Dear patient readers,
Our moderators and your humble blogger are wasting time on a persistent troll who has tried posting under many many handles. That is a violation of our written site Policies. We will keep not approving and on the occasion when they manage to briefly appear, ripping out these fuckwit comments and banning. Go find a better hobby.
Your humble blogger has also been a bit under the weather. So I am behind on getting to issues like Trump’s sudden enthusiasm for “affordability” measures like a credit card interest cap of 10%. I am working on why that is going to be more a backfire than a benefit.
‘Dilbert’ creator Scott Adams dies after prostate cancer battle Live Now Fox (Kevin W)
US FDA requests removal of suicide warnings from weight-loss drugs CNN (Kevin W)
‘A bombshell’: doubt cast on discovery of microplastics throughout human body Guardian (Paul R). resilc adds: “Who is paying who?”
Climate/Environment
The end of green energy Unherd
CARIBBEAN RECORD HEAT
Fierce heat in Mexico,Central America and Caribbean.
And Record again in the US Virgin Islands:
89F/31.7C Charlotte Amalie AP (St Thomas) Tied The Highest temperature ever recorded in the USVI in January pic.twitter.com/d4Y17R4C4P— Extreme Temperatures Around The World (@extremetemps) January 11, 2026
CENTRAL ASIA WARM SPELL
Exceptional warmth spreads and intensifies in Central Asia with temperatures typical of May and around 20C above average.
Today temperatures reached up to +19C in KAZAKHSTAN at 1000m asl !‼️Next days we might see almost 28/30C in Turkmenistan pic.twitter.com/1X6Amdopm8
— Extreme Temperatures Around The World (@extremetemps) January 11, 2026
Himalayas bare and rocky after reduced winter snowfall, scientists warn BBC
Floods Hit Several Indonesian Regions Over Past Two Days Tempo
Flying foxes die in their thousands in worst mass-mortality event since Australia’s black summer Guardian :-(
Drop in ocean’s iron spells danger for seals, penguins, and whales Oceanographic :-(
A rare meteotsunami triggered a sudden giant wave in Argentina’s coastal towns, killing one person and injuring at least 35 Times Now News
In a sane world, this would be front page news everywhere.
But it will hardly be covered anywhere.The North Pacific Ocean surface warmed over twice as much over the past 15 years than it did over the preceding 156 years.
That's an increase in warming rate of >2000%! https://t.co/tPp1fTHiLO pic.twitter.com/vcN2JuZXyp
— Leon Simons 🌍 (@LeonSimons8) January 10, 2026
Atmospheric physicists find error in widely cited Arctic snow cover observations PhysOrg
DROUGHT | VERMONT DROUGHT FORCES DAIRY FARMS INTO COSTLY SURVIVAL MODE Edairy News. resilc: “Ice picking up Latino labor is a much bigger deal tho…”
Water
Water crisis hits Türkiye’s capital as drought, infrastructure issues deepen Hurriyet Daily News
China?
China blames US for trade imbalances as surplus hits record $1.2tn in 2025 Financial Times
Panama Could Terminate License of China’s CK Hutchison Wall Street Journal
Are You Dead?: The viral Chinese app for young people living alone BBC (Kevin W)
Southeast Asia
Indonesia’s Mount Merapi erupts, spewing ash up to 1,600 meters Anadolu Agency
At least 22 dead as crane collapses onto train in Thailand BBC. Live blog. A tragedy as well as not a good look.
Africa
Egyptian army holds billions in secret cash as country misses debt deadline, officials say Middle East Eye
Ethiopia, Djibouti Leaders Talk Geopolitics as Tensions Grow in the Region Borkena
Chad: Malnutrition is a silent crisis Doctors Without Borders
South of the Border
Venezuela winning by being too much of a basket case to loot wasn't on my fight card, but, hey, credit where it's due for an innovative siestamaxxing defense plan.
Has anyone else noticed the "drug boat" airstrikes have stopped? Yeah… https://t.co/IoJirCBqVJ
— Armchair Warlord (@ArmchairW) January 14, 2026
‘History will tell’: as US pressure grows, Cuba edges closer to collapse amid mass exodus Guardian
European Disunion
Europe must now tell Trump that enough is enough – and cut all ties with the US Guardian. Good luck with that. For starters, that would require kissing and making up with Russia.
Trump Gang Theft of Greenland: View from China Karl Sanchez
From Politico’s European morning newsletter:
What’s happening: The foreign ministers of Denmark and Greenland land in Washington for high-stakes White House talks with U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Vice President JD Vance, who insisted on being in the room.
The message: Greenland is not for sale — period. That’s the line Danish and Greenlandic officials plan to deliver, an EU diplomat familiar with the prepping told Zoya Sheftalovich. “It’s good to have an honest conversation with the administration,” the diplomat added….
How the tables have turned: I was in Strasbourg when Nielsen visited the European Parliament in October and said Greenland had “no plans” to seek EU membership. On Tuesday, his tone had changed. If forced to choose between the U.S. and Denmark, he said, “we choose NATO, we choose the Kingdom of Denmark, we choose the EU.”
Mixed signals from Capitol Hill: The talks come as a bipartisan group of U.S. lawmakers on Tuesday proposed a bill to prevent U.S. President Donald Trump from invading a NATO country by targeting funding for foreign military incursions. However, another lawmaker introduced the Greenland Annexation and Statehood Act proposing … Well, it would do exactly what it says on the tin.
Preserving NATO remains the bloc’s top priority, one EU diplomat said in this must-read POLITICO piece by Jacopo Barigazzi and Nicholas Vinocur. Trump himself has hinted it “may be a choice” between Greenland and the alliance, with both Frederiksen and EU Defense Commissioner Andrius Kubilius warning military action would spell the end of NATO….
SCOOP — PARLIAMENT POISED TO DELAY KEY U.S. VOTE: A crucial vote on lifting tariffs on U.S. industrial goods is facing a delay, four parliamentary officials told POLITICO’s Camille Gijs and Max Griera. It’s being proposed as a tactical response to Trump’s threat to annex Greenland and would almost certainly anger Washington.
Imagine the delight and laughter in Moscow and Beijing over the US Congress being obliged to pass a bill to prevent the president of the United States from invading another NATO country. https://t.co/IPHxGnVMut
— Garry Kasparov (@Kasparov63) January 14, 2026
France to open its consulate in Greenland on Feb. 6 amid rising US threats Andaolu Agency
Sorry, the EU has no right to cry ‘McCarthyism’ Responsible Statecraft. Can’t be said too often.
Israel v. The Resistance
Gaza: Storms worsen already dire humanitarian situation, UN warns UN
Gaza: A ceasefire that still kills children is not enough, says UNICEF UN
Jewish terrorist who killed Palestinian family said allowed conjugal visits Times of Israel (resilc)
Iranian protesters reject US and Israeli interference Middle East Eye
The deranged US & Israel-backed Iranian opposition is boasting of the terror tactics its forces are deploying inside Iran, from the murder of civilians to arson attacks on places of worship
See the replies cheering the ISIS like violence and calling for similar acts in the US https://t.co/OoaKx7YChW
— Max Blumenthal (@MaxBlumenthal) January 13, 2026
Trump vows ‘very strong action’ if Iran executes protesters BBC Lead story with VPN set to US. A Global South diplo-connected colleague reports that 3 slotted for execution are Mossad.
