Links 7/21/2026

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1. The Rev Kev July 21, 2026 at 7:21 am

   “Spain Humiliates Trump After He Refuses to Get Out of Victory Photos”

   Pretty sure that Trump would have been backing Argentina – as was official Israel. But it is kinda sad that he has to hang around a winning team to try to share in the glory here. Maybe Spain was resentful too how Trump has been putting his stamp on these games. Not only by interfering with coaching decisions, screwing around with the Iranian team but also doubling the length of the half time show for more razzle dazzle for TV networks and playing the US national anthem which was a first for a hosting nation. Wonder what the 2028 Olympic games in Los Angeles will be like. Two years will go by quick.

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   1. Dr. John Carpenter July 21, 2026 at 10:03 am

      It was fun watching in real time as Trump was displaying chumpy, little brother energy, desperate to hang out with the cool older kids. Most of the players were clearly trying to avoid him and have as little to do with him as possible while he was interjecting himself as much as he could. Sad!

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   2. Huey July 21, 2026 at 10:58 am

      The ref in that match also gave so much leeway to Argentina, imo. Someone mentioned it yesterday, but they were literally just trying to attack the Spanish players rather than win through being better at playing the game.

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   3. pete July 21, 2026 at 2:05 pm

      Wonder what the 2028 Olympic games in Los Angeles will be like.

      They will show off USA technological edge by flying a jetpack into the stadium.

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      1. ambrit July 21, 2026 at 3:12 pm

         Better yet, the Quebec People’s Liberation Army will fly a suicide bomber into the venue by jetpack. What type of Infernal Device you might ask? With jetpacks, the sky is the limit.

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2. vladimir July 21, 2026 at 7:42 am

   For the AI, here’s a good short video comparing ai bubble to the dotcom and crypto bubbles https://youtube.com/a3-vf78ZwTc?is=erVvnH01XCbhETCW

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   1. vladimir July 21, 2026 at 7:51 am

      Sorry, something wrong with the link. It’s the video “No, AI is NOT like the DotCom bubble” by InternetOfBugs

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3. The Rev Kev July 21, 2026 at 7:58 am

   “US, ROK and Japan military chiefs reaffirm North Korea denuclearization goal”

   And after they made this announcement, they all mounted their magical ponies and each rode off into the distance. North Korea will never give up their nukes. If Libya wasn’t a big enough lesson to them – which John Bolton pointed out – then what is happening with Iran is the clincher. The US never talks about attacking North Korea anymore and it is only because of those nukes.

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   1. Rui July 21, 2026 at 11:14 am

      Not only the nukes, the certainty they are willing to use them. Russia’s nukes don’t seem to have the same deterrent effect, these days.

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4. lyman alpha blob July 21, 2026 at 8:12 am

   The ratf**king begins anew! Troy Jackson overwhelming wins the race to replace Graham Platner, who had overwhelmingly won to begin with. Now we find that Jackson is a mean old angry man, and the story ciomes from fellow Democrats. They do have form!

   https://www.yahoo.com/news/politics/articles/maine-democratic-senate-frontrunner-faces-005829803.html

   “Critics say his brash conduct, particularly with female colleagues, raises alarm bells about his temperament as the nominee for a key Senate race.

   “It felt like he was using his body and his voice to make people fearful,” said the former colleague who described recording meetings with him. “I was in a room multiple times where he escalated the situation with both the intent and natural ability to really intimidate using his physical presence.” (She said she did not ultimately keep the recordings because Jackson did not exhibit any concerning behavior in those meetings.)”

   And so on. These “fighting for” Democrats really don’t like it when somebody actually puts up a fight,do they?

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   1. The Rev Kev July 21, 2026 at 8:29 am

      Funny how so many people went ballistic about Platner’s tattoo – but gave Hegseth multiple questionable tattoos a pass. So those 11h hour women that accused Platner of all sorts of misdeeds. Have any gone to a police station to make a formal statement so that he can be charged and defend himself in court against them?

