kyledcheney Periodic reminder of these Marco Rubio-approved recommendations from the Senate Intelligence Committee’s report on foreign interference in 2016.
[TextLink:] https://x.com/kyledcheney/status/2078126249403183130?s=20/photo/1
COMMITTEE SENSITIVE – RUSSIA INVESTIGATION ONLY
(U) The President of the United States should take steps to separate himself or herself from political considerations when handling issues related to foreign influence operations. These steps should include explicitly putting aside politics when addressing the American people on election threats and marshalling all the resources of the U.S. Government to effectively confront the threat.(U) Sitting officials and candidates should use the absolute greatest amount of restraint and caution if they are considering publicly calling the validity of an upcoming election into question. Such a grave allegation can have significant national security and electoral consequences, including limiting the response options of the appropriate authorities, and exacerbating the already damaging messaging efforts of foreign intelligence services.
🐣 RT @CaptMarkKelly Trump’s “Golden Dome” project has the potential to be a $1+ trillion waste of taxpayer money. Ground-based missile defense is hard. Missile defense from space is even harder, and the physics do not favor the defense. We should be investing in systems that actually work.
¤ https://x.com/CaptMarkKelly/status/2078193679768990181?s=20
🐣 RT @BohuslavskaKate Former CIA Director, General David Petraeus: “Look, Ukraine is now using 10,000 or more drones per day. This is just staggering. Last year, they produced 3.5 million drones. We in the United States produced 300,000. We have nothing like what they have.”
💽 https://x.com/BohuslavskaKate/status/2078088928905592921?s=20/video/1
🐣 RT @GenoVeno73 🚨 HERE’S ANOTHER ONE OF LAST NIGHTS LIES DEBUNKED
CHINA: Multiple U.S. intelligence assessments (including 2021 declassified reports) concluded China did NOT interfere with actual voting systems, ballot casting, tabulation, or change election outcomes in 2020. Claims of widespread fraud or direct manipulation tied to this data have not been substantiated by courts, election officials, or CISA. […]
¤ https://x.com/GenoVeno73/status/2078085882091823266?s=20
🐣 RT @jalle51 Russia’s fuel crisis is triggering an internal class war. According to exiled Russian economist Igor Lipsits, the level of hatred building up in the regions against Moscow is unprecedented.
¤ https://x.com/jalle51/status/2078002829734584665?s=20
As Ukrainian drone strikes paralyze refineries, the Kremlin is dry-sucking fuel from rural provinces to keep Moscow’s gas stations full—ensuring the capital’s elite can maintain the illusion of normalcy.
The consequences are devastating:
• Farming on pause: Regional farmers are left without diesel, unable to harvest crops during peak season.
• Economic paralysis: Over 60 regions are facing severe shortages, setting up a brutal food crisis and hyperinflation for autumn.
Putin is trading Russia’s long-term food security and regional stability just to maintain a polished propaganda facade in Moscow. You can’t run tractors on Kremlin press releases. 🇷🇺📉🌾
🐣 RT @armyinformcomua 💥159 vessels. Operation MoLoCHKa.
12 more struck in the Black Sea overnight — 9 dry cargo vessels, 1 tanker, 1 gas carrier, 1 tugboat. ¤ The running total since July 6: 159 enemy vessels struck across the Azov and Black Seas.
¤ https://x.com/armyinformcomua/status/2078032051152834908?s=20
One detail Magyar mentioned that deserves attention:
UAS Forces @usf_army operators are deliberately avoiding hull breaches on shadow fleet tankers — to prevent oil spills contaminating the surrounding waters.
Ukraine is conducting the most intensive maritime drone campaign in history — and doing it with enough precision to choose where the drone hits to avoid an ecological disaster.
159 vessels. Struck selectively. Methodically. Without sinking the sea along with the ships.
Operation MoLoCHKa continues. ¤ MOskva Lyazhe Cherez Krym. ¤Moscow Will Fall Through Crimea.
Source: UAS Forces Commander Robert “Magyar” Brovdi, July 17, 2026
#Ukraine #UAF #DroneWarfare #CrimeaIsUkraine #ShadowFleet
⭕ 16 Jul 2026
Politico: How Trump might try to relitigate 2020 — and the facts he’s up against https://tinyurl.com/242dp7h9 Many of the specific claims Trump might make in his primetime speech have been evaluated before.
🐣 RT @ossoff Tonight I heard a failed and desperate president who as war spirals and prices rise is as always focused on his grievances, his shame, and above all his fear of the accountability that will come with defeat.
¤ https://x.com/ossoff/status/2077955208240316434?s=20
I also heard a president signaling his unmistakable intent to attack these elections and our voting rights, just as he tried to throw out our votes and seize the presidency in 2020.
Our answer will be overwhelming.
Across Georgia a wave of defiance is building to rebuke him so decisively that no president ever again dares such brazen corruption and abuse.
The power of the presidency is nothing compared to the power of the people.
🐣 RT @KDilanianMSNOW Sen. Mark Warner just told our @MSNow audience that everything Trump raised tonight had been examined by the Senate intel committee, which agreed on a bipartisan basis that the spy agencies were right when they said in 2020 that no foreign government changed any votes.
🐣 RT @TVietor08 Incredible stuff here–John Solomon, the right-wing journalist Trump hired to manufacture this voter fraud hysteria–acknowledges that NO VOTES WERE CHANGED by a foreign power in 2020, 2022, or 2024
⋙ 🐣 RT @VaughnHillyard NEW: John Solomon acknowledges no votes were changed in the 2020, 2022 or 2024 elections. He also, when asked if the 2020 results showing Biden won the presidential election are accurate, said, “I’m researching.” And says no intell that Venezuela tempered with US voting machines.
💽 https://x.com/TVietor08/status/2077948113738993975?s=20/video/1
🐣 RT @Ike_Saul To sum up: The White House proved tonight that it’s unclear whether even third world teapot dictators can actually rig their own elections, that China collects data on Americans, and that there’s no evidence of any elections here being corrupted. Thank you.
⋙ 🐣 RT @Ike_Saul According to Trump’s “bombshell documents,” the CIA could not even assess with confidence that Venezuela was ever able to commit large-scale fraud in IT’S OWN VENEZUELAN ELECTIONS, let alone elections here in the U.S. I am actually so glad he released these 😅
[TextLink:] https://x.com/Ike_Saul/status/2077939988482683221?s=20/photo/1
🐣 RT @SethAbramson Boy he must have really been hoping no one would look at the documents he talked about tonight because they underscore what I’ve been saying for 6 years, which is that the Trump-Ukraine Scandal was infinitely worse than people thought from the facts revealed during Impeachment #1
⋙ 🐣 RT @samstein This is really incredible. Docs released by Trump tonight confirm RUSSIA tried to spread claims Biden was engaged in criminal activity vis-a-vis Burisma and that it advanced those narratives “with US officials” and planed a “high-profile corruption scandal… at the peak of the 2020 US presidential campaign.”
[TextLink:] https://x.com/samstein/status/2077935273539723471?s=20/photo/1 [multi]
TheAtlantic: Trump Just Did More Damage to American Elections Than China https://tinyurl.com/yc5xencb “His speech was a mashup of charges that aren’t supported by the documents he released.
TheAtlantic: Trump Still Hasn’t Found What He’s Looking For https://tinyurl.com/92anv4vw The president’s prime-time speech was more notable for what it didn’t prove than what it did.
🐣 RT @MarkWarner Isn’t it weird that Trump’s speech never mentioned Russia – probably the single biggest perpetrator of election influence?
⋙ 🐣 It’s also weird that we 🇺🇸 are allocating $millions to exert influence over EU elections in favor for far-right parties.
🐣 RT @RadioFreeTom The documents are so damning in refuting Trump’s own case that I wonder if anyone in the White House actually read them (or understood what they were looking at)
⋙ 🐣 RT @TVietor08 Trump released documents that confirm Russia tried to interfere in the 2020 election to hurt Biden. It says Russia tried to “orchestrate a high-profile corruption scandal” and push narratives about “voter fraud resulting from mail-in balloting”
[TextLink:] https://x.com/RadioFreeTom/status/2077966379722936557?s=20/photo/1 -2
🐣 RT @mjfree Trump lost 61 out of 62 court cases where he and his team screamed voter fraud in 2020.
¤ https://x.com/mjfree/status/2077919375294636377?s=20
61 TIMES judges — including his own appointees and Republicans — looked at the “evidence” and said bullshit.
He lost fair and square, refused to accept it, cried FRAUD nonstop, and incited Jan 6 with his Stop The Steal scam.
Tonight he’s back with the same pathetic grift. #LoserTrumpsElectionLie
🐣 RT @EdMarkey Trump must be impeached for undermining and subverting our free and fair elections. And when he sends ICE agents to the polls, then we must turn civic action into civil disobedience and take to the streets. Sit in. Protest. Withhold our labor. Everything must be on the table.
🐣 RT @kaitlancollins Ben Ginsberg, who for decades was the go-to election law expert for national Republicans, says, “This feels a little bit like an own goal. The administration has cut back on the cyber security agency, CISA, and the Department of Justice outfit that helps states so that, if there is a problem with the 2026 election, it will be in large part because the defenses that are provided by the federal government to the states to stop that activity have been drastically cut back.”
🐣 RT @BernieSanders At a time when millions of Americans are finding it harder to pay for groceries, housing and healthcare, when the climate crisis is causing record heatwaves and forest fires, Donald Trump felt it appropriate tonight to spew conspiracy theories about the 2020 election.
¤ https://x.com/BernieSanders/status/2077947236860801532?s=20
Pathetically, in true authoritarian fashion, he even threatened to revoke the licenses of ABC and NBC because they would not cover his speech. Insane.
Too many Americans have fought and died to defend American democracy.
All of us, regardless of our political views, must stand together against this dangerous president who is seeking to undermine our Constitution and our basic freedoms.
WaPo Editorial Board: Good AI standards don’t need a new government bureaucracy behind them https://tinyurl.com/5n74a6ab “The head of Google DeepMind offers a proposal modeled on the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority.”
🐣 RT @Svitlana_UA22 BREAKING: Patrushev poisoned with synthetic toxin. Who tried to eliminate the Russian Security Council Secretary, and why? ¤ Media reports regarding the hospitalization of the Russian Security Council Secretary, Nikolai Patrushev, showing traces of a synthetic toxin, have sparked intense discussion among intelligence experts. Information about the incident was heavily concealed by security agencies. […]
¤ https://x.com/Svitlana_UA22/status/2077761516451840022?s=20
🐣 RT @JenniferJJacobs Statement on Trump’s speech from the Chinese Embassy: “China has all along adhered to the principle of non-interference in other’s internal affairs. The U.S. election is an internal matter of the U.S. Its outcome is determined by the votes of the American people. China has never and will never interfere in the presidential elections of the U.S.” @CBSNews
🐣 RT @Mollyploofkins Five facts about the 2020 presidential election:
¤ https://x.com/Mollyploofkins/status/2077836816988733917?s=20
1. Joe Biden won decisively — Biden received 306 electoral votes to Donald Trump’s 232. He also won the popular vote by over 7 million votes (81.3 million to 74.2 million). These results were certified by all 50 states and Congress on January 6-7, 2021.
2. No widespread fraud was found — Trump’s own Attorney General William Barr, the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA), and election officials from both parties stated there was no fraud on a scale that could have changed the outcome.
3. Courts rejected the claims — Trump and his allies filed over 60 lawsuits. Nearly all were dismissed or withdrawn, including by Trump-appointed judges. Only a handful of minor procedural wins occurred, none affecting the result.
4. Audits and recounts confirmed Biden’s wins — Multiple hand recounts and audits in Georgia, Arizona, Wisconsin, and elsewhere slightly narrowed or widened margins but never overturned any state result. Arizona’s “Cyber Ninjas” audit (run by Trump supporters) actually increased Biden’s margin.
5. Fraud occurs but is extremely rare — Studies and Heritage Foundation data show voter fraud cases number in the dozens across millions of votes (e.g., <0.0001% in key states). No evidence showed systematic fraud sufficient to flip even one battleground state. Conspiracy claims of a “stolen” election lack supporting evidence and were rejected by Republican officials, courts, and audits. The election was the most scrutinized in modern U.S. history.
⋘ Trump Speech ⋙
🐣 RT @MarkWarner Trump’s big elections “reveal” is coming tomorrow. Here’s what you need to know.
💽 https://x.com/MarkWarner/status/2077560622401626438?s=20/video/1
🐣 Definitive (2022): Lost, Not Stolen: The Conservative Case that Trump Lost and Biden Won the 2020 Presidential Election https://lostnotstolen.org by John Danforth, Benjamin Ginsberg, Thomas B Griffith, David Hoppe, J Michael Luttig, Michael W McConnell, Theodore B Olson, Gordon H Smith
Politico: How Trump might try to relitigate 2020 — and the facts he’s up against https://tinyurl.com/242dp7h9 Many of the specific claims Trump might make in his primetime speech have been evaluated before.
🐣 RT @TheWarMonitor U.S. intelligence assessments found no evidence that any foreign actor altered votes or election infrastructure in the 2020 election. ¤ They did conclude Russia conducted influence operations to undermine Biden, boost Trump, and erode confidence in the election, but vote counts were unaffected. ¤ The assessment was based on an investigation conducted during Trump’s presidency, overseen by his own appointees. Trump received a classified preliminary version of this same report before leaving office.
[TextLink:] https://x.com/TheWarMonitor/status/2077822338733580671?s=20/photo/1
Foreign Threats to the 2020 US Federal Elections
10 March 2021 / ICA 2020-00078D
Key Judgment 1: We have no indications that any foreign actor attempted to alter any technical aspect of the voting process in the 2020 US elections, including voter registration, casting ballots, vote tabulation, or reporting results. We assess that it would be difficult for a foreign actor to manipulate election processes at scale without detection by intelligence collection on the actors themselves, through physical and cyber security monitoring around voting systems across the country, or in post-election audits. The IC identified some successful compromises of state and local government networks prior to Election Day—as well as a higher volume of unsuccessful attempts—that we assess were not directed at altering election processes. Some foreign actors, such as Iran and Russia, spread false or inflated claims about alleged compromises of voting systems to undermine public confidence in election processes and results.
Key Judgment 2: We assess that Russian President Putin authorized, and a range of Russian government organizations conducted, influence operations aimed at denigrating President Biden’s candidacy and the Democratic Party, supporting former President Trump, undermining public confidence in the electoral process, and exacerbating sociopolitical divisions in the US. Unlike in 2016, we did not see persistent Russian cyber efforts to gain access to election infrastructure. We have high confidence in our assessment; Russian state and proxy actors who all serve the Kremlin’s interests worked to affect US public perceptions in a consistent manner. A key element of Moscow’s strategy this election cycle was its use of proxies linked to Russian intelligence to push influence narratives—including misleading or unsubstantiated allegations against President Biden—to US media organizations, US officials, and prominent US individuals, including some close to former President Trump and his administration.
TheAtlantic (2019): The Three Personalities of America https://tinyurl.com/3u4hvuup “People in different regions of the U.S. have measurably different psychological profiles.”
🌎 https://x.com/Auriandra/status/2077771255969628173?s=20/photo/1
// 11/18/2019 (three charts)
🐣 RT @Beefeater_Fella Epstein used six secret warehouses in different US states to hide photographs and computers containing evidence of his crimes from the police, according to The Telegraph. ¤ The publication reports that investigators never conducted searches at these locations. This fact, The Times clarifies, increases the likelihood that there are still unexamined documents in the Epstein case.
⭕ 15 Jul 2026
TheGuardian: ‘We screwed up the comms’: JD Vance admits errors over Epstein files release https://tinyurl.com/3am25r6e ““We absolutely screwed up the comms of the Epstein files. Like, we just did,” Vance said. “But do I think … we were trying to hide something? No.”
// Vice-president tells Joe Rogan administration botched handling and should have released all documents from start
🐣 RT @BohuslavskaKate SEN. BLUMENTHAL: Russian sanctions bill imposes up to 100% tariffs on major purchasers of Russian oil and gas: China, India, Slovakia, Hungary and Azerbaijan. Our European allies are not targeted. We crafted this bill to make exceptions for our friends and supporters of Ukraine.
💽 https://x.com/BohuslavskaKate/status/2077518335722340562?s=20/video/1
🐣 RT @LevantWire 🚨🇺🇸🇮🇱 BREAKING: U.S. Vice President JD Vance: “We know that there are certain individuals within Israel who are trying to manipulate American public opinion to continue the war indefinitely.”
Vance also said it was “clear” that Jeffrey Epstein had connections with the highest levels of both American and Israeli intelligence
💽 https://x.com/LevantWire/status/2077558437467320629?s=20/video/1
🐣 RT @NSTRIKE1231 ❗️❗️❗️🇺🇦🇷🇺 In a decisive expansion of its naval drone campaign, Ukraine has officially placed Russia’s highly lucrative Black Sea maritime corridors in its crosshairs, launching a massive, multi-pronged offensive against the Kremlin’s vital economic lifelines.
🌎 💽 https://x.com/NSTRIKE1231/status/2077305423019778338?s=20/video/1
This dramatic escalation targeted the shipping hubs of the Azov–Black Sea basin, a critical transit corridor representing a massive share of Russia’s global trade and logistics:
Export Powerhouse: In the first half of 2026, the Azov–Black Sea basin handled 132 million tons of cargo—representing approximately 37% of Russia’s total maritime exports.The Stolen Grain Highway: Terminals across the Black Sea and the Sea of Azov shipped 56.5 million tons of agricultural products during the 2023/24 season, comprising 90.5% of Russia’s maritime grain exports. This route serves as the primary artery for transporting stolen Ukrainian grain.
Crude Oil Arteries: In 2025, Russia exported 52.4 million tons of crude oil via Black Sea routes, accounting for roughly 19% of its overall seaborne crude exports.
This economic choke point directly encompasses occupied Crimea. The heavily fortified ports of Kerch, Sevastopol, and Feodosia function as integral hubs for shipping fuel, military supplies, and looted grain across the peninsula and to foreign markets.Currently, hundreds of Russian tankers, LNG carriers, bulk cargo vessels, and auxiliary tugs are concentrated around strategic ports like Novorossiysk, Tuapse, Taman, Port Kavkaz, and Kerch. Following the total disruption and effective paralysis of Russian shipping in the Sea of Azov, the continuation of Ukraine’s high-intensity drone strikes in the Black Sea threatens to completely sever Moscow’s primary economic and military logistical networks in the region.
