You can have very low interest rates, and you can have debt-driven inflation. You just can’t have both at the same time. That is the reality President Trump refuses to recognize.

At the core of the president’s half-baked plan to resuscitate the economy is a return to the good old days of near-zero interest rates.

In 1993, the U.S. intelligence community — through the CIA, NSA, and other agencies — introduced a research initiative called the Massive Digital Data Systems (MDDS) project. It was funded and managed through unclassified science agencies like the National Science Foundation so that promising results could be scaled into the private sector. The program was introduced to computer scientists at Stanford, CalTech, MIT, Carnegie Mellon, Harvard, and other leading research universities. 

According to Jeff Nesbit — former director of legislative and public affairs at the National Science Foundation, writing in Quartz in 2017 — two intelligence-community program managers met regularly with Sergey Brin as his research progressed at Stanford, and Brin co-authored several papers arising from the MDDS grant before he and Larry Page left to found Google. The grant work fed directly into the page-ranking and query-tracking breakthroughs that became Google's foundation. 

“The 36 neurologists, psychiatrists and other mental health professionals said in the letter that they had seen “objectively observable” signs of serious medical concerns in Trump, including deterioration of cognitive function, grandiose and delusional beliefs, and severely impaired judgment and impulse control.

The letter concludes, “it is our expert opinion that Donald J. Trump is mentally unfit to be the President of the United States, and that steps to remove him from office must be undertaken with the greatest urgency, with vital responsibilities on the shoulders of those in positions of leadership.”

No one in the group examined Trump face to face, the letter said, nor is he a patient of anyone in the group. But the letter said the group has “closely followed his behavior and his statements over the past year.”

Story Highlights

• A federal judge has ordered the Trump administration to disclose the architects of the $1.8 billion ‘anti-weaponization fund’.
• The fund, aimed at compensating individuals claiming victimization by law enforcement, has faced bipartisan scrutiny.
• The administration remains unrepentant, suggesting potential future payouts for Jan. 6 rioters.
• This legal development underscores the complexities surrounding Trump’s legacy and the ramifications of his administration’s actions.

Sam LaGrone, usninews.com

Acting Secretary of the Navy Hung Cao will need a Congressional waiver from both the House and the Senate to be eligible for confirmation as the permanent SECNAV, USNI News has learned.

In order to serve as a U.S. service secretary, nominees are required by law to have been retired from active-duty service for seven years. Cao, who was confirmed last year as Under Secretary of the Navy, is a 1996 U.S. Naval Academy graduate and served as an explosive ordnance disposal and diving officer. He retired from the Navy as a captain in October 2021, according to his Department of the Navy biography. Under current law, Cao wouldn’t be eligible without a waiver until 2028.

A source familiar with the proposed legislative path of Cao ’s nomination confirmed to USNI News he would require a waiver from both the House and Senate before confirmation.

In a statement to USNI News, a senior Pentagon official told USNI News, “the Department looks forward to working with Congress throughout Acting Secretary Cao ’s nomination process.

Cao has been acting SECNAV since John Phelan was removed from the position in April. President Donald Trump announced his intent to nominate Cao earlier this month.

“The Senate needs to confirm this Warfighter, ASAP, so he can continue the fantastic work he has been doing over the past 4 months,” Trump wrote on social media.

It’s unclear how much time the House and Senate will have to pass legislation clearing Cao ’s nomination in the current Congress before the November midterms. The House is currently on a two-week recess after briefly returning from their August recess to pass a continuing resolution. If Democrats take control of the House, Cao ’s path to a waiver becomes more difficult, two sources told USNI News.

Prior to 2021, service secretary nominees had a five-year cooling off period from active-duty service before they could be eligible for nomination. However, Congress increased the requirement to seven years in 2021 as part of the legislative waiver allowing former Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin to serve during the Biden administration without meeting the mandatory seven-year waiting period. Austin led U.S. Central Command and retired as a four-star army officer in 2016.

by Kyle Anzalone, liberterianinstitute.org

Zakharova went on to warn that the CLS deployment would interfere with any US and Russian talks on new nuclear weapons agreements and would be factored into future deterrence planning in Moscow. “Steps such as the deployment in Europe of US ground-based intermediate- and shorter-range missile systems that threaten Russia will, to put it mildly, ‘zero out’ the prerequisites for constructive talks with the US on strategic issues,” she added. 

Since the end of the Cold War, Washington has withdrawn from several major arms control agreements with Moscow . President George W Bush withdrew from the Anti-Ballistic Missile (ABM) Treaty, while President Donald Trump voided the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces (INF) treaty and the Open Skies pact. 