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   2. DJG, Reality Czar July 21, 2026 at 8:34 am

      Uh, oh. Platner was “unsettling.”

      Jackson is “gruff” and “brash.”

      We certainly don’t want to win elections, if winning an election is going to make some bourgeoise “uncomfortable.”

      Not with these profiles in courage: “All five people who described the thrown water bottle were Democrats involved in local politics who requested anonymity for fear of retribution.”

      Ahhh, yes, mayhem by brash water bottle.

      My question is: Why now?

      Why do these accusers never state why this moment is the appropriate moment to make some accusations?

      Does anyone recall where all of these nice-lady tattlers were when Kamala Harris was yelling “I’m Speaking” in Michigan at Americans whose families had be slaughtered in Gaza and on the West Bank?

      https://www.newsweek.com/kamala-harris-palestinian-protest-israel-michigan-1936333

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      1. Christian B July 21, 2026 at 12:14 pm

         These are the same people who threw Albert Camus under the bus…

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         1. ambrit July 21, 2026 at 3:14 pm

            “Absurd!”

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      2. Darthbobber July 21, 2026 at 3:00 pm

         Sanders was invariably “strident”, and always “ranted” or “railed”.

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   3. pjay July 21, 2026 at 8:40 am

      Originally reported by CNN, which in turn is echo-chambering a story from the Washington Post.

      There is one cause that the Democrat Establishment is guaranteed to fight for. That is keeping actual populists out of office.

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      1. JMH July 21, 2026 at 9:23 am

         Maybe they can keep it up until they have there preferred candidate who will go fight and fight and fight and lose to Susan Collins. The democrat party is hopeless. It is going to fade away like the Federalists.

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         1. lyman alpha blob July 21, 2026 at 10:33 am

            Indeed. If they want to win the senate seat, they need to win northern Maine, not just the Portland area where all the “liberals” are, many of them transplants from out of state, or “people from away” as they are known in Maine.

            Platner and Jackson appeal to the more conservative types in the 2nd Congressional district, not only with their personalities but even more with their policies. The other two prominent candidates are Shah, who only moved to the state a handful of years ago, and Bellows, who famously tried to remove Trump from the ballot in Maine during the last election cycle (and lost). Both are well liked by the party, but by the people, not so much, as has been shown multiple times now in this election cycle (both also ran in the gubernatorial primary). They are not the type who will convince people to vote Collins out.

            If the national and state party leaders manage to get their wish, Susan Collins will be laughing all the way to the bank – the one where the big corporate donors deposit her large bags of money.

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         2. scott s. July 21, 2026 at 4:38 pm

            My opinion is that the Federalists did not “fade away” but were hampered as a regional party as the US grew. Politics were mostly local then, so being regional wasn’t really a problem, but increasingly the quadrennial problem of settling on a national candidate forced a focus on national issues.

            The election of Jackson demonstrated this weakness, so the Federalists were forced into a fusion with various anti-Jackson parties, eventually branding themselves as “Whigs”. Though at the state level the old Federalists still could hold sway.

            Unfortunately as a fusion party “Whigs” had the problem of sustaining a national party platform for the presidential election along with the need to field an “available” candidate. Their only success came with nominal Whigs who as army generals had limited exposure to political demands. Then there was the disaster in that neither would last long as President and in one case exposed the VP (Tyler) as not even nominally a Whig.

            But the real downfall of the Federalists was the 1852 Whig nominating convention where the Federalists would insist on backing Webster until the bitter end, resulting in the convention defaulting to yet another old general as its candidate. IMO if the Whigs had come out for Fillmore he would have had a decent chance at election.

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      2. jefemt July 21, 2026 at 9:37 am

         Mike Drop.

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   4. hunkerdown July 21, 2026 at 12:04 pm

      The Mrs. Republican Party has nothing on her mind but policy sex with her husband party, and she only gets that when she defends his “honor”.