🧵 RT @Mylovanov Fire Point co-founder Shtilierman: When Russia enters a territory, it kills at least 20% of the population. ¤ It happened in the Holodomor, the Baltics, western Ukraine, and Chechnya. If they come here, they will cut down 20% as “prevention.” 1/
📌 💽 https://x.com/Mylovanov/status/2077394019936592248?s=20/video/1
[ThreadReader:] https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/2077394019936592248.html
Shtilierman: The company’s goal is to help humanity avoid the Fermi paradox and not destroy itself as a civilization. ¤ Russia stands in the way. It fuels war and confrontation to keep Europe from living in peace. 2/
Shtilierman: The U.S. already treats Russia like losers. Russia keeps showing weakness: burning forums, Moscow’s “roof,” failed signals. ¤ And if Russians had not killed civilians in Bucha, the world might never have started supporting Ukraine. 3/
Shtilierman: Putin knows he can stop fire along the contact line any time, instantly. There was already a Kyiv ultimatum, then Trump stepped in and changed everything. Now Putin sees the talks model changing and his window closing. 4X [Source: YouTube],
NYT: Ukraine Pounds Russian Ships in Its Campaign to Cut Off Crimea https://tinyurl.com/5p8uw35m “After striking roads and railways, Kyiv is now focusing on sea routes as it tries to disrupt fuel supplies and pressure Russia to end the war.”
⭕ 14 Jul 2026
WaPo: After Ankara: The drive to make NATO 3.0 a reality https://tinyurl.com/y7eu37ab “Ukraine walked away as the biggest winner. … It left Ankara with a Patriot production promise, live drone testing agreements with the Pentagon and new deals with three more European states”
// European leaders are promising to make their continent a modern defense industrial powerhouse. But that is easier said than done.
Key takeaways
Europe is promising a once-in-a-generation rearmament. Coming out of last week’s NATO summit in Ankara, European leaders delivered one consistent message: They will make a generational investment in defense manufacturing and defense technology — and take on more of the burden inside the alliance.
Europe is showing signs of de-risking from the United States. The Trump administration’s pressure campaign succeeded in getting Europe to increase defense spending. It also convinced Europe that it needs to reduce its dependence on the United States, at least where it can.
The new architecture is minilateral and preliminary. European and NATO countries are forming assorted alliances among themselves to build and fund a 21st century defense base. But parochial politics between European countries, combined with bureaucracy, could slow the efforts.
Ukraine walked away as the biggest winner. Kyiv is not in NATO, but it left Ankara with a Patriot production promise, live drone testing agreements with the Pentagon and new deals with three more European states. The Trump administration is more willing to work with Ukraine’s defense industry than at any point so far in this war.
Turkey and Syria also got big wins at the summit from Trump. The U.S. president pledged to consider readmitting Turkey into the F-35 program and announced that Syria will no longer be designated as a State Sponsor of Terrorism.
🐣 RT @KenRoth Contrary to Marco Rubio’s insinuation, the International Criminal Court is not claiming jurisdiction over conduct in the United States. Rubio is dressing up his quest for impunity for American war crimes abroad under the label of national sovereignty, which ignores the sovereign right of other nations to invoke the ICC for crimes committed on their territory. [Guardian link:] https://tinyurl.com/2sh7ef3b
EuroNews: EU says threats against ICC ‘unacceptable’ as US launches campaign to ‘dismantle’ court https://tinyurl.com/427we25y ¤
AmnestyInternational: Global: States Must Push Back Against Reprehensible US Campaign to Dismantle the ICC https://tinyurl.com/mvppdzud ““If other states bow to this pressure, they will acquiesce to a new era of lawlessness, impunity and rampant injustice.”
In response to US Secretary of State Marco Rubio’s announcement of a campaign opens in a new tab to “systematically disable” the International Criminal Court’s “ability to operate,” Amnesty International’s Secretary General Agnès Callamard said:
“The Secretary of State’s reprehensible attack on the ICC is the latest in a series of escalating and existential assaults by the Trump administration on the very idea of international justice and a rules-based order, and on the international institutions painstakingly put in place over the last 80 years to ensure global peace and stability. …
“In trying to discredit the Court, Rubio instead highlights its very purpose: ensuring accountability when those with the power to act choose not to. His arguments read like a tacit admission of wrongdoing – suggesting concerns that US officials could one day be held accountable for actions that may amount to crimes under international law, including deporting people to torture in El Salvador’s prisons or the campaign of extrajudicial killings in the Caribbean and Eastern Pacific. The only reason he would have to fear the ICC is if US officials have committed such crimes outside the United States and the US government is unwilling to hold them genuinely accountable.”
“The ICC exists to deliver justice for the victims and survivors of atrocities around the world and hold the most powerful perpetrators accountable for their crimes. By threatening increased sanctions against the ICC and affiliated organizations, visa revocations and travel bans for ICC personnel, and heightened diplomatic pressure on other states to withdraw from the Court and oppose it, the US government is stepping up its campaign for a world without rules and without justice.
“If other states bow to this pressure, they will acquiesce to a new era of lawlessness, impunity and rampant injustice. Now is not the time to appease. Now is the time to resist.
“Appeasement will only further embolden perpetrators and open the door to more armed conflicts and more crimes committed by powerful leaders against their own or other states’ populations. Amnesty International calls on all states to firmly resist – both collectively and unilaterally – the Trump administration’s campaign against the ICC and all international institutions that protect human rights. They must also reiterate their support for the Court and enact practical and legislative measures, including so-called ‘blocking statutes,’ to mitigate the effect of US sanctions on those impacted.
“State inaction and cowardice in the face of past sanctions and attacks is what emboldened the US to announce this strategy. For the good of humanity, victims’ hopes of justice, and the prospect of lasting global security, the international community must come together, stand up to the bullies in the White House and State Department and protect the international rule of law. We must not accept a reality where the most powerful have the least legal responsibility.”
🐣 RT @Kasparov63 Why would the Pentagon be involved in domestic political activities? Unless, of course, this is all more bullshit to fund and enable Trump‘s personal federal shock troops, the equivalent of Putin’s Rosgvardiya, and crack down on elections and any domestic opposition.
‼️ ⋙ 🐣 RT @HQNewsNow Mike Johnson says that the Pentagon is requesting an additional $350,000,000,000 for things like “fighting Communism on our own shores”
💽 https://x.com/Kasparov63/status/2077117723360780776?s=20/video/1
🐣 RT @OccupyDemocrats BREAKING — REVEALED: The REAL reason behind ICE’s run of deadly shootings — and it’s WORSE than ANYBODY thought. ¤ ICE just quietly confessed something TRULY HORRIFYING: agents were killing people because the White House demanded 2,000 arrests a day, no matter the human cost. […]
¤ https://x.com/OccupyDemocrats/status/2077106880078401726?s=20
WSJ: Ukraine Sea Drone Sinks Russian Ship Near Compound Said to Be Linked to Putin https://tinyurl.com/3nxbrvhj “The attack is the latest demonstration of the extent to which Ukrainian naval drones have helped Kyiv exercise greater control in the Black Sea.”
[TextLink:] https://x.com/Auriandra/status/2077201243538125309?s=20/photo/1
// Attack shows extent to which the drones have helped Kyiv exercise greater control in the Black Sea
A 200-foot-long vessel with a helicopter landing pad, the Emerald was operated by Russia’s FSB security service, rather than its regular military, according to the post. The FSB patrols Russia’s borders and has taken a leading role in Putin’s crackdown on domestic dissent.
Ukraine’s navy said that the Emerald took part in a November 2018 attack on Ukrainian ships in the Kerch strait, the narrow body of water separating the Russian mainland from Crimea peninsula, which Russia occupied and annexed from Ukraine in 2014.
Ukraine’s navy posted a satellite photo of the damaged ship, which appeared to have broken in half. The Russian town of Gelendzhik is less than 15 miles from an opulent palace that was the focus of an investigation by the late opposition activist Alexei Navalny.
TheAtlantic, Alex Reisner: Generative AI Is an Engineering Disaster https://tinyurl.com/yc3xf7v5 A shockingly inefficient trillion-dollar project. “At some point you have to learn to be a bit more efficient,” said an AI researcher at Microsoft.— Not “a bit.” A LOT!
[TextLink:] https://x.com/Auriandra/status/2077186597938778250?s=20/photo/1
As they scramble to keep their systems online, AI companies are making things expensive for the rest of us. Large language models such as ChatGPT and Claude are so resource-hungry that tech companies may be purchasing 70 percent of the world’s supply of high-end computer memory, causing a shortage. As a result, the prices of computer memory and storage are skyrocketing: Hard drives that I bought for my reporting two years ago for $350 each were $800 when I checked two weeks ago, and are now out of stock. The prices of some laptops have gone up as much as 50 percent, and low-cost computers are being hit the hardest. Affordable entry-level computers may “disappear by 2028” according to one forecast. And the memory shortage is expected to continue for years.
^
As they scramble to keep their systems online, AI companies are making things expensive for the rest of us. Large language models such as ChatGPT and Claude are so resource-hungry that tech companies may be purchasing 70 percent of the world’s supply of high-end computer memory, causing a shortage. As a result, the prices of computer memory and storage are skyrocketing: Hard drives that I bought for my reporting two years ago for $350 each were $800 when I checked two weeks ago, and are now out of stock. The prices of some laptops have gone up as much as 50 percent, and low-cost computers are being hit the hardest. Affordable entry-level computers may “disappear by 2028” according to one forecast. And the memory shortage is expected to continue for years.The memory is being put into data centers, which tech firms are expanding at incredible speed. They are planning to multiply total U.S.-data-center capacity by a factor of eight over the next few years. The demand for electricity at these sites is already so great that some companies are repurposing jet engines to power them. …
With generative AI, the work of building efficient, scalable systems has not been done. And the problem is exacerbated by the ever-larger generative-AI models, which have grown from 175 billion parameters in 2020 to more than 1 trillion today, according to independent estimates (the actual sizes of the models powering products such as Claude and ChatGPT are secret). The large in large language model should not be a selling point. But the industry’s observation that bigger models tend to outperform smaller ones has given rise to a totemic belief in “scaling laws” that suggest any problem can be solved by simply making models bigger. “Maybe with 10 gigawatts of compute, AI can figure out how to cure cancer,” OpenAI CEO Sam Altman wrote on his blog in September. …
Yet the returns are diminishing. The bigger an AI model is, the less it improves with each added parameter, and so it must be made bigger at a faster rate just to sustain steady progress. …
… [W]ith the massive investment behind the current bloated approach, there may not be much will to change. Ilya Sutskever, a co-founder and former chief scientist at OpenAI, said in a November interview that companies take the brute-force approach “because it gives you a very low-risk way of investing your resources.” It’s harder, he argued, to invest in research that would reengineer a product currently accruing trillion-dollar valuations. Those who suspect we are in an AI-driven bubble economy have pointed out that the profitability of these companies remains an open question, largely because of the high cost and inefficiency of the technology. …
Large language models do not scale logarithmically. When they’re given more words to process, they get slower and use more memory—the time and resources increase faster as the input grows. In technical terms, LLMs scale quadratically. Any computer-science student knows that this is very bad.
Epoch AI, an organization that tries to determine the costs of operating AI models, published a graph last year, which is reproduced here with permission. It shows the exponentially increasing costs of serving more “tokens”—the words users type to chatbots—with several public AI models.
AI does not have to be built this way. Traditionally, the goal of AI was to solve problems in ways that simulated human mental processes. Researchers observed their own thinking and tried to implement their mental habits in code. This approach has mostly been abandoned, partly due to the difficulty of discerning and articulating the rules of human thought, but it did have the benefit of consuming far fewer resources and data.
Today’s approach to AI doesn’t try to describe the rules of human thought; instead, it gives a computer millions of examples to imitate. The huge quantity of examples is one reason that large models can perform better than small ones when generating language, images, and music—they have more material to draw from. Some researchers want to bring back the old, more efficient approach and combine it with the modern approach, but so far these projects have not drawn nearly as much attention or funding as the models that power chatbots. […]
Ultimately, inefficiency may be of little concern to the people within the tech industry who believe that they are replicating intelligence itself. There is an almost-religious conviction among many in Silicon Valley that something mindlike could arise from LLMs, which are ultimately just statistical language-generating software—this, despite the software’s inability to recall basic facts, its lack of common sense, and its complete dissimilarity to a biological brain. Even Yann LeCun, one of AI’s “godfathers,” told The New York Times recently that “LLMs are not a path to superintelligence or even human-level intelligence.” But the mythological lure of AI is so strong that many engineers believe that nothing should stand in their way. Not even the basic task of writing efficient software.
🔆 This❗️⋙ 🐣 RT @DemzDeliver 🚨 BREAKING: Senate Democrats successfully block Republican effort to merge U.S. and Israeli militaries.
🧵 RT @ @USWPColby There is a great deal of hubbub about a collective “middle powers”strategy these days. ¤ At DoW, we are not concerned that this is a serious possibility. Rather, we are more concerned that a few allies and partners will *think it is* and waste valuable time, money, and political capital on a distraction. 1/
📌 https://x.com/USWPColby/status/2077060564900077620?s=20
[ThreadReader:] https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/2077060564900077620.html
⋙ 🐣 RT @Microinteracti1 [Gandalv] Adorable. The Department of War explaining that access to American weapons is “a privilege, not a right” is rather like a landlord lecturing tenants about loyalty while the roof is on fire and the rent has tripled.
¤ https://x.com/Microinteracti1/status/2077143483102498820?s=20
Let’s review the privilege. Iran, a sanctioned economy running on drones and spite, just spent weeks exposing the flagship American arsenal as exquisite, eye-wateringly expensive, and built for a war that ended thirty years ago. Meanwhile the F-35, your crown jewel, requires a maintenance entourage of roughly a hundred people per aircraft, a spare parts pipeline with a mood disorder, and a software licence that can be switched off from Washington whenever the president wakes up cross. Ukraine keeps ageing jets flying from motorway strips with a fraction of that. Turns out the privilege was the overhead all along.
And the reliability argument. You cannot threaten to abandon NATO on Monday, tariff your allies on Tuesday, and then present a “strong demand signal” on Wednesday as if nobody kept notes. Europe is not buying less American kit because we’re sulking. We’re buying less because a weapons system with a political kill switch attached to a four-year mood swing is a subscription service.
You say no one can replicate the American defence industrial base. Quite right. Nobody wants to. Why would anyone copy a factory optimised for the last war? Ukraine has shown Europe what the future actually looks like: cheap, fast, and built next door. Short supply lines, fail fast, and weapons that adapt in weeks rather than decades. While you spend twenty years and two trillion dollars perfecting one aircraft, a workshop outside Kyiv redesigns a drone on Tuesday because the jamming changed on Monday.
The “middle powers strategy” isn’t a distraction, and it isn’t a strategy either. It’s just what happens when the shopkeeper starts insulting the customers, doubling the prices, and musing openly about annexing one of them. Yes, we noticed the Greenland thing. Allies tend to remember when you threaten to take their territory. It’s an odd sales technique, coveting the customer’s house while lecturing him about loyalty.
So do carry on explaining that our engagement with you is a privilege. We’ll be over here, building the cheap fast stuff that actually wins wars, and checking the till twice.
TheAtlantic, Idrees Kahloon: Trump’s Anti-Growth Agenda https://tinyurl.com/yu2yvndh When a superpower’s economy lags, hegemony becomes unsustainable.
[…] Americans today enjoy material abundance … [T]hat is the reaped reward of scientific prowess, high-skilled immigration, the rule of law, free trade, and stable monetary policy—all of which Trump is jeopardizing in his current term.
… Much of America’s outperformance of Europe in the past two decades can be explained by greater efficiency in creating goods and services. The United States is still the best place in the world to be rewarded for inventions and other advancements. Yet the pace of future discoveries could soon decelerate. Out of distaste for elite universities and the study of disfavored subjects, the Trump administration suspended and canceled nearly 8,000 scientific grants in 2025, according to calculations by the journal Nature. The National Science Foundation and National Institutes of Health are issuing roughly 25 percent fewer grants than before Trump returned to office. Federal scientific agencies have seen their workforces slashed. If the president had his way with the federal budget, non-defense research funding would be cut by 35 percent.
One reason for America’s technological ascendance has been its capacity to siphon brainpower from the rest of the world. From 1901 to 2024, 410 Americans have won the Nobel Prize in chemistry, medicine, economics, and physics. Of those, 35 percent were immigrants. Today, America’s lead in AI depends on imported talent: 59 percent of the world’s top AI researchers work in the U.S., and more than 65 percent of them are foreign-born. Even seven out of 10 Chinese-educated AI researchers work in America today. A recent analysis found that 59 percent of America’s “unicorns”—private start-ups worth more than $1 billion—have at least one immigrant founder or co-founder.
… [T]he Trump administration’s hostility toward immigration is not limited to undocumented or low-skilled entrants. The president has attempted to add a $100,000 fee to applicants seeking H-1B visas, intended for skilled workers in health care and technology. The administration is also close to finalizing four-year limits on student visas—which would make most Ph.D. programs difficult to complete for international students.
In their book Why Nations Fail, the Nobel Prize–winning economists Daron Acemoglu and James A. Robinson argued that dependable, pluralistic institutions are essential for long-run growth. Perhaps the paramount proof for their case was the United States, a country that both respected property rights and allowed dominant companies to be replaced by competitors. These norms and institutions are buckling under the pressure. The president treats the law as a tool to punish enemies and reward friends.
… Under Trump, the federal government is gradually becoming more dirigiste, directly involving itself in the operation of businesses: seizing effective control of U.S. Steel, becoming the largest shareholder of Intel, asking for revenue from Nvidia’s chip sales to China. Far from avoiding conflicts of interest and the appearance of impropriety, the president is aggressively monetizing the office—earning $2 billion last year, largely from cryptocurrency sales. The president wields his pardon opportunity to reward his supporters, even those convicted of corruption in elected office and serious fraud. Such capricious governance has not immediately made America less hospitable for investment. However, the risk is not of imminent economic recession, but a steady erosion that becomes apparent only years from now.
Just as British might was once underwritten by the ascendancy of the pound, America benefits from the dollar’s status as the default currency of global commerce. The dollar’s place in international finance is sustained only in trust: in the strength of American institutions, in the full faith and credit of the Treasury, and in the stability of the global financial system. Trumpism is an attack on all three pillars. Trump has tried to undermine the independence of the Federal Reserve, which manages America’s monetary policy, more than any predecessor before him—pointing a weaponized justice system at its officials who do not bend to his will. Because of his tax cuts, the American debt has continued to grow at an extraordinary rate. Trump’s unilateral imposition of sweeping tariffs on the rest of the world—and the abusive way he speaks of allies—weaken trust in both Pax Americana and the dominance of the dollar.