Douglas Macgregor: U.S. War on Iran Risks Triggering World War Glenn Diesen, YouTube
New Not-So-Cold War
No power or water and -19C: Kyiv seeks relief from Russian strikes and cold BBC
France, Spain Increase Russian LNG Imports as EU Ranks Among Top Buyers Kyiv Post
Long but effective:
"All wars are wars of Resources"
Natural Gas reserves by country, look out for Ukraine (now you understand why Uncle Sam is so interested?)
And watch until the end, and you'll understand why Russia is such an irresistible target for Western bankers pic.twitter.com/ttUj7Iy8wf
— Chay Bowes (@BowesChay) January 13, 2026
Imperial Collapse Watch
Shadi Hamid on the Case for American Power Sam Mace. Wowsers. Must be nice to smoke what he is smoking.
Mere Anarchy Aurelien
Loosing the Republic Scott Ritter
Pentagon bought device through undercover operation some investigators suspect is linked to Havana Syndrome CNN (resilc)
Trump 2.0
How It Stops, How It Ends Rick Wilson (Bill L). Important.
Is the US government using ‘Nazi-inspired’ slogans? Metro (resilc)
Ex-Presidents and Democratic Leaders Silent on the Impeachment of Donald Trump Ralph Nader, Counterpunch (resilc)
Stephen Miller’s Worldview Is Straight Out of “Starship Troopers” Washington Monthly
America: Breaking Bad – Again Julian Macfarlane. A rogue’s gallery.
Trump v. Powell
The not just one but two lead stories at the Wall Street Journal now:
versus:
The Billionaires and the November Election Dean Baker
Immigration
US businesses hit by anti-Indian backlash as Trump restricts foreign labour Financial Times
ICE Rampage
ICE agent who shot Renee Good gets $10K donation from Bill Ackman USA Today (resilc)
Joe Rogan criticizes ICE tactics: ‘Are we really going to be the Gestapo?’ NBC
Plenty like this on Twitter, and remember, its algos dampen “left wing” content:
Today at 34 & Park in Minneapolis, a woman tried to drive down the street where a protest had broken out in front of a home ICE was raiding, saying she had a doctor apt to get to. ICE agents busted out her windows, cut off her seatbelt, and pulled her out before arresting her. pic.twitter.com/Y9bDF1xfKW
— amanda moore 🐢 (@noturtlesoup17) January 13, 2026
A 21-year-old in Santa Ana was permanently blinded in one eye after a DHS agent fired a “less-lethal” round at close range. He underwent six hours of surgery to remove plastic, glass, and metal embedded in his face.pic.twitter.com/XwdyrfZUZO
— WarMonitor (@TheWarMonitor) January 14, 2026
Key West protest of Trump’s ICE death squad murder of Renee Good Lucy Komisar
L’affaire Epstein
House GOP moves to hold Bill Clinton in contempt of Congress in Epstein probe Axios
Facing Contempt Threat, Clintons Refuse to Testify in Epstein Inquiry New York Times
Mr. Market is Giddy
Blistering Metals Rally Sends Silver, Tin and Copper to Records Bloomberg
AI
The rapid rise and slow decline of Sam Altman Gary Marcus
America’s Biggest Power Grid Operator Has an AI Problem—Too Many Data Centers Wall Street Journal
ChatGPT Killed a Man After OpenAI Brought Back “Inherently Dangerous” GPT-4o, Lawsuit Claims Futurism
The Bezzle
Eric Adams Launched a Crypto Coin. A Day Later, $1 Million Was Missing. New York Times
Guillotine Watch
Meet the pro-Trump billionaire buying up a Pennsylvania town Oligarch Watch
L.A. Rams Owner Stan Kroenke Becomes Largest Private Landowner in the U.S. New York Times
Peter Thiel makes $3m donation to fight California’s proposed billionaire tax Guardian (resilc)
Class Warfare
Antidote du jour (via):
And a bonus:
In Nara, deers have learned to open the doors of food establishments and bow to ask for food 🦌 pic.twitter.com/A7bdoAqyQ3
— Nature Unedited (@NatureUnedited) January 11, 2026
A second bonus:
Counting the sheep.. 😅 pic.twitter.com/47ZSiCtO40
— Buitengebieden (@buitengebieden) January 14, 2026
And a third (Constance C):
See yesterday’s Links and Antidote du Jour here.
Terrible accident, and truly appalling construction management, which i sadly all too common in Thailand and the wider region. In normal construction, you would only build over a live railway with some form of temporary protective cover for exactly this eventuality, or at the very least, temporary outages of railway use during heavy lift operations, which seems to have been what was going on here (a span being put in place). A primary problem though is that the project is very financially dubious and there has been enormous political pressure from Bangkok to expedite its construction.
The overall construction lead of that project is a Chinese state owned construction company, but the contract called for non-tunnelling civil work to be done by the Thai partners, so its likely that the latter will take primary blame.
Re: Thailand, this is OT, but…
Paradoxocracy (2013) [01:25:29 EN hardsubs]
https://www.dailymotion.com/video/x8iak3n
This is a documentary about the current political situation of Thailand, directed by Pen-Ek Ratanaruang, one of the more interesting contemporary Thai filmmakers. I think we can say that Ratanaruang is quite talented at social satire and more accessible than Apichatpong Weerasethakul. I’ve seen almost all of his films (including the culinary thriller Morte cucina), and can really recommend them.
” Stephen Miller’s Worldview Is Straight Out of “Starship Troopers” ”
Yeah, nah! Certainly there are a lot of quotes to be found in “Starship Troopers” that support this article but truth be told, this viewpoint of Stephen Miller is more akin to the beliefs held in Germany in the 1930s and 1940s with it’s survival of the fittest. The Federation as depicted in “Starship Troopers” is certainly fascist by nature but it is a disciplined society that follows a scientifically worked out moral code that was even being extended to alien species. The viewpoint held by Miller and the Trump regime is based on might makes right with the lust to make personal profits tossed in. I can promise you that if author Robert Heinlein – whose two-part autobiography I am in the middle of reading – were still alive to see the present state of America under Trump, that he would be both outraged and horrified by what is happening and would fight it.
“The Starship Troopers” (the book) is like “Das Capital” or “Wealth of Nations”…..cited by people in media who have never read the actual primary text, but rather recite the “meme version”, lmao.
(or at least it comes across that day)
Yes, I thought the whole framing was curious, to say the least. The book is not my favourite SF novel ever, but it’s an interesting example of the “what-if” genre: in this case, what if some rights (in this case the right to vote) were contingent upon service to the community (in this case military service.) How would that change society? It’s worth pointing out that at the time military service was pretty much universal in the West (even in Britain) so the idea would not have been especially controversial. In addition, the two principal military operations described in the book are actually defeats. If you want an actual fascist space fantasy, try John Scalzi’s Old Man’s War.
Scalzi’s book was great.
And Harry Harrison’s Bill the Galactic Hero was a brilliant reposte to Heinlein’s book.
Nevile Shute had a similar idea to the Heinlein book. I read it so long ago that I have completely forgotten the title. I think -a person could earn up to three(?) votes depending on various qualifications. I believe education was one.
I have not seen the movie but it does not sound like the book which I have read.
The premise of Starship Troopers is that a militaristic, Sparta-like society in which only veterans have voting rights is necessary because being a star-traveling race is a zero-sum game – either our species or alternative species dominates each livable planet – no compromise is possible. It is very much “survival of the fittest.”
Greenland Defense Front antidote–
I’m going to speculate that one of the reason Stephen Miller is pushing Greenland’s seizure is so he can personally club some baby seals to death.
At one point, I remember the natives of Greenland using this interest as leverage for dealing with Denmark on some its unpopular policies.
First time I watched 3 hours of German news/political “discussion” this night in probably 10 years.
