Zero Hedge

Risk For Thee, Safety For Me: Celebrity Activism

Risk For Thee, Safety For Me: Celebrity Activism

Authored by Christian Vezilj via American Thinker,

Hollywood has mastered the art of moral performance. Award shows have become political stages where actors speak with the confidence of prophets and the certainty of philosophers. But beneath the applause lines and emotional crescendos lies a contradiction that becomes impossible to ignore: the courage they demand from others is courage they themselves will never have to summon.

This contradiction was unmistakable at the recent Golden Globe Awards. The ceremony quickly transformed into a coordinated tribute to Renee Nicole Goode, who was shot and killed by an ICE agent. Mark Ruffalo dedicated his award by saying, “This is for Renee Nicole Goode, who was murdered,” adding, “I don’t know how I can be quiet.” Wanda Sykes echoed the sentiment on the red carpet, declaring, “Of course, this is for the mother who was murdered by an ICE agent, and it’s really sad.” She went further, urging confrontation: “We need to be out there and shut this rogue government down, because it’s just awful what they’re doing to people.”

Celebrities wore coordinated pins reading “BE GOOD” and “ICE OUT,” signaling solidarity and moral urgency. The messaging was unified, emotional, and unmistakably political. The narrative was clear: this was a moment to resist, to rise up, to confront injustice.

But what was equally clear — and far more revealing — was what they chose not to say.

While the Golden Globes stage was filled with speeches about ICE, not a single celebrity mentioned the mass slaughter, imprisonment, and torture taking place in Iran at that very moment - Hundreds of protesters have been killed by the Iranian regime. Thousands have been dragged into prisons. Torture, rape, and forced confessions have been documented by human rights groups. The government has imposed sweeping internet blackouts to hide the brutality from the world. [ZH: regardless of whether this is yet more 'regime change paint by numbers' - it was completely ignored].

And yet, on one of the most visible cultural platforms in America, the silence was absolute.

  • No speeches.
  • No pins.
  • No hashtags.
  • No calls to “shut down” the Iranian government.
  • Nothing.

The contrast is staggering. When the villain is a U.S. agency, outrage is immediate, coordinated, and emotionally charged. When the villain is a foreign authoritarian regime slaughtering its own people, the outrage evaporates. The issue is not the moral weight of the cause. The issue is whether the cause is useful to the narrative they want to tell.

But the hypocrisy runs even deeper. It extends to the way Hollywood reacts to domestic events that do not fit its preferred storyline. When Ashli Babbitt was shot and killed inside the Capitol, there were no celebrity tributes. No emotional speeches. No coordinated pins. No calls for accountability. Instead, the officer who shot her was widely described as a hero. The shooting was framed as necessary, justified, even praiseworthy.

Whether one agrees with either shooting is not the point. The difference in reaction reveals the deeper truth: Hollywood’s activism is not driven by universal moral principles. It is driven by selective outrage, selective empathy, and selective courage.

This brings us to the heart of the matter: the asymmetry of risk. Celebrities routinely encourage ordinary people to “stand up,” “fight back,” or “put your body on the line.” Sykes’s call to “shut this rogue government down” is a perfect example. These are not metaphorical suggestions. They imply confrontation, danger, and the possibility of violence.

Yet the people delivering these messages do so from behind layers of insulation that ordinary Americans do not have. They live in gated communities. They travel with private security. Their homes are protected by surveillance systems, controlled access, and armed guards. They are not wrong for wanting safety — everyone wants safety — but they are wrong for preaching danger for others while choosing safety for themselves.

A working‑class person who confronts ICE or police in the street faces real, immediate, physical danger. A celebrity who posts a hashtag or makes a speech faces none. Their activism is symbolic, not sacrificial. It costs them nothing. And yet they speak as though they are shoulder‑to‑shoulder with the people they are urging into the streets.

This is where the phrase “We’re in it together” collapses. When celebrities use it, they rarely mean shared sacrifice. They mean shared sentiment. They mean shared optics. But they do not mean shared risk. Their version of solidarity is digital, not physical.

The deeper civic insight is this: selective outrage and selective courage are symptoms of a broader cultural problem. We have built a society where moral authority is often claimed by those who bear none of the consequences of their own prescriptions. Hollywood’s activism is not dangerous to Hollywood. It is dangerous to the people they encourage to act on their behalf.