Trump has committed his administration to an idiosyncratic vision of American greatness. It is a greatness so internally brittle that it requires extraordinary governmental pressure against institutions and people who disagree with the administration’s aims. Yet it is also so self-assured that America can safely jettison the postwar international order it built, in trade and military alliances, without risk to American supremacy. …
… Today’s advantages in artificial intelligence will be hard to maintain unless the United States keeps attracting the field’s best minds—especially given the declining literacy and numeracy of American students. Building supply chains that exclude China would be easier if allies were not also charged high tariffs. Disregarding the eventual harms of climate change does not just affect future Americans; it also cedes the field of clean-energy technology to China.…
A world order led by China’s authoritarian rulers will still be less attractive than the American-led one that Trump is creating. But the more mercurial the United States acts—the more markets are balkanized, private wealth is contingent on political favor—the less advantage the rest of the world will see in choosing Washington over Beijing. –
… [F]our years of such policies will still take a serious toll, both on quantifiable measures such as health-care costs and scientific capacity and unquantifiable ones such as the trust that allies place in America’s security guarantees. Furthermore, Trumpism may linger as the dominant ideology in the GOP even after Trump leaves office. The irony is that policies intended to “make America great again” would instead push it toward Britain’s fate. …
Reflecting on what turned out to be his country’s apogee, Kipling wrote a memento mori, presciently reminding his compatriots that power is inevitably transient. Trump entertains no such thought. “We will always be the best,” he said in his July 4 speech. Perhaps this really is, as the president claimed, “the dawn of the golden age of America.” Or maybe the United States is eroding its supremacy right now—all of its own accord.
⭕ 13 Jul 2026
NYT: Judge Denounces Trump’s I.R.S. Suit as Improper Exercise in Self-Dealing https://tinyurl.com/4skffrrt “The decision also recommended disciplinary action against the lawyers involved, including the acting attorney general, Todd Blanche.”
🐣 RT @nexta_tv ❤️ QUOTE OF THE DAY © ¤ “We’re not touching the Crimean Bridge. Let them f**k off through it.” ¤ Commander of Ukraine’s Unmanned Systems Forces, Robert “Madyar” Brovdi, said that destroying the Crimean Bridge is not the current priority. Instead, Ukraine is focused on disrupting Russian logistics and making life in occupied Crimea untenable.
➔ “We’re creating conditions that make staying on the peninsula unbearable. Let all those millions f**king leave for Russia via that bridge,” he said in an interview with Irish journalist Caolán Robertson.
🧵 RT @ZelenskyyUa President Trump and I have reached an important deal on licenses to produce Patriot systems. Our teams are now working to implement this truly historic political agreement. We worked toward this for a very long time. ¤ But we always stress one thing – the more diverse our defense is, the harder it will be for our enemies to undermine security in Europe. That is why we need to move faster on Patriots, and SAMP/T, IRIS-T, NASAMS, and, of course, our FREYJA project. […]
📌 https://x.com/ZelenskyyUa/status/2076744266265587913?s=20
🐣 RT @KerryKennedyRFK The U.S. has had a complicated and often troubling relationship with the International Criminal Court (ICC) from the very beginning, but the newly launched State Department’s campaign under Rubio’s leadership goes much further: it seeks not simply to reject the Court’s jurisdiction, but to dismantle an institution created to hold perpetrators of the world’s gravest crimes accountable. And what has become a signature approach of this Administration: to bully our allies into joining that effort. ¤ International justice is not a threat to sovereignty. Impunity is a threat to humanity. … [StateDept link:] https://tinyurl.com/yu9m6p2s
¤ https://x.com/KerryKennedyRFK/status/2076775053405081903?s=20
🐣 RT @OJoelsen Greenland Institute of Natural Resources Suspends New Cooperation with the United States
¤ https://x.com/OJoelsen/status/2076720056528941327?s=20
The Natural Resources Institute has decided to halt all new collaborations and travel involving the United States. Instead, it is shifting its focus toward cooperation within the Kingdom of Denmark and with European countries.
The Director of the Natural Resources Institute, Josephine Nymand, says the institute will no longer enter into new partnerships with the United States.¤ She previously served as Chair of the Research Council, where she worked to strengthen scientific cooperation with Greenland’s western neighbor.
Since then, the situation has changed significantly—particularly after January, when the United States spent an extended period refusing to rule out taking over the country by military force.
“We have collaborations that were established before all of this happened. We will continue those because they involve researchers we have worked with for many years and whom we trust,” says Josephine Nymand. “—However, we are not entering into new agreements or projects with U.S. partners whom we do not already know.”
In recent weeks, KNR has reported that the alleged influence agent Tom Dans has become Chairman of the U.S. Arctic Research Commission. ¤ This has prompted warnings from two prominent research figures: U.S. affairs expert Rasmus Sinding Søndergaard from the Danish Institute for International Studies, and Marianne Holmer, Chair of Denmark’s Research Committee and a member of the Royal Danish Academy of Sciences and Letters.
Josephine Nymand explains that only a few months ago, Tom Dans attended a conference in Aarhus where the Natural Resources Institute was also present. ¤ She says the institute was aware of his whereabouts throughout the event so that its representatives could avoid interacting with him.
Break with the United States
It is not only new research partnerships that have been suspended. The Natural Resources Institute has also halted all travel to the United States.“We have instructed our staff and researchers that, as a general rule, they should not travel to the United States for conferences, meetings, research, or similar activities.”
According to Josephine Nymand, there are several reasons why cooperation with the United States is no longer considered appropriate. ¤ One reason, she explains, is that the Trump administration has censored certain research because it contained terminology that did not align with its views on diversity. —KNR
🐣 RT @NSTRIKE1231 ❗️❗️❗️🇵🇱 Polish Foreign Minister Radosław Sikorski delivered a sharp assessment of the Kremlin’s actual military capabilities, dismissing Moscow’s aggressive rhetoric toward Warsaw as mathematically and strategically empty.
¤ https://x.com/NSTRIKE1231/status/2076616805540356591?s=20
Sikorski completely dismantled the myth of Russian military supremacy, quipping that while the world previously assumed Vladimir Putin commanded the globe’s second most powerful army, it has now become clear that he merely commands the second most powerful army inside Ukraine.
Addressing the direct threat landscape, the Foreign Minister emphasized that Poland has meticulously calculated its national security posture against Russian expansionism for approximately 500 years and has no intention of lowering its guard. While Warsaw treats every hostile statement with absolute seriousness given Russia’s historical record of invasions, Sikorski firmly stated that Putin currently lacks the conventional military resources to launch an attack on Poland. At most, he noted, the Kremlin can resort to localized hybrid provocations.
He backed his assessment by pointing directly to the frontlines, highlighting that even after nearly 13 years of relentless warfare and proxy operations, the Russian military has proven utterly incapable of fully conquering the Donbas.
🧵 RT @MacFarlaneNews FLASH: Federal judge in Florida has released a scathing takedown of Trump’s slush fund, Trump’s sweetheart IRS immunity deal and the lawsuit Trump filed against his own IRS ¤ Judge orders sanctions and possible bar discipline against Trump’s lawyers in lawsuit.
📌 https://x.com/MacFarlaneNews/status/2076695053758517723?s=20
[CourtDoc:] https://tinyurl.com/2pz8e782 56p
⭕ 12 Jul 2026
🐣 RT @panyiszabolcs Inside Moscow’s elite Bauman University, a secret department trains the GRU’s next-gen hackers, saboteurs, and spies. Leaked documents now expose how its graduates feed the units behind Russia’s cyberattacks, election interference, and NATO sabotage. [link:] https://tinyurl.com/y79p4tta
🐣 RT @BohuslavskaKate Rep. McCaul: I’ve visited drone manufacturers in Ukraine. There’re some American companies here, lot of Ukrainian companies, some European NATO countries here.
💽 https://x.com/BohuslavskaKate/status/2076348795239923916?s=20/video/1
They’re manufacturing modern advanced warfare systems. We’d be losers and it’d be foolish not to be full participants.
We need to cooperate with Ukraine and co-produce these advanced weapon systems in Ukraine and near eastern flank of NATO.
We have an amazing opportunity to work with Ukrainians to advance our weapon systems in a faster, more innovative way.
It’s a wonderful idea that has broad-based bipartisan support.
🔄 💙 🐣 Hero. Leader. Champion.
🖼 https://x.com/Auriandra/status/2076354807846064404?s=20/photo/1
This is the guy that Trump tried to bribe into blackmailing Biden and Putin tried to bully into giving up his country. He was a comedian who became a leader in an age where leaders everywhere became clowns. What a fucking champion. #Zelenskiy
🐣 RT @BulwarkOnline “Two deeper structural reforms are essential. First, strip the executive of the massive powers that have accumulated over the last century. Second, make the powers retained by the executive subject to greater oversight with real consequences for abuse.”
⋙ TheBulwark: After Trump: Proposals for a Post-Authoritarian America https://tinyurl.com/mt3jxn65 “How Democrats can lead the charge for a new Reconstruction—if they can avoid becoming what they defeat.”
🐣 RT @highbrow_nobrow Marco Rubio: “For years to come, there are many people on the right…that are going to be having to explain and justify how they fell into this trap of supporting Donald Trump because this is not going to end well.” (Mar 2016)
💽 https://x.com/highbrow_nobrow/status/2076322954099454226?s=20/video/1
// CNN chryon: RUBIO: TRUMP RHETORIC LIKE “THIRD-WORLD STRONG MEN”
🐣 RT @WW3finalboss 🇺🇸🇺🇦🇷🇺 MCFAUL SAYS ZELENSKYY NOW HAS CARDS ¤ “Trump used to tell Zelenskyy: You don’t have the cards”. Zelenskyy answered: “This is not a game, this is a war.”
¤ https://x.com/WW3finalboss/status/2076298247715397797?s=20
Now Trump sees that Zelenskyy has cards. The balance of power is changing, and that is why he may be more willing to help Ukraine.” – Michael McFaul 🇺🇸
“The West’s biggest mistake was worrying too much about what Putin thought.
That started long before the full-scale invasion. It was a mistake at the Bucharest NATO summit, during the war against Georgia and in the response that followed.” – Michael McFaul 🇺🇸
“We failed to help democratic institutions take root in Russia after the Soviet Union collapsed. I supported that effort. We failed. I personally feel responsibility for that failure.” – Michael McFaul 🇺🇸
“Putin will not use nuclear weapons.
He understands the consequences. China and India would isolate Russia if he crossed that line. Putin has made many mistakes, but he is not a stupid man.” – Michael McFaul 🇺🇸
McFaul’s point is clear: Ukraine 🇺🇦 is no longer seen only through fear of Russian 🇷🇺 escalation. It is increasingly seen through leverage, battlefield adaptation and shifting power.
For years, the West worried too much about Putin’s reaction and too little about the cost of hesitation.
Now Ukraine is proving that strength changes politics. Zelenskyy’s cards are not a game. They are resistance, capability and the growing reality that Russia can be forced back.
🐣 📋 RT @CSIS Combined Russian and Ukrainian casualties in the war in Ukraine have exceeded 2 million. The ratio of Russian to Ukrainian casualties likely climbed to nearly 8-to-1 in the first half of 2026, up from between 2:1 and 3:1 for much of the war.
⋙ CSIS: Russian Blood and Treasure: The Ballooning Costs of Putin’s War https://tinyurl.com/yn7bhmsd
⭕ 11 Jul 2026
🐣 RT @anders_aslund Russia’s giant size is no longer strategic depth, but an enormous weakness. ¤ Long transportation is needed & can be attacked anywhere. ¤ Russia can only defend a few spots. ¤ Ukraine has invalidated Russia’s whole strategy since the Napoleonic wars.
💙 🐣 RT @KellyScaletta I worked with Chat to generate this graph, but I find it interesting. There are two maps. The one on the left is how much counties pay vs. receive in federal taxes.
🌎 ◕ https://x.com/KellyScaletta/status/2075986375438979088?s=20/photo/1
Blue means you pay more in taxes than you get back. Red means you get back more than you pay.
The chart on the right shows population density.
When taken together, it shows that the more urban a community is, the less return you get on taxes. The less populated a county is, the more return it gets in taxes.
This turns the whole “big cities take all our tax dollars” stigma on its head.
🐣 RT @Kasparov63 As I wrote a year ago, watch the actions of the Trump admin through the eyes of someone who has watched democracy turn into autocracy. Centralizing election authority, expanding federalized troops and putting them in the streets, cracking down on the press. It’s not original.
⋙ 🐣 RT @BillKristol So military troops under the direct control of Trump and Hegseth will be on the streets of our nation’s capital for the rest of Trump’s term. The rationale—they’re here to help with a crime emergency—is laughable. But of course the real reason is ominous.
🐣 📊 PewResearch (June 18, 2026): Widespread lack of confidence in Trump https://tinyurl.com/42hvweam
(Trump’s favorability in the US is in the low- to mid-30s)
◕ https://x.com/Auriandra/status/2075833598423228434?s=20/photo/1
⭕ 10 Jul 2026
🐣 RT @LetsArmUKR Petr Pavel didn’t drop some bombshell intelligence in that Telegraph interview. He simply said what every serious analyst already knows:
¤ https://x.com/LetsArmUKR/status/2075795022641865024?s=20
Putin will not touch mobilization before the September Duma elections because even his own circus needs a veneer of normalcy. After the votes are counted the window slams shut and another wave becomes inevitable. Not because of some mystical deadline, but because 721 thousand troops cannot finish the job in Donbas, let alone deliver the maximalist prize Putin still openly demands: the whole of Ukraine.
Strip away the polite diplomatic phrasing and the reality is brutal. Moscow is bleeding men faster than it can recruit them. Ukrainian forces are currently destroying around 35,000 invaders per month, more than the Kremlin can sustainably mobilize even with coercion. Every fresh wave of meat just accelerates the math. Z-bloggers and Kremlin mouthpieces quietly admit it: more bodies do not change the trajectory, they only increase the corpse count charged to Moscow’s account.
This is not speculation. It is the observable trend on the battlefield. Ukrainian long-range strike capacity is growing month by month. By the end of 2026 those capabilities will be two to five times stronger. Operational-level logistics will burn, Crimea will be isolated, and the occupiers’ rear areas will keep exploding on a daily schedule. Moscow has no path to victory left, only the ability to prolong the slaughter and terrorize civilians while it still can.
The useful idiots in the West who keep whispering about “negotiations” or “frozen conflicts” are either ignorant or actively laundering Kremlin talking points. Putin cannot stop this war even if he wanted to. Demobilizing a million traumatized conscripts and sending them home to ask what the hell they were sacrificed for is political suicide for a regime that rules by fear and imperial myth. The only off-ramp is complete military defeat on the battlefield. Everything else is theater.
Europe should stop treating Ukraine as a charity case and start seeing it for what it is: the only force currently capable of grinding down the imperial threat so the rest of the continent does not have to. Every drone, every shell, every sanctioned barrel of oil is cheaper than stationing your own troops on the eastern flank after Moscow finishes digesting its neighbor. Pavel is right that pressure must continue. The only correction is that two months was always optimistic. The real countdown is measured in Russian corpses and Ukrainian resolve, and that clock is ticking faster than the Kremlin can reload.
🐣 RT @AntiToxicPeople These are the words of an unhinged psychopath.
[TextLink:] https://x.com/AntiToxicPeople/status/2075784334616018955?s=20/photo/1
🐣 RT @realDonaldTrump 1000 Missiles are Locked and Loaded and aimed at the Islamic Republic of Iran, with thousands of more to immediately follow, should the Iranian Government act on its threat, pronounced in many corners of the Globe, to assassinate, or attempt to assassinate, the sitting President of the United States of America, in this case, ME!
Orders have already been given, and the U.S. Military is ready, willing, and able, for a one year period of time, subject to extension, to completely decimate and destroy all areas of Iran – PRAISE BE TO [———]! President DONALD J. TRUMP
🐣 RT @myzccc [tr] 🔴 From Italian Prime Minister Meloni to Trump: We are no one’s lackey; freedom comes at a price.
💽 https://x.com/myzccc/status/2075623122246787384?s=20/video/1
For 80 years, we entrusted our security to the United States, thinking it was without strings attached—it wasn’t. The price turned out to be being held on a leash.
Freedom may be expensive, but it’s better than being America’s puppet.
Europe must now build a NATO pillar that stands on its own, as strong and respected as the United States; one that can sit at the table with the world.
🐣 RT @CREWcrew ICYMI: The DC District Court rejected the government’s request for a stay of its decision in which it ordered the administration to shut down its massive database consolidating millions of Americans’ personal info. ¤ Another victory for voters!
🔆 This❗️⋙ 🐣 RT @KyivPost China has responded harshly to Russian nuclear threats for the first time, Zelensky said. ¤ According to European leaders, Beijing warned Moscow that there could be no discussion of using nuclear weapons against Ukraine. [link:] https://tinyurl.com/25tjjkx5
TheAtlantic, Shane Harris: CIA Officers Can Sense the Threat Within https://tinyurl.com/3tv3xyvv “A survey’s comments show how acutely some of them feel pressured to reach preferred outcomes instead of following the facts wherever they lead“
// A survey reveals concern among the rank and file that Trump-administration meddling is undermining intelligence work.
🐣 RT @NYMag Hours before Donald Trump addressed the nation on its 250th anniversary, the National Mall was in chaos. [link:] https://nymag.visitlink.me/vZADFB
¤ https://x.com/NYMag/status/2075686512608588046?s=20
A storm was on the way, and law enforcement had ordered the MAGA faithful to evacuate — a process that did not go smoothly. People had waited in the extreme heat for hours to celebrate Trump and America; now they argued with the Secret Service and chanted “USA, USA” out of fury.
By now the mess is familiar. The Great American State Fair attracted small crowds; some states even declined to participate. Bret Michaels backed out, and so did Martina McBride. A mock-up of Trump’s triumphal arch oozed a puslike substance, and a robot dog danced alone in the mud. Nearby, the reflecting pool sat green and full of algae, lethal to ducklings and irresistible to protesters, who demonstrated next to it in costume. Two days before the storm, a portion of the stage broke off and nearly struck dancers who were in the middle of a rehearsal.
Trump’s tastes have always been entertaining, if garish, writes Sarah Jones. Lately, though, the seams are fraying. “If Trump can’t throw a good party or make everything golden, what’s left? Loyalists have leaned on MAGA for glitz and a little excitement. Without spectacle, the future of the movement is in jeopardy.”
🐣 RT @ BlueGeorgia Donald Trump on housing affordability.
💽 https://x.com/BlueGeorgia/status/2075613497002430695?s=20/video/1
“It’s so unimportant.”
“It’s a yawn. Just about everything is a big yawn.”
“I don’t think about Americans’ financial situation.”
“I don’t think about anybody.”
“I don’t care about the midterms.”
“I love the inflation.”
“I don’t want to drive housing prices down, I want to drive housing prices up
🐣 RT @RepMcCaul It was an honor to meet with President Zelenskyy today after his successful meeting with President Trump that resulted in a licensing agreement to build Patriot Interceptors. It was also an honor to receive the Medal of Freedom award, Ukraine’s highest civilian award.
