Links 11/3/2025

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1. leaf November 3, 2025 at 7:11 am

   “300 million tourists just visited China’s stunning Xinjiang region. There’s a side they didn’t see”
   https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c8x1rnnd5gjo

   Either Xinjiang is the greatest Potemkin project in the history of such projects for 300 million tourists with phones and cameras to not find any “crimes against humanity”, or perhaps the photos (some AI generated) of actual regular prisons for criminals or my personal favourite of BDSM photos with fake captions as “genocide” was fake all along.

   Insane they are still willing to push this narrative when everyone can see what is happening in Gaza.

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   1. Tom67 November 3, 2025 at 9:24 am

      I spent hours and hours reviewing testimony of Kasakh-Chinese dual nationals who had been finally let out to Kasakhstan by China after the pressure of their relatives in Kaskhstan had gotten to great. It was horror unto horror unto horror and these are the only people who got out of Xinjiang. No Uighur made it. It is like Cambodia unter Pol Pot or the USSR under Stalin. Nobody believed it (among them famously Noam Chomsky) until it was all over. It is the same now.

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      1. Tom67 November 3, 2025 at 10:28 am

         For whoever reads Russian (or gets the English translation) here an article in the Russian journal “Russki Reporter” (sort of Russian LIFE) from 2019 about Xinjiang: https://les.media/articles/863622-zavodnoy-mandarin. Once you read it you understand why there was no tourism for many years and why they let in tourists in again. Evidently the Potemkin facade has been finished by now.

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      2. Cian November 3, 2025 at 11:24 am

         While I think something certainly happened in Xinjiang, it’s hard to know what exactly it was due to western propaganda and exaggeration. A lot of money went into disinformation campaigns. What we were told in the west was not true, even if the things that happened may have been quite bad. There’s no evidence of a genocide, though the west repeatedly stated that there was one. And there has been no attempt in the west to explain the Islamic extremism (including nasty terrorist attacks in both China, and outside China) that led up to it. Or of course the ways in which western sources were funding/abetting local separatist movements (which seem to have been fairly extreme).

         My guess is that there was a very clumsy and harsh response to (pretty bad) Xinjiang terrorism and also growing local resentment towards modernization and Sinocization, and growing attempts by the US to make that worse. It was probably run by Chinese officials with little connection to Xinjiang, with an eye on promotion. Many of the people running it may not have spoken the local language. But of course its impossible to know, because our sources are either Chinese (censored), or western (dubious).

         I did see a source that I think was fairly reliable, which simply translated accounts of refugees. What they described was detention, which was fairly arbitrary, involved some kind of reeducation (seemed clumsy) and not particularly pleasant living conditions (though better than US prisons, TBF). There was no mention of torture. They were desperately sad, but no more so than you would see (unfortunately) in a lot of countries, and nowhere close to the kinds of repression you’ll see in Kashmir, of Uzbekistan. Neither of which get remotely the same coverage.

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         1. lyman alpha blob November 3, 2025 at 12:14 pm

            There were many reports of Uyghurs fighting with the US backed head choppers in Syria earlier this year – https://foreignpolicy.com/2025/04/04/uyghurs-tpd-syria-fighters/

            When news of Uyghur repression came out several years ago, China claimed there was a Muslim “terrorist” problem with the Uyghurs, which at the time I tended to discount, just as I discounted Western claims that there was a genocide going on for reasons that were never made clear. I assumed repression was due to calls for rights that China did not want to grant, similar to what’s happened in the past in Tibet.

            Given US proclivity for financing radical Islamists as muscle for regime change, I’m starting to think that China might have been telling the truth, and that maybe the US had a hand in fomenting problems in Xinjiang. It sure wouldn’t be the first time that the US sponsored violent groups to cause trouble for China.

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      3. Cian November 3, 2025 at 11:31 am

         Also, FWIW, a prisoner population of 1 million (as that article suggests) would require 50-200,000 guards. That’s excluding anyone doing interrogation, reeducation, police, etc.

         Obviously China is a big place, but that kind of staffing would be hard to hide. Particularly if they weren’t local (as a good number of them presumably wouldn’t be). Police states require extraordinary levels of man power.

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   2. JayBird November 3, 2025 at 9:37 am

      I did notice this article and wondered at the timing.

