Smokey Skies Does Not Mean Global Warming

Authored by Anthony Watts via American Thinker,

Every summer seems to follow the same predictable media script.

Wildfires ignite somewhere in North America. Smoke drifts hundreds or even thousands of miles. Air quality alerts are issued. Television stations fill the screen with hazy skylines. Then, before investigators have even determined how the fires started, headlines begin linking the smoke to climate change.

This year has been no different. As smoke from Canadian wildfires spread across parts of the Midwest and Northeast, much of the news coverage quickly shifted from reporting on the fires to treating them as evidence of a worsening climate crisis. Yet one crucial fact was often left out: many of the fires responsible for the smoke were ignited by lightning, a natural cause that has existed for as long as forests have.

Lightning is not new. Smoke carried by prevailing winds is not new. What is new is the growing tendency to treat every smoky sky as proof of climate change.

That illogical leap simply isn't supported by the evidence.

One of the most striking graphics I've seen tells a story you probably haven't seen in the news. Using data from the European Commission's Global Wildfire Information System, it shows that 2026 has experienced the lowest cumulative burned area across the Americas in at least the past decade.

A second graphic, using the same global database, shows that every inhabited continent is running below its recent average for area burned this year, with Africa, the Americas, and Europe at record lows.

Those are remarkable statistics. They don't mean wildfires have disappeared or that smoke isn't a serious public health concern. They simply demonstrate that the broader wildfire picture is very different from the one often portrayed in daily news reports.

If global burned areas are unusually low, why are so many stories describing an escalating wildfire emergency and attributing it to climate change?

Part of the answer lies in how we consume news. Reporters naturally cover fires that are burning today, not forests that aren't burning. Dramatic images of smoke-filled cities attract attention. Maps showing below-average burned area rarely do. The result is a form of selection bias: the public constantly sees active disasters while receiving little context about longer-term trends. It's a variation of the old news adage, "If it bleeds it leads."

History provides even more perspective.

Another telling graph comes from fire research published by the Royal Society. Drawing on evidence from more than 800 fire-scar sites across western North America, it shows that large wildfires were substantially more common before 1900 than they are today. Fire activity declined with changes in land management, livestock grazing, settlement patterns, and organized fire suppression. In other words, today's forests are not burning at historically unprecedented levels.

The broader scientific literature reflects this. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) in chapter 12 of their Sixth Assessment Report has concluded there is low confidence in observed global trends for fire weather and burned area. The IPCC also reports with high confidence that the global land area burned has declined in recent decades. That is a far more cautious assessment than many news reports suggest.

None of this means climate has no influence on wildfire behavior. Weather has always affected fire, and changing climate conditions may influence fire risk in some regions. But wildfire is driven by many interacting factors: ignition sources such as lightning, accidents, and even arson, wind, humidity, fuel accumulation, insect damage, forest management, decades of fire suppression, and simple bad luck. Reducing every wildfire to somehow being caused by climate change ignores most of what really determines how a fire starts and how it spreads. The smoke itself tells us even less.

Smoke is transported by normal atmospheric circulation. A relatively modest fire season can produce severe smoke episodes if winds carry the plume over densely populated areas. Conversely, enormous fires in remote regions may receive little attention if the smoke disperses harmlessly elsewhere. Smoke over Chicago, Milwaukee, or Buffalo tells us where the wind blew from. It does not tell us why the fire started, nor does it prove that climate change was the primary cause.

Good journalism should provide readers with both immediate news and historical context. Unfortunately, wildfire coverage increasingly follows a predictable formula: smoke appears, climate change is declared the culprit, and the broader evidence rarely enters the discussion.

The public deserves far better than reporting by following a script.

Wildfires are serious. Smoke poses real health risks. Those realities don't require exaggeration or selective reporting. Before every smoky summer is presented as another chapter in an inevitable climate catastrophe, readers deserve to know the full picture, including the parts that don't fit the prevailing narrative.

Because good science depends on evidence, good journalism should too.

Anthony Watts (awatts@heartland.org)) is a Senior Fellow for Environment and Climate at The Heartland Institute and has over 40 years of weather reporting experience in radio, television, and print.

Tyler Durden Fri, 07/24/2026 - 21:45

China Is Now Viewed More Favorably Than America

Public opinion toward the world’s two leading powers has undergone a notable shift. Pew Research Center’s Spring 2026 Global Attitudes Survey reveals significant differences in how countries perceive China and the United States.

The visualization below, created by Visual Capitalist's Iswardi Ishak using Pew Research Center data, compares favorability toward both countries across 36 nations, showing where each holds the strongest public support and where opinions remain closely divided.

How the World Views the U.S. and China

The chart below plots favorable opinions of China and the U.S. using Pew Research Center’s Spring 2026 Global Attitudes Survey.

Regional differences are pronounced. Many countries in Africa, Southeast Asia, and parts of Latin America express more favorable views of China. The U.S. leads in nine countries: Brazil, Ghana, Hungary, India, Israel, Japan, the Philippines, Poland, and South Korea.

The Development Divide

The scatterplot reveals several broad clusters. Wealthier Western democracies generally remain skeptical of both countries, with Germany, France, Sweden, Australia, and the Netherlands posting relatively low favorability ratings for each.

Much of the developing world falls into the opposite quadrant, where China receives majority support while views of the U.S. lag behind. Pakistan stands out with a 90% favorable opinion of China versus 15% for the United States. Large gaps also appear in Malaysia (75% vs. 19%) and Indonesia (72% vs. 29%).

Several African countries, including Ghana, Kenya, and Nigeria, express positive views of both powers. This suggests many respondents see value in maintaining relationships with each country rather than viewing them as mutually exclusive.

Why China’s Image Has Improved

China’s improving standing reflects both rising favorability toward Beijing and declining perceptions of the United States. Recent reporting indicates that this reversal has been especially pronounced among several longstanding U.S. partners, including Canada and countries across Europe.

Public opinion rarely hinges on a single issue. Analysts point to expanding Chinese trade and diplomatic engagement, alongside changing perceptions of U.S. foreign policy and reliability. As countries deepen economic ties with Beijing, trade has become an increasingly important factor in international relationships.

Coverage from the BBC and analysis from the Council on Foreign Relations also suggest that many countries are pursuing pragmatic relationships with both powers, balancing security partnerships with growing economic ties to China.

Soft Power Remains a Global Competition

Although China receives stronger favorability ratings across most countries surveyed, the results do not necessarily translate directly into geopolitical alignment.

Instead, the survey points to an increasingly multipolar world in which economic influence, trade, diplomacy, and public perception all contribute to global power. As China expands its international presence and the U.S. works to maintain longstanding alliances, competition between the two superpowers is increasingly measured not only in economic and military terms, but also through global public opinion.

How does public opinion compare with hard power? Explore The U.S. and China Account for 49% of Global Military Spending on the Voronoi app to see how the world’s two leading powers compare in defense spending.

Tyler Durden Fri, 07/24/2026 - 21:20

Not Giving The Pentagon $1.5 Trillion Is the 'Greatest Threat' Facing The US, Hegseth Claims

Authored by Dave DeCamp via AntiWar.com,

Secretary of War Pete Hegseth, during a Congressional hearing on Tuesday, said a failure to appropriate $1.5 trillion for the Pentagon’s Fiscal Year 2027 (FY27) budget constitutes the “greatest threat” to US national security.

Hegseth, joined by Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Dan Caine and Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins, appeared before the Senate Appropriations Committee on Tuesday to discuss the Trump administration’s request for an additional $87.6 billion in supplemental spending.

Hegseth before the Senate Appropriations Committee on July 21, 2026 (DoW)

Most of the money would go to the Pentagon, but approximately $11.1 billion would go to US farmers. The war with Iran has depleted Pentagon funding, and the shock to the oil economy will have a direct impact on the fertilizer market farmers depend on.

On Tuesday, Hegseth defended the supplemental funding and claimed it would be part of the Pentagon’s FY27 budget, not in addition to it. Congress has yet to approve the $1.5 trillion the Pentagon wants.

On Wednesday, the House of Representatives voted to authorize $1.15 trillion of the massive military budget, but the Senate has yet to approve it.

There is no guarantee the Republican-controlled Senate will sign off on the funding. Democrats have generally opposed the funding on party lines (only six democrats in the House voted for it) and even Republican senators have balked at the massive price tag.

Pete Hegseth: Not funding this department at $1.5 trillion is the greatest threat our nation faces. pic.twitter.com/j2AvDMdpzg

— Acyn (@Acyn) July 21, 2026

Hegseth characterized the full budgetary request as a "generational investment" and claimed the supplemental funding was of the utmost importance:

"As you know, we live in a dangerous world that requires bold and swift action. Hence, this supplemental request for fiscal year 2026. This request is an urgent, necessary injection of resources to address the immediate needs of our department," he said.