¤ https://x.com/RepMcCaul/status/2075671594232328396?s=20
⋙ 🐣 RT @ ZelenskyyUa I met with Michael McCaul @RepMcCaul Chairman Emeritus of the U.S. House Committee on Foreign Affairs. I’m grateful for the bipartisan support and for attention to Ukraine.
Michael congratulated Ukraine on a successful NATO Summit in Ankara. I briefed him on the outcomes of my meeting with the President of the United States. The Summit was indeed a success for us. Licenses to produce future Patriot systems in Ukraine – this is very important to us. We expect that our teams will be able to deliver on this swiftly.
We also discussed the situation on the battlefield, Russia’s attacks against Ukraine, and our long-range responses. The fuel situation in Russia is the result of Ukrainian technology at work. And we are ready to develop this capability – especially in drones – together with our partners who have stood with us from the very beginning. We already have the framework to do that: the Drone Deal. And we discussed how it could work between our two countries. Thank you.
🐣 RT @KubiliusA NATO published interesting data on defence spending in 2026. ¤ Some takeaways ⬇️
1. Baltics and Poland are leading in how much of GDP they are spending on defence. The USA is Nr.9. …
◕ https://x.com/KubiliusA/status/2075511441864413296?s=20/photo/1
// NATO defense spending
🐣 RT @NSTRIKE1231 🇷🇺 The Kremlin has been forced into a humiliating and unprecedented public admission, officially conceding that Ukraine’s relentless long-range kamikaze drone campaign has fractured Russia’s energy infrastructure and triggered a catastrophic domestic fuel crisis.
¤ https://x.com/NSTRIKE1231/status/2075570203761803716?s=20
In a stunning break from Moscow’s rigid propaganda narrative, Russian Deputy Prime Minister Alexander Novak openly confessed to severe structural deficits, widespread fuel shortages, and rolling closures at gas stations across the country. Novak explicitly blamed the rapidly spiraling domestic emergency on the fact that Russia’s massive refinery networks have been heavily crippled and knocked offline due to devastating Ukrainian aerial “strikes,” leaving the state’s processing hubs trapped in a state of permanent emergency repairs.
This high-level capitulation shatters months of Kremlin attempts to minimize the impact of Ukraine’s systematic deep-strike campaign. By publicly acknowledging that Kyiv’s drone fleet has successfully choked domestic supply and sparked panic buying at the pumps, the Russian leadership has exposed its absolute inability to protect its most critical economic assets, proving that Ukraine’s asymmetrical air strategy is successfully inducing a state of systemic industrial paralysis deep inside the Russian homeland.
NYT, David Lawrence: This Is a Lot More Worrying Than the Supreme Court’s Ruling on Executive Power https://tinyurl.com/5d3xft2f //➔ Trump moves on AI like a Communist
⭕ 9 Jul 2026
🐣 RT @anneapplebaum There are many small ways to cheat. And they will try all of them
🐣 RT @maddenifico Trump’s Deranged Authoritarian Coup: Firing the FEC to Annihilate Democracy and Rig the 2026 Midterms
¤ https://x.com/maddenifico/status/2075398944016765256?s=20
In a psychotic escalation straight out of a dictator’s playbook, Donald Trump has now fired the three remaining members of the Federal Election Commission after his disgusting voter suppression bill, the SAVE Act, was rejected.
Drunk on power and protected by a spineless, corrupt Supreme Court that just handed him the keys to the kingdom, Trump has obliterated the last remaining guardrail against total electoral domination. The FEC — the independent agency that polices campaign finance and prevents outright cheating — is now gone. Destroyed. Neutralized.
This madman didn’t get the laws he wanted to rig the game, so he simply eliminated the referees entirely.
With the 2026 midterms just 100 days away, Trump has removed every institutional obstacle standing between him and absolute control of the ballot box. This isn’t politics anymore. This is a full-blown authoritarian takeover happening in real time.
He’s not even pretending. This is a naked, shameless power grab by a deranged tyrant who sees democracy as nothing more than an annoying speed bump on his path to unchecked rule. Congress won’t help him cheat? Fine — he’ll fire the watchdogs. Courts won’t stop him? Even better.
America is now staring directly into the abyss. A rogue president has just dismantled the final firewall protecting free and fair elections, and the country is sleepwalking toward one of the darkest, most illegitimate election cycles in its history.
This is how democracies die — not with tanks in the streets, but with a smiling autocrat in a suit signing termination letters while the institutions meant to stop him cheer him on or cower in fear.
We are on the precipice — and this dangerous, unhinged madman is shoving us over the edge.
🐣 RT @MarkWarner Reports that the White House has dismissed the remaining members of the Election Assistance Commission — all of whom were unanimously confirmed by the Senate, including a commissioner appointed by President Trump himself — should concern every American, regardless of party, …
¤ https://x.com/MarkWarner/status/2075384278611824725?s=20
… [T]he EAC was established by Congress as an independent, bipartisan body to help states administer secure and credible elections.
If these reports are accurate, removing every remaining commissioner just months before the 2026 midterm elections is an extraordinary step that demands an immediate explanation from the administration and raises profound concerns about political interference in the institutions that support our elections.
🐣 RT @PeterAPatriot @Grok: Taking into account Trump’s actions since 2020—including efforts to challenge election results, recent appointments, and this EAC decision—what overall risk score (1–100) would an impartial political scientist assign to concerns about executive influence over election administration? Explain with evidence, not speculation.
¤ https://x.com/PeterAPatriot/status/2075399944928641345?s=20
⋙ 🐣 RT @Grok An impartial political scientist would note these facts: U.S. elections are decentralized, with states holding primary constitutional authority. The EAC develops voluntary voting guidelines, certifies equipment, and offers technical support/funding guidance under HAVA—it has no regulatory power to run or control elections.
Commissioners are presidential appointees (bipartisan structure via congressional recommendations). The firings align with the 2026 Supreme Court ruling expanding removal authority for executive agency leaders. Trump’s 2020 challenges proceeded through courts and legislatures without altering certified outcomes. Prior 2025 executive directives to the EAC on citizenship verification and equipment standards faced court blocks for exceeding presidential authority.
Institutional federalism, state processes, judicial review, and congressional oversight constrain centralized executive control. Rhetoric since 2020 heightens perceptions of risk, but evidence of decisive impact on election integrity remains limited. ¤ Risk score: 35/100.
😝 WaPo: Rubio tries to enlist other nations in antifa fight, but some allies recoil https://tinyurl.com/4cxtvsux 😆 😂 😝 Good luck with that! 😆 😂 😝
‼️ 🐣 RT @RpsAgainstTrump NEW: Donald Trump has terminated the remaining members of the independent, federal commission that assists election administration officials nationwide just a few months before the midterm elections [Guardian link:] https://tinyurl.com/52jhzzj3
[TextLink:] https://x.com/RpsAgainstTrump/status/2075424377907052734?s=20/photo/1
“It is irresponsible and dangerous that this Administration remains dead set on causing chaos for our election officials across this country,” Arizona secretary of state Adrian Fontes said in a Thursday statement. “This move undermines the integrity of nonpartisan election administration.”
🐣 RT @DefenceU Results of the 36th NATO Summit for Ukraine: @NATO will allocate $80 billion for Ukraine’s defence in 2026, with the same level of support planned for 2027.
¤ https://x.com/DefenceU/status/2075252229699699060?s=20
🇳🇴 Norway commits over $306 million for Patriot missiles. Sourced from existing stocks and new production orders.
🇩🇪 Germany and Ukraine will jointly produce Bars missile-drones. Germany funds production on its territory, every unit goes to Ukraine.
Ukraine signed three more Drone Deals: with 🇪🇪 Estonia, 🇳🇱 the Netherlands, and 🇩🇰 Denmark.
The goal is to scale up production of drones and military tech.A new defence bank, DSRB, with funding of up to $134 billion, announced by the leaders of 🇨🇦 Canada, 🇦🇱 Albania, 🇧🇪 Belgium, 🇬🇷 Greece, 🇱🇻 Latvia, 🇱🇺 Luxembourg, 🇷🇴 Romania, and 🇹🇷 Türkiye.
Ukraine has been invited to join as a founding state. DSRB will provide low-interest loans for defence projects.The Ankara agreements advance the core priorities of Ukraine’s defence strategy: technological superiority on the battlefield and win-win partnerships.
🐣 RT @kyledcheney NEW: In the one year since ICE adopted a massive expansion of mandatory detention — aimed at people with years-long roots in the U.S. and nearly all without criminal records — federal courts have overruled them at least 15,000 times.
◕ https://x.com/kyledcheney/status/2075208424275525757?s=20/photo/1
⋙ 🐣 RT @kyledcheney The rebuke has cut across ideological lines. More than 465 judges have rejected ICE’s new approach, including a majority of Trump appointees to consider it. ¤ That legal rout has continued in the appeals courts. Now, the admin and ACLU are asking SCOTUS to resolve a crucial question: ¤ How much process are ICE detainees — how have NOT yet been ordered deported — due? [Politico link:] https://tinyurl.com/mvummmx8
🐣 RT @kyledcheney NEW: In the one year since ICE adopted a massive expansion of mandatory detention — aimed at people with years-long roots in the U.S. and nearly all without criminal records — federal courts have overruled them at least 15,000 times.
◕ https://x.com/kyledcheney/status/2075208424275525757?s=20/photo/1
😂 RT @AzPetrich It’s official and its awesome! The dance has a name. The Epstein shuffle. ¤ Thank you, Belgium. 🇧🇪 ❤️ 👏
🖼 https://x.com/AzPetrich/status/2075218364335874475?s=20/photo/1
🐣 📊 RT @benny0692698414 🇺🇸 New Poll: Most Americans Oppose Taking Control of Greenland ¤ A new national poll shows that a clear majority of Americans do not support the idea of the United States taking control of Greenland. //➔ CBSNews/YouGov (Jan 6-9, 2026, not “new”)
◕ https://x.com/benny0692698414/status/2075233871088562346?s=20/photo/1
Key findings:
• 75% oppose a U.S. attempt to take control of Greenland.
• 52% strongly oppose the idea.
• 25% support it.The results suggest that most Americans do not favor changing Greenland’s current status. Greenland remains a self-governing territory within the Kingdom of Denmark, and both the Greenlandic and Danish governments have repeatedly stated that Greenland is not for sale.
Source: CNN/SSRS National Poll (January 2026)
🐣 RT @marlene4719 Belgian PM Bart De Wever, says what Rutte, if he had balls, would tell Trump:“NATO Article 5 says, if you are attacked, then we will all defend each other together. ¤ The article does not say if you yourself decide unilaterally to attack another country, all the other partners have to participate in that.”
🐣 RT @NSTRIKE1231 🇺🇦🇺🇸GOOD NEWS | Ukraine is about to lock down its airspace with a massive influx of American and European air defense firepower, leaving Russia’s incoming missile waves rushing into a lethal wall of high-tech interceptors.
¤ https://x.com/NSTRIKE1231/status/2075303155944853871?s=20
President Volodymyr Zelensky officially announced that a fresh emergency batch of American Patriot interceptor missiles will arrive in theater within the coming days. In a parallel breakthrough, Zelensky confirmed he has secured distinct bilateral agreements with key European allies to deliver an even larger supply of advanced, hit-to-kill PAC-3 missiles. While the exact operational arrival dates for the European contribution remain highly classified, the imminent arrival of the American shipments ensures Ukraine’s air defense grid will be immediately replenished to combat mounting Kremlin aerial campaigns.
This rapid re-armament shatters Russia’s strategy of trying to bleed out Ukraine’s air defenses through sheer mass. By securing an immediate influx of top-tier Western interceptors alongside guaranteed long-term PAC-3 commitments from Europe, Kyiv is proving that its defensive shield can be fortified faster than Moscow can manufacture its missiles, effectively reducing Putin’s multi-million-dollar bombardment strategies to a complete exercise in futility.
NYT, Bethany McLean: It’s a World-Class Investment. It’s a Junk Investment. What Is Going on With SpaceX? https://tinyurl.com/yxt6et3f “As for Mr. Musk: Doubters have argued for years that he’s a just modern-day P.T. Barnum, a showman who never really delivers on his promises”
🐣 RT @marceelias 🚨BREAKING: A federal judge in Washington, D.C. has denied the Department of Homeland Security’s request to pause her order shutting down use of its modified SAVE system to certify registered voters’ citizenship status.
⋙ DemocracyDocket: DHS citizenship database must remain suspended, D.C. judge says in scathing opinion https://tinyurl.com/5cx86wt3
🐣 RT @AmUkrCommittee 🛡️Seven bipartisan Members of Congress have called on the Administration to conclude a framework agreement with Ukraine and European allies for joint production of air defense systems and unmanned systems.
¤ https://x.com/AmUkrCommittee/status/2075219290286895201?s=20
In a letter sent July 8, the lawmakers stress that Ukraine is running dangerously low on PAC-3 interceptors, the only true defense against Russian ballistic missiles, while Russia continues its strikes on civilians. Their message: joint US–Ukraine production is the fastest path to protecting civilians, rebuilding allied stockpiles, and strengthening American manufacturing at home. …
🐣 RT @MarcoFoster_ [5/13) President Obama on Iran: “We pulled it off without firing a missile. We got 97% of their enriched uranium out. There’s no dispute that. It worked and we didn’t have to kill a whole bunch of people or shut down the Strait of Hormuz”
🐣 RT @michaeldweiss NEW: We obtained a classified tranche of documents prepared by the Chinese and Russian military proposing an unprecedented level of integrated aerospace defense between the two countries. One of their targets? The @Starlink satellite constellation, which they see as a major threat, thanks to its use in the ongoing war in Ukraine, and now aim to countermand with cyber attacks or simply by shooting down @elonmusk’s property in Low Earth orbit:
⋙ TheInsider: Shooting Starlink: The “no limits” partnership between Russia and China is taking aim at Elon Musk https://tinyurl.com/2rfxry8d
Secret documents from a series of clandestine Russian-Chinese military forums reveal a joint plan to defeat Elon Musk’s Starlink and a weapons development partnership far deeper than either country will admit. From air- and missile-defense systems to AI-enhanced drone capabilities, cooperation between Moscow and Beijing is allowing Russian forces to keep pace with Ukrainian innovations while China gains the opportunity to test its wares under combat conditions. Although the threat of increased Western sanctions continues to place constraints on their “no limits” partnership, Russia and China are moving forward with several joint projects — and former U.S. military officers are concerned about Washington’s will to stop them.
⭕ 8 Jul 2026
🐣 RT @ddale8 Leaving aside his false claim that nobody else has settled a war, here are the eight items on President Trump’s “ended eight wars” list:
¤ https://x.com/ddale8/status/2075018026399752344?s=20
– A diplomatic dispute between Egypt and Ethiopia that was never a war
– Some sort of mystery situation between Serbia and Kosovo that also wasn’t a war under Trump
– The war in the eastern DRC that has never actually ended despite a US-brokered peace agreement
– The 12-day war between Israel and Iran last year, though Israel proceeded to join the US in going to war with Iran this year
– The war between Israel and Hamas, though Israel has continued to conduct near-daily attacks in Gaza despite a US-brokered ceasefire
– An India-Pakistan ceasefire Pakistan vocally credits Trump for but India claims Trump had nothing to do with
– The Armenia-Azerbaijan peace agreement and Thailand-Cambodia ceasefire in which all parties say Trump/his team was indeed a significant factor
TheAtlantic, Tom Nichols: Iran, Not Trump, Is in Control of This War The cease-fire was always just a Trump fantasy. https://tinyurl.com/68d45zp8 “This is the flailing of a man who’s in over his head and is reacting to events, rather than guiding them”
[TextLink:] https://x.com/Auriandra/status/2075158771337171241?s=20/photo/1
[…] The Trump administration, for its part, bumbled into this war without a strategy. Instead, it relied on bad assumptions, outdated information, and the president’s gut feelings. It assumed—because the president wished very hard—that the Iranian regime would collapse quickly. Trump and Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth (who encouraged Trump to go to war) ignored years of analysis and war-gaming from the military and the intelligence community, and then were caught flat-footed when the Iranians closed the strait and choked the international economy, the one thing everyone else in the world knew they would do. The administration has since tried to bomb its way out of this war, but without the ability to hold territory, the United States is now merely depleting its stocks of expensive ordnance to little strategic effect.
^
Even by his usual standards, Trump has been incoherent in Ankara, Turkey, where he’s attending a NATO summit. Over the course of 24 hours, he has renewed his demands for the United States to own Greenland; confused Iran with Japan; and confused Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky with Russian President Vladimir Putin. He also noted that his videos are popular on “Tic Tac.” He meant “TikTok.” …This is not the approach of a president who’s running a war; this is the flailing of a man who’s in over his head and is reacting to events, rather than guiding them. Lest this kind of equivocation lead the Iranians to doubt Trump’s resolve, the president has added that he’s still considering two other terrible ideas: an invasion of Iranian territory, and a campaign of probable war crimes. […]
TheAtlantic, David Graham: The Supreme Court Ruling That Further Politicizes Everyday Life https://tinyurl.com/3a2saz2h Trump v. Slaughter isn’t just about expanding executive control—it’s about the government exerting partisan influence over more aspects of Americans’ everyday lives.
[TextLink:] https://x.com/Auriandra/status/2075136294888292758?s=20/photo/1
What Trump v. Slaughter means for most people is that the president now has much greater control over many of the parts of the government that affect us most directly. In other words, partisan politics will start infringing on areas of life where they have hitherto been remote or absent. Seeking the overturning of Humphrey’s Executor was a goal laid out in Project 2025, the policy plan that has become a road map for the Trump administration. Project 2025 seeks not just a much more powerful president but a reshaping of American society at a fundamental level, instituting a traditionalist and Christian regime. Control of these agencies is one method to achieve that.
NYT, David Wallace-Wells: Did We Make the Wrong Bet on Big A.I.? https://tinyurl.com/eyu8b8y2 “When AI companies began raising prices on their premium products to more closely match the cost of producing them, many of their clients balked” //➔ should govt fill the gap?
🐣 RT @BohuslavskaKate 🇺🇦 FM Sybiha: Ukraine is attacking only legitimate targets, guided by right of self-defense under Article 51, UN Charter. This approach, shared by our partners, strengthens our negotiating capabilities, pushes Russia towards serious negotiations. War has finally come to Russia.
🐣 RT @NSTRIKE1231 ❗️❗️🇸🇪🇺🇦🇷🇺 Swedish Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson has laid out an uncompromising reality check for European security, pairing a blunt assessment of the Kremlin’s strategic failure with a historic announcement regarding the future of Ukraine’s combat aviation.