      They have this one running now:

      The word genocide has been decidedly dropped from it though.
      I don’t get the UK. Do they or don’t they want Chinese students to come here?

      https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cq50j5vwny6o

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   3. DJG, Reality Czar November 3, 2025 at 10:42 am

      leaf: Someone is seriously fudging these figures. Which keep getting reported without question.

      Xinjiang has a population of 21 million. Italy has a population of 59 million. In 2023 and 2024, Italy received 130 million individual visitors — for a presence (nights / stays) of 480 million in 2024.

      Maybe, maybe, although I doubt that Xinjiang has the tourist structure that Italy has, maybe, Xinjiang had 300 million nights/stays by visitors.

      But I doubt it.

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2. The Rev Kev November 3, 2025 at 7:14 am

   “Ukraine receives promised Patriot air defense systems from Germany, Zelensky says”

   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q9yAfQ3CTnc

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   1. ilsm November 3, 2025 at 9:02 am

      Germans may see that defense is less than worth the money.

      As Japan now wants about 400 tomahawk land attack missiles (TLAM) to displace SM 3 interceptors on their already too few missile defense destroyers!

      Japan also demurred (saved a couple billion bucks) on building two Lockheed long range defense radars!

      Japan thinks it more productive to be able to “go downtown” to Pyongyang! If US gives the nav links!

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   2. Ricardo November 3, 2025 at 11:01 am

      Footage of the delivered Patriot air defense systems
      https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dsx2vdn7gpY

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3. Alice X November 3, 2025 at 7:31 am

   Well, Candace Owens x Norman Finkelstein 2:44:52 – I’ll be back in a couple of hours if I make through.

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   1. Alice X November 3, 2025 at 12:09 pm

      I paused about forty minutes in, it’s well traveled fare with NF (for me at least, I’ve followed him for years). Interesting that some right wingers are just catching up to the grim foundational history (I’ve known about for years), better late than never. NF is as good a place to start as any. The video has 1,436,286 views, she has 5.51 million subscribers. I hope the message spreads far and wide. There is also the possibility of latent actual anti-Jewish sentiment in that realm, but there is a genocide being perpetrated so it may be a knock-on effect. I hope not, viewing Arabs and Muslims as our fellow brothers and sisters is goal enough.

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4. Wukchumni November 3, 2025 at 7:32 am

   Oh Randy, you’re so Fine
   You’re so Fine, but you have no neckline, hey Randy, hey Randy
   Oh Randy, you’re so Fine
   You’re so Fine, you blow my mind, hey Randy, hey Randy

   Oh Randy, you’re so Fine
   You’re so Fine, you blow my mind, hey Randy, hey Randy
   Oh Randy, you’re so Fine
   You’re so Fine, you toe the AIPAC line, hey Randy

   Hey Randy
   You’ve been talking smack all night and that’s a little long
   You think you’ve got the right, but I think you’ve got it wrong
   Why can’t you say Tucker’s right? So you can defend genocide Randy?

   ‘Cause when you say Israelis have the will, it always means fresh kills
   You’re givin’ me the chills, Bibi, please, Bibi don’t
   Every night you claim they have the right Randy

   Oh Randy, what a pity, you don’t understand
   You played your part when AIPAC took you by the hand
   Oh Randy, you’re so petty, can’t you understand
   It’s guys like you, Randy
   Oh what you do Randy, do Randy
   Do play your part, Randy

   Hey Randy
   Now when the devil in the details has hooves, who’s ever gonna know
   And every time you claim he’s an anti-Semite by putting on a show
   There’s something AIPAC can use, so don’t say no Randy

   So come on and give it to me anyway you can
   Anyway you want to do it, I’ll take it like a man
   But please baby, please don’t herd me into the pro-Israel camp Randy

   Oh Randy, what a pity, you don’t understand
   You played your part when AIPAC took you by the hand
   Oh Randy, you’re so petty, can’t you understand
   It’s guys like you, Randy
   Oh what you do Randy, do Randy
   Do play your part, Randy

   Mickey, by Toni Basil

   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3E-Zrg9CB_Q&list=RD3E-Zrg9CB_Q

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5. The Rev Kev November 3, 2025 at 7:41 am

   “Trump says Orbán requested exemption from Russian oil sanctions – Here’s how Washington responded”

   ‘Analysts note that Washington’s refusal carries both economic and political weight, signalling that the United States will not make exceptions for any ally as long as they remain dependent on Russian energy.’