Additionally, New START expired in February after Trump declined Russia’s offer to continue observing the treaty’s limits for another year. Trump has called for replacing New START with a new agreement that includes China

Claire's Observations:  Everything the US appears to be doing, appears to be calculated to enrage  Russia even further, on top of US support for Ukraine against it in that ongoing war which appears to have no end, in spite of the pre-mid-term, "for US public consumption" meeting between the US' "Gruesome Twosome", Kushner and Witkoff, with Putin over the weekend.

 One has to wonder just what they believe they got from Zelinsky as some kind of "carrot" with which to entice Russia back to the negotiating table.

My guess is that whatever might have been offered, was just too pathetically small, or weak in nature, to induce Russia to come back to a bargaining table which has been stacked against it from the very beginning.

by Dave De Camp, antiwar.com

The US, Japan, and South Korea on Monday kicked off five days of trilateral military drills for the third consecutive year, exercises that North Korea has denounced as evidence that the US is continuing hostile policies toward Pyongyang despite Washington cutting short earlier US-South Korean war games.

The drills, dubbed Freedom Edge, began in 2024 and were a result of a Camp David summit President Biden hosted in 2023 with the leaders of South Korea and Japan. Washington has been fostering the mending of ties between Tokyo and Seoul as part of its strategy against Beijing in the region. The drills were held twice in 2024, making the 2026 version the fourth iteration.

South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) said that the “multidomain” exercises began in waters east and south of South Korea’s southern Jeju Island. US Pacific Command said the five days of drills will take place in international waters and airspace to the south of South Korea, as well as at military installations and command posts in Japan.

Rear Adm. Kim Ji-hoon of South Korea’s JCS said that the drills were meant to counter North Korea, which just commissioned its second naval destroyer. “The trilateral Freedom Edge exercise is being executed to counter North Korean nuclear and missile threats, and that’s the main purpose of the exercise,” Kim said, according to Yonhap News Agency.

Claire's Observations;  It will be interesting to see how the relationship between Kim's sister, , Kim Yo Jong, and his daughter, Kim Ju Ae, will evolve over time, and who will wind up carrying the mantle of leadership in the country, when Kim Jung Un is no longer in control.

The family dynamic has certainly seen its share of assassinations and imprisonments play out over time.  Throck, my AI, describes this as follows: 

 "The Kim dynasty's history has included political imprisonment, forced exile, purges, executions, and—more recently—assassinations of family members.

The remarkable thing about the Kim dynasty is that the danger has not necessarily stopped at the palace walls. The succession has repeatedly involved eliminating people who might provide an alternative source of legitimacy or power.

The striking thing is that three generations of the ruling family have repeatedly eliminated people who could potentially represent competing centers of power. The purges were not confined to ordinary political opponents; in some cases they reached very close to the ruling family's own circle. And that makes Kim Ju Ae's emergence especially fascinating. If Kim Jong Un is genuinely preparing her to inherit the regime, she will eventually have to contend with the same extraordinarily complicated family network that has produced both potential successors and potential victims."

In September '23, UAE President bin Zayed called Netanyahu to deliver a harsh warning. Netanyahu did nothing. An extensive investigation, conducted for a new book, reveals the PM's failures surrounding Oct. 7. Netanyahu: 'This is an absolute lie'

by Dave De Camp, antiwar.com

Yemen’s Ansar Allah, also known as the Houthis, said on Monday that a Saudi airstrike hit a prison in northern Yemen’s al-Jawf province, killing at least seven people, including a child, as the war in the country continues to escalate.

Footage from Yemen’s Al Masirah TV shows the aftermath of the strike on the Central Corrective Facility in the city of Hazm and the body of the child who was killed. The Ansar Allah-led Yemeni Health Ministry said the dead included inmates and a child who was visiting the prison, and that another seven people, including a female visitor, were wounded in the attack.

Yemen’s Ansar Allah, also known as the Houthis, said on Monday that a Saudi airstrike hit a prison in northern Yemen’s al-Jawf province, killing at least seven people, including a child, as the war in the country continues to escalate.

Footage from Yemen’s Al Masirah TV shows the aftermath of the strike on the Central Corrective Facility in the city of Hazm and the body of the child who was killed. The Ansar Allah-led Yemeni Health Ministry said the dead included inmates and a child who was visiting the prison, and that another seven people, including a female visitor, were wounded in the attack.