True solidarity requires more than a speech, a pin, or a social media post. It requires standing in the same place, facing the same risks, and sharing the same consequences. Anything less is performance.

And performance, no matter how passionate, is not courage.

Tyler Durden Wed, 01/14/2026 - 22:30

China Blames Trump For Its Staggering $1.2 Trillion Trade Surplus Amid European Howls Of Outrage

China Blames Trump For Its Staggering $1.2 Trillion Trade Surplus Amid European Howls Of Outrage

At the start of December, China stunned the world when it reported that its trade surplus had surpassed a record $1 trillion, with one month still left to go in calendar 2025.

Fast forward to last night when China reported that in December, its trade balance rose from $112 billion in November to a whopping - and the second highest on record - $114.14 billion, matching Bloomberg estimates...

...  exports grew 6.6% YoY in dollar terms, more than double the average forecast from a Bloomberg poll of analysts of 3.1% and greater than November’s growth rate of 5.9%, while imports rose 5.7% in dollars last month on a year earlier, also far outpacing analyst expectations of 0.9% growth and the previous month’s figure of 1.9%.

Adding across, China's full-year trade surplus exceeded $1 trillion for the first time - $1.2 trillion to be precise - blowing away last year’s figure of $993bn despite exports to the US falling 20%, as those to the EU rose 8.4% and to south-east Asia rose 13.4%, where as we show below the bulk of transshipments to the US take place, as Chinese producers diverted shipments to other markets while ultimately still targeting US consumers. 

And since China's record $1 trillion trade surplus hit a month earlier had already outraged its trading partners, who finally called out Beijing (long after Trump did so first) for its mercantilist, imbalanced trade policies, Beijing needed a scapegoat for the even bigger number it reported. It decided to blame the US, the one country that until recently had reportedly "alienated the world" in its pursuit of more balanced Chinese trade.

As the FT reported, "China blamed the US for growing global trade imbalances as the world’s second-biggest economy reported a record full-year trade surplus of $1.2tn for 2025 despite President Donald Trump’s trade war."

Why? Because as we first reported last month, China's gargantuan surplus will further inflame global trading tensions, particularly with the EU where China is indiscriminately dumping cars below cost and singlehandedly putting the entire German auto industry into an early grave; it's not just Europe - all export-focused developing countries are also seething, as they find their exports are simply not competitive with cheap Chinese goods which are being dumped at a furious pace around the globe. 

In a sign of the growing decoupling of direct trade between China and the US, the American share of Chinese exports last year was 11.1% , down from 14.7% in 2024, some of the lowest levels since the 1990s, the FT reports. Of course, that is woefully inaccurate at worse, and at best incomplete, since China has merely redirected its US goods via intermediary countries - i.e., transshipments - such as Vietnam, which has seen imports from China soar to a record high.

And since Vietnam didn't grow an affluent middle class overnight, all that is happening is China is sending its trinkets to Hanoi first, before they are reshipped onward to China, under the guise of Vietnamese exports.

But, as last month, the loudest complaints about China’s surplus are expected from the EU (which said nothing when Trump was complaining loudly over the past decade and now is stuck with a crippled economy which has lost all export vibrancy for ever), yet which is terrified of its own shadow, and still has to follow the US and implement broad-based tariffs. Instead, the bloc has called for Beijing to stimulate domestic demand and reduce its own barriers to manufactured imports, something Beijing - already stuffed to its gills in debt - has shown precisely zero interest in doing, or being able to create organically.

And so, China decided to... blame Trump.

Wang Jun, vice-minister of the General Administration of Customs of China, said on Wednesday that trading partners’ export controls on high-tech products were preventing China from importing more, in not so thinly veiled comments directed at the US. Successive US administrations have imposed stringent curbs on China’s access to high-end semiconductors.

“It should be pointed out that some countries politicize economic and trade issues, using various pretexts to restrict exports of high-tech products to China; otherwise, we would import more,” said Wang, adding: “There is vast room for import growth.”

Actually no, there isn't, because as the upcoming Chinese data dump will reveal, China's domestic economy continues to deteriorate with retail sales and fixed investment at a level that signals flat GDP at best, if not negative. 

Which only leaves a flood of exports to keep China's economy alive. Sure enough, economists have warned that China’s economy is too reliant on manufacturing and exports for growth amid anaemic domestic consumption and a years-long property sector slowdown. 