   Friend or not, I suspect that Trump is going to shake down Hungary for some big money or something. But if Trump tells Orban that he will not allow him to be dependent on Russian energy. I wonder if Orban will ask him when the US will stop importing Russian refined uranium so that the US is not reliant on Russian energy. Probably won’t though as Trump would chuck his toys out his pram and start threatening sanctions.

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6. flora November 3, 2025 at 7:47 am

   .File under Antitrust. utube. ~13 minutes.

   Billionaires Owning Everything Just Got Worse…

   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-VSvaiXeNI8

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7. Wukchumni November 3, 2025 at 7:49 am

   I’m in a bit of an internal struggle over home insurance, which just went up to almost $10k a year. I’m seriously giving some thought to dropping my coverage-and having no mortgage, it’d be a piece of cake to do-going nekkid-skinny stripping if you will.

   Flooding isn’t a risk, nor hurricanes or tornadoes~

   …its all about wildfires

   If my insurance carrier (with the charismatic black spokesman who for some reason is friends with NFL players) was to exclude wildfires from my coverage, it’d be the easiest no brainier in the world to drop them.

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   1. The Rev Kev November 3, 2025 at 8:14 am

      I supposed that if you banked that ten odd grand a year, it would only take a few years to have enough put aside to build a new place if a wildfire swept tiny town and your own home away.

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      1. Wukchumni November 3, 2025 at 8:29 am

         I’d pay Julio and his merry band of tree monkeys the 10 grandidos to ascend into the apogees of trees on the many splendored acres of the all cats and no cattle ranch to remove all the dead limbs I couldn’t reach with a 14 foot pole saw, is the first thing I’d do with the windfall.

         We have a modest house almost 50 years old that could be rebuilt toot suite if something wickedly hot were to expunge it~

         Another factor for dropping insurance is the idea that no home has ever been lost to a wildfire here, as we are in an oak savanna, nothing like Paradise which was full of ready to burn pine trees.

         Saw this listing the other day, and it’s my favorite home in Tiny Town that i’ve oft admired from a distance when driving to the Ladybug trailhead in Sequoia NP. Its about a mile from William Shatner’s ranch~

         Love the swimming hole, of Fallingwater revisited

         Got $2 riding on the next lotto~

         https://www.redfin.com/CA/Three-Rivers/48250-S-Fork-Dr-93271/home/190338475

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         1. The Rev Kev November 3, 2025 at 8:45 am

            Yeah, I see what you mean, Definitely some Fallingwater inspiration going on there. I suppose that it is high up the hillside in case of flash floods going through that river. Beautiful views and the interiors look great too.

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            1. Wukchumni November 3, 2025 at 12:06 pm

               You’d be fine, except on Christmas Eve 1867, when a wall of water about 100 feet tall came ripping down South Fork canyon, after nearly a month of snow accumulation ran into a pineapple express, initially starting a snowslide that turned into a landslide, taking out the entire lower Garfield Grove of around 1,500 Giant Sequoias-all mature trees 15-20 feet wide at chest height, a few hundred feet high and 1,500 years old, and then created an earthen dam with boulders and Sequoias fusing it together, and water flow on the Kaweah stopped for a day as the dam filled up and then let loose…

               On Christmas Day down in Visalia, 5 foot wide sections of Sequoias were seen floating in the streets there.

               It remains the largest landslide to have ever happened in what is now a National Park in living time since Americans have been watching such things.

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   2. SteveD November 3, 2025 at 8:43 am

      The potential impacts of such a policy if enacted in California are boggling. I’m anxious to see what happens in our great neighbor to the east. Some things off the top of my head….
      – Home values drop as wildfire insurance becomes scarce and/or unaffordable.
      – Mortgage issuers “fill the gap” with extremely expensive wildfire coverage
      – property values drop, leading to municipal funding shortfalls
      – local jurisdictions increase taxes to substantially increase firefighting resources

      I mean, it could go in all sorts of directions.

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      1. mrsyk November 3, 2025 at 9:12 am

         How long before the residential real estate market is primarily brokered by PE? Private Equity, a one stop home buying experience, where inventory, financing, insurance, and a white picket fence are provided.