      The ideal Democrat is a spicy but compliant groomer-wife to the GOP.

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5. DJG, Reality Czar July 21, 2026 at 8:21 am

   Classic Literature: Camus.

   I recommend reading the article. The author of the article is correct in that Camus somehow emerged with remarkable moral authority, which he has managed to retain.

   (The left/right stuff is weak, in that Sartre was a radical communist, and Camus, malgré tout, fits well into French leftist thought. Pier Paolo Pasolini has a similar status here in Italy — a writer and artist who refused to be controlled or forced to obey.)

   There are two collections of Camus’s essays in English that are worth seeking out:
   —Resistance, Rebellion, and Death
   —Lyrical and Critical Essays

   During our confinement to quarters during the first waves of Covid, I sat on the back porch and re-read La Peste in a copy that I had retained from college. If you can read it in French, you will appreciate his severe, insightful, and inviting style. Otherwise, try The Plague in English with a translation that isn’t fusty.

   Camus never babies his readers, which is why La Peste is so disturbing. Dr. Rieux carries on even though his own wife is up at a tuberculosis sanatorium in the mountains. His description of the death of the son of the judge shows no mercy toward the reader, because we as human beings have to know how unimportant we are. And at this point in the staggering collapse of the Empire, a book like The Plague, which shows mercy toward the weak and eccentric but not toward the reader, may be the antidote that is required.

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   1. The Rev Kev July 21, 2026 at 8:52 am

      It occurred to me in reading that article that if Camus was alive and in his prime right now, the right and the left would still be attacking him and having him cancelled. It might even be that he would have to flee to the Russian Federation in fear of what might be done to he and his family.

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      1. DJG, Reality Czar July 21, 2026 at 9:08 am

         Rev Kev: I’m not so sure that he’d have to go anywhere, given that he didn’t take orders well.

         I mentioned Pasolini because the right is trying to claim him in Italy, with amusing results.

         Recently, Dacia Maraini, a well-known writer, gave an interview and blunted it all by saying something like, “Are you nuts? I knew him well. He was a dissident, a homosexual, and definitely not a man of the right.” Some of the righty assertions have died down.

         I have a feeling that Camus would get more support now in France, particularly because Sartre and his Maoist / conformist wing of communism have fallen apart in France. And the Russian Federation is no paradise for dissidents. Even the Russian scholar and “divulgatore” Paolo Nori admits that the translations of his own books from Italian into Russian have been censored, yet he’s willing to continue a dialogue.

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         1. steelyman July 21, 2026 at 6:38 pm

            Re “And the Russian Federation is no paradise for dissidents.”

            I believe Edward Snowden might want to have a word or two with you.

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   2. JMH July 21, 2026 at 9:49 am

      I have read Lyrical and Critical Essays, but not Resistance, Rebellion, and Death. I must get a hold of it. I much admire his unstinting honesty, his refusal to sugar coat … I doubt it ever occurred to him. I first read Camus in college, in the 1950s, and I have circled back to him repeatedly through the years. Aurelien in a pair of essays two or three years ago called his a Philosophy for Really Hard Times suggesting that the present was a moment for it. I concur. I read The First Man two weeks ago. Camus had hard times bred in the bone. There was no room for gilding the lily in the world of his youth, nor was the world in which he matured all that forgiving. I reading that Primo Levi in Auschwitz was sucking on an icicle. A guard took it way from him. Levi asked why. The guard replied, “Hier is kein warum.” (Here there is no why.) Camus replying to the question if life has no meaning why not suicide, rejected it. He responded, Live. Without hope but without despair. You just go on. That can seem bleak. I find it a comfort.

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   3. NotThePilot July 21, 2026 at 9:29 pm

      There are still several things by him I haven’t read, but besides The Plague, I’m always pleasantly surprised that more people have read The Rebel than I expect.