“China’s staggering trade surplus is simultaneously a symbol of its exporting prowess and the weaknesses in its growth model,” said Eswar Prasad, professor of economics at Cornell University.

One more point: China's staggering trade surplus is a remnant of an era in which nobody dared point out that the neoliberal, mercantilist emperor is dead, until Trump came along. And while Europe laughed at him at first (just like they laughed when he told Germany they are entirely reliant on Russian gas), Brussels has finally figured out that it can do nothing and watch its economy implode from inside while purchasing cheap Chinese trinkets, or it can join the US president in calling out China's trade practice. At which point China's record trade surplus will collapse, with various unpleasant consequences for its economy. As for the US, it is on the right path, but it too needs to plug the gaping loopholes such as record trans-shipments through Vietnam and other Pacific rim countries. Once it does that, only then will Beijing be forced to finally revise its export-led model which is the main reason why the world finds itself in a brutal trade war for the second year running. 

Tyler Durden Wed, 01/14/2026 - 22:00

Analysis: Havana's Playbook Or Conspiracy Theory? Testing Washington's Claim That Cuban Intel Fueled US Protests

Analysis: Havana's Playbook Or Conspiracy Theory? Testing Washington's Claim That Cuban Intel Fueled US Protests

Submitted by The Bureau's Sam Cooper,

In the aftershock of the Trump administration’s special-forces extraction of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro, a new report from the Heritage Foundation advances a sweeping, Cold War–inflected thesis: that the real command post for much of Latin America’s authoritarian drift — and a significant driver of American street unrest since 2020 — is Havana.

Its most incendiary claim is also, arguably, the one most relevant to a Trump administration now tightening its focus on leftist heads of state from Mexico City to Bogotá: that Cuba’s communist regime, working through Venezuela and allied networks across Latin America, has sought to weaponize narcotics trafficking while also stoking social unrest inside the United States.

“Venezuela is rightly getting all the attention after the arrest of dictator Nicolas Maduro, but it is important to bear in mind that Cuba’s communist regime is the mastermind of Caracas’s plan to destabilize U.S. streets through narco-trafficking and political unrest,” Heritage senior fellow Mike Gonzalez writes, citing letters from two senior Venezuelan figures now imprisoned in the United States for their roles in “a narco-terrorism conspiracy,” who both portrayed the enterprise as part of a Cuban effort “to dismantle the moral fiber of America from within.”

In Gonzalez’s telling, the allegation is substantiated — though he is drawing heavily on witnesses whose motives, perhaps including bids for clemency, critics could question.

Hugo “El Pollo” Carvajal, a former Venezuelan intelligence chief, and Cliver Alcalá Cordones, a former senior Venezuelan military officer, both separately wrote to President Donald Trump, according to the Heritage report, accusing Cuba’s regime of masterminding narco and political conspiracies emanating from Venezuela.

The conspiracy, wrote Carvajal, “was suggested by the Cuban regime to Chávez in the mid-2000s,” and was “successfully executed with help from FARC, ELN [both Colombian guerilla groups cited in the DOJ’s indictment of Maduro), Cuban operatives, and Hezbollah.”

Gonzalez casts Cuba’s intelligence services as the hemisphere’s enduring “revolutionary operator”: training guerrillas, embedding security cadres inside allied states, and building political infrastructure designed to outlive the era of jungle insurgencies.

Venezuela under Hugo Chávez and Maduro, he argues, became Cuba’s richest proxy — financing Havana with oil, exporting the revolution’s methods, and, serving as a staging ground for narcotics and leftist terror networks that United States officials have cast as direct threats.

Moving to an element that many readers may find as implausible as any narco-conspiracy claim — and backing his argument with intelligence records and open-source material — Gonzalez writes that, “From training Marxist terrorists in the 1960s, to the pro-Hamas mayhem at U.S. universities in 2024 and 2025, to the spread of transnational crime syndicates in U.S. cities, Cuba’s rulers have long plotted America’s demise.”

Heritage can be viewed as an ideologically driven, controversial, strongly conservative-leaning institution, but its work can also carry added signaling value in a Trump-era Washington because it often functions as a personnel and policy pipeline.

CIA Director John Ratcliffe has had ties to Heritage and helped shape Project 2025-era thinking on intelligence reform—linking the report’s framing to currents inside the administration itself.

Heritage’s new Cuban influence report is framed as a 60-year flow chart, structured around a turning point in Havana’s own revolutionary mythology: the Tricontinental Conference.