Footage from Al Masirah TV of the aftermath of the strike on the Central Corrective Facility in al-Jawf

Airstrikes were also reported in the provinces of al-Bayda, Marib, and Taiz, where much of the recent ground fighting has taken place. So far, Saudi Arabia hasn’t taken credit for the strikes. Sources within the Saudi-backed government, whose leadership is based in Riyadh, claimed “Yemeni government” warplanes carried out airstrikes, but the government hasn’t had a real air force since Ansar Allah took control of the Yemeni capital of Sanaa in 2014.

Saudi airstrikes that hit the Sanaa International Airport on July 13, 2026, which reignited the war in Yemen, were initially reported by Western media as “Yemeni government” strikes, but US officials subsequently told Axios that Saudi Arabia carried out the attack after Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman got a green light from President Trump to escalate against Ansar Allah.

Saudi Arabia’s air operations in Yemen are very reliant on US support, as they require US-provided intelligence, maintenance for US-made warplanes, and the use of US-made bombs. The US backed a brutal Saudi/UAE-led war in Yemen, which killed hundreds of thousands of Yemenis, from 2015 until a ceasefire was reached in 2022.

Claire's Observations:  Things appear to be escalating here in Yemen as well.  How long, please, before all  this military activity,  is referred to as a world war?!?

The state of New Mexico sued the Department of Justice and Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche on Wednesday, saying the federal government blocked the state's ability to investigate the sex crimes of financier Jeffrey Epstein at a ranch there.

The lawsuit filed in federal court in Washington, D.C., said the Justice Department and Blanche stonewalled New Mexico Attorney General Raúl Torrez's criminal investigation into Epstein and others, taking steps that "actively harms victims and undermines the public interest."

By Tyler Durden

Britain’s highest taxpayers have been drifting offshore since the non-dom regime was scrapped in April 2025 and inheritance tax was extended to worldwide assets.

This shift is already visible on the Sunday Times lists: six of the 2026 Tax List’s top 100 (including Revolut ’s Nik Storonsky) had left in the previous year, the compiler noted that one in nine names on that list were no longer UK-resident, and the companion Rich List dropped dozens of foreign billionaires while recording a sharp rise in British nationals now based in Dubai, Switzerland and Monaco.

But, the latest news is likely the most disturbing to the increasingly socialist government as the UK's 3rd largest taxpayer - hedge fund founder Chris Rokos - is set to leave.

If the highest taxpayers keep leaving - as Rokos ’s reported move to Greece underlines - Labour’s bet that abolishing non-doms and tightening inheritance tax would raise more money starts to look fragile, because a thin slice of people already supplies a large share of income-tax receipts.

The government then faces an awkward choice: accept a smaller tax base and tighter budgets, or raise rates on the mobile and immobile alike and risk accelerating the outflow it is trying to tax.

Claire's Observations:  This.... is desperation on the cusp of madness on the part of the current British government, and a clear sign that neither corporations, nor the individuals who own them,  want to stay in a country which taxes them to death, then wonders why corporations can't make a profit, and are forced to leave in order to do so.

In the immortal words of the American comedian Ron White, "You can't fix stupid!"; and this is precisely where the British government is, at this point in time in looking at wealth taxation.

Authored by Naveen Athrappully via The Epoch Times,

A district court denied a motion from three Stars and Stripes journalists that sought to block the Department of War from firing them.

While plaintiffs argue that the terminations "violate their First Amendment rights to communicate as citizens on matters of public concern," such rights have "some limitations" when applied to people employed in public service, Judge Trevor N. McFadden, from the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, said in the Sept. 4 order.

"When government employees provide public commentary in their official capacity, their speech is government speech, and the First Amendment does not apply," the judge said, adding that the plaintiffs have not demonstrated any "irreparable harm."

The journalists - Max D. Lederer, Erik A. Slavin, and Lara S. Korte - filed their lawsuit on Aug. 27.

On July 5, Korte and Slavin gave interviews to CBS News. The program discussed changes to Pentagon regulations governing Stars and Stripes and their impact on its independence.

Korte said that restrictions may come on her reporting. "I'm working for Stars and Stripes ... not for the Pentagon, not for any administration, not for any policymaker. I'm here to cover the military community," she said.

Meanwhile, Slavin said he would not comply if the Pentagon requested depictions of the story that were inaccurate.

On Aug. 11, Stars and Stripes published a story about "deteriorating conditions" aboard the USS Abraham Lincoln, according to the lawsuit. The vessel had been on extended duty amid the U.S.-Iran war.

On Aug. 12, a day after the article was published, Lederer was allegedly ordered to give Slavin and Korte Notices of Separation, citing insubordination for statements made in the July 5 interview.

However, Lederer did not deliver the notices. Instead, he announced his retirement.