         Little Pink Houses.
         John Mellencamp

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   3. Louis Fyne November 3, 2025 at 8:58 am

      obviously dunno your area….

      worth looking into dropping insurance and putting that money into fire suppression, and clear-cutting trees around your house. and/or a metal roof

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   4. Adam1 November 3, 2025 at 9:02 am

      $10k is not chump change. It’s definitely something to consider. Insurance should be viewed as providing you coverage for a risk you can’t afford on your own. But at $10k it might even be more realistic to self insure (just deal with a disaster if it happens). To me the $10k expense only makes sense if you knew your home would burn down in the next year or two – that’s the biggest risk I’d think.

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   5. Keith Newman November 3, 2025 at 10:04 am

      @Wukchumni at 7:49 am
      Yikes! 10k annually for insurance! Last time you mentioned you were closing in on that amount I checked mine to compare – 1700 CAD for a 4 bedroom house, 2600 sq ft. And I live right beside a flood zone up in Quebec.
      It’s all about risk I guess… or insurance company profits.
      Good luck with your lotto ticket alluded to below. Lovely looking place but you might want to check out its insurance costs…

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      1. Wukchumni November 3, 2025 at 11:43 am

         So envious of your insurance rate, my abode is a touch smaller than yours, and when you figure the exchange rate of the C$, it comes out to US$1200~

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   6. B Flat November 3, 2025 at 11:17 am

      Billionaire Charlie Munger pointed out that self-insurance for those who can afford it is a more efficient alternative to traditional homeowner’s insurance policies. Both he and Warren Buffett took this approach, preferring to bypass the “claims process and all kinds of things” by simply writing a check to rebuild if needed. I’d consider banking the premium against the likelihood of fire burning my house down in any given year, but the juice ain’t worth the squeeze. And I imagine HOAs compound even in disaster. Good for you though if you can manage it Wuk

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      1. Wukchumni November 3, 2025 at 11:39 am

         I could pull it off, but methinks i’d be property non grata as far as ever being insured again-they obviously aren’t happy with my surroundings. Yeah-a quarter of a million acres have burned above me in 3 separate wildfires in the past 5 years, so there’s that.

         I’d be cutting the homebilical cord~

         My sister down in San Diego was quoted something $inister for her home by her existing carrier, so she decided to go shopping around and found nobody would take her on at any price among retail insurance companies.

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8. MarkT November 3, 2025 at 8:26 am

   That map (Crude Oil Reserves in Billion Barrels) is much more than useful. My conclusion: Canada had better watch out!

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   1. The Rev Kev November 3, 2025 at 8:30 am

      It was Alex Christoforou that was pointing out that the countries that Trump has targeted lately – Iran Venezuela and Nigeria – all happen to be rich in oil. Just a coincidence I’m sure.

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      1. Mikel November 3, 2025 at 11:43 am

         Looking at some of the global business relationships and there are also those that lobby for some US interventions.

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   2. hayrake November 3, 2025 at 9:50 am

      I live in a sparsely populated mountainous area in New England. Yesterday I heard loud noise and knew it to be an airplane. Went out to take a look and saw 5 altogether. They were 4 prop military planes and they were flying very, very low. I’m guessing 300 ft or less.
      I read that Venezuela is mountainous and maybe something like where I am. Could it have been an exercise to let the “guys” see something like Venezuela.

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      1. ilsm November 3, 2025 at 10:34 am

         Yes probably familiarize to similar terrain.

         During the Cold War and before USAF sidelined the A-10 you might see a pair flying down the valleys and off ridge lines in the Adirondacks.

         Jet noise in woods the sound of war makingl

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9. eg November 3, 2025 at 8:45 am

   Re “The end of the rip-off economy”

   Even for the Economist, this is egregious. On top of the tweeted commentary pointing out the thoughtless quoting of George Mason shills, we get this unquestioned howler:

   “AI ‘will help people who didn’t have the privilege of great advice to get…pretty great advice,’ argues Bret Taylor, the chairman of OpenAI, creator of ChatGPT.”

   Sure, and the fox will guard your henhouse 🙄

   Finally, in the very last paragraph we get the admission that information asymmetry won’t go away, because Akerloff’s phishers for phools will weaponize the technology against consumers — yet inexplicably the very last sentence of the final paragraph contradicts this admission completely:

   “providers and retailers are likely to fight back with their own AI tools. Amazon listings are already swamped with AI-generated product descriptions. Use ChatGPT with your plumber today, and you may be able to convince him to cut his price. Use ChatGPT with him in a year, and he may have his own model telling him to charge you even more. Companies are working on “generative engine optimisation”, which could result in chatbots putting out information favourable to their product or service. In time, many markets may require AI arbitrators, where both parties agree to abide by the ruling of an impartial third-party bot. What seems clear is that the days of the know-nothing consumer are well and truly over.” (emphasis mine)

   Wat?