In 1966, Fidel Castro convened revolutionary movements, party cadres, and aligned delegations from Africa, Asia, and Latin America in Cuba to coordinate what the regime cast as a global campaign against “Yanki imperialism” — and what Gonzalez depicts as a blueprint for exporting upheaval through training, financing, propaganda, and the patient building of transnational networks.

Most readers will seize on the report’s most recent — and most incendiary — contention: that Black Lives Matter and other leftist social-justice groups did not merely ride the wave of outrage after George Floyd died in May 2020, during a police arrest in Minneapolis, but helped accelerate and channel it in ways that, in Heritage’s telling, served a longer-running Cuban strategy of political destabilization.

To support that framing, the report points to what it describes as coordination across the Western Hemisphere — Chile, the United States, and Colombia — from 2019 to 2021.

It contends there is “much evidence of Cuba and Venezuela attempting to destabilize the United States and its allies in the Americas,” and coordinating those efforts through the Foro de São Paulo (the São Paulo Forum), which Heritage depicts as a Marxist convening infrastructure that reactivated in 2019, including a New York gathering attended by aligned activists and representatives of leftist political parties across Latin America.

“From that point on,” Gonzalez writes, countries in the Western Hemisphere “suddenly started experiencing street riots that led to political change.”

Chile and Colombia saw major protests in 2019; protests in Colombia were “repeated and magnified” in 2021. Both, the report says, contributed to electoral outcomes — with the election of Gabriel Boric in Chile and Gustavo Petro in Colombia.

In the United States, Gonzalez writes, the George Floyd riots in 2020 “almost came close to leading to societal overhaul.” He adds that, aside from what he describes as the long-standing relationship between BLM and Maduro — and between BLM and Bolivia’s Evo Morales — Black Lives Matter has “taken parts in Foro conferences,” including one in the Washington, D.C., area on July 17, 2017, where one of the stated goals was to create “strategic links” with groups inside the United States.

To ground that claim, Gonzalez leans heavily on a prior Heritage special report from 2024 that examined what it called an interlocking “ecosystem” of organizations behind pro-Palestinian protests and parts of the Black Lives Matter movement.

In that earlier report, Heritage highlighted the People’s Forum in New York, led by Manolo De Los Santos, portraying him as a Cuba-aligned organizer who helped build movement infrastructure and, according to Heritage, mobilized activists ahead of the April 2024 takeover of Hamilton Hall at Columbia University.

Separately from the new Heritage report, open-source monitoring of the online narrative in the hours following Maduro’s extraction pointed to the same organizing source driving a storyline of “kidnapping,” illegality, and U.S. imperial overreach — including messaging from the People’s Forum and its director, self-acknowledged Marxist Manolo De Los Santos.

Within hours, similar language appeared in statements from prominent U.S. left figures — among them New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani, who publicly condemned the operation and characterized it as unlawful.

The new Heritage report expands the frame: it argues that the São Paulo Forum has extended its outreach to U.S. groups invited to conferences over the years — naming, among others, Black Lives Matter, Democratic Socialists of America, Code Pink, and the ANSWER Coalition — and portrays these connections as part of a deliberate strategy to create “strategic links” inside the United States.

Some of the report’s most serious allegations rest on contested or difficult-to-verify claims drawn from opinion journalism rather than court records.

One example is a 2025 Washington Examiner column by Heritage report author Gonzalez that cites an unnamed former Venezuelan official claiming that Hugo Chávez personally provided suitcases of cash — the source estimates “at least $20 million” — to a U.S. activist before she went on to co-found Black Lives Matter, describing it as funding meant to export street protests into the United States.

“Chávez ordered his people to hand the suitcases to them — suitcases filled with dollars, at least $20 million,” the defector told him, Gonzalez’s column says, adding that the purported defector “is cooperating with and providing evidence to the U.S. government on other subjects, particularly the close connection between the Cartel de los Soles narco group and the Venezuelan state.”

According to Gonzalez’s column, the defector claimed, “The meeting took place at the Miraflores presidential palace, in a huge suite called the Japanese Suite, where private meetings are held.”

Gonzalez presents that alleged episode as emblematic: the revolution as a transnational political-financial project with paid beneficiaries and operatives in the United States, not merely an ideologically motivated movement.

But the Heritage thesis is not primarily about money.