The "immediate needs" refers to the ongoing war with Iran, which analysts believe has cost far more than the Pentagon is willing to admit.

On Tuesday, Hegseth told Senators the war has cost approximately $37.5 billion thus far. Credible independent analysis, however, suggests the cost could already be north of $100 billion, a number much closer to the supplemental money the White House has requested.

The Pentagon wants more money than the US spent in all of World War 2 https://t.co/q6nxT8axWK

— Ken Klippenstein (@kenklippenstein) July 22, 2026

Unprecedented budget ask amid a 'war of choice'...

CNN split screen comparison of what Hegseth was saying months ago on the Iran War and what he said today. pic.twitter.com/YUEBfKsKIU

— Acyn (@Acyn) July 22, 2026

Regardless of the true cost of the war, Hegseth’s commitment to the $1.5 trillion funding target tracks typical military bureaucratic logic, and it marks a major boost in military spending, a nearly 50% increase from this year’s more than $1 trillion military budget.

Tyler Durden Fri, 07/24/2026 - 20:55

From Porn Star To Politician: Amaranta Hank Sworn In To Colombia's Congress

A former adult film actress was sworn in as a Colombian senator on Monday, and she is vowing to fight for the rights of the country's adult-content creators.

Deyci Alejandra Omaña Ortiz, 33, who performed as Amaranta Hank before leaving the business, took her seat in Bogotá for the left-wing Historic Pact party, La Opinión reported. She won it as the 23rd name on the party's closed candidate list.

Villa del Rosario está presente en el Congreso de la República. Fue en el Templo Histórico donde se firmó la primera Constitución de la Gran Colombia, donde Simón Bolívar tomó posesión como Presidente y donde se abolió la esclavitud. También fue Villa del Rosario donde me crié,… pic.twitter.com/fx0gTLViB4

— Alejandra Omaña (@aleomanao) July 20, 2026

The former journalist turned adult performer turned politician was elected in March to represent the Norte de Santander region, and she is wasting no time. Her signature priority is guaranteeing social-security rights for adult performers, who she says are ripe for exploitation by unscrupulous companies and agencies.

"These women have been unprotected by the state because, due to misinformation, prejudice and double standards, no one has declared to regulate it," she said in a campaign video obtained by the Post.

This is not Omaña's first role in Colombian government. Before her election she served as a deputy minister in the Ministry of Equality under President Gustavo Petro, appointed alongside another former adult performer, Juan Carlos Florián - a pair of appointments that stirred considerable controversy within Petro's administration. Her Senate run, in other words, was a step up rather than a leap from nowhere.

Omaña, who entered the adult industry in 2017 and left two years later, has defended her decision to run despite her past. "My experience allowed me to understand inequality, the struggle for freedom and the popular economy, arguments that I now promise to bring directly into legislative debate," she said, according to the Post. "The problem is that society consumes adult films but denies us the possibility of speaking in spaces of power."

Her agenda extends past the industry that made her famous. Omaña has said she will also push for improved mental-health services and stronger measures to prevent sexual abuse, and has floated designating her home city of Cúcuta a special border, commercial and historic district. Born in Cúcuta and a working journalist until 2017, she has framed her arrival in the Senate as the start of a broader project.

"We can look for a different way of doing politics," she said. The Historic Pact, currently Colombia's strongest political force, won more than 4.4 million votes - 22.7 percent of the Senate ballot - and took 25 seats in the March elections that carried her into office.

Tyler Durden Fri, 07/24/2026 - 20:30

Over 148,000 Mail Ballots Rejected In California's Primary Election, Data Show

Authored by Jack Phillips via The Epoch Times,

Election data that was provided by California state officials for last month's primary elections show that more than 148,000 mail-in ballots were rejected, an uptick of more than 40,000 from the 2024 primary.

Election workers conduct ballot tabulation at the Los Angeles County Ballot Processing Center during California's state primary election in the City of Industry, Calif., on June 2, 2026. Patrick T. Fallon/AFP via Getty Images

All in all, 148,241 were rejected in the state's June 2 primary election, according to data released by the California Secretary of State's office, which manages elections. The figure represents 1.73 percent of all mail-in ballots.

According to the data released earlier this month, more than 93,000 mail-in ballots were rejected by officials because they arrived too late. Another 8,300 were rejected because there was no voter signature on the ballot, and nearly 44,000 were rejected due to a non-matching signature.

Meanwhile, some 580 weren't used because no photo ID was provided, more than 740 were rejected because the voter had already voted, around 640 were rejected because the ballot was missing from the envelope, and roughly 450 were flagged as having multiple ballots in each envelope, the election figures show.

The data provided by the office did not list the rejected ballots by party registration.

The rejection rates varied by county, with Tulare County having the highest rate at 3.52 percent. Alpine and Merced counties saw 3.36 percent rejection rates, according to the data. The lowest was reported in Placer County, with a 0.93 percent rejection rate.

Los Angeles County, the county with the highest population and most voters, reported a 1.34 percent rejection rate, while San Diego County saw a 1.37 percent rate, the figures show.

The 2026 primary rejection figures are up from the 2024 primary, when 108,982 mail ballots were tossed, representing a 1.56 percent increase, according to the California Secretary of State's office.

Kim Alexander, the head of the California Voter Foundation, told media outlets this week that ballot rejections during the primary election last month were largely due to them being mailed too late.

"Ballots rejected due to lateness are caused primarily to being postmarked too late to count, not because they arrived too late to count," Alexander told The Associated Press.

Following last month's primary, President Donald Trump criticized California's election system. At one point, he questioned results showing Los Angeles mayoral candidate Spencer Pratt falling to third place behind two Democrats.

"Not possible for Spencer Pratt to have lost the L.A. runoffs after the big lead he had," Trump wrote on social media at the time. "Rigged Elections!"

California Gov. Gavin Newsom's office has sought to counter claims made by Trump that elections are being mismanaged in the state, including a post issued on X last week.

"California law is clear: You MUST be a U.S. citizen to vote state and federal elections," the post said. "Voter fraud is EXTREMELY RARE - and almost always committed by U.S. citizens."

Newsom added that the Trump administration has "provided NO evidence to support" recent claims of non-citizens being registered to vote in California. It came as Department of Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin said on July 17 that around 250,000 non-citizens were registered in New Jersey, Nevada, Pennsylvania, and California.

The Trump administration has sought to tighten rules around mail-in ballots, issuing an executive order that would create a voter list regarding who could get a mail-in ballot during elections that was blocked by a judge in late June. Trump has long said, especially in the lead-up to and after the 2020 election, that voting by mail leads to fraud and irregularities.

On Thursday, Sen. Tammy Baldwin (D-Wis.) and Wisconsin Gov. Tony Evers called on the U.S. Postal Service to address delays in the state in April.

"Hundreds of absentee ballots received by the Postal Service before Wisconsin's Spring Election were delivered after Election Day, preventing them from being counted," the two Democrats wrote to U.S. Postmaster General David Steiner.

The California Secretary of State's office did not respond to a request for comment on Friday.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

Tyler Durden Fri, 07/24/2026 - 20:05

New York City Says This Rideshare App May Owe Millions In Unpaid Congestion Fees

New York City Council Majority Leader Shaun Abreu is calling on the MTA to investigate rideshare platform Empower, arguing the company may be sidestepping New York City's congestion pricing system while gaining an unfair advantage over licensed competitors like Uber, Lyft and the city's yellow taxi fleet, according to the NY Post..

The Post writes that cecause Empower does not hold a Taxi and Limousine Commission license, Abreu contends it has not been collecting the per-trip congestion charges that licensed for-hire vehicles are required to pass along to passengers, allowing the company to advertise lower fares.

According to Abreu, if Empower is facilitating as many as one million rides per month in New York City, the unpaid congestion fees could amount to tens of millions of dollars annually that would otherwise help fund the region's transit system. He has asked the MTA to determine how many Empower trips entered the congestion pricing zone without paying the required toll, calculate any missing revenue and pursue repayment if appropriate.

MTA Chairman Janno Lieber said the agency is already examining the issue and intends to recover any fees that should have been collected, saying companies should not be able to exploit regulatory loopholes.

Empower strongly disputes the accusations. The company says it has repeatedly offered to work with city officials to facilitate payment of any applicable taxes or congestion charges but claims those proposals were rejected. Empower maintains that it is not a traditional rideshare operator because drivers pay a monthly subscription fee to access its platform, set their own fares and keep the full amount paid by passengers, making the company a software marketplace rather than a transportation provider.

The controversy adds to Empower's broader legal challenges in New York. The city has already filed suit, alleging the company is effectively operating as an unlicensed rideshare service while avoiding the regulatory requirements and costs imposed on its competitors. Similar disputes have arisen in Washington, D.C., where courts previously ordered Empower to stop offering rides without proper authorization and later imposed millions of dollars in contempt penalties after the company continued operating.