It defied description.
Staggering incompetence, dishonesty, opportunism, double standard, cluelessness – did I forget anything?
However this is all popocorn-worthy nonethless:
The final season of BORGEN – as I mentioned several times – has almost exact dialogue – where Greenland protagonists complain about Denmark´s political class (exploiting Greenland´s resources) – the way Denmark in the real world is now complaining about the US intending to do the same thing now.
Not to speak about Europe´s former colonies in Africa and Asia who I am sure have enough standup comediens offering fun time with joking about all of these shenanigans.
With the slight difference that we first exterminated their populations before taking the resources and the strategically significant spots.
History repeating itself, first a tragedy… fits for once
I’m not completely sure, but I suspect parts of that video are AI generated.
Gee, do you think? I wonder which parts are not. :-)
I made an exception to our usual “no AI” rule because the fake in this was so obviously fake. Plus I found it to be fun.
It got me off to a pleasant start on a ridiculously long day! Loved it.
Thanks, it was definitely worth it and brought a big smile
Good call! Lots of fun, essential human involvement in the creative process, and consequently a fine example of innocent, no-harm-no foul, old-school AI.
Penguins inhabit Antarctica and cannot fly, so forming an alliance with polar bears is impossible. This is clear evidence that the video was generated by AI.
But the one penguin is wearing a coat, which could imply they traveled…
I think the Penguin is a cameo. There’s a series of YT videos about “Democratic People’s Republic of Penguin” or something like that featuring Penguins dressed like that (with AKs).
Walrus’s don’t smoke cigars (except behind the garage).
Here’s another from the same channel, it’s a Great Patriotic War, donchano, penguins and polar bears, the soviets unite. BTW the vocals are quite good:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PWMnNoHshRA
I find both pieces up lifting. When you make your adversary a joke, you are winning.
Defend the Nation from the Orange Hand.
I’d be looking for a front row seat for a one on one between Miller and one of the Greenland Defenders.
Canada should poke a stick in America’s eye and incorporate a “Greenland Defenders” hockey team into their league.
LOL! I’ve never been a sports fan, least of all hockey (back in the day when a hubby had a game on the tube, all I could say is: where the hell is the puck? and why are they always fighting?), but today I could go for that.
Only if he has a jsoc battalion to protect him from ‘irrational retaliation’.
Correct link for ChatGPT Killed a Man After OpenAI Brought Back “Inherently Dangerous” GPT-4o, Lawsuit Claims.
Fixing, thanks!
re: Iranian protesters reject US and Israeli interference – Middle East Eye
Isn´t MEE Quatari sponsored? Or am I mixing that up?
(Not a word there of the protesters supporting the government.)
p.s. For those who are interested, Iranian director Mohammad Rasoulof made his latest film inspired by the death of Mahsa Amini “The Seed of the Sacred Fig”:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Seed_of_the_Sacred_Fig
I wasn´t satisfied with it fankly. Too forced a narrative, too uneven and unnecessarily long for what he was trying. There have been better takes on that sort of psychosis.
Also it´s tiring to get 100% nightmarish films about Iran in the West.
It´s on MUBI to my knowledge.
Pretty sure that films like that will one day find their place on the shelves with earlier works like that – such as the 1940 film “I Married A Nazi”.
David Hearst is the Editor in Chief of the London based MEE. They have been accused of being Qatari backed but according to wiki, this is denied. I have seen any number of their pieces, including those one on one with Hearst. I’ve always found them reliable, and they certainly don’t pull any punches on the Zionist Entity. I have understood Hearst to be Jewish. My 2¢.
My library has Zelensky’s Man of the People TV show although I’ve never checked it out. They do have some Russian titles as well.
And a few in the neighborhood still forlornly fly their bleached by the sun Ukrainian flags. Call them low information leftists.
One could argue that film world in general went woke as a cover story for all their military and capitalist cheer leading. The successful members of that community are not exactly poor. I believe a lot of those Iranian exiles live in LA.
My initial draft for the post included a comment about Rasoulof and Panahi and their prison stories:
Both were imprisoned. Both have been able to work still, both are outside Iran now I believe and both alluded to the fact they might return to Iran even though put into prison then.
I am not intending to mitigate: But what former convict of any US prison would ever want to go back to prison??? And also: What US convict did do a movie in prison (secretly), whetever the shape and size of it.
It is odd.
p.s. I was wondering what Makhmalbafs are doing. I assume they have left. And as is the case with most known emigré artists from evil dictatorships, as you say, they probably are not living under hardship. Which doesn´t mean that Samira (I really like her work) and Co. are not trying to do serious and helpful things. The fact that they are not using their fate to get movies financed and parade through media all the time is sympathetic.
In this short (1:43) YT video, Middle East Eye has no issue giving out the Western perspective on the protests, this from Hrana, a U.S. based Iranian rights organization.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DpKxpGCbeWU
“Facing Contempt Threat, Clintons Refuse to Testify in Epstein Inquiry”
Correct me if I am wrong but can’t Bill and Hillary plead the Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination if they appeared in front of that Oversight Committee and be done with?
You are correct, but they couldn’t plead the 5th regarding incriminating others, including their backers. Also, going to the hearings adds to their credibility which I believe they are trying to frame as politically driven.
…I think this is used constantly in the movie “MISS SLOANE” (2016) about a lobbyist testifying in Washington…
1:22 min.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5k8KaMdPYTY
The main character repeats the Fifth constantly during the inquiry by the Senators, until she doesn´t.
“Upon the advice of counsel, I must
respectfully decline to answer your
question, based on my rights under
the Fifth Amendment to the United
States Constitution.”
At one point she asks her legal counsel:
-“This would be a whole lot easier if I
could just shout ‘Fifth’.”
-“No deviations.”
-“Can I use a silly voice?
(silly voice)
Upon the advice of counsel…”
Legal counsel frowns…
Here in Oz we don’t have a Fifth Amendment so people on a stand under oath will say ‘I don’t remember’ which when they say it forty or fifty times to different questions get a bit monotonous.
Still – that sounds great.
It´s so much more honest…and in many cases probably truer than they want it to be 😂
On the advice of my lawyer, I respectfully decline to answer on the basis of the 5th Amendment, which – according to the United States Supreme Court – protects everyone, even innocent people, from the need to answer questions if the truth might be used to help create the misleading impression that they were somehow involved in a crime that they did not commit.
https://www.criminalattorneystpetersburg.com/news/2020/august/a-new-way-to-take-the-fifth/
If Congress were anything other than a fund-raising scheme and padded resume line, “politically driven” might make sense.
It’s rigged. The Epstein files have been purged of Trump and Republicans names. He could say, I’ll testify after those redactions are removed. That won’t happen.
The Republican strategy for mid-terms was anounced yesterday:
MAFYA🖕
I’ve always wished, if liberal Democrats were any other than self gratifying hacks, is that they’d set up hearings for the sole purpose of holding those “invited” to testify in contempt and jailing them. That would be amusing. A CEO doesn’t want to come testify for 5 weeks straight about the color of grass? Contempt. Jail. By the way, have you seen the prices of eggs lately. Some of these things might be easier to solve than they appear.
re: Germany free speech
BERLINER ZEITUNG
machine-translation
“I hate freedom of speech!”: Acquittal for the creator of the Faeser meme
The editor-in-chief of the right-wing populist newspaper Deutschland-Kurier is back in court in Bamberg over a meme. The prosecution is demanding an acquittal.
https://archive.is/Vs4Nj
I think the Clintons defying a subpoena is strategically brilliant. It gets Epstein back on the front pages. It is clear that Justice in in breach for non-compliance with a law Trump signed and that Epstein really gets under Trump’s skin, a la his single digit salute yesterday.