      That said, I think my all-time fav is his short-story collection Exile & the Kingdom. The range he packs into that small book is insane, and while he hides it well, I think it’s way more cohesive than it seems, almost like an extended exercise in his wider philosophical program.

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6. raspberry jam July 21, 2026 at 8:41 am

   The Made-in-China Anxiety Gripping America’s AI Industry Bloomberg
   OpenAI Exec Laments That China Is Giving Away Models So Good That For-Profit Companies Won’t Be Able to Compete Futurism

   I commented a bit about this over the weekend in the thread starting here:
   https://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2026/07/links-7-18-2026.html#comment-4444986

   Of particular interest note the (poorly-formatted, sorry) table of current model charges per 1 million token by the latest class of model.

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   1. Glen July 21, 2026 at 1:29 pm

      More on the China AI moment here:

      China’s Kimi K3 DESTROYS US AI Lead
      https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9E_TV02oWQA

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7. flora July 21, 2026 at 8:58 am

   File under AI :

   From Cal Matters.

   Kaiser nurses say technology is making their jobs — and patient care — worse

   https://calmatters.org/economy/technology/2026/07/kaiser-nurses-workplace-surveillance-ai/

   Opening three paras:

   “Kaiser Permanente nurses who answer advice and triage calls say their duty of care for patients is being increasingly threatened by workplace surveillance.

   “Seven current and former nurses told CalMatters that those who spend more than 15 minutes on a call with a patient routinely face criticism from Kaiser management or get called into performance evaluation meetings. Call time, they said, factors into monthly performance scores they receive.

   “In addition to tracking call length, they said Kaiser uses software that tries to predict on a daily basis whether they’re being unproductive or failing to answer calls quickly. Artificial intelligence systems have also been used to rate their empathy and tone of voice.”

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8. DJG, Reality Czar July 21, 2026 at 9:02 am

   Andrew Korybko. Germany Borrowing 800 Billion Euro to Do Stupid Things.

   I recently read an article by Pino Arlacchi (always worth reading) in Fatto Quotidiano. It turns up now in AntiDiplomatico, which I will paste in below.

   According to Arlacchi, the supposed rearmament isn’t even economically viable. It’s just suspension of EU budgeting rules, resulting in nothing: “E i risultati? Tra gennaio e febbraio di quest’anno la Commissione ha approvato i piani nazionali di spesa Safe: sommandoli tutti, si arriva a circa 150 miliardi. Meno del 20% della cifra annunciata, e interamente sotto forma di debito. Il resto è rimasto ciò che era fin dall’inizio: una simulazione di eurocrati, un atto di propaganda.”

   Yes, it is in Italian, so if you read Italian it isn’t a long read. Others may want to try copying it over into a reliable translation program (if such a thing exists).

   https://www.lantidiplomatico.it/dettnews-riarmo_europeo_un_grande_bluff_di_pino_arlacchi/45289_68119/

   More details than Korybko provides, with a deeper critique of the foolishness and bravado.

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   1. The Rev Kev July 21, 2026 at 9:09 am

      Yandex Translate comes up with this-

      ‘And the results? Between January and February of this year, the Commission approved the national Safe spending plans: adding them all up to about 150 billion. Less than 20% of the announced figure, and entirely in the form of debt. The rest remained what it was from the beginning: a simulation of eurocrats, an act of propaganda.’

      Yandex Translate also awards those eurocrats five Pinocchios.

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   2. .Tom July 21, 2026 at 10:54 am

      Pace Korybko, I’d say the basic motivation of Europols in pushing the Russia threat is it’s the only thing they have left to offer voters. That they and their pals get their beaks wet is certainly also a factor but frightening populations into supporting the current leaders hardly a novel idea.

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      1. AG July 21, 2026 at 11:14 am

         EU in truth fearful of the US not RU.
         But that still doesn’t add up entirely.

         2 questions I can’t answer:

         -What are they fearful of in detail – had the EU hypothetically resisted the US move on RU what would have happened
         -What´s the benefit of not doing the right thing as EU governments

         Not going to war with RU, not opposing China would have caused much smaller problems than what we have now. So who in the EU profits of this?