Moreover, on Aug. 18, Lederer gave an interview with Stripes, raising concerns about the "direction" of the publication, the complaint said.

by Tyler Durden

At the start of the year, we warned about the prospect of humanoid robots moving beyond factory floors and into military operations.

China's World Humanoid Robot Games last month showcased advances in robotic speed and mobility, while reports of Beijing's expanding military research suggest preparations for eventual battlefield deployment are gathering pace. The prospect of humanoids operating alongside troops and one-way attack drones presents an unsettling new view of warfare's next phase: the rise of the machines.

Reuters published a new report on Monday that said:

China's defense establishment is accelerating research into humanoids' military uses and planning for their eventual wartime deployment, according to a Reuters review of more than 100 Chinese military procurement notices, academic studies, patents, official publications, government records and defense-company materials.

While the world marveled at China's World Humanoid Robot Games, which showcased robots sprinting, jumping, dancing, and participating in sporting events, the Chinese military urged researchers to accelerate the transfer of advanced technologies from laboratories to military training grounds for robotic "combatants."

Posted by Tyler Durden: Authored by Andrew Korybko via Substack,

Indefinitely perpetuating the Ukrainian Conflict through these means indefinitely delays the full implementation of the US' planned "Pivot (back) to (East) Asia", can lead to Russia selling its natural resource wealth to China at bargain-basement prices, and maintains China's "active neutrality".

Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE/RL) referenced the EU's summertime disbursement of the first €1 billion to Ukraine for drone procurement out of the €6 billion promised for this program in an article late last month about how "Ukraine's Drone War Exposes An Uncomfortable Reliance On China". They drew attention to the carve-out allowing Ukraine to purchase Chinese parts with these funds, ergo the politically incorrect observation back then that "The EU Plans To Pay China To Help Ukraine Kill Russians".

RFE/RL reported that "While Kyiv has cut back on the purchase of ready-made drones from China, components such as motors, lithium batteries, and fiberoptics are still in high demand." Additionally, "In the first six months of 2026, imports of Chinese parts had already reached around 76 percent of the total recorded for the previous year." They also cited a Ukrainian report which claimed that "38 percent of the value of drone components imported by Ukraine in the first half of 2025 came from China."

The purpose of their piece appears to be to instill a sense of urgency in Ukraine and the West alike to radically ramp up domestic drone production in order to reduce what one of their cited experts described as Ukraine's "hostile interdependence" on China. They explained that "Beijing remains Kyiv's largest trading partner, while Ukraine is a key supplier of agricultural goods to China." That's true, and it's one of the reasons why China won't cut Ukraine off from drone-related sales, but there's more to it.

While Sino-Russo ties are better than at anytime in history, it was suspected as far back as early 2023 that "China Doesn't Want Anyone To Win In Ukraine", the reason being that a supposedly manageable forever war would indefinitely delay the full implementation of the US' planned "Pivot (back) to (East) Asia". Moreover, resource-rich Russia could become disproportionately dependent on China, thus leading to Moscow selling its natural wealth to Beijing at bargain-basement prices.

A major hurricane is bearing down on Kauai on a track eerily similar to Hurricane Iniki, the storm that devastated the island in 1992 — and it's putting the island's $20 million beachfront estates directly in the crosshairs. In this video we break down why 73% of Kauai's beaches are already retreating inland, how the island's volcanic and reef-fringed geology makes it uniquely vulnerable to erosion and storm surge, why Hawaii's regulators won't let owners build the seawalls that could save their properties, and how the post-Lahaina insurance crisis is quietly making Hawaii's most expensive real estate impossible to finance. This is the story of what happens when extraordinary wealth is built directly in the path of physics that doesn't care about the price tag.

Webmaster Addition: I remember the damage from Iniki!

In a recent appearance at the Hampton Institute, Hillary Clinton stated that Benjamin Netanyahu’s “first and foremost” offense is the damage he has done to Israel and its reputation.

“There should be no doubt in anyone’s mind how seriously Netanyahu has damaged, first and foremost, Israel,” Clinton said. “And second, the perception that people not just in the United States, but around the world, have of Israel, and that has to be repaired.”

She hit that “first and foremost” part especially hard while speaking. Really leaned her ovaries into it.

Remember how we were always hearing that the official death toll in Gaza is an undercount because there are thousands of bodies trapped under the rubble?

Well, it looks like Israel has been moving those remains along with the rubble, conveniently destroying evidence of genocide.

Teachers' unions have spent decades insisting member dues aren't funding Democrat politicians.

A New Jersey union just got caught funneling $114 million of mandatory teacher union dues into a secret super PAC.