Or, maybe I’m giving them too much credit.
Maybe. At this point in time, with Trump in charge of “Justice”, the Clintons are exposed to considerable risk. Trump 2.0 is petty and vindictive, the Clintons, particularly Hillary, arch enemies. Your gambit makes sense if Trump has something real to hide in his relationship with Epstein, and the Clintons know it.
Poor Bill, he just can’t die quickly enough.
re: Germany electricity prices highest in EU
BERLINER ZEITUNG
machine-translation
New EU data: Electricity in Germany is almost four times as expensive as in Hungary
German households pay more for electricity than anyone else in Europe. Experts point to electricity tax and grid fees as levers to reduce costs – but the Merz government is hesitant.
https://archive.is/Eos8z
‘Electricity in Germany is almost four times as expensive as in Hungary’
It’s because Hungary still gets its energy from Russia much to the exasperation of the EU.
re: Iran
from comments in MoA:
Leith Marouf told Garland Nixon live and on air today that the Danish government gave the Iranians a list of Western agents in the country as part of a tit-for-tat with Trump over Greenland. If true, the colonizers have knives out for each other. That gladdens my heart.
Interesting, I looked it up. Here is a link to the statement by Leith Marouf
MIDDLE EAST IN DEPTH W/LAITH MAROUF – WAR THREATS AGAINST IRAN AS THE EMPIRE DESCENDS INTO MADNESS
starts with the short statement
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Z6oSqRkIGU&t=1884s
Well, given that the real names of the sources would be known only to a tiny handful of people in the nation concerned … I don’t think so.
No clue.
Malouf has been cited on NC before.
Of course his quip on YT is verrry short.
But if he didn´t trust it enough would he quote it publicly?
p.s. It´s a different thing: But in Germany there was this police scandal a couple of years ago where the guy keeping the names of undercover assets by German Criminal Police had embezzled money. And there was the fear he could use his delicate intel as leverage in his case. Or become susceptible to blackmail.
At least considering that we are humans, many people in the Western intelligence services are pretty pissed off and that digital fingerprints can be manipulated/erased – it´s not impossible. And if this is kinda half-official because its US vs. Denmark, protection could come from higher up.
Another example is that Dutch intelligence allegedly had a Russian source in Russia re: “Russiagate” and Clintons. They relayed it to the CIA and Brennan with that knowlegde warned RU that Russiagate was none of their business. I dunno what happened to that Dutch source.
FWIW, I saw the same claim over a week ago in several different places. Of course, I could never speak to the veracity of such claims, I immediately drew the connection to the belligerence surrounding Greenland.
“Flying foxes die in their thousands in worst mass-mortality event since Australia’s black summer”
Not a fan of them. They are loud with their screeches and are notorious for spreading some really nasty viruses like Hendra. That is why I had to ensure that none of our horse troughs (bathtubs actually) are under any trees where they may roost. They are a protected species too so if you are in a town infested by them and don’t even dare hang clothes out to dry, you are all out of luck. Several years ago in our State there was a really bad heatwave and people complained of the excess heat. But when it was found that flying foxes were dropping out of the trees dead, people suddenly said that they could put up with that heat a bit more. Volunteers went out to help the dying bats and several got scratches from them meaning they had to go off to hospital to get a bunch of injections for some of the diseases that they carried.
Mate, not all of us are bat genocidal crazy.
Scott Adams tried a treatment protocol created by William (Villiam) Makis, a Canadian ex-physician using ivermectin and fenbendazole.
Needless to say, that protocol didn’t work out in the end, with Makis’s supporters claiming Adams didn’t follow the protocol, but Adams himself said back last May: “Please don’t recommend that I take ivermectin and fenben. I tried that last year, via Dr. Makis, to no effect. There are claims of it working, but I am aware of no patient that benefited from it.Neither do you.”
There are claims of success was well. No treatment is perfect.
re: The rapid rise and slow decline of Sam Altman Gary Marcus
Once I built an AI, I made it run
Made it run on your dime
Once I built an AI, now it’s done
Taxpayer, can you spare another dime?
http://www.protestsonglyrics.net/Great_Depression_Songs/Brother-Can-You-Spare-A-Dime.phtml
Repeat from yesterday.
On the Danny Haiphong podcast yesterday, Ray McGovern and Scott Ritter held forth.
At the very end, Ritter mentioned that he had just been “unbanked” by his long time bank. He states that the bank said that he was “unbanked” at the instigation of the Feds due to “suspicious transactions.”
This is just what has happened previously in Canada, the Truckers Convoy Protests, and England, too many to enumerate.
This is basically “economic sanctions” carried out in the Homeland. It started overseas, and, like everything else pernicious, has returned to haunt the American Public.
Hold on tight. We are now an “Occupied Province” of the Empire.
Aiee, thanks for the report.
I don’t know if this is relevant, but the Feds have struck again. Now cash transactions over $200 USD in certain southern border counties will automatically be reported to the IRS.
See: https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/taking-200-out-of-an-atm-should-not-trigger-federal-financial-surveillance/ar-AA1AWHwJ
The noose tightens.
Stay safe in the tropics.
Unherd.
It’s always interesting to see California as the poster child of renewable energy being the cause of expensive power but they never bring up Texas which has more solar and wind than California but has some of the lowest prices in the country. .
LBL ( Lawrence Berkeley’s lab ) released a paper a few months ago breaking down the rising costs of electricity. Renewables isn’t one of the reasons.
Wild fires, bad management, weather, lack of infrastructure maintenance and needed upgrades, greed, profits, fuel costs and the list goes on.
Solar is making massive gains all over the world and even the US. By far the most installed power production like 85% of all new generation in the US has been renewable.
But to many the article will be music to their ears.
‘Max Blumenthal
@MaxBlumenthal
The deranged US & Israel-backed Iranian opposition is boasting of the terror tactics its forces are deploying inside Iran, from the murder of civilians to arson attacks on places of worship
See the replies cheering the ISIS like violence and calling for similar acts in the US’
The Iranians claim to have audio recordings from outside the country ordering these attack. Burning mosques? Must have felt good to those ISIS guys but how is that supposed to drum up support for a regime change? And orders were also give to shoot random people to build up a body count which makes me wonder now how many of those deaths were caused by the regime and how many by these clandestine imports. And since the net & Starlink went down, it seems that the revolution will not be televised.
– ‘History will tell’: as US pressure grows, Cuba edges closer to collapse amid mass exodus – Guardian
The view from the Open Society Foundations: “Open up Cuba, we just want to help you!”
I’ve been reading such stories for 60 years now. This is not to deny the tremendous harm done to little Cuba through decades of economic strangulation. The article mentions the brief “thaw” under Obama. It does not mention that this loosening led to an immediate destabilization effort through USAID and US NGOs. Cuba is a tragedy indeed. But spare me the crocodile tears by humanitarian liberals. I commented yesterday on how Democracy Now weeps for all those innocent protesters in Iran being slaughtered by the Iranian government. More of the same here. Such Evil Governments that oppress their own people deserve to disappear… but of course they’re not calling for war or anything!
Just something you wrote and channeling my inner Ronald Reagan-
‘I’m from the Open Society Foundations and we’re here to help.’
With that sort of help the only future for Cuban guys would be as Uber drivers and labourers while for girls it would be either as waitresses or hookers.
file under ICE. From Due Dissidence.