         Destroying the car manufacturers and petrochemicals in Germany is help to no one.

         The arms industry never was big in Europe.
         They don´t have the power to push through this kind of “strategic” decision.

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         1. Tom Stone July 21, 2026 at 10:06 pm

            AG, I highly recommend “One Nation under Blackmail” and particularly the epilogue which explains that Epstein and Maxwell were no longer needed due to the advances in surveillance technology.
            It’s available for download , free.
            Simply put EVERY EU and US “leader” is subject to blackmail, and they know it.
            They can go along (The carrot) to get along or they will be ruined.
            In the extremely unlikely event that there is no blackmail material available they can be disposed of by spending $ ( Massie) or kiddie porn will be “Found” on their phone or PC.
            There is no privacy, Total Information Awareness is here and being used to maintain the status quo.
            Which will work until it doesn’t.

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            1. Ben Panga July 22, 2026 at 12:10 am

               A reminder:

               Whitney Webb has explicitly encouraged people to download her “One Nation Under Blackmail” for free from archive.org

               https://archive.org/details/one-nation-under-blackmail-vol-1-2-whitney-alyse-webb_202401?

               (There are many instances of it on archive.org, this is just the first result)

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            2. John July 22, 2026 at 3:37 am

               I have a friend who is very into Whitney Webb and tells me about her work. It does sound plausible. It’s tough to explain US foreign policy vis-a-vis Israel using the normal tools of analysis (it’s bad foreign policy and it’s bad domestic policy, and you certainly can win an election without AIPAC money–it’s only one of many interest groups within the US political arena).

               However, how do you explain the many dissenting voices within the US, including people as famous as Bernie Sanders, Ilhan Omar, Ralph Nader, Noam Chomsky, or Joaquin Phoenix?

               How do you explain half of the Democratic party voting against funding for Israel the other day?

               How about Trump and Iran eventually coming to an MoU/ceasefire that held for some weeks rather than a full-scale invasion (which I can’t imagine will happen)? If they truly had dirt on Trump bad enough to manipulate him, wouldn’t he be willing to end his political career and order a full-scale invasion?

               And how about Mike Huckabee (of all people) publicly saying that they didn’t need Israel’s permission to negotiate with the Houthis (back in 2025)? I never would’ve imagined hearing someone from a US administration make a comment like that, and certainly not from the most pro-Israel administration in history.

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            3. .Tom July 22, 2026 at 9:11 am

               That’s right Tom. That’s the political capture part.

               And Nat Wilson Turned set out the social control part on Monday afternoon.

               https://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2026/07/palestine-laboratory-greg-stoker-politicide-loewenstein-ice-ukraine.html

               Everything is going according to plan.

               Click to Edit – 

               

               That's right Tom. That's the political capture part. And Nat Wilson Turned set out the social control part on Monday afternoon. https://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2026/07/palestine-laboratory-greg-stoker-politicide-loewenstein-ice-ukraine.html Everything is going according to plan.

               SaveCancelDelete

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9. flora July 21, 2026 at 9:20 am

   File under AI: From Cal Matters.

   Kaiser nurses say technology is making their jobs — and patient care — worse

   https://calmatters.org/economy/technology/2026/07/kaiser-nurses-workplace-surveillance-ai/

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   1. ChrisFromGA July 21, 2026 at 1:38 pm

      Star date 2034: Operation “Rip and replace AI” kicks into high gear, as hospitals get rid of AI technology and fall back to EHRs and good old pen and paper.

      “The Pitt” had a great episode based on the premise that the hospital got hit by a cyber attack and all the nurses and docs had to go back to filing paperwork and keeping track of patients on a white board.

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      1. ambrit July 21, 2026 at 3:21 pm

         It sounds like it’s just about the right time for a Butlerian Jihad.