   Epic drivel …

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   1. Huey November 3, 2025 at 10:21 am

      Impartial 3rd party bot? What in the bleeding hell

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   2. Mikel November 3, 2025 at 11:16 am

      If I recall, I remember doctors were already fed up with people using the net for self-diagnosis.
      And they are still trying to pass off the lie that their programmed code, that largely scrapes internet, is “thinking” and “reasoning”.

      This may be the deadliest grift of all time – which is why they are trying to remove any remnants of laws that would put asses behind bars after the carnage.

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   3. tegnost November 3, 2025 at 11:50 am

      Right?
      A bull sh!t generator is going to end rip offs.
      Plumbing.
      I was fixing a leak and installing a shut off valve, and although I religiously scroll past the generated content, this time I looked at it, being in a rush and wanting to know do I leave the valve open or closed when I glue it on and it’d been a while, I kind of thought open but the generated comment said closed I scrolled down and the rest were web sites that said open. Don’t believe it.
      Another, I installed an on demand water heater and was getting an e5 message, the generated comment suggested call a plumber, might be dangerous! Confusing!
      Next youtube video, not ai….
      reduce water flow problem solved.

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10. ilsm November 3, 2025 at 8:56 am

    AI: the Hare and the Tortoise.

    US including but not limited to the AI/Big Tech is increasingly exemplar of Aesop’s hare!

    The authors consideration of Chinese prowess in “analog” is interesting, around 1999 I worked with a fellow who followed extant “futurists”. He had been to a conference where the topic of “analog over or versus digital” was discussed and those futurists saw need to “keep after analog”.

    I did not pay enough attention to the topic and soon moved on to more program management work.

    The US in many areas is becoming the hare…..

    Thanks for sharing.

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11. AG November 3, 2025 at 9:05 am

    re: film history interview Jonathan Rosenbaum

    I didn´t know whether put it here or on the Sunday Movie post – a great interview about film and his book “Movie Mutations”

    “Movie Mutations: The Changing Face of World Cinephilia”
    https://www.amazon.de/Movie-Mutations-Changing-World-Cinephilia/dp/0851709834

    with the one and only Jonathan Rosenbaum.

    Conducted in Budapest in 2020, posted Oct. 28th 2025

    From Movie Mutations to 1968: An Interview with Jonathan Rosenbaum in Budapest

    The following interview took place in a hotel lobby in early February 2020.
    https://jonathanrosenbaum.net/2025/10/from-movie-mutations-to-1968-an-interview-with-jonathan-rosenbaum-in-budapest/

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12. The Rev Kev November 3, 2025 at 9:11 am

    “US issues ‘final warning’ to Baghdad over Iraqi resistance factions”

    I have noticed a trend here. The US and Israel want Hamas to disarm. Not going to happen so now they are trying to find troops around the world as an occupation force that will do it for them. In Lebanon, the US is demanding that Hezbollah be disarmed by the Lebanese army. Again, not going to happen and Israel and the US don’t want to do that job. Now the US is demanding Iraq disarm the Iraqi resistance as they can’t do the job themselves either. Of course if that happened you might find that ISIS might come back and Iraq does not want that to happen. Always wanting other countries to do the lifting for them as they can’t do it themselves.

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    1. ilsm November 3, 2025 at 9:37 am

       How is US going to sell the Abraham Accords’ coalition against Iran, if it does not disarm Shi’a in Iraq?

       Those Iraqi resistance units were just fine when they shoved ISIS out of north Iraq! I seem to recall they were granted almost ‘national guard” status. These are largely Shi’a formations and killing Suleimani was aimed at them!

       If these were the Falluja Sunni killers of US marines they would be okay! Or rehashed ISIS like in Damascus.

       What is Hegseth proposing? TLAM to Baghdad?

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       1. gf November 3, 2025 at 10:22 am

          An Israeli air base in Baghdad or even closer to the
          Iranian border is my guess.

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    2. Christopher Fay November 3, 2025 at 10:11 am

       I think the US would reinsert ISIS to wage Jihad against Iraq and call it popular will of the center of Iraqi society being tired of the radical Shia. The US needs unrestricted access to that air space.