Tyler Durden Fri, 07/24/2026 - 19:40

The Manufactured 'Bipartisan' Push For An AI Kill Switch

Authored by Jordan Schachtel via American Greatness,

The AI Kill Switch Act, introduced Thursday by Rep. Ted Lieu (D-Calif.) and Rep. Nathaniel Moran (R-Texas), seeks to hand the government unprecedented authority to order private companies to throttle, suspend, or shut down products in "kill switch" fashion, purely on their own arbitrary determination, with fines up to $20 million a day. Behind this carefully staged rollout is a fanatical coalition that looks like a broad consensus, but it is mostly one funding network with an arsenal of astroturf organizations at its disposal.

The Lieu-Moran bill arrived with endorsements preloaded from five groups: the AI Policy Network, Americans for Responsible Innovation, ControlAI, the Future of Life Institute, and the Alliance for Secure AI. Five organizations may sound like a broad coalition, so let's pull the thread and explore the details.

Americans for Responsible Innovation is funded by Coefficient Giving. Coefficient Giving is the freshly rebranded Open Philanthropy, the vehicle for Facebook billionaire Dustin Moskovitz and Cari Tuna's fortune and the central bank of the far-left Effective Altruism (EA) movement's AI doom apparatus. Dustin Moskovitz was one of the largest individual megadonors supporting Kamala Harris's 2024 presidential election effort, contributing roughly $38 million to the pro-Harris super PAC Future Forward (FF PAC). The Open Philanthropy Action Fund pumped $2.9 million into ARI. ARI's 501(c)(3) sister organization collected another $3 million in general support.

The Alliance for Secure AI is the group built to make all this palatable to the Right. It spent six figures on ads running on Fox News and Newsmax last summer, pitching AI fear to conservative audiences. Who pays for the conservative outreach? In May, the New York Times reported that the Alliance for Secure AI is funded by ... Coefficient Giving. Surprise! You will search its website for that disclosure in vain.

ControlAI, the third member, openly advocates an international prohibition on advanced AI development and swims in the same donor waters. The group's top leaders have been calling for a complete shutdown of AI development since the very early iterations of ChatGPT.

The Future of Life Institute, which has also received millions from Coefficient Giving, is an EA-aligned leftist nonprofit best known for its ruthless insistence that America must force industry to "pause AI" indefinitely.

The AI Policy Network (AIPN) is an AI doomer outfit that is supported by leftist tech bros in Silicon Valley, some of whom are longtime AI panic mongers and influential executives at Anthropic and OpenAI.

This power grab arrives on the heels of the OpenAI sandbox episode, in which the company itself reported a security breach that has not been independently verified. OpenAI has every incentive to inflate the dangers of its own product because a frightening "autonomous" AI is both a better marketing pitch and a better argument for the regulatory moat that keeps its future competitors out. Washington is now being asked to hand a cabinet secretary sweeping authority over private enterprise on the strength of an incident report written by the party that stands to benefit.

So the "broad coalition" is substantially one checkbook, belonging to a left-wing Silicon Valley billionaire, laundered through a series of organizations that act as window dressing for one agenda. This is not bipartisanship, but rather the lobbyist-concocted appearance of bipartisanship.

The bill empowers the Homeland Security secretary with a shutdown trigger that includes a loss-of-control scenario, defined to cover a model behaving contrary to instructions in "another high-stakes context." That phrase is defined nowhere. The company must comply immediately without recourse. Its petition for reconsideration, the statute says flatly, does not stay the order. If the secretary ignores the petition for five days, silence counts as a denial. Court review would, of course, come months later, long after the product went dark, the business was likely destroyed, and all of the customers went elsewhere. Do we really want to grant the government this power?

And the definitions of who is covered? Rewritten by the agency, by rule, every single year, guided by a factor list that ends with "such other factors as the secretary determines relevant." Try executing a successful business strategy when your legal exposure gets redefined annually by government bureaucrats.

Some frontier AI model companies are not yet protesting the bill, largely because this enormous compliance burden could potentially create a wall around the incumbents. The giants can absorb the lawyers, the audits, the whims, and the like. Startups that attempt to catch up could get obliterated in one fell swoop. This kind of regulation is deliberately priced at a level only the largest firms can bear. It is a moat with a safety label.

The AI doomer lobby wants its federal chokepoint, and some of its frontier lab collaborators get a licensing wall between themselves and their future competitors. Everyone in this somewhat complex coalition wins except the American innovators.

What Congress is being sold is a federal "kill switch" button for upstart private enterprise, wielded on undefined standards and immune to timely challenges; and it's all being pushed by a fake "movement" that is mostly one billionaire's philanthropic arm.

Jordan Schachtel is an independent journalist who covers AI, tech, and world politics, and he's the publisher of The Dossier on Substack.

Tyler Durden Fri, 07/24/2026 - 19:15

Forget Beef. This Protein Is Way Cheaper

Building on Bank of America's latest note, which cited Oklahoma State University agricultural economist Derrell Peel's warning that the US cattle cycle is unlikely to improve anytime soon, beef prices are poised to remain elevated through at least next year. But two competitively priced proteins that consumers can switch to today remain largely overlooked.

That overlooked protein is ground pork, with an average of $4.81 a pound in mid-June, compared with $7.95 for ground beef, while pork chops cost roughly one-third as much as beef steak, according to Bloomberg, citing NielsenIQ data.

Still, beef consumption is forecast at a 15-year high, underscoring how stubborn consumers are and how unwilling they are to trade down for their meats.

Processors including Smithfield Foods are responding with precut, marinated and ground-pork products designed to improve convenience and compete with beef and chicken.

Industry insiders see ground pork as the category's biggest opportunity, though ground beef's $17 billion in annual sales suggests any shift will be gradual.

"People don't want to risk something not tasting great when it comes down to it," said Reba Hatcher, chief commercial officer at meat subscription company ButcherBox, who the outlet cited. "Even if it's cheaper when you go to the checkout, it's not cheaper if you end up throwing it away or people end up hating it at the dinner table."

For readers wondering just how long beef prices will remain elevated, the BofA note provides a timeline for when the cattle cycle could turn upward. Spoiler alert: not anytime soon. Read report.

With beef prices unlikely to meaningfully ease anytime soon, the Beck Ranch Carnivore Trio in ZeroHedge Store lets readers stock the freezer with more affordable and premium chicken and pork while still keeping premium ground beef in the mix. 

Get yours here.

Tyler Durden Fri, 07/24/2026 - 18:50

Health Officials Urge States To End Mercury-Containing Dental Fillings

Authored by Zachary Stieber via The Epoch Times,

Federal health officials on July 22 encouraged state Medicaid officials to stop covering dental fillings containing mercury.

Health Secretary Robert Kennedy Jr. on Capitol Hill in Washington on April 22, 2026. Madalina Kilroy/The Epoch Times

The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) sent letters to the Medicaid director in each state urging them to phase out mercury-containing dental fillings by restricting or ending state Medicaid coverage for dental amalgam, fillings that combine mercury and other materials to treat cavities.

"Americans should feel confident that the health care they receive is always working in their best interest," CMS Administrator Dr. Mehmet Oz said in a statement.

"That's why we're urging state Medicaid programs to end the use of mercury-containing dental fillings. This is a straightforward and meaningful step that reflects our shared commitment to safe, higher quality care for all Americans and supports the Trump Administration's broader goal to Make America Healthy Again."

Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. added: "Mercury has no place in the mouths of our children or in modern American health care. For decades, we have relied on a material that contains one of the world's most toxic heavy metals when safe, effective mercury-free alternatives are widely available. The Make America Healthy Again agenda means confronting outdated practices that needlessly expose Americans to toxic substances."

The letters to the state officials noted that the Indian Health Service, which provides healthcare to American Indians, announced in February that it would end the use of mercury-containing fillings by 2027, citing "health concerns regarding mercury exposure."

Researchers have found signs that amalgam can cause health problems, including higher mercury concentrations in the blood, and patients attributing health problems to the amalgam.

The Minamata Convention on Mercury, signed by the United States in 2013, advises countries to restrict the use of amalgam and identify alternatives, and some countries have already phased out the fillings.

Certain groups such as the American Dental Association say amalgam fillings are safe.

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration says there is limited data on long-term health outcomes of amalgam in young children, and advises that populations such as children under 6 may face a greater health risk due to mercury exposure.

Alternatives to amalgam fillings include composite resin, porcelain, and glass ionomer.

The International Academy of Oral Medicine and Toxicology says that composite fillings are as durable as amalgam and are the most frequently chosen alternative because the white coloring matches the teeth well, and the cost is moderate.

Tyler Durden Fri, 07/24/2026 - 18:25

Death Toll Revised Lower: Trump Admin Accused Of Playing Politics With Iran War Casualties

The US administration and Department of War has just reduced the total number of American service members killed during the Iran war from 18 to 14.