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10. motorslug July 21, 2026 at 9:29 am

    https://ips-dc.org/meet-our-new-private-jet-tracking-initiative/

    “We are excited to announce a new tool from the IPS Private Jet Accountability Project, what we are calling the “Private Jet Emissions Tracker” (PJET). The first tranche of data will be released under the banner, “Red Card for Private Jets at FIFA World Cup.” We will be releasing data for the semi-final matches and final match in New Jersey this week.”

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11. flora July 21, 2026 at 10:00 am

    re: Report: Pentagon develops options for striking Cuba – Miami Herald (Robin K)

    Why? Do T and Miriam envision setting up new casinos there?

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    1. ambrit July 21, 2026 at 3:30 pm

       Plus, and I get this from conversations I had with old guard Cubanos about the old days of Batista’s regime, the whole island of Cuba will be turned into an Epstein Island. (Under the old regime, prostitution was “tolerated,” and most people were so poor that their daughters ended up “on the street” hooking for the touristas to help the family make ends meet.)
       I do wonder what Russia and China might do, behind the scenes to support Cuba in any war with America. Targeting data for missiles and drones against Homestead Airforce base, or Tampa where Southern Command is headquartered and a lot of retired senior brass live?
       The American Neocons had better watch what they ask for. The battlefield has changed significantly over the past few years.

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12. Tom Stone July 21, 2026 at 10:05 am

    The timing of the release of Kimi is interesting, it ahowed up just as a large number of corporations that went all in on AI are starting to choke on the cost of tokens.
    When pointy headed bosses realize that they can get the same shoddy, unreliable results from Kimi that they do from OAI or Anthropic at a fraction of the cost they will jump on it.
    Without a condom.
    Add the insatiable demand for capital from OAI and Anthropic as liquidity dries up and the Bubble looks ready to pop.
    My guess is by Labor day, the first week in September.
    Stay safe and enjoy the show.

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    1. The Rev Kev July 21, 2026 at 10:12 am

       Are you sure that OAI and Anthropic just won’t run to the Feds and have all Chinese AI banned on the grounds of “national security?” That’s how they grabbed control of Tik-Tok and handed it over to the Zionists.

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       1. hunkerdown July 21, 2026 at 12:53 pm

          They have been, every five months or so. CXMT’s cheap RAM is now on the Feds’ radar as well, thwarting the material conditions to run local processing of any sort. This time around, as of the beginning of July, OpenAI’s new chief lobbyist and fixer Dean Ball operates under some rarefied “future strategist” shingle, and he is as motivated as any other cokehead in the US AI business.

          The attacks on the maker community, on consumer information and computation, on anonymous participation or even reading online, seem to evince the single object of Israel assuming the mantle of the stern patriarch at the “heart of the West” (as one wealth manager put it) and seeking to disarm the US populace to more easily beat them into submission.

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13. flora July 21, 2026 at 10:14 am

    File under No Longer Free Press:

    Ken Klippenstein’s substack with a list of the named terriorists. That’s quite a list. It will probably grow and grow. / ;)

    https://www.kenklippenstein.com/p/after-political-terrorism-event-us

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    1. Screwball July 21, 2026 at 10:35 am

       This looks to be from the State Dept. and Rubio.

       Who would have thought Rubio would be so truly awful in so many ways? Well, I did, for one. The guy was always a slimy POS and it was easy to tell he was a slimy POS because he proved all the time he was a slimy POS. But what do I know?

       Of course the other slimy POS (plural) in DC voted the slimy POS into the cabinet position 99-0.

       Pardon me while I go play my tiny violin.

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       1. flora July 21, 2026 at 4:01 pm

          Wonder if Judge Napolitano and LtCOL Karen Kwiatowski will get added to the list? / smh

          LtCOL. Karen Kwiatkowski : How the Deep State Uses Trump

          https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ck4Xo1U7UHw

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    2. AG July 21, 2026 at 11:23 am

       ““Many of the most significant upheavals in recent American political history — from the George Floyd riots to the rise of Antifa to the explosion of pro-terrorist activism on American college campuses — can be linked, in some way, shape, or form, to Cuban influence,” the report says.”