Support For ICE PLUMMETS – w/ Lee Camp & Joy Marie Mann
No surprise. utube, I start the clip at the beginning of the segment.
JK Rowling BACKS IRAN PSY OP, Support For ICE PLUMMETS – w/ Lee Camp & Joy Marie Mann
https://youtu.be/N5W84g9lu3w?t=8535
Here’s Ken Klippenstein’s latest. He showcases leaked ICE documents about their secret domestic programs. He states that no one else has these documents:
https://www.kenklippenstein.com/p/21-secret-ice-programs-revealed
“No power or water and -19C: Kyiv seeks relief from Russian strikes and cold”
In nearly every interview I see coming from the streets of Kiev, the people say that they are going to win the war and hopefully get all their territories back. If this has been the general consensus, perhaps Russia shutting down the electricity grid and its associated services is their way of telling the people there that what the regime is telling them is not true and that they are actually losing this war. Won’t be making Zelensky any popular but he is hardly in the country anymore anyway and averages about 50 foreign trips a year.
RE: Ford factory heckler suspended
The Daily Mail piece doesn’t mention it, but according to this article, he was suspended not by Ford, but by the UAW –
“Now, the union says the worker has been suspended while Ford looks into the matter.
A representative from the UAW told Michigan Advance that they could confirm that he was suspended but the length of the suspension was unknown. The union was also uncertain about the process that would follow to investigate the matter.”
So just a knee jerk suspension to curry favor with the vulgarian who hasn’t done a damn thing to help labor, and won’t be doing so any time soon. Just one more USian institution showing how far it has declined and how useless it has become.
The only ones who have figured out how to deal with these clowns (at least the cartoon versions of them) are the guys from South Park. When bullies try to push you around, you don’t run away with your tail between your legs, you kick them in the ass and then do it again – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m8Cn2vUC1mQ
The fact that the Union announced the suspension does not mean the unions suspended him. The union represents the worker in disciplinary cases, so it is not surprising they would be the ones to announce it. Ford would probably rather hush it up.
The article cited by Lyman is clearly referencing the suspension by Ford, as reported by the union. I can’t even imagine a process by which a union would suspend the union member on behalf of the employer.
Thank you both for the clarification. But, I’m not going to change my opinion about the fecklessness of the unions until I see that they put up a fight for this guy. Too many unions working a little too closely with management these days for my liking.
And the UAW is supporting the worker now, verbally at least – https://thehill.com/homenews/administration/5689049-united-autoworkers-union-donald-trump-ford-plant-exchange/
My bad for misinterpreting. So many in positions of power are caving in to this nonsense without putting up a fight that I start to assume everyone is.
File under ICE. From Jimmy Dore with guest host. utube, ~24+ minutes.
ICE Acting Out Of Control Is All PLANNED & ON PURPOSE!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jv6PCes3d1s
Re; ICE Rampage
ICE Agents’ Families Drop Bombshell Confessions About Extremism, Abuse Claims, and Lives Torn Apart After Getting Hired
One comment claimed, ‘All the 2nd Amendment militia and Proud Boy groups magically evaporated when ICE started hiring. It’s not that they changed — they found new employment.’ Others echoed the sentiment, arguing that ICE shifted from a bureaucratic enforcement agency to one driven by ideology, leaving ‘regular people’ to exit while extremists stayed.
Be it government or private sector, when a workplace turns to shit, those who can bail usually do. Those who stay, it’s often because their views often align with those of management: scum gathers and spreads, and as the saying goes, a fish rots from the head.
Why should we not be suprised that ICE attracts nativists, thugs, and christian jihadists? The longer they stay within the organization, the deeper their roots and the more they’ll spread to infest other agencies.
WSWS General Strike: Scheduled for Tuesday January 20, 2026
https://www.eastcountymagazine.org/free-america-walkout-january-20
Do not work or spend a penny that day, or ‘do the walkout’ from work.
Commit to using cash going forward.
Do little, with less.
Whistles, not guns, participate, observe. Words appear to matter… put them on placards,
don’t provoke a trigger -happy numbskull who feels cornered in the clear bright light of open discourse.
Help source and promote new candidates with new ideas for the 2026 election cycle.
Verify your own voting status mid-summer.
VOTE.
I’ll make one exception to the ‘do not spend a penny that day.’
I’ll continue to spend pennies at locally owned, independent, small mom&pop stores that have been in business here for a long time. Covid lockdowns wiped out a lot of them. I’m doing what I can to keep the remaining ones in business.
I like it and I will participate and spread the word, but it’s not day one of a general strike. It’s a one day walkout. This can be useful for planning and generating interest in an eventual general strike, but calling this event itself a general strike isn’t a good idea. Mislabeling it can inadvertently create opportunities for critics and mislead others who are understandably fired up for a long-term, well planned national action when they hear that a general strike is scheduled to begin on Tuesday.
I’m all for a General Strike, but announcing one less than a week before the planned event just shows how unserious the Left can be.
Why is this important? None of it is going to happen beyond more tit for tat lawfare. No one has the moral authoritary to carry out such a purge, much less to actually succeed in making it productive.
“How It Stops, How It Ends Rick Wilson (Bill L). Important.”
Important maybe as a view into the daydreams of the NPR class. The author definitely has an unshakable faith that someone will do something.
Yep, when I get to the “should” part of an essay, I stop reading.
The US of A is a giant system that has been built for the mega rich. It’s in the Constitution. The development of the system was funded by the mega rich all the way along.
Bribes, kickbacks, donor rules that funnel money by the barrow loads to crooked politicians. Lobbyists and more lobbyists with sweetheart deals looking for breaks. It’s been the American way forever.
Now we’re in the ‘we don’t give a sh*t about optics’ phase.
Too late for ordinary people to do anything about it. Voting? I have a bridge to sell you. Sit-ins? Straight to jail or the morgue. Lawfare? And who, pray tell,has the deeper pockets. And the judges in their pockets? Community action? Who owns all the channels of communication?
Best we can do is strap in and try to survive. Imho, the next step will be to require those who want to live in the US, regardless of place of birth, to pay a yearly fee – US residence as a service with a yearly subscription.
Ahso, the pall of nihilism.
Nup. If nihilism is a family of philosophical views arguing that life is meaningless, that moral values are baseless, or that knowledge is impossible then I’m not arguing that.
Call me a realist. I look at Chas Freeman, Larry Wilkerson, Alastair Crooke telling me what is happening and why. And a bit at that crazy dude Professor Jiang.
If we are all to survive a world where we have no power, except to vote and get worse or worser (worser now in power in the US and Europe and UK), to go to demonstrations and get arrested, lawfare (I will never afford that), then I say we have to start saving ourselves because the powers that be are fighting amongst themselves and don’t care. We are gnats to them, to be brushed off or squashed.
In the end, our families and friends and communities are who are important. And we have to base our survival on the values that count, such as community welfare, family and individual resilience and preparedness, growing our own food etc, preparing for what Jiang sees coming through his lens of Game Theory.
Which doesn’t include wasting our energy p*ssing in the wind and metaphorically shooting popguns against the armoured bulldozers which are the modern oligarchy. Run away, stay under the radar. Perhaps survive long enough for these psychopaths to wipe each other out.
Fight smarter not harder. That’s my two cents worth.
As an early Soviet writer and literary critic, Viktor Shklovsky, put it, “when we give way to the tram, we do not do it out of politeness”.
– ‘How It Stops, How It Ends’ – Rick Wilson (Bill L). Important.
– ‘America: Breaking Bad – Again’ – Julian Macfarlane. A rogue’s gallery.