Removing the four most recent deaths, which occurred in Jordan and in Iraq last week, appears to be politically-driven as a way to keep official casualties lower related to President Trump's decision to go to war. That's what's being widely alleged anyway.

The NY Times, which reported the significant change, wrote that "Three military officials said that one reason behind the change was that the Trump administration decided to remove four service members killed this past weekend from the list — three in Jordan and one in northern Iraq — because their deaths occurred after President Trump declared a cease-fire in the war in April." 

UPI/Shutterstock

The report lays out that—

• On Wednesday, the Pentagon reported on its casualties website that a total of 18 American service members had been killed during the war in Iran.
• By Thursday, the Defense Department had lowered that number, reporting that 14 American troops had been killed in the war.

The White House is being widely accused of using troop deaths to play cheap political tricks for the sake maintaining image, and ahead of the November midterms and as voters increasingly turn negative on the dragged-out war.

For example, some scathing commentary out of Rolling Stone says the following:

Soldiers die in war. But ever since the death toll in Vietnam broke a generation's appetite for war, the American public has been uniquely sensitive to casualty counts as a result of our military actions abroad.

We venerate fallen servicemembers as heroes, no matter how just the conflict they died in was. But now, Donald Trump's administration is reportedly trying to say that some deaths don't count.

On Thursday, the Pentagon's official roll of servicemember deaths as a result of the Iran war suddenly changed, with four names dropping off the list, bringing the total number from 18 down to 14. The New York Times reported that the change came as a result of a direct action, with the Trump administration declaring that four servicemembers who were killed last weekend at bases in Jordan and Iraq don't count toward the tally of deaths in the Iran conflict, as they occurred after he had declared the conflict to be at a ceasefire in late April.

This kind of paradoxical, absurdist logic is core to the administration's messaging on the Iran war. We are at war, but not technically at war, because there is a cease fire. However, neither side has ceased firing; four American soldiers just died. However, because there was a cease fire, their deaths cannot be attributed to the Iran war, which is not technically an active conflict, despite the conflict being very active.

Sean Parnell, the chief Pentagon spokesperson, on Thursday claimed on X that "the site errors on the Defense Casualty Analysis System were due to a temporary data disruption" and the "site anomalies are currently being resolved in coordination with the Military Services."

US defense officials explained that "their deaths occurred after Trump announced a ceasefire in the war in April."

This was after the Pentagon website that informs the public about the dead and wounded had clearly changed with no explanation. But the bottom line is that at the start of the week the four service members' deaths were listed under Operation Epic Fury but by Thursday their names were dropped. By close of Friday the website has remained uncorrected, displaying the lower number.

Tyler Durden Fri, 07/24/2026 - 18:00

Why Were Americans Funding Jobs For Transgender Workers In Nepal?

Authored by David Manney via PJ Media,

Former HIV outreach worker and biological male Rubi Lama lost a job he'd held for nine years when U.S. funding vanished from a health program in Nepal. He tested people, counseled those at risk, and helped sex workers avoid infection.

AP Photo/Manuel Balce Ceneta

Months later, unable to find other work, he joined them along a highway outside Hetauda.

Fox News:

An Associated Press social media post about transgender aid workers in Nepal turning to sex work after losing their jobs due to U.S. foreign aid cuts sparked a wave of conservative backlash, with critics arguing the video made the case for defunding USAID rather than saving it.

The AP post said that in Nepal, where "a conservative culture leaves openly transgender people with few legal job options," around 100 LGBTQ aid workers left jobless by U.S. funding cuts had turned to sex work to survive. An accompanying video focused on Rubi Lama, a former HIV outreach worker who said USAID-funded programs had provided free condoms, lubricant and HIV-prevention medication before the cuts.

"When USAID funding was there, condoms were free, lubricant was also distributed ... for free," Lama said in the video, adding that HIV treatments, including PrEP, were also available without cost. "But, now it is gone."

His story is painful on a human scale; it also raises a question many Americans are asking: why was the United States expected to keep paying his salary?

Lama worked for Friends Hetauda, part of a network connected to the Blue Diamond Society. The society received 85% of its funding from USAID, operated 20 clinics, and employed 350 people.

Associated Press:

For nine years, Lama - who is transgender - had devoted her life to conducting HIV outreach in Nepal's marginalized communities, including the LGBTQ+ sex workers who wait by this highway each night. But after the United States slashed its foreign aid funding last year, Lama and more than 280,000 aid workers worldwide found themselves out of a job.

In impoverished Nepal, where a conservative culture leaves openly transgender people with few legal job options, the impact on aid workers' lives was particularly crushing. Starving and scared, Lama and around 100 other LGBTQ+ aid workers left jobless by the funding cuts have turned to sex work to survive, walking the streets alongside the very people they once fought so hard to help.

When the money stopped, 262 employees lost their jobs, and the organization says 35% to 45% of those former workers later entered sex work.

The clinics provided HIV tests, condoms, counseling, antiretroviral drugs, and PrEP. More than 1,200 clients reportedly lost access to PrEP after the shutdown. Those are real health services, and the people affected aren't punchlines.

The political reaction followed a familiar script: President Donald Trump cut foreign aid, vulnerable workers suffered, and American taxpayers were cast as villains for refusing to continue the arrangement.

Trump's Executive Order:

Section 1. Purpose. The United States foreign aid industry and bureaucracy are not aligned with American interests and in many cases antithetical to American values. They serve to destabilize world peace by promoting ideas in foreign countries that are directly inverse to harmonious and stable relations internal to and among countries.

Sec. 2. Policy. It is the policy of United States that no further United States foreign assistance shall be disbursed in a manner that is not fully aligned with the foreign policy of the President of the United States.

Sec. 3. (a) 90-day pause in United States foreign development assistance for assessment of programmatic efficiencies and consistency with United States foreign policy. All department and agency heads with responsibility for United States foreign development assistance programs shall immediately pause new obligations and disbursements of development assistance funds to foreign countries and implementing non-governmental organizations, international organizations, and contractors pending reviews of such programs for programmatic efficiency and consistency with United States foreign policy, to be conducted within 90 days of this order. The Office of Management and Budget (OMB) shall enforce this pause through its apportionment authority.

Critics spoke as though Washington had fired public employees in Ohio rather than ended overseas grants in Nepal.

Foreign aid can serve American interests; HIV prevention can reduce disease, improve stability, and protect people who travel across borders. Compassion also has limits when one country becomes the permanent source of salaries and program funding for organizations half a world away.

Nepal has a national government; it has health agencies, wealthy residents, international charities, and neighboring countries with their own interest in regional health.

Fox News:

USAID later told partners to pause new funding obligations and issue stop-work orders or suspensions for existing awards, while critics have said the review led to major disruptions, staff reductions and the cancellation of critical foreign-assistance awards.

But Federalist editor-in-chief Mollie Hemingway argued the AP post exposed misplaced priorities, particularly among the media, saying the outlet presented U.S. tax dollars flowing to a "trans Nepalese job protection program" as though it was a good use of public money.

"The AP announces that your hard-earned tax dollars were flowing to a trans Nepalese job protection program as if that was an even remotely good use of your money," Hemingway wrote in a post on X. "AP is sick Democrat propaganda."

"How dare Elon cut USAID funds to the Nepalese trans sex worker community," quipped Republican activist Jack Posobiec.

Where were they when an organization depended on Washington for 85% of its budget?

President Trump ordered a review of foreign assistance on Jan. 20, 2025, requiring programs to prove they were efficient and aligned with U.S. foreign policy.

The order didn't ban all aid; it required justification before the money kept flowing.

The old system trained foreign groups to build programs around American checks, and when the checks stopped, the collapse was immediate. A model that leaves hundreds of employees with no local funding, no transition plan, and no replacement support was never sustainable.

American families face medical bills, housing costs, layoffs, and taxes of their own. They can care about Rubi Lama without accepting lifelong responsibility for his paycheck. They can support targeted HIV treatment without giving every foreign NGO a permanent claim on the U.S. Treasury.

The outrage over Nepal makes President Trump's case for him. Foreign aid should have a clear purpose, measurable results, shared costs, and an exit plan.

Sympathy can't replace accountability.

Tyler Durden Fri, 07/24/2026 - 17:40

Black Dems Up In Arms As Party Considers Giving Nevada First 2028 Primary

It's always fun watching the party that cherishes identity politics being torn apart by identity politics. 

That's once again the case, as the Democratic National Committee endeavors to lay out its sequence of primaries for the 2028 presidential race. As a DNC panel convenes in Washington this week, there's substantial momentum behind the idea of taking the coveted "first in the nation" spot away from 25% black South Carolina, and handing it over to 31% Hispanic Nevada. Party sources tell the New York Times that the black vs brown infighting over the possibility is getting increasingly nasty. 