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    3. Mikel November 3, 2025 at 11:50 am

       My guess is that, for the US military, Israel’s interests take priority over all these latest saber rattlings.

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13. Jason Boxman November 3, 2025 at 9:34 am

    MAGA on the March

    Democrats are more enthusiastic about the midterms as Trump’s approval hits a second-term low, CNN poll finds (CNN)

    In a midterm election year, though, views of the president can outweigh perceptions of the opposition party. Trump’s approval rating in the poll stands at 37%, the worst of his second term in CNN polling and roughly equivalent to his 36% approval rating at this point in his first term.

    And his disapproval rating, at 63%, is numerically the highest of either term, one point above the previous high of 62% as he was leaving office in January 2021.

    No need to offer any material benefits, mission accomplished

    CNN’s poll results suggest that the Democratic Party’s ongoing internal image troubles may not necessarily translate into defections at the ballot box. Democratic-aligned voters remain far less fond of their own party (65% have a favorable view of the Democratic Party) than Republican-aligned voters (80% have a favorable view of the GOP), but even those Democratic-aligned voters with a negative view of the party are almost universally behind the Democratic candidate in their district (93%) and broadly motivated to vote (71% say they are extremely motivated).

    All told, Democrats hold a 12-point advantage among those voters who say they are extremely or very motivated to turn out next year.

    and

    Roughly 8 in 10 consider the federal government shutdown a crisis (31%) or a major problem (50%), and 61% disapprove of Trump’s handling of it. Nearly as many disapprove of the way each party’s congressional leadership is handling it (58% disapprove of each). Taken all together, about 9 in 10 American disapprove of at least one of those three players on the shutdown.

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    1. JP November 3, 2025 at 12:41 pm

       So much hand wringing on the left. Polls showing not much support from formally Dem strongholds. I think the simple fact is 30% of the registered voters sat out the last election because none of the above. The real battle is about who gets those potential votes off the bench. It will probably require an actual choice and the Dem party may not be capable of that. Ezra Klein gives this some discussion:

       https://www.nytimes.com/2025/11/02/opinion/democrats-liberalism-elections-crick.html#commentsContainer

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14. The Rev Kev November 3, 2025 at 9:44 am

    “Ukraine’s Suicide Helicopter Missions… Why?”

    ‘I think the more likely explanation is that this was a joint-CIA-GUR operation to extract CIA paramilitary officers who were operating with Ukrainian forces in and around Pokrovsk.’

    It might work out that the Russians may bag themselves a few high-ranking NATO officers as well as spooks. Who knows what they will find in Pokrovsk. Hate to be a merc in that city right now. Putin said that the captured Ukrainians will be held according to the Geneva Conventions. I don’t think that that applies to mercs though.

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    1. Louis Fyne November 3, 2025 at 9:51 am

       there are no NATO officers at the front. imo.

       there is so much Ukraine money sloshing around, and plenty of retired, middle-aged ex-SpecOps/ex-vanilla military that there are plenty of people to hire off-the-books for plausible deniability.

       And such “high-value” personnel would not be at a battle like Pokrovsk—unless Ukraine/Whitehall/Langley love throwing away such assets….which, of course, is not implausible given the comedy of errors of the past 11+ years

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       1. Luxo November 3, 2025 at 11:05 am

          There are no AFU officers at the front, also. They are all commanding from the rear, as per testimonies of POWs.

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15. The Rev Kev November 3, 2025 at 10:08 am

    “Neo-Nazi-Led Think Tank Gets Warm Welcome in Washington”

    When you read this article, the whole thing was a well-planned set up. Men in military uniforms. Check. Young photogenic chicks. Check. They had all the meeting laid out for them with the State Department, Capitol Hill, and the Atlantic Council. Then there is the connections with J.P Morgan, the American Enterprise Institute, Michael McFaul, Stanford University, Michael Flynn, the House Foreign Affairs and House Intelligence committees and many, many more organizations and people. The worse of it is they they are getting their hooks into the US military so may influence those young officers for decades to come.

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    1. gf November 3, 2025 at 10:38 am

       This is why the entire state will have to be liquidated.
       Even if it is not part of NATO they will come to the “Israel” model of proxy over time.
       Undeclared nuc’s etc.

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16. Jason Boxman November 3, 2025 at 10:13 am

    From ICE Watch

    Spreading the COVID, make infectious disease great again!