It is interesting to compare the two views of Trump in these two anti-Trump essays. For Rick Wilson, the Trump administration
“… is a government led by the most egregious criminal in American political history, a man with a dark soul, a twisted mind racked with mental disorders and pathologies, and a will to power that rivals the dictators and strongmen we once understood without a blink of doubt or question to be the antithesis of our values. He is the kind of man Americans once sent their son to fight and defeat… He is served by a party, a movement, and a media that view him as a nearly religious figure, a man of destiny willing to smite the people and cultures they hate…”
Here is Julian Macfarlane’s MUCH more accurate description:
“Putting aside psychologisms such as “narcissism” and sociopathy, Trump is just a spoiled rich kid who has not developed intellectually or emotionally since he was 12 and his hormones took over and realized he – or at least his Dad could buy his future without any effort on this part… My friend, Dr Bob, calls him “infantile”. I don’t like to characterize him in that way because I like babies. But “infantile” is a lot easier to pronounce and more communicative and less awkward than “post-pubescent-ish”… In any case, the Donald was lucky enough to inherit money, which he used to make more money hiring advisors so he didn’t need to bother his little brain with details. Sometimes he got lucky, sometimes not— but he ended up rich and lazy… And that’s the kind of President he is. He relies on his advisors…”
I’m sorry, but while I want Trump gone and agree on the dangers of his administration, I do not see Wilson’s tirade as all that useful. He paints the Orange Man as a Nieztschean Hitler worshiped by squealing MAGA masses Wilson clearly despises. He leaves out everything in the “ten generations of Americans” before Trump that had “shattered the bond of faith and trust in a system of representative government unique in the history of the world” long before this WWE character came to power. I do not take Trump’s many threats lightly. But Wilson provides no understanding of why we have a Trump in power, or what the larger dangers are beyond the cartoon Villain depicted here.
Macfarlane’s piece is much more helpful in this regard. It also focuses on the Trump administration. But instead of describing a Fascist “blood and soil” monster exercising his God-like Will to Power, Macfarlane names names, and identifies interests, in ways that actually describe what we are up against. Note that two key figures crucial in carrying out Trump policy – Rubio (Sec of State) and Ratcliff (CIA Director) – have bipartisan support in Congress and in much of the Establishment. These are the actual dangers we face. Trump is a clown, a performer who has always been in over his head.
I’m convinced that Trump’s recent moves have shaken the Powers that Be. Threatening Powell at the Fed has many powerful financial interests concerned. Threatening NATO has shaken the foreign policy Establishment. Trump is dangerous to be sure. But for me Wilson’s essay is more Trump derangement than useful analysis.
The kind of threat Trump represents to the Blob (NATO, Greenland, etc) and the financial sector (the Fed) makes me glad that he won in 2024 and not Harris, in spite of all the insanity since then. I think the establishment needed a good shakeup and they are getting that, plus grotesquely exaggerated version of their wet dreams. If we survive next 5-10 years, this provides the pathway via which we can break out of the status quo, however unpleasant things might be in the short term. If God wills it that all the ill gotten gains reaped through arrogance and self righteous along with the blood of the innocent around the world shall be sunk and until every drop of blood drawn with the lash shall be paid by another drawn with the sword as was said three thousand years ago so still it must be said “the judgments of the Lord are true and righteous altogether.”
I didn’t;t realize Greenland and Denmark were part of the Blob. Thanks for that.
This post has some ideas to consider after a successful revolution to return the the former Republic. I am little vague on how that feat might be accomplished. The post’s suggestions, a couple of extracts:
“…a tactical veto of civil society: a collective refusal by elected leaders, local governments, businesses, the legal community, and civic and religious leaders to facilitate the ‘will to power.'”
“…we must embark on a national lustration, a public and legal purging of the rot.”
“… friction in the gears of the state…”
and so on, sound good but I think they put the cart before the horse. Simply enforcing existing laws would be a welcome change, assuming some of the tweaked and twisted laws put in place over the last forty years were un-tweaked and un-twisted. The “how it ends” starts to sound like a bloodless reenactment of the Revolutionary Tribunal that followed the French Revolution. My view of the present state of affairs in the u.s. leaves me skeptical of the post’s seemingly ‘gentle’ and ‘lawful’ transition to a return of the Republic. I doubt such return if it ever occurs will be bloodless and similarly I highly doubt the Revolutionary Tribunal that followed would be bloodless.
Scott Ritter’s linked article “Losing the Republic” offered a more realistic and useful tactic to save the Republic: use the 25th amendment, like it was intended to be used, against a powerful fellow who has proved to be mentally unstable and unwilling to uphold the Constitution. All it would require is a handful of Republicans finding courage or a conscience, or being paid bags of money by a ‘good’ billionaire, to 25th the guy. A little leadership, one vote and this nightmare is over. Rinse and repeat, if that Vance fellow thinks he also can swing around like a lawless cannon.
Thank you. Trump is just the vulgar pitch man. First term was unexpected and there wasn’t much to pitch. This time around, the oligarchs and those wishing to become one, found a useful idiot they could manipulate. Getting rid of Trump isn’t going to stop the real power behind him.
As you noted, Rubio has barely any opposition in DC. Neither do the owners of Palantir, Amazon, etc., who have been given massive government contracts by administrations of both parties over the course of decades now, to the point that it will be difficult to run government without them if they are allowed to continue to insinuate themselves into its workings.
Yeah, that Rick Wilson piece really left me scratching my head. He looks old enough to know that enacting change takes more than simply building a wish list. But I guess you never know. At one point he admits the Democrats are not going to do anything about it, but then he just moves on as if that is hardly even a stumbling block.
I don’t know, I would hardly think such a post even worth commenting on if it weren’t so typical of what has been passing for “the left” for what’s now been many long years.
I think that the “The Burger Reich Strikes Back”
sub “American Fascism Enters Its Most Delicate Stage ”
from yesterday is more accurate. Both of those articles
underestimate the fascistic nature of this regime, and no Trump
is not the regime.
I agree with you re the comparison to MacFarlane’s article.
Re the article by Rick Wilson:
The big tell for me was the author’s liberal derangements best exemplified by this troubling paragraph (about halfway through the article) that was pure neocon:
“Restoring USAID shutdown would begin to right the ship of America’s battered reputation in the international community. A renewed commitment to NATO and ASEAN in the face of Russian and Chinese malfeasance in the world will begin to, at least marginally, reverse the decade of free-play Trump handed the world’s two most dangerous authoritarian states.”
As someone who lives in an ASEAN country I don’t think there’s any great desire in this region for any additional “commitment”. Certainly American commitment didn’t do much for Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia. I think most people are pretty sick of the US and have been for a while.
Psychology research on narcissism and psychopathy is having a big moment.
And research has identified an underlying predisposition driving these behaviours, a dispositional tendency defined as “The Dark Factor Of Personality”, or D.
The definition of D: “The general tendency to maximize one’s individual utility – disregarding, accepting or malevolently provoking, disutility for others – accompanied by beliefs that serve as justifications”.
And that Dark dispositional tendency is what we see everywhere now.
In western politics and in western business. The people who have risen to the top have this dispositional tendency in spades. Almost all of our billionaires, political leaders and business leaders.
In politics the operation killing Venezuelan fishermen then kidnapping Maduro, the mass murder of Palestinians to steal their lands, the ICE killings and general lawlessness, the craven support by European “elites” for the US dismantling and destroying their economies and the livelihoods of their people, the unhinged war against Russia where ordinary Ukrainians are being slaughtered, the soon to be annexation of Greenland by the US…… the list is endless
In business the looting of power consumers, CEOs hyping almost worthless products to sell more of them, anything AI, CEOs goosing their company stock price to make out like bandits with options, ……… the list is endless
Although I’m not a great fan of organised religion, it did have the benefits of creating a community and laying down some moral precepts that at the very least should be observed with lip service.