If the switch happens, South Carolina's tenure in the top slot will have only lasted one election cycle. After a decades-long tradition that had both Republicans and Democrats kicking off their presidential primary balloting in Iowa and New Hampshire, the Biden team maneuvered the DNC into putting South Carolina first in 2024, after the state's black voters played an outsize role in helping Biden win the 2020 nomination. The move was made easier by the fact that, when it was setting the 2024 calendar, the Democratic Party still had a strong, post-2020 case of Black Lives Matter fever, and was fixated on pandering to blacks at every turn. 

Christale Spain, who became South Carolina Democrats' first black party chair in 2023, says putting Nevada first would be disrespectful to blacks (Meg Kinnard/AP)

“If Nevada gets elevated over South Carolina, it would be because of their Latino vote,” South Carolina Democratic Party Chair Christale Spain told the New York Times. “So you would then be telling black voters that you matter less than brown voters. And I refuse to believe that our party wants to send any type of message like that.” Of course, a corollary of Spain's assertion is that putting Nevada second tells brown voters that they matter less than black voters.

It's increasingly apparent that America's Latino population is a critical swing vote. Factor in Nevada's status as one of the swing states, and it's easy to see why Democrats are rethinking the batting order -- especially when South Carolina is a solid red state that hasn't given its electoral votes to a Democrat since Jimmy Carter won 56% of the vote in 1976.  

Nevada Democratic Party chair Daniele Monroe-Moreno says putting her swing state first would be a smart strategic move

In an interesting twist to this colorful controversy, the indignant black female South Carolina chair is facing off with the determined black female chair of the Nevada Democrats. “I’m a Black mama whose children are Black and Latino, Native American," Daniele Monroe-Moreno told the Times. Nevada is about 11% black, slightly lagging blacks' 13% share of the US population.  

Reverend Al Sharpton -- yes, he's still alive, though not all that relevant -- is among those decrying the idea that South Carolina might be told to give up its seat at the front of the metaphoric primary bus. "Pushing South Carolina to the back of the line would be a slap in the face to the very voters who’ve kept this party alive," he said on Thursday.  

The 2024 Electoral College map: Nevada was part of Trump's sweep of all seven swing states, but the state went to Biden in 2020

Some black leftists are ridiculing the uproar. "I'm sorry, this is absurd," tweeted Briahna Joy Gray, former press secretary for the 2020 Bernie Sanders Campaign, adding: 

"Democrats do not respect the Black vote because they don't have to -- Black Americans vote blue no matter who. The *most* Black voters ever get are rhetorical gestures like promises to pass the George Floyd Act (which never happened) or Junteenth (hooray). By contrast, Latinos are swing voters & consequently will be courted. Moreover, NV is a winnable state for Dems -- SC is not -- so it makes sense to prioritize it."

Other states are making a dark-horse bid to go first, including substantially-Latino (49%) New Mexico and substantially-black (19%) Virginia. Democrats may put off a final decision until after the midterms, to avoid throwing cold water on the voter enthusiasm of whatever states end up losing the race to go first. 

Gray questioned the sincerity of black South Carolina pols who are expressing outrage over the prospect of losing their slot: "The scramble to keep SC as the first state to vote in the primary is 100% about SC local politicians trying to preserve their newfound endorsement power & influence. It bears no relationship to the interests of Black Americans in SC or anywhere else."

Tyler Durden Fri, 07/24/2026 - 17:20

Confirmed Deaths In Ebola Outbreak Eclipse 1,000

Authored by Zachary Stieber via The Epoch Times,

The Ebola outbreak spreading in Africa has killed more than 1,000 people, authorities said on July 23.

A doctor provides care to a patient with Ebola virus disease at an Ebola treatment center in Bunia, Congo, on July 13, 2026. Benediction Murhabazi /AFP via Getty Images

The number of confirmed deaths from Ebola in Congo in recent months hit 1,033, Congolese authorities said.

Forty percent of the confirmed 2,536 patients have died.

Another 506 people have recovered, and 738 are currently in isolation or being treated in hospitals, according to officials in the central African country.

"Health teams are pursuing surveillance operations, case management, and contact tracing to contain the spread of the disease," Congo's Ministry of Communications said.

Teams have been able to track the contacts of 77 percent of patients in a bid to control the outbreak, much lower than the 90 percent threshold suggested as ideal by the World Health Organization.

The only other deaths confirmed in the outbreak are two in Uganda, which has not recorded any new cases in several weeks.

The outbreak was detected in Congo in mid-May, although it is believed to have started weeks or even months earlier. It is caused by the Bundibugyo virus, a rare type of ebolavirus for which there are no approved treatments or vaccines.

"These are people dying. They are dying because we don't have vaccines, we don't have medicine, we don't have funding," Dr. Jean Kaseya, director-general of the Africa Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, said during a summit in Ghana on Wednesday.

The Africa CDC and other entities have been seeking and have received tens of millions in funding from the United States and other countries to combat the outbreak, but say they need more funds and resources.

World Health Organization Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus told reporters earlier in July that the outbreak was "continuing to outpace the response" and that the response plan needed more than $400 million in additional funds.

Ebola was first identified in 1976 after an outbreak in modern-day Congo. The deadliest Ebola outbreak on record ran for two years starting in 2014 in West Africa, causing 28,610 cases and killing 11,308 people.

That outbreak was caused by the Zaire ebolavirus.

The current outbreak is growing at a much faster rate than that outbreak did, according to Kaseya.

U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention scientists said in modeling projections released in June that absent "large-scale and sustained public health interventions," the outbreak centered in Congo could become as large as the 2014-2016 outbreak.

"Rapid identification of cases, contact tracing, isolation and treatment of persons with [Ebola], community engagement, and use of safe and dignified burial for persons who die from [Ebola] are necessary to control the outbreak," they said.

Tyler Durden Fri, 07/24/2026 - 17:00

LA Is Finally Cleaning Up Its Infamous "Graffiti Towers" Before The Olympics Arrives

For years, the unfinished Oceanwide Plaza towers have stood as one of downtown Los Angeles' most notorious landmarks. Not because of their architecture, but because of what they became. After construction stalled, the empty high-rises were transformed into a massive canvas for graffiti artists, attracting vandals, urban explorers and thrill-seekers who repeatedly scaled the abandoned buildings.

Covered in colorful tags and visible across the city's skyline, the so-called "graffiti towers" have come to symbolize both the project's collapse and the city's struggle to deal with one of its most recognizable eyesores. But now Los Angeles' infamous graffiti-covered Oceanwide Plaza towers are expected to be cleaned within the next 90 days under a commitment from the project's proposed new owner, according to Mayor Karen Bass' office, according to NBC Los Angeles. 

NBC reports that with the 2028 Olympics approaching, KPC Development Co. has agreed to remove the graffiti from the unfinished skyscrapers, allowing the city to withdraw its objection to the project's revised bankruptcy plan so cleanup can begin before construction resumes.

If the bankruptcy court approves the sale, KPC plans to complete the long-stalled development, which is slated to include apartments, a hotel, restaurants and retail space. The company will pay for the graffiti removal, city officials said.

Residents who have long complained about the vandalized towers welcomed the announcement, saying the cleanup is an important step toward improving downtown Los Angeles before the Olympics.

And hey...cleaning up the towers is a start. Now the city just has to get around to cleaning up the rest of Los Angeles before the world arrives for the Olympics.

Tyler Durden Fri, 07/24/2026 - 16:40

"I'm Not Racist": Musk Slams Snooty Leftist Interviewer, Says "I Support The Normal People"

Authored by Steve Watson via Modernity News,

During a terse exchange, Elon Musk told the virulently leftist editor-in-chief of The Economist that civil war in Britain is inevitable on current trends - driven by rapid migration of people whose beliefs clash with Western civilisation.

In response, Zanny Minton Beddoes accused Musk of supporting the "far right," and amplifying racists.

Musk called the coming confrontation a "reckoning," rejected the racist smear, and turned the tables on an interviewer determined to paint secure borders and opposition to rape and murder as fringe extremism.

When the interviewer insisted she lived in Britain and called the claim "nonsense," he shot back: "You live a very closeted existence!"

He expanded:

"If you have a large and growing, rapidly growing, group of people whose beliefs are antithetical to western beliefs, at some point there will be a reckoning."

Musk described the prospect as inevitable and called it a "crying shame" that mainstream outlets refuse to recognise the threat to Western civilisation.

Pressed on whether he was racist or anti-Muslim, Musk answered directly:

"My partner is half-Indian and I have four children with her. One of them was named after a famous Indian physicist. So I would say I'm not racist."

He continued:

"If people are coming to a country with antithetical views, I am against that. I'm against rape and murder, I'm against the imposition of rules and laws that are contrary to what we've come to accept in the West."

The interviewer's line of attack was clear.

She framed Musk's support for parties defending borders and cultural continuity as backing for the "far right" and even "very fringe parties."

Musk refused the frame.

"No, I support the NORMAL people," he said. "What you call the far right FALSELY."