       Cuba?
       This is so embarrassing.
       Eventually it should hurt him politically.

       Considering that they wrote the same nonsense after Batista was gone, frankly I see little difference between the US then and today. It´s just even less believable today.

       But looking at it from bird´s-eye view what has changed?
       The US is fighting illegal wars all over the globe getting millions killed directly or indirectly.

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    3. Milton July 21, 2026 at 12:54 pm

       I noticed that AOC didn’t make the cut. If Russia, Russia Amy G was included on the list, the bar was set pretty low. Shows how tightly intertwined Alexandria is with the Dem leadership.

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       1. AG July 21, 2026 at 3:04 pm

          Lets wait who else in the media world will notice that detail…

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    4. amfortas July 21, 2026 at 3:32 pm

       my first thought when it came across my feed was that i should immediately go to lil marco’s twitx and demand answers as to why i aint on his fucking list.
       unlike many of them who are, i’m a derned anarchist…socialism is the middle ground compromise, for me.
       and, remember, i hate my country BECAUSE i am a patriot.
       stop doing stupid shit; it just proves us right.

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14. Jason Boxman July 21, 2026 at 10:49 am

    Oil Buyers Battered by the Iran War Energy Crisis Race to Build Buffers (NY Times)

    Rodela Romero was attending an event at her church in northern Manila when her phone rang. It was a local reporter asking her to comment on what was being described to her as a nightmare scenario.

    Ms. Romero, who oversees the oil industry at the Philippine Department of Energy, had been following news of the U.S.-Israeli strikes on Iran that day in late February. Now, the reporter told Ms. Romero, the Strait of Hormuz — the vital maritime choke point through which the Philippines imports enormous amounts of crude oil — had been shut.

    “We import almost 100 percent of our petroleum products,” said Ms. Romero, 64. “We’re so vulnerable,” she recalled thinking at the time.

    In the ensuing weeks, government officials scrambled to secure supply from alternative producers, at great cost. Gasoline prices doubled and diesel prices tripled, triggering transit strikes in Manila and a sudden spike in inflation that experts warned could push more than a million Filipinos into poverty.

    Washington forgets or doesn’t know that much of American goods and plenty of services come from abroad, like call center outsourcing to the Philippines. There’s going to be all kinds of blowback from Trump’s War.

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15. The Rev Kev July 21, 2026 at 10:55 am

    “Trump’s Officials Are Removing the Evidence Women Won Freedom and the Vote.”

    I think that the author misses the bigger picture. It’s not only excluding women from history.The Trump region has attracted a lot of happy-clappers and some of them are pretty hard core. So there is a line of thought in them that says that women should be excluded from exercising a vote. In fact, you would have the ‘head of the household’ do the voting for that family. And yes, that is right out of the playbook from centuries ago. You might say that that is only a minority view from some religious factions but that is how the opposition to Roe vs Wade stated off and after a coupla decades they won. These people are patient. And all you would have to do is annul the 19th Amendment which makes it easier to do.

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16. ChrisFromGA July 21, 2026 at 11:37 am

    Glass half full department:

    I’ve been playing with AI a bit, and one thing I realized it is very good for is cutting through the maze of obfuscation that big corporations have put on their websites to block you from reaching customer service.

    I used it to quickly get direct numbers for financial services reps at my bank, vs. wasting time hunting around their website which inevitably makes it harder and harder to speak to a human, directing you to chatbots and such.

    AI vs. AI.

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    1. MicaT July 21, 2026 at 7:49 pm

       Brilliant, thanks

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17. Tom Stone July 21, 2026 at 12:03 pm

    Denying Women the vote is something our VP and Pissy Pete Hegseth are openly in favor of.
    Unhappy women have a lot of ways of expressing their unhappiness, I well remember Mom serving Dad eggs that were both raw and burned when she was displeased.
    Millions of grumpy incels would be one result, perhaps this is a way of increasing the fighting spirit of “Our Troops’?