All that has gone, blown away by the greed, egotism, entitlement, vindictiveness, deceitfulness, callousness, narcissism and psychopathy of a world built by those who spend their lives looting and shooting.
Yanis Varofakis on BreakingPoints. utube. ~33+ minutes.
Yanis Varoufakis: Trump’s MASTER PLAN On Fed, Venezuela, AI
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AQIrvPeNtds
Been seeing chattering on twitter that strikes on Iran are imminent. Personnel apparently evacuated from Al Udeid, the israeli presidential plane landing in Crete, and a general spike in rumors. Of course nothing might happen, but I’ve a feeling that it won’t be the case. And I suspect that the Iranians are better prepared than for last time.
So Benito has fled from Israel, just in case?
I cannot confirm, but this is the source I’m quoting. I tend to be a little wary of these OSINT accounts, but if they are right (and these plane tracking things do seem to be somewhat verifiable) then yes.
He did the last time during the start of the 12-day war as his life was too valuable to put at risk. /sarc
Just another chickenhawk.
But we don’t have a carrier group in the area like we did last time…..
Good point. Don’t know what it’s about then. Clearly it can’t be a psyop aimed towards Iranians since, well, they’re out of the internet. More stupid posturing from the Trump admin like with Venezuela? Or maybe israel simply is going to attack by itself.
According to Ritter, no carrier group necessary. In fact it might wise not to have one around when the missiles start flying. Here with Danny Haiphong @ the 2:00 mark:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mc59OgV8bDc&t=1523s
Larry Johnson enumerates at length at the top of this video the reverse view:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8Xw0O8SYiCk
I have no evidence but it seems an imminent strike against the leadership of Iran makes sense before there is a lull in the protests.
I think Larry Johnson made the same point on a program about “maybe they’re gonna go without a carrier group this time.” Makes sense, if they’re on some sort of fast timetable.
What’s funny, in a sad way, is that I suspect that the NC Commentariat have just as good a chance of predicting “what next” as do some of the highly paid professionals, using open source resources and commen sense..
Now all the stupid gambling addicts are pushing for this shit on polymarket. Over 34 million $.
Reminds me of the get rich schemes with GameStop, AMC, and DOGECOIN.
Great time to make money
🤮
All quiet on the pizza front.
https://www.pizzint.watch/
I see DEFCON 3 there now.
3 out of 6 pizzerias much busier than usual.
as ive related many times, im on the eastern edge of the West Texas Training Area.
most of the training happens well to my north, over the horizon.
but in the last week, there’ve been a whole lot of apaches and other military choppers all heading west, towards goodfellow, i assume—which used to be one of the bases for the heavy lift wing(c-5, ).
idk if its even still a working base,lol.
still, theyre going somewhere, and there aint much in that direction, until you get to Ft Bliss.
i assume they are to be loaded on one of those big planes and taken into one or another of our bubbling theaters.
this sort of thing happens when theres a war on, or soon to be.
in the lead up to iraq2.0, in fact, the highway over there was almost impassable for several days with Ft hood emptying out and heading to the coast.(US87 is a FEMA secondary route, it turns out).
this time, only choppers, so far.
1st CAB of 1st AD (Ft Bliss) rotated out of Europe (Atlantic Resolve) last Nov. Maybe related?
Judge Napolitano and Prof. Seyed Mohammad Marandi from Tehran, utube, ~26+ minutes.
LIVE FROM TEHRAN: Foreign Pressure or Internal Crisis? : Prof. Seyed Mohammad Marandi
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p7_Z7lmL7j0
no mass cancellation or major delays on the night flights in/out of Ben gurion
From “I wish we could pull everybody together and do a general strike”—New York City nurses speak out on their struggle second day into strike
But not a word about COVID. Sad. Someone should maybe tell them, so they don’t kill any patients.
Apparently the MAGAts have been obsessed with maps of the ‘Technate’ of the US, running from Greenland through Canada down to South America – https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2026/jan/14/europe-trump-democracy-violent-conquest-federalism?CMP=share_btn_url
In a similar vein, looks like those maps of Greater Israel aren’t looking so stupid…
Jordan, where’d you go?
In looking at the women Trump has surrounded himself with, they are all of a type that I think of as pepsico pretty.
It wasn’t until I was an adult that I learned how common rape and molestation of pretty girls was, and i wonder how much abuse has shaped the personalities of these women?
Has Trump gone completely Bonkers?
He has always been impulsive and erratic, declaring himself ” Acting President” of Venezuela and threatening to invade Greenland seem a step or two beyond that.
Of course the real question is whether he has outlived his usefulness to TPTB, not whether he is objectively insane.
“Gone?” As in “past tense?”
I’m’a’vote for “has been for some time and Bonkers is lost in the rear view mirror.” ;-)
From Jan 9 last year:
> Venezuelan president says FBI official among ‘mercenaries’ arrested for plotting attacks Anadolu Agency
> Three Ukrainians are among seven alleged mercenaries arrested in Venezuela, leader Maduro says
making it clear Venezuela is a uniparty/establishment policy unfolding. Trump just throws extra Big Mac Sauce on it for his own special dish.
Major geographical error in the story about Mt. Merapi’s eruption in Indonesia. It’s in central Java, not in Sumatra! See: https://volcano.oregonstate.edu/merapi
Well, there are actually two volcanos called Mount Merapi in Indonesia, the more famous and more active one in the Yogyakarta Special Region Province, and the one that is erupting now, in West Sumatra. Yes, confusing!
At least six Minnesota U.S. attorneys resign over Renee Good investigation: https://www.nytimes.com/2026/01/13/us/prosecutors-doj-resignation-ice-shooting.html
And Trump admin claims Jonathan Ross, ICE shooter suffered “internal bleeding” from incident, released from hospital same day: https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-15463861/ice-agent-jonathan-ross-renne-nicole-good-interal-bleeding.html
Article notes that a bruise can be classified as internal bleeding.
One of the resigning attys was there to investigate fraud. Now he’s supposed to investigate Good’s widow instead?
Another set of ICE videos from Minneapolis. Guest host on the Jimmy Dore show. utube, ~25+ minutes.
ICE Agents INVADE Minneapolis High School!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m1e45kvO3Vo
re: Ukraine Nazis
Dutch TELEGRAAF
Former Dutch soldier Hendrik candidly discusses horrors on the Ukrainian front: “A corrupt gang.”
Dutch soldier Hendrik was wounded in Ukraine by a mortar shell in the trenches. He returned to the battlefield, and in this final installment of a two-part series—the first published on January 3rd—he recounts the less rosy aspects of the country we support.
https://archive.is/ySUbS
>Stephen Miller’s Worldview Is Straight Out of “Starship Troopers”
Yes, NATO is the guardian of peace. So, please, don’t dismantle it!
Once upon a time, that was true. Last few years it’s been an arm of US imperialism, replacing the EU, i.e., turning Europe into a military run government. with NATO to lead an unwinnable war against China (after an unwinnable war against Russia) and aiding the US to play in the West Asian sandbox?
“Make NATO North Atlantic Again (MANANOAA)” would be different – but The Donigula is not interested – The Donster wants Europe to pay for following its economic suicidal path as ordered by the US (Trump demanded German industry relocate to the US – of course they relocated to China) instead of the US subsidizing the economic suicide.