He pointed out that the same positions - secure borders, safe cities, sensible spending - were mainstream only 10 or 15 years ago.

Speeches by Obama or Hillary Clinton on these subjects would today be denounced as Trumpian extremism by the "lunatic left."

When Beddoes claimed people "loathe" him, Musk was unmoved, firing back "I don't care, but the fact that, as you pointed out, a quarter billion people follow me is that I think a lot more people actually like me than don't. And I think a lot more people hate you and the media more than you realize."

?? Elon Musk just ENDED this snobby British reporter's career !

Question "we started this conversation saying superlatives. It's why people loathe you. Do you understand that?"

Musk "I don't care, but the fact that, as you pointed out, a quarter billion people follow me is... pic.twitter.com/kCZ7OPk0jy

— J (@JayTC53) July 23, 2026

OOF. Feel the burn.

WATCH: Elon Musk DEMOLISHES a Reporter to Her Face For Calling Him 'Far Right', DARES Her to Keep it In The Interview: 'DON'T CUT THIS'

"These are the NORMAL people"

"I would like to ADMONISH YOU and the Media"

Absolute Masterclass ? pic.twitter.com/Y481A616k4

— Benny Johnson (@bennyjohnson) July 23, 2026

The pattern is familiar. Positions once held by centre-left politicians are now labelled extreme so that any defence of Western norms can be pathologised. Musk called it out without apology.

She can't comprehend what he's saying. Fascinating. https://t.co/Uy7L0z4jYT

— ??? ??? (@antleary) July 23, 2026

Watching this woman made me glad I cancelled my subscription. You got time with world's most brilliant man and just tried to lecture him. Nobody cares about your woke bullshit

— ClevelandRocks (@cavsfan1983) July 23, 2026

The full interview, spanning AI, Europe, politics and the rest, is available here (for now):

The Economist Elon Musk July 23rd 2026 pic.twitter.com/xti3kXcZFc

— Lord Withers (@_lordwithers) July 24, 2026

Musk's warning with regards to Britain is not abstract theorising. It lands against a backdrop of UK government moves that look like quiet preparation for internal fracture.

Last year Professor David Betz of King's College London warned that official talk of a Russian invasion threat was a convenient cover for hardening infrastructure and building a citizen's militia against domestic conflict.

Low trust, political factionalism and demographic change, he argued, are pushing Britain toward civil strife.

Just days ago the UK government urged households to stockpile long-life food, water, medicines and wind-up radios while announcing the largest home-defence wargame in decades - Operation Albiston Shadow - again framed around hybrid Russian threats. Betz's analysis remains the same: the real concern is internal, not external.

Musk's latest comments connect those dots in plain language.

The UK has seen repeated outbreaks of disorder linked to migration failures - Southport, Southampton and beyond. Official responses have often appeared two-tier. At the same time, the state is stockpiling resilience messaging and running large-scale domestic defence exercises while insisting the danger is primarily Russian.

The academic critique from Betz and others is that this is politically safer language for a deeper problem: a society whose cohesion has been eroded by rapid demographic change and elite refusal to confront incompatible values.

Musk is simply saying the quiet part out loud. Large-scale importation of populations that reject core Western principles - equality under the law, free speech, protection of women and girls - creates friction that does not magically resolve. When media and political classes treat any discussion of that friction as "far right," the pressure only builds.

Britain's leadership can keep pretending the only threats come from Moscow or from citizens who notice the transformation of their own towns. Musk is not pretending. Neither should anyone else who values the civilisation that still, for now, allows such interviews to happen.

Your support is crucial in helping us defeat mass censorship. Please consider donating via Locals or check out our unique merch. Follow us on X @ModernityNews.

Tyler Durden Fri, 07/24/2026 - 16:30

"The Polycrisis Of 2026 Whirls Like A Demon-Infested Storm Overcoming This Human Project..."

Authored by James Howard Kunstler,

Struggle session

“. . .there is no saving the Left. There is only saving America from them.” — Sasha Stone

The polycrisis of 2026 whirls like a demon-infested storm overcoming this human project of ours like a medieval panorama of the world’s end. Everything is fraught, tilting toward hazard, menace, ruin. Even under a summer sun, the mind sees only darkness everywhere it looks.

Apocalypse now, it seems like.

You almost can’t blame the doomers, the black pill-ers, lost in their transports of dread.

But I tell you, we will get through this.

Is it a surprise that the IRGC has a death wish for its host, Iran? They’ve been advertising it loudly for half a century, yearning for martyrdom, the bliss of paradise, marriage to multiple perfumed virgins, all the pomegranates you could ever want, and perpetual dreamtime beside a gently burbling fountain in the palace of eternity. Trouble is, to get there you must have your head blown off.

That’s exactly what the IRGC is asking for, though the millions of ordinary Iranians probably have their doubts about the ask. They are hostages of the IRGC regime, which refuses to just stop being a problem for the world. Mr. Trump’s proffer for Iran still abides: become a normal nation, sovereign and all, only without atom bombs. Let ships sail through Hormuz unmolested. Sell your oil, make some money, trade with the other fellas across the Persian Gulf, have a nice civilized life with all the refinements of age-old Persian culture, even with its Islamic overlay. Be happy!

The USA does not seek to occupy Iran, steal its resources, subjugate its people, force them to buy Minnie Mouse plush toys, play baseball, eat Jimmy Dean sausage for breakfast, strum banjoes, or wear cowboy hats. Just stop projecting violence and discord all over the Middle East.

You can’t make us, the IRGC says. Yes, we will, the USA replies. And so it goes. Next up: bridges and power plants. Plus, every ship you damage, we’ll deduct the cost of repair from your frozen assets held in our banks. This is where things stand after the thirteenth night of strategic bombing against the IRGC’s launch sites, drone factories, missile storage caverns, and shoreline military installations. Iran prepared assiduously for this death-scene for decades, building hidey-holes here, there, and everywhere. But every time they launch something now, our satellites mark the coordinates, and boom, now there’s one less hidey-hole.

Iran’s currency, the rial, has an exchange rate against the US dollar of about 1,900,000 to one dollar. There is hardly a functioning economy left. The people are flat broke. Everyday life must be hell now. Could be the IRGC was getting tons of munitions and material for free from China, but days ago we blew up the railroad bridge at Aq Tekeh-Khan that was China’s main connection to Iran, so that’s over with.

You must doubt that Russia is capable of sending arms to Iran at this point. Russia needs every drone and missile it can fabricate now that Ukraine is sending drones clear into Moscow and St. Petersburg on a regular basis. Of course, that war is being stoked by NATO, which perforce includes the USA. A bill (H.R. 2913 — the Ukraine Support Act) that would furnish $1.3-1.8 billion in direct security, military, and reconstruction assistance for Ukraine plus $8 billion in loans was passed by the House in June, but languishes in the Senate. President Trump has threatened to veto it, as running counter to the administration’s preference for negotiations with Russia to end the Ukraine War rather than extend it.

These two conflicts must seem intractable for now, but the mojo driving them has clear and present limits.

If the USA does not underwrite Ukraine’s war effort, then that leaves the EU nations, who are increasingly broke, and for all their idle talk are really incapable of mounting a major arms production campaign.

The UK especially is skating on thin ice these days as Mr. Trump methodically cancels its long-running command and control of global finance through the City of London (as its “Wall Street” is called). In fact, it looks as if the floundering UK — with dopey Andy Burnham rolling in as Britain’s seventh Prime Minister in a decade — has passed the ball of globalist leadership to its forward striker (and all-purpose fixer) Mark Carney the Prime Minister of Canada.

Carney, who was previously chief of the Bank of England, has played a series of losing games against President Trump the past year, while Mr. Carney is busy wrecking the Canadian economy for the sake of the globalist “green” flimflam, a sustained high volume of third world immigration, and outlandish DEI activism that includes giving vast tracts of real estate back to Canada’s First Nations people, their Indians. Carney has also very actively played footsie with the CCP to a degree that is seriously pissing off Mr. Trump. Among all the other shocks and surprises upcoming, you might imagine him having to send the 82nd Airborne up to Ottawa to inform PM Carney that there will be no globalist seat of operations in North America.

Yes, things are getting that strange. And then, continuing the clean-up operation south of our border, there is Cuba to straighten out. Cuba is obviously next. Our patience with that failing state’s communist export project is particularly thin, now that the Democratic Party here is entertaining Marxist-Leninist dreams of glory.

On top of all that, we have serious concerns with the financial markets and the widening income inequality that drives the younger generations’ yen for “socialism” (free rent, free medicine, free stuff).

Financialization concentrates and compounds wealth while the salary-mule class stagnates, suffers, goes broke, and nurses its grievances.