It is about intelligence tradecraft — and the report’s central claim is that Cuban operatives embed themselves within allied regimes to “coup-proof” leaders by monitoring militaries and securing palaces, often maintaining loyalty to Havana rather than the host nation.

Gonzalez cites a 2024 essay by former Mexican foreign minister Jorge G. Castañeda arguing that thousands of Cubans have been stationed in Venezuela over the years — including security advisers and intelligence agents — to help keep Maduro in power, and that this Cuban presence may have constrained Maduro’s room to maneuver as U.S. pressure intensified.

The report’s historical flow chart then moves into Central America, leaning on Washington’s own record as evidentiary scaffolding.

Gonzalez highlights a 1978 U.S. State Department analysis written a year before the Sandinistas toppled Nicaragua’s dictator Anastasio Somoza. The document, as quoted in the Heritage report, said that “since the FSLN (Sandinista National Liberation Front) was formed in the early 1960s,” the Sandinistas “have looked to Cuba for ideological inspiration, strategic guidance, tactical training, material support, and sanctuary,” and that “throughout the FSLN’s existence, Cuba has been a training site.”

The report argues that Havana’s method then evolved — not away from revolutionary ends, but away from overt insurgency as the primary tactic.

Gonzalez leans on what he presents as the São Paulo Forum’s blueprint “formula” for leftist politicians in the Western Hemisphere: de-emphasize Marxism, run as reformers, win elections — and then, once in office, rewrite the rules. He points to Colombia’s current president, Gustavo Petro, as both a contemporary example and, in the report’s telling, an unusually candid witness to earlier Cuban involvement.

Petro, a former member of the leftist insurgent group M-19, is quoted as saying: “Fidel Castro helped M-19 in many of its Colombian actions and, we should admit it, M-19 troops trained in Cuba.”

Petro — who, in recent weeks, has also shown signs of seeking a détente with Washington, softening some of his fiercest rhetoric — had previously, in what Gonzalez calls a “loose-lipped” moment, “also revealed that Mexico’s new President Claudia Sheinbaum was also a secret M-19 asset,” quoting Petro calling her “a collaborator and militant of M-19 in Mexico.”

From there, Gonzalez lists what he presents as the cascading regional success of Castro’s influence model: “This formula worked in 1998 in Venezuela with the election of Hugo Chavez, the (São Paulo Forum’s) first triumph and a dictator who went on to use his country’s oil wealth to keep Castro’s Cuba afloat.” Lula was elected in Brazil in 2003; Evo Morales in Bolivia in 2005; Rafael Correa in Ecuador and Manuel Zelaya in Honduras in 2006; and Ollanta Humala in Peru in 2011 — “all Marxists,” the report says, who “obscured their ideology and ran as reformists,” and all São Paulo Forum participants.

Taken together, the report advances a unifying thesis: social unrest, street violence, and narco-terror cannot be understood as separate problems. They are instruments — in this view — of an intelligence-led revolutionary strategy refined over six decades, updated for the age of social media and protest politics, and funded for years by Venezuela’s oil.

That thesis also reads as a political finger to the wind — one that seems to match the rhetoric coming from the White House now: that the Trump administration’s Venezuela operation is not the end of a campaign, but the opening move in a broader rollback of Marxist-aligned regimes.

What the report does not do — and cannot do, on its own — is prove a single controlling hand behind every riot, protest, or crime wave in the United States since 2020. It assembles a narrative from history, open sources, and United States government statements, then asks readers to see continuity.

Tyler Durden Wed, 01/14/2026 - 18:30

Liberal Think Tank Urges Democrats To Ditch 'Abolish ICE' Rhetoric Ahead Of Midterms

Liberal Think Tank Urges Democrats To Ditch 'Abolish ICE' Rhetoric Ahead Of Midterms

A center-left think tank is urging Democrats to abandon the "Abolish ICE" rallying cry, warning that the slogan threatens to sabotage any chance at immigration enforcement reform while playing directly into Republican hands.

Demonstrators gather in Minneapolis on January 7, 2026 after an ICE agent shot and killed Renee Nicole Good.

Third Way released a memo on Tuesday responding to a surge of progressive demands to eliminate Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) following the fatal shooting of 37-year-old anti-ICE activist Renee Nicole Good by an ICE agent in Minneapolis after she attempted to run the agent over with her vehicle. 

While the memo acknowledges that many Democrats see the Trump administration's immigration policies as excessive and lawless, it also warns that frustration cannot justify scrapping enforcement altogether. 