Having been to Nara, I can vouch for the deer. At first, they’re charming and cute. Then you realize they will not leave you alone if they think you have food.
Sounds like the chipmunks in Rocky Mtn National Park. / ;)
utube short.
https://www.youtube.com/shorts/VkYgN7ot8Eg
SOTU this year is going to be something special, I wonder if Trump will have Agent Ross there as his guest?
There’s also a good chance that Trump will have an epic meltdown, he must be pissed at the ingratitude of big oil after gifting them Venezuela’s massive reserves.
And of course ICE has plenty of time to add to the drama between now and then.
On the Iran front, Reuters is reporting that a US military “move” on Iran is likely in the next 24 hours, Al Jazeera is reporting that diplomatic contact between the US and Iran has been severed, and I am able to access neither the presstv.ir website nor the livestream via the Roku app — these were both accessible yesterday from here in SoCal.
The Associated Press has two articles up that further support this.
Some personnel at key US base in Qatar advised to evacuate as Iran official brings up earlier attack
UK shuts Tehran embassy and withdraws diplomats
Now Trump has supposedly “softened his rhetoric” on Iran (whatever that is supposed to mean), and PressTV was restored not long after I reported it’s inaccessibility, so perhaps there is nothing to see here, move along and so forth.
Another person has been shot by ICE agents in Minneapolis. Local news is reporting that protesters are out in large numbers.
I love that the Aurelian essay puts much of its focus on the PMC.
” The PMC is heir to an elitist political tradition found at different places and different times which distrust the common people.”
“The PMC…distrusts the common people and feels itself inherently superior and uniquely entitled to rule.”
Since most of us at NC are PMC–where does this felt sense of inherent superiority originate?
For myself, the very process of getting a graduate degree helps to certify oneself internally, as well as in the greater society, as some kind of “expert.”
But, as Aurelian also mentions, for most people life is not about symbolic manipulation of some sort but primarily about survival. ( I have found all the writings of Musa Al-Gharbi helpful on key issues concerning the PMC in modern politics.)
Near as I can tell from discussions with those in my very elite cohort, it comes from an inherent sense of entitlement. The universe owes them more. Because they’re better. You know they’re better because they did so well at school and come from good families. They have important careers.
I remember the looks of horror I received when explaining to my friends one day years ago what I was doing as an engineer working night shift to support important activities at an energy facility. The idea that I was expected to work night shift, and that the additional compensation for that shift work was not great, was something they all agreed should be illegal. While I agree night shift is hard work and the people who do it deserve more for their efforts… the response of these people who lived such comfortable lives and took for granted the ability to turn their lights on at 3 AM really shocked me. Their existence depended on all this invisible labor. The idea that they could ever be asked to participate in that was something they found intolerable. They simply deserved to have other people do it for them. That really woke me up to what the PMC was.
In my long experience in the darkening heart of the PMC (the research university), the attitude of a member of the PMC depends on his or her origins and imagination. Those born to it who lack the wit to understand their good fortune are most common. They inhabit the notional Left and notional Right. Those not born to the PMC but who wanted to do something like biology research at a reasonably high level and had the good fortune to reach his or her goal tend to understand how lucky they have been. Some maintain the proper perspective. But more probably want to pull up the ladder they used to reach their goals. And we all had a ladder. My career would have gone sideways with the slightest variation of circumstance. I still marvel at my undeserved good fortune, which played out over a long time. When I needed a boost, or more often a push, someone was there to offer it.
Catherine Liu correctly calls the typical members of the PMC “virtue hoarders.” Musa al-Gharbi is very good and his book hits virtually every nail squarely on the head, but Liu is more succinct. It is no accident that al-Gharbi has working class roots that remain strong. He sees straight through the performativity of the PMC, or symbolic capitalists. That term grates on my nerves a bit because it reminds me of Richard Florida and Robert Reich, but that is just me.
It’s funny, back in the summer of 1970 I decided to leave graduate school after completing all course work, passing my orals, and only needing to complete my dissertation.
Right from the beginning of these studies (1966), I found myself turned off by what I then called the “professional attitude” of most of my fellow graduate students–strangely uninterested in ideas but extremely excited about quickly getting the necessary certification for career blast-off.
The Vietnam war had reached new heights of absurdity and I had slowly decided (1967-1970) that I really wanted to become a revolutionary political leader which necessitated trying politics in the real world. So I quit graduate school and spent the next 10 years failing miserably at my newly chosen career.
After that decade of political failure, I then came face to face with having to start completely over and to directly experience a real struggle for economic survival. That was the first step in changing my political outlook.
file under “out no longer free press”:
From ABC national news.
FBI searches Washington Post reporter’s home for alleged classified information, newspaper says
https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/fbi-searches-washington-post-reporters-home-alleged-classified/story?id=129205960
re: Greenland
First time I watched 3 hours of German news/political “discussion” this night in probably 10 years.
It defied description.
Staggering incompetence, dishonesty, opportunism, double standard, cluelessness – did I forget anything?
However this is all popocorn-worthy nonethless:
The final season of BORGEN – as I mentioned several times – is offering almost identical phrases of dialogue in scenes where Greenland protagonists complain about Denmark´s political class (exploiting Greenland´s resources), as Denmark´s government is having now in the real world when complaining about the US intending to do the same thing Denmark did in the TV serial (and in reality).
Not to speak about Europe´s former colonies in Africa and Asia who I am sure have enough standup comediens offering fun time with making jokes about these shenanigans.
With the slight difference that we first exterminated their populations before taking the resources and the strategically significant spots.
“History repeating itself, first a tragedy… ” fits for once.
It’s becoming clear that getting even basic humanitarian aid to Gaza is going to require military intervention.
If the Europeans were oh so concerned about Greenland, they would threaten that or at least sanctions against Israel for the continuing mass murder.
Sharing this link to boost the signal. Google has rolled out a host of changes to their Gmail and other services connected to Gmail. Proton posted a helpful explanation of how to disable these new features and why you should disable them.
I feel like we’re all going to experience that reconditioning scene from a clockwork orange here. Google and others will lock us in a chair to pry our eyes open and force us to consume AI content and use AI features. The invasion of privacy I felt today was visceral as my personal email morphed in front of my eyes into something with an idiotic AI summary. Why do they have to be so awful?
Another person has been shot by ICE agents in Minneapolis.
“A federal officer shot a person in the leg in Minneapolis after being attacked with a shovel”
Ah, at last, the Russian trace!
For the curious, local news coverage can be watched at:
https://www.kmsp.com/
https://www.kare11.com/
https://www.kstp.com/
In my opinion, KMSP has had the best coverage.
US to suspend visa processing for 75 countries starting next week
https://abcnews.go.com/US/us-suspend-visa-processing-75-countries-starting-week/story?id=129210370
Thailand? Uruguay? Brazil? Some NATO members too.
I’m gonna guess that somebody asked ChatGPT for a list of countries and this was it.
How the new NPS foreign visitor surcharge is working out.
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026/jan/08/trump-national-parks-international-visitor-fee
But can you draw a mustache on Don’s snarling face?
The rapid rise in Pacific Ocean temperature is not direct greenhouse warming – the ocean is too massive for it to warm on these time scales. What it has to be is a change in ocean circulation patterns, which is more worrisome as it presents an amplification of global warming trends.
Pleasantly surprised this discussion of Climate and ENSO remains available on a governmental server.
https://www.climate.gov/news-features/blogs/enso/how-pattern-trends-across-tropical-pacific-ocean-critical-understanding