We’re pushing into the season of financial train wrecks. AI has cornered all the free capital in the land — for something that appears to be an existential menace as much as any potential economic benefit — and it is wildly perverting the equity market. The bond market groans under the debt burden and the impossibility of fiscal prudence. Capitalism that can’t self-correct invites financial and political violence.

It’s probably a greater threat to us than the faraway wars, bad as they are. Mr. Trump, Secretary Bessent, and others in charge surely know this — that the American ownership class has become tiny, and that the cure for that is getting the vast dis-owned, forsaken middle-class back into businesses that they will own, in an economy based on production of real goods, not on playing games with money.

There is so much to be done and we can get it done if we screw our heads back on.

Views expressed in this article are opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of ZeroHedge.

Tyler Durden Fri, 07/24/2026 - 16:20

Financial Repression: How The US Government Will Quietly Confiscate Your Wealth

Authored by Nick Giambruno via InternationalMan.com,

When I first heard the term “financial repression,” I thought it had to be a joke.

Why would governments and central banks use a term with such a negative connotation? Even people who are financially illiterate can understand that financial repression is a bad thing.

Simply put, financial repression is a strategy governments use to reduce their debt burden by manipulating interest rates below inflation.

It allows them to borrow in dollars and repay in dimes.

Here’s how the IMF describes it, emphasis mine:

“Financial repression includes directed lending to government by captive domestic audiences (such as pension funds), explicit or implicit caps on interest rates, regulations of cross-border capital movements, and (generally) a tighter connection between government and banks.”

More from the IMF:

“High public debt often produces the drama of default and restructuring.

But debt is also reduced through financial repression, a tax on bondholders and savers via negative or below-market real interest rates.

After WWII, capital controls and regulatory restrictions created a captive audience for government debt, limiting tax-base erosion.

Financial repression is most successful in liquidating debt when accompanied by inflation.”

For example, if inflation is 9% and governments fix interest rates at 4%, there is an ongoing 5% wealth transfer from the lender to the borrower. And that transfer compounds over time.

I think financial repression is how the US government will try to manage its otherwise impossible debt situation.

Consider this.

Among the biggest expenditures for the US government are so-called entitlements like Social Security and Medicare.

It’s unlikely any politician will cut entitlements. On the contrary, I expect them to continue growing.

That’s because tens of millions of Baby Boomers—about 22% of the population—will enter retirement in the coming years. Cutting Social Security and Medicare is a sure way to lose an election.

With the most precarious geopolitical situation since World War 2, National Defense—another large expenditure—is unlikely to be cut. Instead, defense spending is all but certain to increase. President Trump has proposed increasing it from $917 billion to $1.5 trillion. The ongoing war with Iran guarantees military spending has nowhere to go but up, way up.

Different types of welfare programs also make up a considerable part of the federal budget and are unlikely to be cut.

In short, efforts to reduce expenditures will be meaningless unless it becomes politically acceptable to make chainsaw-like cuts to entitlements, national defense, and welfare, while also reducing the national debt enough to lower interest costs.

In other words, the US would need a leader who—at a minimum—returns the federal government to a limited Constitutional Republic, closes the 800 military bases abroad, ends entitlements, kills the welfare state, and repays a large portion of the national debt.

However, that is a completely unrealistic fantasy.

It would be foolish to bet on it happening.

In any case, don’t count on increased tax revenue to offset these increases in federal expenditures.

Even if tax rates went to 100%, it still wouldn’t be enough to stop the debt from growing.

According to Forbes, there are around 902 billionaires in the US with a combined net worth of about $6.8 trillion.

The US federal government spent around $7 trillion in FY 2025, and will almost certainly spend a lot more in FY 2026 and beyond.

Even if the US government confiscated 100% of billionaire assets through a wealth tax, it wouldn’t cover even a single year of current federal spending.

And even after confiscating all billionaire wealth, the US government would still have to borrow more than $200 billion to cover FY 2025 spending.

Here’s the bottom line: increasing taxes, even to extreme levels, isn’t going to change the trajectory of this unstoppable trend—even slightly.

The truth is, no matter what happens, the deficits will not stop growing, nor will the debt needed to finance them.

In short, it’s politically impossible to even slow the federal spending growth rate, let alone cut it.

That means issuing ever-increasing amounts of debt is the only way to finance continuously expanding budget deficits.

The ever-growing interest expense on the ever-growing federal debt compounds the problem. It adds to the deficit, which must be financed with even more debt, which creates even more interest expense.

So what options does the US government have to deal with this impossible situation?

In my view, the US government has no choice but to implement financial repression.

The idea is to stealthily confiscate wealth from bondholders without causing too much alarm.

Financial Repression

There are many flavors of financial repression.

Capital controls. Mandates forcing banks, pension funds, and insurance companies to buy government bonds. Regulations that make government debt appear “safe” or “risk-free” on institutional balance sheets. Yield curve control. Interest rate caps. Restrictions on moving money abroad.

And countless other policies designed to trap capital inside the system and push it toward government debt.

For example, many countries have forced private retirement funds into unwanted government debt. I have no doubt the US government would do the same under pressure.

They could try to sell it to a scared and financially ignorant public as a safety measure—a way to help people protect their retirement savings by moving them into “safe” Treasuries amid a stock market collapse.

They could sell it with patriotic lies and push War Bonds, as they have done in the past.

They could mandate that a certain amount—say, 25%—of all new contributions to private retirement accounts must consist of Treasuries. For your own good, of course.

They could even forcibly convert existing assets held in retirement accounts into government bonds.

No matter the method, the result is the same.

The government needs to borrow enormous amounts of money at artificially low interest rates.

So it creates rules, incentives, and restrictions that force or pressure savers and institutions to finance government deficits on terms they would never voluntarily accept in a free market.

That is the essence of financial repression.

It’s no wonder financial repression is so attractive to politicians.

It allows them to reduce the real value of the debt without admitting they defaulted, without officially raising taxes, and without making the politically impossible spending cuts that would otherwise be required.

And they can do it while perhaps not even 1 in 100 people truly understand what is happening.

Financial repression will not arrive with a public announcement. It will come through policies that appear reasonable, temporary, and even protective—while quietly eroding the value of your savings and limiting your financial freedom.

This is only one part of a much larger crisis now taking shape. Read our free report to understand the forces driving it, the risks they pose to your wealth and personal freedom, and the three strategies you can use right now to prepare.

Tyler Durden Fri, 07/24/2026 - 15:40

US Bombing Campaign Effectiveness In Doubt As Iranians Rebuild At Rapid Pace

Neocon war hawks thought that Iran's defense capabilities could be obliterated through shock and awe style heavy bombing raids, such as during the opening days and weeks of Operation Epic Fury, but just like pretty much every other assumption about how things would go in the little Iran "excursion" - they are once again proven wrong.

Several fresh reports from both American and Israeli sources say that Iran is rebuilding damaged and destroyed facilities at much faster-than-expected pace. This is despite the well over 20,000 US-Israeli strikes carried out at the height of the war.

Analyzing the latest satellite imagery assessing the damage, The Wall Street Journal writes that the Islamic Republic has "quickly rebuilt infrastructure damaged during the U.S. and Israeli bombing campaign over recent months, from missile bases nestled deep inside mountains to bridges, ports and production facilities, according to Israeli and Western officials and a review of satellite imagery."

Handout satellite image courtesy of Vantor shows tunnel entrances at a missile complex in Isfahan, in central Iran. via Vantor/AFP

The publication says that this is a significant factor in explaining how the Iranians have managed to maintain their grip on the Strait of Hormuz and thus serious economic and political leverage.

Everything from roads to bridges to tunnel entrances have also be restored at surprising speeds, which also suggests the US bombings have had a rallying effect among civic workers and the broader population in support of the nation and the government.

WSJ offers but one example as follows: "Near Kangavar, in western Iran, satellite imagery from Planet Labs in March showed two tunnel entrances and an access road damaged by airstrikes aimed at blocking access to an Iranian missile base. Within weeks, imagery from Airbus revealed a neatly paved road leading to freshly excavated entrances."

Israeli media too has listed out the following further examples:

Kangavar Missile Base: Attacked in early March; satellite images show an access road was destroyed, but a newly paved road was built weeks later to bypass the damage.

Bandar Anzali Port: Despite Israel claiming significant damage in March to the IRGC-linked port, command center, and shipyard - early July images show active reconstruction underway.

Tehran Missile Plant: Recent imagery documents active rebuilding efforts at a missile production facility near the capital.

This is causing US and Israeli officials to revisit strategy concerning potential future major bombing campaigns over Iran.

It was in April that the US and Israel began ramping up attacks on bridges and rail lines to cripple Iran's national transport network. Israel especially adopted attacks against key civilian infrastructure as a battle tactic, in hopes that eventually there would be a groundswell of anti-Tehran anger domestically, leading to government overthrow. Of course, regime change has never happened, and is proving an illusive Neocon fantasy. 

Finally have a moment to comment on this.