¤ https://x.com/NSTRIKE1231/status/2074788872802668839?s=20
Kristersson made it clear that Moscow has zero genuine interest in meaningful negotiations, but highlighted that Russia is simultaneously incapable of achieving a military victory against Ukraine. Because of this volatile deadlock, he warned that international allies must remain extremely prepared for a vast array of unpredictable Russian scenarios.
To ensure Ukraine can decisively break this stalemate, Kristersson confirmed a massive, two-pronged aviation breakthrough. Ukraine is officially purchasing 16 next-generation, high-tech Gripen E multirole fighters under a newly finalized 2.5 billion dollar contract. To provide an immediate tactical boost while those cutting-edge airframes are being manufactured, Stockholm is concurrently donating 16 second-hand Gripen C/D fighter jets from its active military inventory.
This combined package will deliver a total of 32 powerful combat aircraft to Ukraine. While the donated Gripen C/D models are scheduled to arrive in early 2027 to rapidly reinforce frontline air defense networks, the elite Gripen E fleet will follow closer to 2029, systematically upgrading Ukraine’s long-term capabilities to sweep Russian cruise missiles and guided bombs from its sovereign skies.
🐣 RT @NATO Ankara Summit Declaration issued by the Heads of State and Government participating in the meeting of the North Atlantic Council in Ankara, Türkiye ¤ Read the full statement → https://bit.ly/nato-ankara-declaration ¤ #NATOsummit
The Ankara Summit Declaration
08 July 20261. We, the Heads of State and Government of the North Atlantic Alliance, have gathered in Ankara to reaffirm our ironclad commitment to our collective defence under Article 5 of the Washington Treaty and to the transatlantic bond. An attack on one is an attack on all. Our unity, solidarity and collective strength remain the foundation of peace, security, and prosperity for the one billion citizens in our Alliance of free and democratic nations. We remain committed to our 360-degree approach to deterrence and defence.
2. To counter the long-term threat Russia poses to Euro-Atlantic security and stability, and the persistent threat of terrorism, Allies are delivering on The Hague defence commitment. In 2025, European Allies and Canada increased their investments in core defence requirements by more than $139 billion. Our investments are delivering the capabilities we need while strengthening our industrial base and resilience. Today in Ankara, we announce more than $50 billion in new procurements and commit to expanding collective manufacturing capacity and working with industry to accelerate innovation. We will continue our work to eliminate defence trade barriers among Allies and leverage NATO’s partnerships to maximise defence industrial depth and cooperation.
3. We are building the future: a stronger Europe in a stronger NATO – a modernised Alliance. European Allies and Canada, working with the United States, are assuming greater responsibility for the Alliance’s defence. NATO’s deterrence and defence rest on an appropriate mix of nuclear, conventional, and missile defence capabilities, complemented by space and cyber assets. We are committed to maintaining our combat advantage. We are investing in our ability to deploy, enable and sustain our armed forces and deliver our capability targets in all domains, including in deep precision strike, integrated air and missile defence, uncrewed systems, cutting edge technologies, and intelligence capabilities. We are developing an interoperable transatlantic warfighting cloud and adopting powerful AI models.
4. Ukraine contributes to transatlantic security, and Allies stand united in our unwavering support for Ukraine in defending its freedom, sovereignty, and territorial integrity. European Allies and Canada now finance the vast majority of security assistance to Ukraine through bilateral and multilateral means. Allies underscore that this support must be equitable, predictable, and sustainable in the long-term. For 2026, Allies pledge €70 billion in military equipment, assistance and training for Ukraine and affirm their sovereign commitments to sustaining at least equivalent levels in 2027. To this end, we welcome the European Union’s decision to provide multi-year funding to Ukraine through the Ukraine Support Loan.
5. The Alliance continues to respond and adapt to the strategic competition, pervasive instability, hybrid threats and recurrent shocks that define our broader security environment. Allies reiterate that Iran must never have a nuclear weapon and call on Iran to fully respect freedom of navigation in the Strait of Hormuz.
6. We express our appreciation for the generous hospitality extendemjjd to us by Türkiye. We look forward to our next meeting.
NYT: After Insulting Allies at NATO Summit, Trump Says They Love Him https://tinyurl.com/3zryjuyv “His secretaries of state, defense and treasury stood stone-faced behind him as he pin-balled his way through all sorts of topics” //➔ He will allow Ukraine to produce Patriot missiles.
// The meeting in Turkey featured President Trump at his most mercurial, veering from scorn to praise for European countries, including some whose patience with mollifying him has worn thin.
🐣 RT @business Trump says he will allow Ukraine to manufacture Patriot missile interceptors, a key weapon in repelling Russian attacks [Bloomberg link:] https://tinyurl.com/3rkzss27
WaPo: In shift, Trump praises Zelensky, will let Ukraine build Patriot missiles https://tinyurl.com/36f4s73p “It was a dramatic departure from Trump’s more acerbic tone toward Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, whom he once derided as ungrateful.”
🐣 RT @revishvilig Trump to Zelenskyy: “We are gonna give you a license to make Patriots. ¤ This way he can’t complain that we are not giving him enough. ¤ Make them yourself.” 1/3
[TextLink:] https://x.com/revishvilig/status/2074861280872058973?s=20/photo/1
⋙ This is absolutely crucial for Ukraine and a major victory for President Zelenskyy. Ukraine desperately needs additional air defense interceptors as Russia continues to pound its cities with ballistic missiles. 2/3
⋙ With winter just around the corner, Moscow is likely to once again target Ukraine’s critical energy infrastructure in an attempt to freeze the country into submission. 3/3
🐣 RT @KyivIndependent Despite all expectations, Ukraine seems to be leaving the NATO summit in Ankara with a major win. ¤ Alongside an allied pledge of $80 billion in defense aid for 2026, President Volodymyr Zelensky has also secured an apparent green light from U.S. President Donald Trump to produce Patriot missiles, sorely needed amid increasingly deadly Russian attacks.
🐣 RT @_InfoGram_ Spanish PM Pedro Sánchez has delivered another headache to Trump 🔥 🇺🇸 Reporter: “Why are you against Trump?”
💽 https://x.com/_InfoGram_/status/2074949720263500184?s=2/video/1
🇪🇸 Pedro: “Because we are a peaceful nation, a nation committed to peace.
Not waging an illegal war against other countries.” 🔥
This man is winning from all over the globe due to his massive courage 👏
📊 🐣 RT @SenSanders In a new WSJ poll, 75% of Americans believe billionaires have too much power in Washington and working people have too little. ¤ THEY ARE RIGHT. While working families struggle, never before have so few people held so much economic and political power. ¤ We’re taking them on!
¤ https://x.com/SenSanders/status/2074946710728516045?s=20
🐣 RT @Kasparov63 Ukraine has heroically defied expectations at every step, and is now revolutionizing warfare as well. My article on the Drone Age, how Ukraine is leading, and how NATO nations must follow, because Russia and China are learning fast.
⋙ TheTelegraph, Gary Kasparov [UK]: Gunpowder ended the age of knights. Now drones will upend the modern military order https://tinyurl.com/3eetfpam “Ukraine has opened the door to the future of warfare, and Western leaders must capitalise on this momentum”
🐣 RT @McFaul Ukraine is in Europe.
⋙ 🐣 RT @M_Simonyan Not a single Russian missile has hit Europe during these five years. Not a single Russian tank has been sent to Europe during these five years. Not a single Russian combat aircraft has been flown to Europe during these five years. ¤ And during all this time, THOUSANDS of European missiles, tanks, and aircraft have been sent into Russia and have hit Russia. And after all that, we are being lectured on Russian responsibility.
🐣 RT @bayraktar_1love 🛢️Russia has banned diesel fuel exports. This is a very good sign: … If Moscow is being forced to keep diesel at home instead of exporting it, it means Ukrainian strikes have knocked out enough refining capacity that Russia can no longer comfortably supply its own market and sell surplus fuel abroad.
🐣 RT @SSWorks Social Security works because people believe it is neutral, safe, and focused on benefits—not a surveillance weapon for ICE to use against American citizens.
🐣 RT @alexstubb [tr] NATO 3.0 is in the works. My message from the NATO summit in Turkey’s Ankara:
¤ https://x.com/alexstubb/status/2074925951687778779?s=20
1. The summit hit right in the middle of change. The work always takes its own time. A stronger Europe in a stronger NATO.
2. Europe’s defense industry is strengthening and forming the backbone of our capabilities.
3. Russia is a long-term and broad threat that won’t disappear even after the Ukraine war is resolved. We are increasing defense spending and continuing to develop our defense.
4. Ukraine’s rightful place is in NATO. Ukraine is a security provider in Europe.
5. Finland has secured its place in the alliance. We have achieved several goals related to NATO’s presence.
🐣 RT @ShaunPinnerUA China may have just made one of the most overlooked diplomatic moves of the war. ¤ An invitation to Kyiv from Beijing is more than just another meeting on the diplomatic calendar. It raises important questions about China’s long-term interests, Russia’s growing dependence on Beijing, and whether the geopolitical landscape is beginning to shift in ways many have yet to recognise. ¤ I take a closer look at why this matters, and offer some food for thought, what it could mean for Ukraine, and why Putin may have more to worry about than first appears. 🇺🇦 [link:] https://tinyurl.com/5fwz83jp
🐣 RT @atrupar TRUMP: Would you go to Moscow? ¤ ZELENSKYY: It is difficult. There are lots of Ukrainian drones there. It’s dangerous.
💽 https://x.com/atrupar/status/2074845536826355825?s=20/video/1
🐣 RT @NOELreports Trump said the U.S. will give Ukraine a license to produce Patriot missiles, while Zelensky said Kyiv is starting work on a drone deal with Washington. Rubio said Ukrainian deep strikes are making it harder for Russia to defend its airspace and could create room for negotiations. Trump called the strikes on Russian oil refineries an escalation that could help bring the war to an end. #NATO
WaPo: Trump says ceasefire with Iran is over, calling its leaders ‘scum’ https://tinyurl.com/5b9dercy “The president at a NATO summit in Turkey declared the end of a truce after U.S. forces carried out strikes in response to Iranian attacks on ships in the Strait of Hormuz.”
🐣 RT @OJoelsen Denmark will defend Greenland, Mette Frederiksen says after Trump’s threat ¤ Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen said ahead of the NATO summit that the alliance’s most important message is that NATO remains strong and united in an uncertain time. ¤ Her message on Greenland was equally clear.
“Greenland is not for sale. Denmark is a sovereign state, and we are prepared to defend every part of NATO and the Kingdom of Denmark,” she said firmly.
⭕ 7 Jul 2026
WSJ: The Canadian Who Steered Europe Away From the U.S. https://tinyurl.com/b2fwt8rs “Facing threats from Trump, Mark Carney emerged as a central figure in a project to reshape the Western alliance” // ✛ The outsized impact of idiotic ideas from Jared, Witkoff, Katie Miller
Mark Carney swept to power on a backlash to President Trump’s talk of making Canada the 51st state, which many Americans took for mere shtick. But for the new prime minister, reading intelligence reports detailing the gravity of the crisis, it was a breaking point.
In private phone conversations with Carney’s predecessor, Justin Trudeau, Trump had threatened to scrap the 1908 agreement delineating their shared border. “I tear that up and your whole country unravels,” Trump told Trudeau in one call, according to two people familiar with the matter. …
It was Carney’s first crack at a riddle that would come to bedevil governments on both sides of the Atlantic. What to do when your closest ally turns into a threat?
His prescription in large part would lay in Europe, where Carney, a former Bank of England governor, had made his past and now saw Canada’s future. The Canadian banker who never before held elected office would emerge as an unexpected central figure in a high-stakes project to reshape the economic and military community known as the West.
Since World War II the alliance had worked like a wheel: The U.S. as the indispensable hub and the rest as spokes.
Carney argued that Canada and Europe would have to build an alternative model, a “dense web of connections” that wouldn’t overly depend on any single country. His approach contrasted to that of another influential leader, NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte, who was encouraging Europe to double down on its relationship with Trump—whatever it took to keep America from abandoning the alliance.
They represented opposing poles of a years-old debate coming to a boil in Europe, with the U.K., like Rutte, betting heavily on its special relationship with Washington. France, conversely, was eager to build up Europe’s own sovereign defense base and technology, from quantum computing to AI systems held outside America. Carney would try to sway the outcome, without provoking the superpower that imports three-quarters of Canada’s goods.
In effect, a push to make Canada America’s 51st state had lighted a fuse of unintended consequences that would play out far beyond North America, as overseas allies asked themselves whether the U.S.-led alliance could truly last. …
The first prime minister born in Canada’s Northwest Territories, Carney was an unlikely radical, a picture of the global elite Trump campaigned against. An alumnus of Harvard, Oxford and Goldman Sachs who became the first foreigner to run the Bank of England, he kept two cellphones, even as prime minister: one Canadian and another with a British number, and list of contacts, from his time in London. …
Carney’s brainchild barely registered, in part because he floated it the same week of August 2019 that news broke of another outrageous proposal that at first seemed like a joke: Trump wanted to buy Greenland.
And yet now, as Canada’s leader, Carney would make an expanded version of the same case to America’s closest allies—that the entire global security system was too dependent on Uncle Sam. …
Just two days after assuming office, Carney traveled not to Washington—a conventional first stop for a new Canadian prime minister—but to France. Standing alongside Macron at Paris’s Élysée Palace, he called Canada “the most European of non-European countries.” …
Starmer was more aligned with Rutte’s conviction that they could salvage the Western alliance by flattering Trump, and he had avoided publicly mentioning the president’s campaign to annex a British Commonwealth nation.
One gesture of support came from King Charles III, Canada’s head of state, who symbolically planted a red maple tree in Buckingham Palace’s garden. When the king made plans to visit Canada, Starmer was nervous about provoking the U.S. president, according to officials involved in those discussions. …
Carney would have to try again to bring Starmer on board in November, when they headed to the G-20 in South Africa. The U.S. was boycotting in protest of what Trump had called “white genocide,” which gave Carney more time with Macron, Finland’s Stubb, and Spain’s Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez, all of whom shared his perspective. Starmer was still cautious, though—the West had to salvage its relationship with America, he told Carney. “We don’t have a relationship to keep!” Carney replied. …
One rare constant was Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner. Shortly before Carney took power, the Ottawa government was desperate to rebut Trump’s unsupported claims that Canada had become a major source of fentanyl. …
… By the end of 2025, the U.S. had imposed steep tariffs on Canada, and trade talks were frozen, with Trump publicly offering a way Canada could avoid tariffs: “You become 51.”
Canadian officials looked for support in Europe. But few leaders spoke out. The EU had its own trade deal with Trump by then, taking the crisis between two NATO allies as background noise.
A single stone thrown from Mar-a-Lago would shatter that false calm.
Katie Miller, wife of Trump’s deputy chief of staff, was dining with the president in January, hours before special forces captured Venezuelan dictator Nicolás Maduro, and noticed Trump was in a ruminative mood.
“I wish I had more time,” Trump said. “If I had more time, I would do Greenland.”
“You do have time,” she reassured him. On Jan. 3, with Maduro now in U.S. custody, she thumbed out a provocative single word tweet: “SOON,” she posted on X, with an American flag covering Greenland.
The intervention, echoed by White House officials, was the equivalent of a fire alarm across Europe. It would test Europe’s patience with Rutte’s strategy of making concessions to Trump and push a critical mass of leaders to see the U.S. as Carney had warned: a country willing to weaponize its dominance over allies. …
On Jan. 6, she and Carney joined other leaders in a gilded hall of the Élysée Palace in Paris for a prescheduled meeting of Ukraine’s backers. Before it began, the leaders huddled under the rococo ceiling and chandeliers started urgently discussing Greenland. Trump’s pointmen for Ukraine, Steve Witkoff and Kushner, were in another room, giving Frederiksen time to lobby European counterparts, seeking support for Danish and Greenlandic sovereignty.
“This is not about you or me,” she kept repeating, “this is about European solidarity in a time of crisis.” Carney, on the sidelines, was pitching his ideas of tethering Canada closer to Europe.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, in town to rally military support against Russia, looked exhausted as Witkoff entered and launched into a speech less focused on the battlefield situation or the breakdown in the alliance than the economic opportunities awaiting Ukraine if it made peace with Putin. As he proposed that Zelensky could get a trade deal with America and a reconstruction effort overseen by BlackRock, the world’s largest asset manager, one European aide wrote a note to give her prime minister.
We can no longer rely on America, it said. “All we have is international law.”
That day the White House floated the possibility of using military force to acquire Greenland. France’s defense ministry reached out to the Pentagon for clarification on the administration’s intentions, but didn’t get a clear answer. Diplomats posted to NATO’s arched-glass headquarters in Brussels began grabbing each other in their offices and huddling in regional groupings, according to people close to the talks, discussing whether their alliance was breaking apart. Denmark was already equipping Arctic troops for an unthinkable: a shooting war with America.
Rutte was furiously messaging Trump, trying to save the alliance. Carney, meanwhile, was on CanForce 1—his team preferred to simply call it by the name of its European maker, the Airbus—to China, where he would ink a “new strategic partnership” with Xi Jinping. …
Trump watched from Air Force One as Carney delivered the speech, the Davos crowd rising in rapturous applause for his rallying cry for Western nations to stand up to great powers or “be on the menu.” Canada was “ungrateful,” Trump complained to aides. Carney, without mentioning the U.S., went further than any Western leader in defining a manifesto against Trump’s governing style: “You cannot live within the lie of mutual benefit through integration when integration becomes the source of your subordination,” he said. …
NATO’s Rutte, meanwhile, was closing in on a rough agreement with Trump, whose upcoming Davos speech was being billed as the moment the alliance could die. …
When Rutte stepped past a navy blue NATO flag to meet the president, he faced an entourage of five Trump cabinet members all wearing matching Florsheim dress shoes. The Dutchman inhabited the now-familiar role of empathetic counselor. “We can help,” Rutte said, proposing that NATO could boost security in the Arctic. The president dropped his threat of military force.
But Trump still had choice words for Carney, when he gave his speech that day. “Canada lives because of the United States,” he said. “Remember that, Mark, the next time you make your statements.”
The next evening, top EU leader António Costa brought nearly 30 heads of government into the European Council headquarters known as “The Space Egg,” for what became an emotional, five-hour conversation about the U.S. that some called “therapy night.” …
Their plan was evolving into a delicate, two-step maneuver. Rutte was leveraging his personal relationship with Trump to keep the U.S. engaged in NATO—for as long as possible. At the same time, the allies were trying to step back from a decades-old dependency on American technology, military power, and trade, without provoking Washington [.…]
🐣 RT @carlbildt With European trust in President Trump 🇺🇸 bordering on non-existent, and large reductions of 🇺🇸 forces in Europe coming, the Ankara summit is the beginning of a @nato with far less 🇺🇸. Reality has to be faced. Our future security will perhaps rely more on 🇺🇦 than on the 🇺🇸.