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18. DMK July 21, 2026 at 3:22 pm

    “The Albert Camus Story”

    “In 1956, he flew to Algiers to give a speech calling for a civilian truce. Outside the building, an angry crowd of French colonists gathered, openly screaming for him to be lynched. His friends were terrified, but Camus refused to leave the stage until he finished his speech. In the speech, Camus told them that no cause justifies the deaths of innocent people. They had to hustle him out a back door to save his life.”

    Camus’ words are the answer to those who say that Hamas had a right to kill Israeli civilians on October 7. And that Israel was within the rules of war in killing Gazan civilians.

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19. Mikel July 21, 2026 at 4:11 pm

    What’s Driving Germany’s Planned €800 Billion Remilitarization? – Andrew Korybko

    “The ruling liberal elite’s commitment to the aforesaid ideological cause, which some of them have been misled into thinking is the key to rejuvenating their country’s declining economy, might also be influenced by the perceived prestige that they expect to accompany playing this geopolitical role.”

    This reminded me of J. Helmer’s recent lament (and perspective that’s usually more in the M. Hudson wheelhouse): he thinks a major obstacle for Russia is that to go from SMO to country fighting a more total war puts Russian oligarchs in conflict with other government officials about control of the economy.
    I think about this when I read about Germany and “remilitarization” in the face of de-industrialization.
    All that’s known for sure is that social spending will get cut in order to allegedly “re-militarize”. It somehow all comes back to that – in all countries.

    It’s a similar thread that weaves through so many countries. They all have visions or narratives playing out like 20th Century battles, but trying to do it with 21st Century economies ruled by neoliberal economics (or some form of gangsterism crossed with rentierism) and the exaltation of finance and service industries.
    It’s like asking how can war be made without making things.

    And no country is trying to reignite growth of an economic middle class (that often accompanies a diversified instrustrial economy). Doesn’t take much before the cries of “overheating the economy” come into play. Just funny how that works.

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    1. Lee July 21, 2026 at 7:03 pm

       “All that’s known for sure is that social spending will get cut in order to allegedly “re-militarize”. It somehow all comes back to that – in all countries.”

       In case there’s any doubt, here’s Rubio in a Congressional hearing complaining that “Many of the countries in Europe were able to build these very robust social safety nets because they didn’t have to spend it on defense because NATO and the United States were providing it for them.” YouTube

       I seriously doubt that if Europe steps up that the U.S. will be spending less on “defense” and more on it’s social safety net.

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20. AG July 21, 2026 at 5:44 pm

    re: Ukraine and Oreshnik

    Mark Sleboda with Jamarl Thomas today said he´d expect multiple Oreshnik launches this year.

    He assumes the RU government is waiting for something – maybe finish testing or changes on the system – to then use them potentially against what may be one of the Oreshnik´s intended targets – massive underground Cold War era bunkers – to take out core infrastructure which they hadn´t been able to touch so far – because those bunkers were built for serious WWIII.

    He calls it “a coming regular strike pattern” of Oreshniks.

    Final 3 minutes of video#1
    https://marksleboda.substack.com/p/russias-long-range-strike-campaign

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21. amfortas July 21, 2026 at 7:23 pm

    amfortas holds forth and hijacks one of my fave twitx friends thread:https://x.com/AmfortasH/status/2079701108214128841

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22. Glen July 21, 2026 at 9:19 pm

    Maybe I should post this in the testosterone article, but this guy doesn’t seem to need any more:

    Benjamin Netanyahu is a war criminal.
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8ZuV5L0QL04

    Well said Mr Mayor.

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23. The Rev Kev July 22, 2026 at 3:54 am

    ‘Cat’s best reaction ever to a magic trick’

    Man, the look on that cat’s face was priceless.

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