    Everyone gets sick in detention, which is notoriously crowded, and notoriously cold, and there was concern, now, that this man had not made it back. Some people popped up in far-off ICE detention centers, some people popped up in their country of origin, some people just did not pop up. “We’re worried that we’re never gonna hear from him again,” Vic later told me.

    Not necessarily COVID, but bad for individual and public health nonetheless.

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17. ocypode November 3, 2025 at 10:15 am

    Dancers at Trump’s Halloween party as people begin losing food stamps under his administration

    Did no one think about the symbolism of using the Roaring 20s as the theme? Not exactly a good look, to put it mildly, and seems to be the very embodiment of hubris. Sometimes I feel like we’re in 1788 and the Estates General are about to be convened; it’s just a matter of time until it all falls apart.

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    1. Huey November 3, 2025 at 10:29 am

       Yup, that and the Cuomo video blew me away but at least with Cuomo I couldn’t help but laugh.

       The Trump video made me sick. It was something like 10x shorter than the Cuomo vid and I could barely make myself sit through it.

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       1. cfraenkel November 3, 2025 at 12:06 pm

          Y, the Cuomo video is so comically bad it just shines a spotlight on the elite’s FUD as self serving nonsense. The Trump stuff is really happening (and much worse, skittering around under the covers, unseen.)

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    2. Ricardo November 3, 2025 at 10:55 am

       The Greatest Gatsby

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       1. Wukchumni November 3, 2025 at 12:11 pm

          {golf clap}

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18. ISL November 3, 2025 at 10:35 am

    The Russian Diplomat’s take on Venezuela was very informative. Particularly:

    “Russia could easily have supplied its overseas partners with the full package – from the Yars and Kinzhal to the Burevestnik and Oreshnik. And there’s even a Poseidon patrolling underwater somewhere nearby…”

    My SWAG is that Trump will TACO because it is in Russia’s interest for a proxy (under attack) to sink many US naval vessels and heavily deplete dwindling A/D assets. And should the US become bogged down in Venezuela (as in Vietnam, slowly, but always escalating), it would lessen Russian and Chinese nuclear Thucydides concerns.

    Also, if there currently is an intel war (a reasonable supposition) between the US (attempts to corrupt) versus Russia, China, and Venezuelan intel, this will be another critical test of the declining empire (Ukraine being a failed test). TACO = intel battle loss.

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19. Jason Boxman November 3, 2025 at 10:51 am

    ‘A Big Positive’: How One Company Plans to Profit From Medicaid Cuts (NY Times via archive.ph)

    Everyone’s favorite company, who’s executives did not go to jail after what was when one of the largest data breaches

    New work requirements are expected to leave millions of poor Americans uninsured. For Equifax, which charges states steep prices for its trove of employment data, it is a business opportunity.

    I’m so happy for you

    When Equifax’s chief executive spoke to investors this summer, he described a “just massive” new business opportunity: helping states enforce the Medicaid work requirement that is expected to leave millions of poor people without health insurance.

    Equifax has, for years, dominated the business of verifying Americans’ incomes, a crucial piece of data for banks writing mortgages or landlords renting apartments. The giant domestic policy bill that congressional Republicans passed this summer is about to make the company’s services even more lucrative.

    Beginning in 2027, states must verify that tens of millions of low-income adults work, volunteer or take classes at least 80 hours a month before giving them Medicaid or food assistance. The work requirements and other new restrictions on public benefits are designed to save the federal government nearly $400 billion by significantly reducing the number of poor people eligible for the programs.

    Another business that shouldn’t exist.

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20. Mikel November 3, 2025 at 11:04 am

    How will the invasion of Venezuela end? -Top War.

    That former diplomat left Venezuela with some new, catchy phrases and a lot of cringe stereotypes.

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21. Tom Stone November 3, 2025 at 12:02 pm

    By early December we will be seeing the first of the new crop of ICE agents hitting the streets after 6 weeks of rigorous and comprehensive training.

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    1. Wukchumni November 3, 2025 at 12:09 pm

       Its worse than you know, ICE’s new crops’ disguise is Salvation Army BDU’s.

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22. Screwball November 3, 2025 at 12:48 pm

    There are reports floating around social media that Nancy Pelosi is not going to seek re-election. If true – The Good. The Bad – I can only imagine the swamp creature who replaces her. The Ugly – whoever it may be.

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