NYT: Administration Demands States Change Voting Rules or Lose Antiterrorism Funds https://tinyurl.com/4bvwtw7p “Federal officials said they would withhold some money unless states pursue paper ballot systems, verify citizenship and conduct costly audits.”
🐣 RT @votevets BREAKING: In DIRECT VIOLATION of the Constitution, Donald Trump has resurrected his push for the U.S. to acquire Greenland, saying it “should be controlled by the United States,” and suggesting the U.S. could pull ALL TROOPS out of Europe if they refuse to acquiesce. Denmark is a NATO ally and poses no imminent threat to the United States, any push to remove troops requires a vote in Congress.
🐣 RT @ddale8 Greenland isn’t surrounded by Chinese and Russian ships. There hasn’t been $19.2 trillion invested in the US under Trump. Trump hasn’t settled eight wars. Biden’s military aid to Ukraine wasn’t worth hundreds of billions of dollars. The 2020 election wasn’t rigged. ¤ Fact check of Trump’s remarks from…a single meeting with Erdogan today [CNN link:] https://tinyurl.com/38re5tt6
¤ https://x.com/ddale8/status/2074603042872394043?s=20
‼️ 🐣 RT @atrupar Trump on Greenland: “That’s what hurt my relationship with NATO. Because Greenland doesn’t help Denmark. Denmark doesn’t spend money to really help Greenland, but it’s an important part for the United States. And it’s surrounded by China ships and Russian ships. Greenland should be controlled by the United States, not by Denmark. We could remove all our soldiers out of Europe. They better be careful.”
💽 https://x.com/atrupar/status/2074482770710004056?s=20/video/1
//➔ Readers: Denmark provides more than $1 billion in annual subsidies to Greenland. Experts and NATO intelligence confirm no Chinese or Russian ships surround Greenland.
🐣 RT @JudiciaryDems Conservative and libertarian lawyers are coming out against Todd Blanche. ¤ He played a huge role in the $1.776 billion MAGA slush fund proposal. ¤ He signed off on Trump’s immunity from IRS scrutiny. ¤ He spearheaded targeted prosecutions into Trump’s political “enemies.” ¤ CORRUPT.
[TextLink:] https://x.com/JudiciaryDems/status/2074505562524430458?s=20/photo/1 -3
🐣 RT @ NSTRIKE1231 🇺🇦❌🎯🚀 Ukraine has shattered Western handcuffs on deep-strike operations, with its Foreign Minister boldly declaring that Kyiv no longer requests anyone’s permission to hammer legitimate military targets deep inside Russia.
¤ https://x.com/NSTRIKE1231/status/2074525847076188526?s=20
By invoking the UN Charter to justify its devastating long-range asymmetric campaign, Ukraine is asserting total strategic independence.
🇺🇦 “Ukraine no longer needs a third party’s permission to carry out strikes with long-range weapons on legitimate military targets inside Russia,” — Minister of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine, Andrii Sybiha.
“We will continue asymmetric operations with our own weapons, because this is our right to self-defense, guaranteed by Article 51 of the UN Charter,” Sybiha noted.
This diplomatic ultimatum signals a permanent shift in how Kyiv dictates the terms of this war. By utilizing a rapidly expanding arsenal of domestic long-range weaponry, Ukraine is effectively telling its Western partners that the era of managing escalation is over, ensuring that Russian military infrastructure will continue to burn regardless of foreign political hesitation.
Rep Jared Huffman: How Trump Hijacked America’s 250th Birthday ~ Rep Huffman is the Ranking Member of the House Natural Resources Committee https://youtu.be/WHvRA1W54LY?is=mlVaFQXq4OZJjhjR/video/1
🐣 Rep Jared Huffman (D-CA) Releases Report on How Trump Hijacked America’s 250th Birthday to Enrich Himself, Sell Access, and Harvest Americans’ Data https://tinyurl.com/52jmzxbs
🐣 RT @HQNewsNow 1,200 former DOJ employees have just sent a letter urging Senators not to confirm Todd Blanche as AG:
[TextLink:] https://x.com/HQNewsNow/status/2074498680044823021?s=20/photo/1 -2 (2)
“In the coming weeks, many will rightly underscore the corruption and abuses that have defined the Justice Department under Todd Blanche’s leadership: the vindictive prosecutions and investigations of the President’s foes; the deals designed to reward lawbreakers with taxpayer dollars; the erasure of accountability for January 6; the mishandling of the Epstein files; and the denigration of judges and repeated violations of their orders… For the sake of the institution where we once proudly served, we urge you to reject Todd Blanche’s nomination.”
🐣 RT @votevets BREAKING: In DIRECT VIOLATION of the Constitution, Donald Trump has resurrected his push for the U.S. to acquire Greenland, saying it “should be controlled by the United States,” and suggesting the U.S. could pull ALL TROOPS out of Europe if they refuse to acquiesce. Denmark is a NATO ally and poses no imminent threat to the United States, any push to remove troops requires a vote in Congress.
🐣 RT @visionergeo ‼️‼️🇷🇺🇺🇦 BIG | Ukraine has just opened a devastating new front in the energy war—after crippling Russia’s oil refineries, high-precision strikes are now systematically targeting the Kremlin’s massive gas export infrastructure.
¤ https://x.com/visionergeo/status/2074576390477824166?s=20
Ukrainian long-range drones launched a massive coordinated aerial assault on the strategic Krasnodarskaya compressor station. This vital facility acts as the central heartbeat of the Blue Stream pipeline, a major geopolitical artery that pumps Russian natural gas across the floor of the Black Sea directly into Turkey and southeastern Europe. The successful strikes caused extensive damage to the station’s specialized equipment, instantly jeopardizing the pipeline’s overall throughput capacity and freezing critical export flows.
This operation represents a dangerous, strategic escalation that hits Russia’s primary remaining source of foreign currency. With oil refining already in freefall, the disruption of the Blue Stream pipeline cuts off one of Putin’s final economic lifelines to the outside world, proving that Russia’s multi-billion-dollar gas monopoly is completely defenseless against Ukraine’s deep-strike capabilities.
⭕ 6 Jul 2026
ProPublica: Amid Mounting War Casualties, Pete Hegseth “Defunded and Impeded” Efforts to Protect Civilians https://tinyurl.com/bej7e96r “The gutting of a program focused on shielding noncombatants puts service members in peril … and may violate federal law.”
// “Ten members of Congress have warned the secretary of defense that the Trump administration’s gutting of a program focused on shielding noncombatants puts service members in peril, erodes the military’s moral standing and may violate federal law.”
🐣 Communism does exist except as very fringe groups in either the US or the EU. It’s not 1954 anymore.
◕ https://x.com/Auriandra/status/2074235571082326141?s=20/photo/1
// party ideology in US and EU: ⋙ Source: NYT (2019): What Happened to America’s Political Center of Gravity? https://tinyurl.com/r4p277fc ¤
⇈ ⇊
🔄 🐣 The two core distinctions between capitalism vs. socialism/communism are:
¤ https://x.com/Auriandra/status/2074233016004599851?s=20
1) who owns the means of production (factories, services, farms))
2) welfare-state vs. laissez-faire: i.e. how much redistribution and regulation sit on top of the ownership model .US Democrats and European Social Democrats both sit firmly on the capitalist side of the first axis while pushing in favor the second. (Bernie Sanders and AOC) are European-style Social Democrats.)
Democratic Socialism (narrowly defined, as in Europe) and Communism sit on the other side of the first axis, differing mainly on method (ballot box vs. revolution) and degree (partial vs. total collectivization).
* Note: Unfortunately, the terms “Social Democracy” and “Democratic Socialism” tend to be used interchangeably in the US.
🐣 RT @RachelBitecofer That [Mamdani’s NYC] is not socialism. Crack a history book
◕ https://x.com/RachelBitecofer/status/2074207218090856740?s=20/photo/1 -2
// 1) Most EU countries not socialist, 2) Social Democracy v Socialism
🐣 RT @SkylineReport The Supreme Court didn’t need fake numbers. ¤ It only needed the wrong denominator.
◕ https://x.com/SkylineReport/status/2074191140044108156?s=20/photo/1
Justice Alito’s Voting Rights Act opinion relied on DOJ turnout statistics that counted the entire voting-age population, including people who weren’t even eligible to vote, instead of the standard citizen voting-age population used by election experts.
Recalculate using the accepted methodology and one of the Court’s central claims about Black turnout largely falls apart.
That’s not a harmless statistical quirk. ¤ It’s how voter suppression gets laundered into a story of “racial progress,” then cited as justification for weakening the very law designed to stop discrimination.
Facts matter. ¤ Methods matter.
And sometimes the denominator changes the Constitution.
🐣 RT @davetroy People underestimate the degree to which forcefully dismantling the Kremlin’s grip on power will lead to a significant reduction in chaos in the US and Europe. Absent their support, a lot of bad actors would eventually go dark.
🐣 RT @SteveRattner Since President Trump’s re-election, the vast majority of job growth has been in health care and education. ¤ Despite promises to re-shore industry through tariffs, over 100,000 manufacturing jobs have been lost.
◕ https://x.com/SteveRattner/status/2074145281466142790?s=20/photo/1
🔆 This❗️⋙ 🐣 RT @FT Lukashenko says Belarus will not join Putin’s war in Ukraine [link:] https://tinyurl.com/3p5kvt47
🐣 RT @BillKristol It’s July 6. And I can say with some confidence: Donald Trump tried to hijack our 250th anniversary; he failed. Both the Declaration and our history were too weighty and elevated to yield easily to Trump’s insane grandiosity and insistent mediocrity.” [Bulwark link:] https://tinyurl.com/2s3erfey
⭕ 5 Jul 2026
🔄 WSJ: There Is No Going Back’: The Inside Story of Europe’s Rupture With America https://tinyurl.com/v9b2padk “Trump’s tariffs, threats against Greenland spurred a rebellion by top leaders; the limits of ‘flattery diplomacy’”
⋙WSJ (1128/2025): Make Money Not War: Trump’s Real Plan for Peace in Ukraine https://tinyurl.com/4fmwcbw6 The Kremlin pitched the White House on peace through business. To Europe’s dismay, the president and his envoy are on board.
X‼️ 🐣 RT @GBC_Press 🚨🇮🇱 | Netanyahu: “Did the Nazis ask the Jews to leave nicely? Did they say ‘Please leave?’… Did anyone do that? Did they say ‘Get out so we can come in?’ Of course not.” ¤ With this speech, he confessed with his own mouth that he himself is a Nazi.
💽 https://x.com/GBC_Press/status/2073842486603067708?s=20/video/1
🐣 RT @newrepublic In a scathing dissent—joined by Justices Ketanji Brown Jackson and Elena Kagan—Sotomayor warned the country’s founding framers had “‘never intended’ to give the President ‘the complete set of powers’ that the English Crown held, let alone more.” https://trib.al/ZLDQRO0
🐣 RT @ltgrusselhonore Draft Op-Ed: The 4th of July Hangover: The Bad and The Ugly!
¤ https://x.com/ltgrusselhonore/status/2073807895892738258?s=20
1. The Grift: America Freedom 250 hijacked the celebration in DC. The President is making $1.5 billion from his crypto coins and hotels.
2. The Iran War: Both sides took a break – America to celebrate 250 and Iran 🇮🇷 for a funeral.
3. The Save Act will disqualify millions of registered voters.
4. The oligarchs now have more money and pay less tax. They also manage the message by owning much of the media. MAGA has a new Boggie Man Communist
5. The Supreme Court has literally told the President he can do whatever and get away with it.
6. The President is flying around in a gifted, used 747 aircraft ( Spent nearly a billion tax dollars to retrofit) from a foreign country with business ties to the His Family.
7. Data centers are destroying local communities, rising energy prices, and threatening the local drinking water supply.
8. White nationalists with Confederate flags marched in DC on the 4th of July.
9 Hundreds of Infants and children locked up in detention camps. Gun Violence , one of leading cause of youth deaths in America!
10 . God Bless America! Please Vote ! “ We are better then how we look , w a chance to be better than what we are , w Freedom , prosperity and Justice For All HTDL “
🐣 RT @HunterBiden I hope everyone had a great 4th of July. I know @realDonaldTrump and family did. ¤ 250 years ago we declared independence from a king who ran the colonies as a family business. In just 18 months the Trumps have made King George look like an amateur. […]
¤ https://x.com/HunterBiden/status/2073819087646441705?s=20
🐣 RT @adgirlMM It was in Boston where Paul Revere rode to warn the patriots that the King’s troops were approaching.
🖼 https://x.com/adgirlMM/status/2073820639925006678?s=20/photo/1 -2
Last night in celebration of 250 years of America, Boston held a spectacular drone show, beautifully choreographed to an orchestral performance of Tchaikovsky’s “1812 Overture.”
The White House set off a record-breaking blitzkrieg of 850,000 fireworks that filled the nation’s capital with a nonstop bombardment of blasts, booms, smoke and flashes for 40 minutes straight. Undoubtedly stirring distress in veterans, pets and every wild animal in the area. All to satiate the ego of a president who wants everything he does to be “bigger” and grandiose.
250 years of America.
“Let the warning ride forth once more. Tyranny is at our door.”
🐣 RT @MollyJongFast Stunning incompetence
⋙ 🐣 RT @lesleyabravanel Watching the sky over the capital is the perfect metaphor for a Trump presidency: burning through millions of taxpayer dollars to create a record-breaking mess while everyone else is left to deal with the hazardous air quality and the bill.
💽 https://x.com/MollyJongFast/status/2073930837054177614?s=20/video/1
⭕ 4 Jul 2026 🇺🇸
TheAtlantic, Francis X Rocca: Pope Leo’s July 4 Message to America Was Unmistakable https://tinyurl.com/4y5d7h2h “By spending the semiquincentennial mourning the plight of migrants, Leo sent a clear challenge to his native country.”
💙 🔄 🐣 RT @CausMoney Obama: It’s worth remembering that as far back as 1776, the very idea of people governing themselves was a radical one.
💽 https://x.com/CausMoney/status/2073427498151375038?s=20/video/1
Before that, the story of human history had been one of conquest, hierarchy, and rigid caste systems. ¤ It was a world in which the strong dominated the weak, and power, wealth, and status were passed down along bloodlines. Most people were ruled by a few.
But amid the fire and steel of revolution, another story took flight on this continent. It was a declaration that proclaimed we were all created equal, endowed by our Creator with certain unalienable rights.
In the newly independent America, there would be no kings or lords, no serfs or subjects—only citizens. Each of us could pursue our own version of happiness, and we could determine our common destiny through elected representative government.
This had never been done before. And because it had never been done before, the success of this experiment was never guaranteed.
When our Founders set out to establish our federal union, they fell far short of living up to the vision laid out in the Declaration. They preserved slavery. They allowed states to restrict the vote to white men who owned property.
But in drafting our Constitution and Bill of Rights, they did show foresight, and they did show genius, giving us a framework that allowed each generation to make our union more perfect.
For more than two centuries, through petitions and protests, marches and strikes, through moral appeals from pulpits, and conversations around kitchen tables, men and women from every walk of life, of every skin color, of every faith, from every corner of the country took up the cause of democracy and made it their own. Until what “We the People” meant was no longer just some of us, but all of us.
That’s why the story we tell in this building doesn’t start with Michelle’s story or mine. It starts with our country’s origin story.
It starts with a printing of the Declaration of Independence from the founding era. It starts with the pen and inkwell that Frederick Douglass used. It starts with the Bible Lincoln took the oath on, and Ida B. Wells’s pamphlet. It starts with the suffragist button, and the hardhat worn by Frances Perkins, President Franklin Roosevelt’s secretary of labor.
That’s also why the exhibits here don’t just focus on policy. They focus on the shared values that make democracy possible. The belief that everyone has intrinsic dignity and worth. The belief that no one stands above the law, and that no one is beneath its protection.
The belief in checks and balances in government. The belief in accountability that comes from an independent judiciary and a robust free press. The belief that the allegiance of our military and law enforcement is not to any one president or political party, but to the people and our Constitution.
The belief that after the people have a voice through free and fair elections, power should transfer peacefully. And the recognition that in a vast and complex society like ours, no group or faction can get everything it wants 100 percent of the time.
And the belief that character matters. That honesty, integrity, and decency matter. That empathy, responsibility, and a sense of honor matter.
These qualities matter in public affairs just as much as they do in our private lives.
These are the values and traditions I believe in. These aren’t Republican values or Democratic values. They’re American values that we all can share, no matter our party. They’re our greatest inheritance. They’re the story of America at its best because they reflect a fundamental belief: that our fellow citizens are good people, and that despite all our differences, we can see each other, hear each other, and work together for common goals
🐣 RT @TheAtlantic Ten years ago today, J. D. Vance called Trump “cultural heroin” in The Atlantic: “To every complex problem, he promises a simple solution … He never offers details for how these plans will work, because he can’t,” Vance wrote of Trump. ¤ Read the piece:
⋙ TheAtlantic, JD Vance: Opioid of the Masses (From 2016) https://theatln.tc/H6kZ85x “To many, Donald Trump feels good, but he can’t fix America’s growing social and cultural crisis, and the eventual comedown will be harsh.”
🐣 RT @reggiebblue Former Presidents Bush, Clinton, Obama and Biden share their messages for America on the nation’s 250th birthday. … [w Jenna Bush]
💽 [6:19] https://x.com/reggiebblue/status/2073410637259067452?s=20/video/1
Bush – “One of the things about the 250th is the fact that you can worship freely without the government telling you how to worship, speak in a public square without being jailed, a press that’s willing to hold the powerful to account.”
Clinton – “America is bigger than anybody’s personal hopes and dreams. The country will survive by the freedom to speak, freedom to vote, freedom to be active in politics.”
Obama – “Remember what’s best in us. The basic principle upon which this country was founded which is we don’t have rulers, kings, monarchs, aristocracies– we have citizens.”
Biden – “250th anniversary of the country reminds people that democracies depend on certain basic rules. Democracy is dictated by the rule of the Constitution.”
🐣 RT @SkylineReport Today isn’t just about fireworks.¤ It’s about a promise. ¤ The Declaration doesn’t say liberty belongs to the powerful, the popular, or the politically convenient. ¤ It declares these truths to be self-evident:
¤ https://x.com/SkylineReport/status/2073430287929778541?s=20
• All people are created equal.
• We possess unalienable rights.
• Governments exist to secure those rights.
• Their power comes from the consent of the governed, not the other way around.The founders weren’t claiming to invent those principles. ¤ They were claiming they were so fundamental that any reasonable person should recognize them.