Iran is a country of over 90 million people, with high educational attainment and strong motives for self-defense.

The real surprise in this story is that U.S. and Israeli officials seem surprised that Iran is rebuilding so quickly.

— Rosemary Kelanic (@RKelanic) July 24, 2026

President Trump himself had also at the time repeatedly threatening to bomb bridges, power plants, and other infrastructure to send Iran "back to the Stone Age."

Iranian officials say multiple damaged rail lines and bridges have been restored in record time - sometimes within 40 to 96 hours - using domestic engineering teams. The ceasefire which was declared on April 8, but which is now defunct, was used as a time of rapid rebuilding - something which even US officials have acknowledged. 

Tyler Durden Fri, 07/24/2026 - 15:20

'Caution Is Warranted': Ed Dowd Warns Wall Street's AI CapEx Party Is Ending

Authored by Ed Dowd via 'Beyond The Narrative' substack,

The signs are piling up faster than the hype can spin them. AI capex has been the rocket fuel for markets, but the second derivative is turning. Factors ending the party:

• Private credit stalled — flows reversing, redemptions surging, industry effectively paused.

• Enterprise demand cracking — ROI skepticism, token costs biting, data/alpha extraction backlash.

• Power constraints hitting hard — the grid can’t scale without massive, long lead time builds or dystopian reallocation.

• Open-source pressure — Chinese based DeepSeek and now the new open-source frontier model Kimi K3 are rivaling OpenAI and Anthropic frontiers labs at fraction of the price, commoditizing the economics.

Credit markets always end the party. We’re watching it live.

Private Credit: The Silent Pause Button on AI Capex

This is where financing reality bites. Morgan Stanley estimated private credit could fund up to 50% of the external financing needs for the massive AI data center buildout. That channel is now under serious stress.

Flows in private credit are going the wrong way. The industry is effectively paused. Redemption requests are surging, funds are gating, and high-profile bankruptcies plus underwriting scrutiny are flashing warnings. Private credit has become the new junk bond market…except it lacks transparency, liquidity, and is now being stress-tested in real time.

With outflows accelerating, near-term funding from Private credit for AI data center buildouts looks less likely. NVIDIA and others keep popping up in private credit loan books. What happens to repossessed GPUs in a stressed environment?

Continued capex relies on credit markets keeping the spigot open. When that spigot slows or gets expensive, the capex math breaks. Financing could turn prohibitively costly, pausing or dramatically slowing the cycle that has supported the S&P 500 index with roughly 45% of the market cap being AI or AI-adjacent.

Additionally AI infrastructure inflation itself is credit driven. This reflexive credit driven surge in demand has caused cost inflation for chips and data center construction making the past cost projections moot. These inflated costs make ROI hurdles even harder. Current creditors are reassessing their exposure as the Goldman Sachs credit desk has recently highlighted.

Enterprise Demand Is Cracking

The people who are supposed to use this stuff are slowing down. Companies that rushed AI tools into workers’ hands are now reining them in because costs at scale are biting. That’s not theory…it’s the second derivative showing up in real budgets. They are stepping back and trying to assess the ROI from this investment as their AI budgets come in above initial cost projections.

Alex Karp of Palantir laid it out bluntly. Enterprises are livid. They’re paying for tokens that create no reliable value. They’re watching their own workflows, customer data, and competitive alpha get extracted and potentially sold back to competitors. Token pricing itself is the confession…if these models delivered durable, defensible productivity gains at scale, the labs would price on value or take equity cuts, not meter compute.

Open-source pressure

DeepSeek and other cheaper open-source models were already pressuring token pricing for those users who didn’t need the frontier models. To make matters worse, recent newcomer Moonshot AI’s Kimi K3 is a Chinese open-weight model rivaling top US frontier leaders OpenAI and Anthropic at a fraction of the cost. It’s putting direct pressure on closed-source pricing and exposing how over-hyped the token economics have become. Why pay premium rates when open-source alternatives deliver competitive performance? Competitive pricing hurts revenue growth for the two US frontier leaders which is likely to push their IPOs into next year (if at all) and raises the cost of their debt capital. The downstream effect is an eventual capex slowdown for the pick-and-shovel crowd (semiconductors etc.). Simple as that.

Power Constraints: The Physical Wall Nobody Wants to Talk About

Even if the money were flowing freely, the electricity isn’t. AI compute requires tremendous amounts of energy and water. Currently installed electrical capacity can’t handle the aggressive projections without massive new builds, which take years of capital, permitting, and construction or drastic reallocation of existing power away from other uses.

One path is slow and practical: add real capacity. The other gets dystopian fast: reduce human usage or rolling blackouts to free up juice. The reality will be somewhere in between and will play out politically. Local opposition to data centers is already rising over electricity rates, water use, and land. Towns are pushing back. This isn’t abstract futurism…it’s a hard physical constraint on timelines and costs.

Power adds another multiplier to the capex problem. Data centers need gigawatts. Hyperscalers are already forecasting enormous spending just to keep up. When private credit tightens and power infrastructure lags, the combined effect is a slower, more expensive buildout than the bull-case spreadsheets assume. The second derivative doesn’t just slow…it can stall.

Market Concentration and Cyclical Reality

Semiconductor stock valuations have hit record levels recently around 19-20% of the entire S&P 500. That’s not healthy diversification; it’s concentration in a notoriously cyclical industry whose recent boom has been funded by debt to business models that remain unproven at scale.

The biggest AI capex spenders have seen their stocks pull back meaningfully from highs even as broader indices hover near records. ROI concerns are finally showing up in price action. Even the Bank of International Settlements (BIS) has been more sober: ‘AI has boosted confidence via productivity expectations, but it’s also raising job fears, supply bottlenecks, and the risk of overinvestment boom-bust cycles we’ve seen before.’ Power and credit constraints make that overinvestment risk even more acute.

Bottom Line

We’ve seen this movie before. Credit questions profitability first. Physical limits and cheaper open-source alternatives (hello Kimi) force the timeline and pricing reckoning. Circular deals, negative free cash flow, sky-high chip prices, and now power realities all point in the same direction.

The party isn’t over tomorrow but closing time signals are everywhere: semis at peak gross margins, enterprises pausing, private credit tightening, power wall rising, open-source commoditization accelerating. Stock market AI concentration at extremes.

Skepticism isn’t denial of eventual AI value. It’s calling the current valuation and frenzy for what it is…priced for perfection that customers, credit markets, the electrical grid, and open-source competition aren’t delivering.

Watch the flows. Watch power builds. Watch Kimi-style pricing pressure. Watch the second derivative across money, megawatts, and model costs. The unwind in these concentrated, debt-fueled, physically constrained narratives tends to be swift once the marginal equity buyer and/or lender steps away.

Caution is warranted…the bright bar lights are about to be turned on. The distance to a real repricing is shrinking fast. Protect capital. The math doesn’t lie.

Tyler Durden Fri, 07/24/2026 - 15:00

SpaceX Reportedly Turns Away Falcon Customers As Starship Gamble Comes Into Focus

Yet another corporate media report based on anonymous sources is likely to draw an immediate response from Elon Musk. He has repeatedly used X this year to challenge reporting on Tesla and SpaceX.

Bloomberg reports that SpaceX has begun turning away satellite operators seeking dedicated Falcon 9 launches after 2028 and is no longer accepting future reservations. The report was based on people familiar with the matter, and the company has not confirmed it.

The report continued:

Engineers at Musk's rocket, satellite and artificial intelligence juggernaut have halted building some non-reusable components for the Falcon family, such as the rocket's massive upper stage, said one of the people.

. . .

SpaceX's plans could change for a number of reasons, including development setbacks with the futuristic Starship vehicle, the people said. The company is likely to still use the Falcon 9 for launches for the Department of Defense and NASA, some of the people said.

If Starship isn't operational by the end of 2028 and Falcon production isn't extended, satellite operators could face a shortage of heavy-lift launch capacity. That means a lot is riding on the mega-rocket Starship getting through the testing phase and achieving commercial viability.

Starship's execution risks weighed on SpaceX shares this week after last week's test-launch delay. Over the past several weeks, more than $1 trillion in market capitalization has been wiped out.

Shares have fallen about 16% below the $135 IPO price in recent days.

The CIO of Tigress Financial Partners noted that the latest Starship launch abort "underscores ongoing execution risk around ramping Starship to high-cadence, reusable operations, and reinforces that repeated delays could push out revenue and margin trajectories."

Could be wrong, but it seems that 4 engines didn’t light causing the abort sequence

Unfortunate scenario, but better safe than sorry! Hoping for another attempt tomorrow pic.twitter.com/o0BQ8Ekt7i

— Victor Kerman (@VictorKerman) July 16, 2026

Starship's Thursday launch attempt was postponed due to adverse weather conditions, with another attempt scheduled for later this evening. Check back for updates.

Tyler Durden Fri, 07/24/2026 - 14:45