What happened to that money when their union boss ran for governor is a story Democrats do not want told.

By Karen Kwiatkowski, courtesy of lewrockwell.com

The proposed “debt-forgiveness enlistment program” could help Trump and Bessent reset the US financial system, currently characterized by a boom-bust cycle on steroids, and unhinged nuclear brinksmanship in Washington and Israel. Crashing the massive AI/Data Center bubble, and the coming sell-off of those stocks among others, is expected to allow insiders to capture profits and assets, while the investment portfolios of cities, counties, corporations, retirees and working people lose 98% of their value.  The buy high, sell low pattern of the digital Trump meme coin may have served as a test run for the multiple trillion dollar bubbles being manufactured and managed for purposes of a reset of the US dollar, likely into a digital format where debts may be erased on command, and permissions to access capital centrally and politically managed.

The US Government and its cronies need the elimination or repudiation of its debt (via war with creditors foreign and domestic and/or the destruction of the republic) without losing their own heads, property or power.  Transforming a military draft into indentured servanthood in order to additionally “wipe out debt” is potentially quite elegant.  Not only will a small amount private debt held by future “volunteers” be “paid back” by the government, absent a “draft” means those who dissent or disobey unconstitutional or immoral orders are just violators their own “voluntarily signed contracts.”

Claire's Observations: In reading this,  I am very much reminded of that line from Star Wars, Episode III:  Revenge of the Sith (2005), spoken by Padmé Amidala:  “So this is how liberty dies… with thunderous applause.”

Will debt-laden, younger people "buy into" this debt forgiveness"/recruitment gambit"?!?  I don't know; but please get ready for this to be sold hard,  through every media you can imagine.  

The Genocidal Zionist Entity faces a crisis. Its Epstein-syndicate-blackmailed asset Trump is deep underwater in the polls. And Israel’s war on Iran, fought using the hijacked US military, is shaping up as a catastrophic defeat.

The US desperately needs to end the Iran war and stop the bleeding. American allies are the biggest victims of the slow-motion economic train wreck caused by the Resistance Axis’s blockade of West Asian oil and fertilizer exports.

In Asia, Japan, South Korea, and Taiwan have nearly exhausted their strategic energy stockpiles. And in Europe, whose industrial economy was crippled by the US demolition of the Nordstream pipeline, energy supply shocks tied to the Hormuz shutdown are making matters even worse. Europe is beginning to face escalating shortages of diesel, jet fuel, and heating fuel.

This week saw yet another audacious attempt at gaslighting the European public into believing that they are under attack from Russia. This is War Propaganda 101.

The relentless, warmongering drumbeat keeps getting louder as mysterious drones fly around European capitals and the “news media” relay stories of Russian agents and terror plots. We are witnessing an Orwellian system akin to his dystopian novel, Nineteen Eighty-Four.

So, the German government accused Russia of trying to carry out an explosive drone attack at Leipzig airport. There was zero evidence to back up the provocative allegation. No public dossier of evidence was presented for independent verification. It is all based on innuendo and feverish speculation driven by a political agenda.

Ironically, the real aviation terrorism story this week was the NATO- and EU-backed Kiev regime’s implicit threat to shoot down civilian airliners in Russian airspace. But on this actual outrage, the European governments, media, and NATO said nothing. Their silence is complicity and self-indicting.

by Mianh Walsh, telegraph.co.uk

If you walk into a room and forget why you’re there, or lose your train of thought halfway through a sentence, it can be easy to dismiss these moments as inevitable parts of getting older. But what if your brain isn’t simply on a one-way journey towards decline?

Even after years of drinking, smoking, poor diet or too little exercise, there are steps you can take to rebuild the damage done.

What is neuroplasticity?

The brain isn’t a static organ: some of the changes caused or accelerated by unhealthy habits can improve when those habits change. This is part of what academics call neuroplasticity, and this ability doesn’t switch off when we reach middle age.

“Neuroplasticity is the mechanism by which the brain is able to recover from injuries, adapt to new circumstances, and learn throughout life,” says Barbara Sahakian, professor of clinical neuropsychology at the University of Cambridge and author of Brain Boost: Healthy Habits for a Happier Life.

“There are two main types of neuroplasticity: structural – physical changes in the brain’s anatomy such as the formation of new neural connections, or the creation of new neurones in certain brain regions. Then there’s functional, in which the brain redistributes functions across different regions to compensate, for example when injury has occurred.”

While not all damage done to the brain can be reversed, some of it can be undone within a matter of months or even weeks. So what can you change and how long does it take?