For 250 years, America’s greatest moments have come when we’ve expanded that promise to those it was denied in practice.
Its darkest moments have come when we’ve narrowed it.
On Independence Day, the question isn’t whether we can recite those words.
It’s whether we’re willing to live by them.
That’s not politics. ¤ That’s the American experiment.
🐣 RT @marceelias “We have Petitioned for Redress in the most humble terms: Our repeated Petitions have been answered only by repeated injury. A Prince, whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people.”
// from Declaration of Independence
🐣 RT @Rainmaker1973 America’s largest groundwater reserve now faces data centers under construction directly above it. ¤ Recent analysis reveals that multiple proposed and under construction AI data centers lie directly atop or adjacent to the Ogallala Aquifer. This vast underground freshwater reservoir ranks as the largest in the United States and stands among the most critical groundwater resources in North America. […]
🌎 https://x.com/Rainmaker1973/status/2073425873940754592?s=20/photo/1
💙 🐣 RT @Victorshi2020 NEW: On America’s 250th, Sarah Jessica Parker narrates a reading on resisting authoritarianism and building a better future—featuring Mark Ruffalo, Ted Danson, Sheryl Lee Ralph, Leslie Odom Jr., Margaret Atwood, & more. ¤ “What happens next is not inevitable. It depends on us.”
// Based on Timothy Snyder’s On Tyranny
💽 https://x.com/Victorshi2020/status/2073422921377464821?s=20/video/1
🐣 RT @HistoryCalendar July 4, 1776 — The United States Declaration of Independence is adopted by the Second Continental Congress.
🖼 https://x.com/HistoryCalendar/status/2073346375824113947?s=20/photo/1
🐣 RT @JoeBiden Two hundred and fifty years ago, a group of Americans signed their names to a piece of parchment and made a promise no nation had ever made before: that we’re all created equal, endowed by our Creator with unalienable rights — life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.
🖼 https://x.com/JoeBiden/status/2073413015383257352?s=20/photo/1
We’re the only nation in history built not on ethnicity, or blood, or geography but on an idea. That’s always been what makes us exceptional. We chose that path 250 years ago but that’s where the work began, not where it ended. Every generation has had to choose it again. At Valley Forge, at Gettysburg, on the beaches of Normandy, in the streets of Selma. Americans recommitted themselves to the principles on which our nation was founded.
Now it’s our turn.
There’s nothing guaranteed about our democracy. We have to fight for it, defend it, and earn it. Over and over, year after year. That’s not a burden. That’s what it means to be an American.
250 years in, we still haven’t fully lived up to those words in the Declaration. But we’ve never walked away from them, and this July 4, I hope all of us can commit to one thing: that we never will. I don’t believe we’re as divided as we’re told we are. I’ve bet my whole life on the American people, and I’m not stopping now.
Happy 250th birthday, America. Our story isn’t finished. Let’s keep writing it together.
🐣 RT @RonFilipkowski Trump and his sons ripped off nearly one million of their supporters and made a fortune producing nothing of value for anyone. Blood sucking leeches, using the US presidency to do it. And they couldn’t care less and their cult doesn’t seem to mind. Strange times in America.
[TextLink:] https://x.com/RonFilipkowski/status/2073432428132057231?s=20/photo/1
⋙ NYT: Nearly a Million Investors Lost a Total of $3.8 Billion on Trump Crypto Coin https://tinyurl.com/mvr855a6 ”A report from a cryptocurrency analytics firm details how those who bought the Trump memecoin have fared, with most retail investors having lost money while sophisticated traders did better.”
🐣 RT @RoyalFamily 🇺🇸 A message from His Majesty The King to President Trump and the American people, as they mark 250 years of the United States Declaration of Independence. ¤ To read His Majesty’s message in full, visit https://www.royal.uk/USA250
[TextLink:] https://x.com/RoyalFamily/status/2073361296393695576?s=20/photo/1
🐣 ✝ RT @ @RichRaho Pope Leo in Lampedusa: “Indifference to the common good and corruption in migrants countries of origin; a global economic system that generates poverty and exclusion; fear that fuels prejudice and contempt; the belief that such problems do not concern us — all are present-day echoes of the haste to ‘pass by.’” [link:] https://tinyurl.com/5xxrmdzb [Homily: Mass at Lampedusa]
¤ https://x.com/RichRaho/status/2073363187508838654?s=20
💙 🐣 RT @ZelenskyyUa Today marks the 250th anniversary of one of humanity’s brightest, strongest, and most influential dreams – the American Dream of an independent, free, and prosperous nation that defends people’s freedom, faith, and the pursuit of happiness.
¤ https://x.com/ZelenskyyUa/status/2073387630725571020?s=20
That dream has endured many trials. It did not merely survive – it has, for two and a half centuries now, served as an example for other nations and helped the entire humanity stand firm and become freer. This was especially important in the 20th century, when America helped save the world from the rule of tyrants and built the alliances and partnerships that, for the first time, gave a large part of humanity lasting peace and the opportunity to develop in freedom.
Now, in the 21st century, America’s influence and importance are certainly no less. And we see that particularly clearly in Ukraine, which is fighting for its independence, freedom, and our people’s right to happiness with much the same hope, the same purpose, and the same determination with which Americans won and defended their own independence.
We deeply value the support of the United States, especially now, during Russia’s full-scale war against Ukraine. American weapons – from the Javelins that President Trump decided to give to Ukraine to the Patriots that most reliably protect the lives of our people – everything the United States has provided to help us defend our country demonstrates the strength of the American spirit, American resolve, and American technology.
And we know the value of all these words better than anyone. When we ask America for Patriots, we believe that the values of respect for life and for people that prevailed 250 years ago will prevail again today. The world needs the kind of leadership that guarantees protection for freedom and for life.
I wish America a happy Fourth of July, the President of the United States and all Americans every success, and all of us around the world who value America – fruitful cooperation. “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.” That is what unites all of us – all who respect America and thank America today.
May the dreams of free people always triumph over the evil and hatred of those who seek to destroy freedom. America, thank you! I am confident that if we’re in it together, we’ll definitely achieve peace! Congratulations on your Independence Day!
🐣 RT @BarackObama America is a constant work in progress. Every generation must take up the unfinished work of the last and carry it further—protecting what’s right, fixing what’s wrong, and making our union a little more perfect. 250 years later, that’s more important than ever.
💽 [5.27] https://x.com/BarackObama/status/2073399118844629037?s=20/video/1
NYT: In Strike After Strike, Ukraine Is Bringing the War to Crimea https://tinyurl.com/bjvkdajf “The Ukrainians have the ability to touch every single place where there’s an air defense weapon or a logistics hub or an airfield or headquarters.” said US Lt. Gen. Ben Hodges (Ret.)
⭕ 3 Jul 2026
🐣 RT @reggiebblue President Clinton’s message on America 250.
💽 https://x.com/reggiebblue/status/2073067591950586311?s=20/video/1
“America is bigger than anybody’s personal hopes and dreams. The country will survive by the freedom to speak, freedom to vote, freedom to be active in politics. I am grateful that I had a chance to make maximum use of the talents that God gave me to help other people.”
🐣 RT @ZelenskyyUa I held a Staff meeting. An important achievement of our state and our weapons manufacturers is that Ukraine has reached the capability to produce such a volume of technologically advanced weapons that, in the long term, it can surpass Russia’s capabilities. Today, we focused most of our attention on this.
¤ https://x.com/ZelenskyyUa/status/2073064292056703046?s=20
We also spoke directly with the manufacturers about what is needed from the state, from administrative decisions and financing, to maximize all types of Ukrainian capabilities and ensure deep forms of pressure on Russia, on its battlefield capacity, and on its ability to drag out the war. This concerns primarily Ukrainian drones of all types, unmanned ground systems, our missile program, electronic warfare systems, and military equipment.
This discussion today, held with the participation of weapons manufacturers, was a continuation – at the highest level of military decision-making – of consultations that have been taking place over the past few weeks at the National Security and Defense Council, in Parliament, and at the Ministry of Defense.
First, I instructed the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Ministry of Defense to focus on working with partners to secure additional funding for production. I expect concrete results – agreements with partners. Investment in Ukrainian production is an investment in forcing Russia towards peace, and our partners must see this as our shared achievement.
Second, the implementation of Ukraine’s long-range sanctions plan and medium-range sanctions has shown that limiting Russia’s ability to wage war depends directly on spreading among Russian social groups the sense that the war is directly affecting everyday life. Ukraine will continue its policy of increasing the cost of occupation for the occupiers and restricting Russia’s ability to finance the war.
Third, I am grateful to all our specialists who are developing our missile program, including work on effective Ukrainian ballistic and anti-ballistic systems. Today, we effectively reviewed capabilities and defined steps that will accelerate production, testing, and deployment.
We also separately reviewed the volumes and timelines for the delivery of air defenses that are needed on an almost daily basis. In the coming days, the key priority across all diplomatic work, all meetings and negotiations will be air defense for Ukraine. I am grateful to everyone who is helping. I am proud of everyone who produces defense capabilities for Ukraine. Glory to Ukraine!
🐣 RT @RichRaho Pope Leo in address upon receiving Liberty Medal:
[TextLink:] https://x.com/RichRaho/status/2073074499612750027?s=20/photo/1
“Over the course of these two hundred and fifty years, for so many peoples throughout the world, it has been the steadfast determination to realize the noble vision of the Founding Fathers that has made America a symbol of freedom, while the country opened its own doors to successive waves of immigrants, enabling them and their children to contribute to shaping the nation’s future.
It was this same love for freedom that drove the United States, in the darkest hours of the last century, during the two world wars, to look beyond themselves and, with great sacrifices, to support the cause of freedom even beyond their own borders.”
🐣 RT @reggiebblue President Obama’s message on America 250.
“Remember what’s best in us. The basic principle upon which this country was founded which is we don’t have rulers, kings, monarchs, aristocracies– we have citizens.
If we pay attention to our responsibilities and duties and extend respect to our fellow citizens, then we’re gonna have another 250 year run that’s gonna be just as good.”
🐣 RT @RichRaho NEW: Pope Leo has written a letter to the US marking its 250th Anniversary; Leo writes: “Defending human life also includes welcoming, protecting, and assisting immigrants.. “
[TextLink:] https://x.com/RichRaho/status/2073080627130245235?s=20/photo/1 -4
Letter of His Holiness Pope Leo XIV on the
250th Anniversary of the Founding of the United States of AmericaI extend my heartfelt congratulations to all Americans on the occasion of the 250th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence. This semiquincentennial marks that defining moment in the history of the United States of America, July 4, 1776, that gave enduring voice to the ideals of liberty, equality, the pursuit of happiness, justice and democratic self-government.
For two and a half centuries, generations of Americans have worked together to carry these principles forward – through sacrifice, service, innovation and civic participation. This anniversary stands as an invitation not only to celebrate the nation’s remarkable journey, but also to reflect upon the responsibilities that the sons and daughters of this country bear to one another, and to the generations who will inherit the nation that is being shaped today.
Among the most cherished of these principles is religious freedom – the right of every person to worship according to conscience and to practice their faith openly, without coercion or fear. In marking this anniversary, it is important to recognize that freedom of religion has long been central to the American promise, protecting both individual dignity and the peaceful coexistence of a diverse people. /1
This same freedom has permitted the Catholic Church to take root and flourish within the United States, to the advantage not only of her own members, but of the entire nation. As faithful sons and daughters of the Church, Catholics are called to imbue every dimension of their existence with the charity of Christ (cf. 2 Cor 5:14), living out the Gospel in the circumstances of daily life. Such a way of living has given rise to the many benefits that the Church has provided over the years to the development of this nation. In particular, I bring to mind her service in areas of education, the preferential care of the poor, healthcare and basic social services, to name a few.
In the Encyclical Sapientiae Christianae, my predecessor Pope Leo XIII wrote that “no better citizen is there… than the Christian who is mindful of his duty” (no. 7). In fact, faith – far from standing in opposition to the responsibilities of citizenship — lends new vigor to the pursuit of justice, peace and the common good, bringing to perfection every natural gift bestowed by the Creator. Saint Paul himself encouraged the early Christians to pray for those in positions of authority in order to live a peaceful life in accord with the will of God (cf.1 Tim 2:2). In this regard, it is in the faithful fulfilment of duty – to God and country – that Catholics are called to continue to serve the nation, as leaven for the growth of a civilization of love (cf. Mt 13:33).
Also among the principles that have guided the development of this country is the God-given dignity of every human life, each person being endowed with an inherent worth that calls for reverence, [/2] protection and care. In this spirit, a full understanding of this dignity leads to recognizing the importance of safeguarding human life from its beginning at conception until natural death, and of building a society in which the vulnerable, the suffering and the forgotten are always met with compassion, solidarity and love.
Defending human life also includes welcoming, protecting and assisting immigrants, whose hopes, sacrifices and contribution have formed part of the history of this country from its very beginning. In every generation, those who have arrived seeking freedom, opportunity and a place to belong have helped to shape the nation’s character. To receive them with compassion and generosity is not only an act of charity, but also a recognition of the dignity that belongs to every human person.
In my recent Encyclical Letter, Magnifica Humanitas, I wrote about working together for the common good. “Building a world in which everyone can flourish requires shared responsibility and courage. No one can single-handedly bear the weight of the challenges the world is facing” (no. 13). We need one another, and we need to work together in unity to confront the challenges that the world is facing today.
May this milestone renew the shared commitment to the promise of freedom, justice, opportunity and democracy. May Americans honor the courage and vision of those who came before them by strengthening their communities, respecting their differences and working together toward a more perfect union. /3
Congratulations on this extraordinary national anniversary. May the spirit of 1776 continue to inspire hope and unity as the United States of America moves into the future. In assuring all of you of my prayers in your renewed efforts to strengthen the nation in the principles that guided its Founding Fathers, I entrust you to the intercession of the Immaculate Conception, patroness of this country, that she will continue to watch over America and protect all who dwell therein.
[Signature: Leo PP XIV]
From the Vatican, June 25, 2026
TheAtlantic, Adam Serwer: These Justices Are Not Impartial https://tinyurl.com/37x4f822
“Trump’s logic holds that the growing number of nonwhite people in America is a threat to the nation, whose fundamental character is racial, and that the country is the exclusive property of white Christians”
[TextLink:] https://x.com/Auriandra/status/2073200507083014361?s=20/photo/1
// Why such a slim Supreme Court majority upheld birthright citizenship
“We began by declaring that ‘all men are created equal’ We now practically read it, ‘all men are created equal except negroes.’ When the Know-nothings get control, it will read, ‘all men are created equal except negroes and foreigners and Catholics,” Abraham Lincoln famously wrote to Joshua Speed in 1855. “When it comes to this, I should prefer emigrating to some country where they make no pretence of loving liberty—to Russia, for instance, where despotism can be taken pure, and without the base alloy of hypocrisy.”
🐣 RT @EdKrassen New York City Mayor Mamdani just gave one of the most amazing speeches you will ever hear:
💽 https://x.com/EdKrassen/status/2073079385750434235?s=20/video/1
“We are told that America is exceptional because we are richer, stronger, and more powerful than everyone else.
“The truth, my friends, is that America is exceptional because here, nothing is fixed into place. The frontier may be closed. We may have walked on the moon. But the work of fulfilling the values first enshrined in the Declaration of Independence — that work endures, and it belongs to us all.
“It belongs, too, to our newest Americans: those standing here with me today, all of whom were recently naturalized. Nearly a decade ago, I, too, felt what you feel: the joy of no longer being just a New Yorker, but an American, too.
“You each hold a special power: the power to determine what America means.
“The powerful have always known their answer. America, in their view, is an arena of supremacy where only a select few are allowed freedom; where not all are created equal. America, if you ask them, becomes less the more people it welcomes. America, they will tell you, belongs only to those with the right accent or the right shade of skin. The rest of us, they insist, should be grateful for merely being allowed to visit.
“How small they are. How weak. How unoriginal.
“At every moment in our past, those who led through exclusion and isolation have tried to win power and enrich themselves by turning us against one another. Division is the oldest trick in politics — and the cheapest.
“But time and again, including 250 years ago, those forces of division have been vanquished by the forces of progress.”
⭕ 2 Jul 2026
NYT: Trump’s Huge Windfall Has Few Known Global Precedents President https://tinyurl.com/567prrc9 “Trump’s earnings in office are at a level once unimaginable for any leader of a liberal democracy, particularly a sitting American president.”
🐣 🆕 RT @NewsfromScience It’s just a microscopic water droplet surrounded by a fatty membrane and stuffed with chemicals and snippets of DNA encoding a mere 36 genes. ¤ But it’s also arguably the closest researchers have come to building a living cell from scratch. ¤ Learn more: https://scim.ag/4eS5JmR
🖼 https://x.com/NewsfromScience/status/2072674190331711562?s=20/photo/1
🐣 RT @jalle51 DAY 6 OF THE 40-DAY CAMPAIGN: SNYDER’S BRUTAL PARADOX – HOW TRUMP’S “HELP” IS CRUSHING RUSSIA 🧠🇺🇦📉
¤ https://x.com/jalle51/status/2072577671976898757?s=20
As we track record-breaking Russian casualties, burning mega-refineries, and absolute fuel panic within the Federation Council, the legendary historian and professor Timothy Snyder has highlighted a brilliantly brutal geopolitical paradox.
Snyder notes that Ukraine’s strategic position is currently fundamentally stronger than Russia’s. However, his most profound analysis touches upon Donald Trump:
“At this point, Ukraine’s position is stronger than Russia’s. And I think, in an odd way, Trump has been bad for Putin because he has de facto helped Russia. But he has helped them prolong a war they cannot win, so by helping them, I think he has made the damage to them greater.”
Prolonging a war that Russia structurally, logistically, and economically cannot win is not a pathway to victory—it is a guarantee of deeper, irreversible exhaustion. By keeping Putin’s imperial delusions on life support, it merely forces Russia deeper into catastrophic demographic collapse, economic ruin, and total strategic depletion.
Meanwhile, Ukraine’s positioning continues to harden, their domestic drone innovation reaches the stratosphere, and advanced fighter fleets are secured. Russia isn’t winning; they are simply being allowed to bleed out slower until there is nothing left to salvage. The clock is ticking, and the trap is shutting tight! ⏳💀🦅
TheHill: Tillis: SAVE America Act is ‘dead’ as time has run out to implement new voting rules https://tinyurl.com/3cvysx8j
⭕ 1 Jul 2026
TheAtlantic, Helen Lewis: The Supreme Court’s Utterly Mainstream Ruling on Women’s Sports https://tinyurl.com/bdfz853y “Somewhere from 66 to 80 percent of Americans believe that sports should be segregated by sex, rather than gender identity”
// The justices position themselves at the center of American public opinion.
TheAtlantic, Anne Applebaum: Trump’s Anti-Patriotic Trap https://tinyurl.com/439dwawb “I don’t know whether the United States of America will ever reach its tricentennial, but if it does, it will be … because the country is once again governed by people who believe in an American union.”
// The president celebrates only some Americans. But patriotism is not about who is in the Oval Office.
“People will not fight for abstractions,” Vance said, “but they will fight for their home.” Not “all men are created equal,” in other words, and not “Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness,” but tombstones. Vance believes that blood and soil, not ideas and principles, are what make him American.
As it happens, I can compete with the vice president in a race to lay claim to old bones. There is a cemetery in Galveston, Texas, where multiple members of my family are buried, too, actually going back more than five generations. …
But here is where Vance and I differ: I do not think that the presence of my ancestors in a Galveston cemetery makes me American. On the contrary, all of us—me and Vance; Vance’s in-laws, born in India; my great-great-great grandparents, born in Alsace; our respective children and eventual grandchildren—are, were, or will be Americans because we live in the community created by the abstractions that he dismissed in his speech. More important, I am convinced that these abstractions, all of those words vowing to “establish Justice” and “secure the Blessings of Liberty,” are much stronger, much more powerful than the pull of our respective clans and graveyards. Why? Because they can unite and inspire a nation that contains people with origins and ancestors as radically different as those belonging to me and Vance.
The lawyers, farmers, plantation owners, and rabble-rousers who wrote our founding documents were well aware that they needed a set of unifying ideas. By the time they got around to composing the Constitution, more than a decade after the independence declaration that we are celebrating this week, they were no longer primarily concerned with liberty and the pursuit of happiness, but with the need to keep 13 separate colonies and people of many divergent views and religions inside a single nation. Unlike the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution does not begin with a universal claim, that “all men are created equal.” It begins with the specific need to “form a more perfect union.” That need became more urgent over subsequent centuries, as that union came to include an ever-wider selection of people, among them former slaves and immigrants from Asia, Eastern Europe, Latin America.
To hold the country together, we still require functioning institutions. But we also need symbols: a flag, a national anthem, shared ceremonies that remind us of our founding ideas. Thanksgiving. The Fourth of July. Presidential inaugurations. The State of the Union address. Indeed, convention speeches are traditionally used to invoke unity and “abstract” American values too.
Since Donald Trump and J. D. Vance took office last year, they have set out to destroy both the institutions and the symbols. Vance did not choose to speak about graveyards by accident: Because they believe that only their clan represents America, that only people like them deserve to be considered “real” Americans, and that the American government exists to serve them alone, they need to undermine anything that tells a more unifying story.
With that goal in mind, Trump has deliberately and methodically defaced the White House, a structure originally designed to evoke the classical virtues—simplicity, modesty, symmetry—that were widely admired at the time of America’s founding. He desecrated the Rose Garden, cultivated by a series of first ladies as a gift to the nation, replacing its grass court with a patio copied from his Florida resort as a gift to himself. He dug up the East Wing to build an even bigger monument to himself, accepting hundreds of millions of dollars from private donors to do so, while secretly demanding hundreds of millions more from taxpayers as well. He defaced the South Lawn with a spectacle of half-naked men beating each other into a bloody pulp, acting out performances of dominance and submission.
Even his destruction of the Reflecting Pool on the National Mall has real significance. He had it redone by people he claimed to know, in a color he preferred, without consulting anyone or going through any formal process. When the renovation proved incompetent, fostering algae, he forced police and the National Guard to pretend that the pool had been vandalized, even to investigate and arrest people who touch the water. This seems a trivial matter, but it is not. Representatives of the American state now have to comply with the president’s personal fictions, however ludicrous, because he and his tribe believe that federal employees work exclusively for them, not for all of us.
… Everyone knew that the bicentennial [in 1976] was for all of us. The tall ships, the fireworks, the Freedom Train that carried a moon rock around the country—all of these were symbols we shared, no matter which part of America we came from. President Gerald Ford didn’t try to make the events of that year about himself or his base, or his tribe, or his bank account.
This year is different, because the White House is inhabited by people who don’t believe in the “abstractions” that we usually celebrate on the Fourth of July. And this affects the rest of us, whether we want it to or not. Congress’s celebration, planned for a decade, has been usurped by the president’s celebration, funded by private donors and featuring a political speech by himself. Other institutions in and around Washington postponed or reduced their 250th celebrations, so as not to get in the way of the president. Many people who might have participated will not attend, pay attention, or care.
I don’t know whether the United States of America will ever reach its tricentennial, but if it does, it will be because the narrow tribe that Trump and Vance represent has been defeated and removed, and because the country is once again governed by people who believe in an American union. This is not a partisan statement: Democrats and Republicans will together have to wrest the state away from people who believe they rule by right of inheritance, and give it back to a nation that still believes that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their creator with certain unalienable rights, and that the purpose of government is to serve the nation—not to enrich an oligarchic clan.
🚫 🐣 RT @Ric_RTP Palantir’s CEO just exposed Sam Altman and Dario Amodei for robbing every Fortune 500 company.
¤ https://x.com/Ric_RTP/status/2072403984304984202?s=20
// actually mainly a sales pitch for Palantir
📋 NYT, Nicholas Kristof: USAID Cuts Killed People. That’s the Truth. https://tinyurl.com/4bxn6fzs “A Boston University researcher estimated that the aid cuts have cost more than 750K lives worldwide. A study in the Lancet … forecast that the aid defunding will cost 9.4M lives by 2030”.
Elon Musk is newly minted as humanity’s first trillionaire, but the world’s richest man seems grumpy. And he definitely is not a fan of mine. ¤ “Kristof is lying through his teeth,” he announced on social media this week.
I got on his nerves for pushing back at his claims that his demolition of the United States Agency for International Development last year did not cost lives. The fracas began after Representative Ro Khanna, a California Democrat, said that Musk had “possibly sentenced to death” a large number of children, and Musk retorted that it was “time to sue this liar.”
“There is not even a single dead child!” Musk protested on social media. I noted that I had met many families of children who had died — and that’s when he concluded that I was lying.
Musk’s assertion that not a single child died is absurd, yet he doubled down: “They cannot cite a single name of someone who died out of the ‘millions’ they falsely claim have died. Not a single name!”
On X, I began to give Musk some names. Let me elaborate: [… details on 3 cases … ]
A Boston University researcher estimated that the aid cuts have cost more than 750,000 lives worldwide. A study published in the Lancet, the British medical journal, forecast that at present rates, the aid defunding will cost 9.4 million lives by 2030.
These figures may not be accurate; we just don’t have solid mortality data, and the aid cuts have also reduced data collection. What I can say after visiting numerous impoverished villages is that aid cuts are unquestionably costing the lives of many children.
Some prominent conservatives leaped to the defense of Musk, saying in effect: Why is it our job to save the lives of children in South Sudan? Why don’t rich liberals write checks? Why don’t other countries do more?
Those are fair questions. But if any of us came across an ambulance that had run out of gas with a hemorrhaging woman inside, surely we would happily hand over a $10 bill to save her life.
Until Trump’s second term, American aid cost just 23 cents for every $100 of gross national income and saved a life approximately once every 10 seconds. Seems like a bargain to me. Certainly it appears wiser than spending billions of dollars on a war with Iran.
I say “wiser” because all this is not just about compassion but also about self-interest. Aid money serves national security and protects us from diseases. I’ve noted that the current Ebola outbreak in Africa may have gotten out of control precisely because we cut aid spending in the region.
Yes, other countries should do more, impoverished countries should be less corrupt, and our own aid can be allocated more wisely. But note that some countries in Europe are significantly more generous than America, spending up to 10 times as much on aid as a share of national income as we do.
Should liberals donate more to humanitarian causes? Sure. But compassion isn’t a liberal impulse — it’s a human one. It was evangelicals and Republicans who in 2003 started the single best aid program ever, the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief, or PEPFAR; it has saved more than 26 million lives so far. Some of the most heroic aid workers I’ve met in dangerous locations have been Christian missionaries, from nuns to doctors; they would dispute the idea that empathy is woke. …
So let me offer a challenge to Musk: Come with me on a reporting trip to South Sudan or Somalia or Mozambique. Meet starving children whose lives can be easily saved. Hold them. Look into their eyes. Talk to their terrified moms.
You’ll understand that these kids are just like ours, except that they didn’t do as well in the lottery of birth — and that just because we can’t save every child’s life doesn’t mean we should save none of them.
🐣 RT @RpsAgainstTrump President Donald Trump and his family’s financial dealings drew sharp criticism from The Wall Street Journal’s editorial board on Wednesday, with the conservative newspaper accusing the Trumps of “cashing in on the Presidency in big and sketchy ways.”
⋙ WSJ Editorial: The Trump Family and ‘Honest Graft’ https://tinyurl.com/4njev784 “They are profiting off the Presidency in ways that demean the office”. … “The 927-page report shows Mr. Trump made some $1.4 billion last year from crypto alone. Yowzers.”
[TextLink:] https://x.com/Auriandra/status/2072530962672419152?s=20/photo/1
Americans tell pollsters they don’t think they are getting ahead financially. But President Trump and his family are having no trouble, judging from his 2025 financial disclosure report released Tuesday. The Trump clan is cashing in on the Presidency in big and sketchy ways.
The 927-page report shows Mr. Trump made some $1.4 billion last year from crypto alone. Yowzers. This includes $635 million in royalties from the memecoin that Mr. Trump launched days before his inauguration. Trump Organization business affiliates make money from what are akin to transaction fees when the memecoin is traded.
Another $593 million came from token and equity sales by World Liberty Financial, whose co-founders include the President, his sons and special envoy Steve Witkoff. Mr. Witkoff’s son, Zach, is its CEO. A business entity affiliated with Mr. Trump and his family members owns a major chunk of World Liberty.
We have detailed some of World Liberty’s dubious deals with foreign actors that may have been trying to buy influence with the Administration. This includes DWF Labs, a crypto firm based in the United Arab Emirates, and the Pakistan government. Abu Dhabi used World Liberty’s stablecoin to invest in the Binance crypto platform.
Binance pleaded guilty in 2023 to violating U.S. anti-money laundering laws and Iran sanctions. Its co-founder Changpeng Zhao, who pleaded guilty to violating the Bank Secrecy Act, was pardoned by Mr. Trump in October. The Journal reported in May that since the plea deals billions of dollars were routed through Binance and financed Iran’s regime.
Then there’s the Trump family’s financial alchemy involving government support for critical minerals. The Administration has provided billions of dollars in financing to an array of critical mineral developers to shore up U.S. supply chains so China can’t weaponize its dominance. The government investment has caused an industry gold rush.
The Trumps are seeing their opportunities and taking them, in the tradition of what Tammany Hall’s George Washington Plunkitt called “honest graft.” (For Princeton history majors, Tammany Hall was a 19th century Democratic political machine.) The President’s disclosure report shows capital gains in the range of $100,000 to $1 million from critical mineral developer MP Materials, whose share price surged last summer after the company announced the Pentagon was taking a 15% stake.
Donald Trump Jr.’s venture capital firm, 1789 Capital, invested in Vulcan Elements three months before the company received a $620 million government loan. Investment bank Cantor Fitzgerald, which is headed by Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick’s sons, has been a financial adviser or underwriter for many startups that have received government support.
The Trump Administration has also offered up to $1.6 billion in financing for a project to develop a tungsten mine in Kazakhstan. There’s no question the U.S. needs to diversify its tungsten supply, which is critical to weapons systems. But a firm partly owned by Mr. Trump’s sons Eric and Donald Jr. invested in a company backing the project shortly before the Administration announced a minerals deal with Kazakhstan last November that paved the way for the project. Kazakhstan President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev posted a photo of himself at a White House deal-signing ceremony.
The Administration has proposed establishing price floors for critical minerals to ensure China can’t flood the market and financially undercut alternative suppliers, as it has in the past. This might make sense, but a government guaranteed price paired with financial support make these projects potentially very lucrative for investors like the Trump family.
v
Assuming all of this is legal, it’s still an unseemly display of using the Presidency for family profit. It’s hard to believe the Trump boys would be able to do the same deals if Dad wasn’t in the Oval Office. The main difference between Hunter Biden’s foreign dealings and the Trump projects is that the Trumps are brazenly open about theirs.But there will be political costs—for Republicans. If Democrats take back the House or Senate this November, they will have a field day probing the Trump family deals. Charges of GOP corruption will resound through 2028. This will feed the left’s class warfare and facile narrative that billionaire “oligarchs” are getting rich off government.
Foreigners may come to think they can buy American goodwill or favors if they cut the Trumps in on the action. Americans, and especially his supporters, deserve better from this or any President.
🐣 RT @FPRI Robert Person writes, “The democratic pillar of defensive liberalism is the most imperiled. As citizens lose faith in democratic institutions, they fall prey to the appeal of populist strongmen. The Axis of Upheaval understands this and uses the openness of our democratic systems against us.” [link:] https://buff.ly/S6698dK
// FPRI: Foreign Policy Research Institute
WaPo: They built the world’s most powerful AI. They’re facing a mystery they can’t explain. https://tinyurl.com/yrdyrkze AI companies have hired computer scientists, neuroscientists and philosophers to study whether AIs experience emotions or are conscious.
🐣 RT @Dr_TheHistories This map is based on the influential 1989 book Albion’s Seed by historian David Hackett Fischer.
🌎 https://x.com/Dr_TheHistories/status/2072345314611327117?s=20/photo/1
Fischer argues that four major migrations from different regions of the British Isles between the 1610s and the American Revolution laid the cultural foundations of the United States.
Puritans from East Anglia settled New England, southern English settlers established Virginia and the Tidewater South, Quakers from England’s North Midlands founded Pennsylvania, and Scots-Irish borderlanders populated Appalachia. According to Fischer, these migrations shaped regional accents, religious traditions, politics, architecture, and ideas about family and freedom that can still be seen today.
While the map simplifies a much more complex history and does not include the influence of later immigrants, Indigenous peoples, or enslaved Africans, Albion’s Seed remains one of the most influential works on the origins of regional American culture.
🐣 RT @SenWhitehouse The shadow docket is one problem. The other is a Supreme Court making up facts that aren’t factual, in secret, and outside proper judicial fact-finding process. They get the last say, so they just make it up. (E.g.: how is dark money transparent?)
⋙ 🐣 RT @propublica New: We found that the Supreme Court is deciding more consequential rulings than ever before in largely unsigned orders with little to no explanation of how they voted or the reasons why. [link:] https://tinyurl.com/5xdw2dhn
🐣 RT @DemocracyDocket BREAKING: In a huge win for voters, a federal court granted the NAACP’s request to halt the USPS implementation of Trump’s executive order targeting mail voting. ¤ The order, which covers the entire nation, comes after a judge blocked the implementation in 23 blue states just last week.
🐣 RT @marceelias 🚨 BREAKING: In the latest blow to President Donald Trump’s anti-voting agenda, a federal court on Wednesday granted the NAACP’s request to halt the U.S. Postal Service’s (USPS) implementation of his executive order against mail voting.
⋙ DemDocket: Court blocks USPS from implementing Trump’s anti-mail voting order https://tinyurl.com/y393ndyr “U.S. District Court Judge Emmet Sullivan granted the NAACP’s request, saying that… USPS’s arguments to the contrary as ‘without merit.’”
🐣 RT @ TheRickWilson This is…a lot.
⋙ 🐣 RT @atruparm here is the entirety of Palantir CEO Alex Karp’s televised nervous breakdown this morning on CNBC
💽 https://x.com/atrupar/status/2072313022035398795?s=20/video/1
⋙ 🐣 RT @MrReluctant I watched the first 8 minutes and realized it made little sense. Can someone give me a 3-sentence summary of the crazy?
⋙⋙ 🐣 RT @NathanCPerry
¤ https://x.com/NathanCPerry/status/2072349864059417068?s=20
He’s claiming that both business leaders and the government (customers) are upset with the models by the big AI companies like Anthropic because the models don’t run locally, the customers don’t have enough control, the customers don’t know how they really work and what data gets shared with Anthropic because it’s a black box.
Essentially he’s saying the customers can use the Palantir and Nvidia products to build and run the ai models locally while ensuring the data does not get saved by the model in such a way it can be accessed by third parties thus ensuring security.
⋙⋙⋙ 🐣 thank you.
Karp maybe bipolar. Flight of thought is a symptom (eg not finishing sentences, etc)
Doesn’t imply he’s not intelligent; thinking faster than he can get the words out or explain the connections.
I appreciated the freshness and candor.
🐣 RT @_InfoGram_ This is absolute cinema 🎥
🇺🇸 Trump at 6:00 PM: “We’re not letting Iran get nukes, no matter what. We’re sending our guys to inspect.”
🇮🇷 Araghchi at 7:00 PM🔥: “Sure — only if we can send our team to Israel to see if they have nukes. If Israel has them, then Iran should too.”👏
Araghchi trapped him completely 💪
🐣 RT @DropSiteNews 🚨 Israeli Plan to Herd Palestinians Into Controlled “Shelters” to Begin “Within A Matter of Weeks”
¤ https://x.com/DropSiteNews/status/2072199773801591272?s=20
🔸Israel is preparing to channel Palestinians into fenced “humanitarian shelters” in areas outside Hamas’s control, policed by a foreign force, while its military deepens its occupation of the rest of Gaza, according to the pro-Netanyahu paper Israel Hayom, which reported the plan approvingly.
🔸Under the plan, unarmed civilians would be directed to a first zone in Tel al-Sultan, near Rafah, an area Drop Site has documented Israel systematically razing.
🔸A “multinational force” – the ISF – operating under the Trump administration’s “Board of Peace” would deploy there from a newly built base, equipped to police the zones, while the Israeli military “continues to maintain and deepen its hold” beyond the Yellow Line.
🔸 The camp/base for the force “has already been built,” and the Board of Peace has “begun identifying sites” for logistics warehouses, with the groundwork underway now, and deployment in the coming weeks.
🔸The paper described the effort as a “pincer movement”: the military seizing more territory as the population is siphoned into the controlled zones, in the hope that Hamas is left “without a population, territory or resources.”
🔸Officials said the areas would receive caravans and aid, but not the concrete needed to actually rebuild Gaza.
◽️The plan matches what Drop Site has previously exposed through leaked documents: a surveilled, checkpoint-controlled “planned community” in Rafah designed to force Palestinians into what amounts to an Israeli panopticon, tracked and screened as a condition of receiving aid.
🔸An Israeli political source told the paper the military would keep up “the pace of targeted killings while remaining below the threshold of international criticism… as long as Hamas is unwilling to disarm.”
🖼 The buildup is already visible: the “Board of Peace” itself posted images of tactical vehicles arriving at a logistics base on June 30, matching the article’s account of preparations underway.