The group argues that Democrats need to distinguish between reforming abusive practices and destroying the institution responsible for upholding immigration law.

“Moments like this can and should provoke anger and demands for dramatic action,” the memo explains. “In the wake of Good’s death and a growing number of disturbing immigration enforcement incidents, calls to abolish ICE have once again surged on the left. The impulse is emotional. The slogan is simple. But politically, it is lethal.”

The memo, authored by Sarah Pierce and Lanae Erickson, warns the Democratic Party that calls to abolish ICE “risks squandering one of the clearest opportunities in years to secure meaningful reform of immigration enforcement—while handing Republicans exactly the fight they want.”

The memo insists that “The goal is not to eliminate enforcement. It is to ensure enforcement is lawful, targeted, and worthy of public trust.”

The think tank even drew a direct parallel to the 2020 "defund the police" movement, which became toxic within the Democratic Party and likely cost them some seats in multiple cycles

Democrats have seen this movie before with calls to “defund the police” after lethal, law enforcement abuses that stoked racial tensions. We know how this movie ends.

Calls to abolish ICE follow the same script. It would be a tragedy built upon a tragedy if Democratic overreach allowed the inexcusable killing of Renee Good at the hands of ICE to be used to the advantage of Donald Trump and a Republican Party that is sympathetic to its excesses. Republicans understand this. They have deployed the “Abolish ICE” phrase to their advantage before and will use it as a political lifeline again.

It’s hard to argue that progressive slogans that sound anti-law enforcement don’t cost Democrats politically and shut down space for substantive policy change. And the think tank's argument rests on a pragmatic political calculation based on the most recent national election. Voters responded to what they perceived as weak enforcement under President Biden. 

What Third Way misses is that Trump is following through on his campaign promise to launch the "largest deportation program in American history" if elected. They see an opening for Democrats to stake out the middle ground, focused on accountability and restraint, rather than abolishing the agency.

"The lesson is clear: when the debate sinks into polarizing slogans that read as anti-law or anti-safety, space for practical reform disappears," the memo warns.

But what we’re seeing nationwide reflects a party with no interest in the middle ground. Blue states and cities have declared themselves sanctuaries for illegal immigrants, and local leaders are actively pushing for ICE to leave their jurisdictions, not tone down their activities. 

"Immigration laws are meaningless if they are not enforced," Third Way argues. "And they can be enforced in ways that protect public safety, respect legal norms, and uphold civil liberties. Voters understand this."

While voters get it, Democrats in Washington, D.C., do not.

But not everyone in the party is on board. Rep. Ayanna Pressley (D-Mass.) recently reiterated her position that ICE should be abolished, not reformed.

 Speaking on MSNOW this week, Pressley made it clear she doesn’t believe ICE should exist.

"I will continue to demand an independent and thorough investigation, continue to call on Congress in this moment to use appropriations and the power of the purse to rein in ICE," Pressley said. "Again, I believe it should be abolished. We need public hearings and accountability."

It’s doubtful Democrats will shift toward a more moderate stance on immigration enforcement. Democrats have clearly signaled that their priority is to resist Trump at every turn, not to compromise.

Tyler Durden Wed, 01/14/2026 - 18:10

Obamacare Enrollment Trails 2025 By Less Than Expected

Obamacare Enrollment Trails 2025 By Less Than Expected

Authored by Lawrence Wilson via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

Plan selections in the Affordable Care Act Marketplace were 3.5 percent behind 2025’s number with two weeks left in open enrollment, but the drop-off has not been as severe as some analysts predicted.

An Affordable Care Act sign sits in front of an insurance agency in Miami on Nov. 12, 2025. Joe Raedle/Getty Images

Some 22.8 million people had selected a plan by Jan. 3, about 830,000 fewer than at the same point in 2025. The program, popularly known as Obamacare, appears on track for its second-highest enrollment ever.

The open enrollment period began on Nov. 1, 2025, and ends on Jan. 15 in most states. During open enrollment, anyone can sign up for Obamacare. Outside that period, only those who report a qualifying life event such as a birth, divorce, or job change can enroll.

The decline for 2026, if it continues through the final weeks of open enrollment, will mark the first drop in participation since 2020.

Subsidies Boosted Enrollment

Since its inception, Obamacare enrollments started slower than predicted, taking three years to reach 12.7 million in 2016. From there, enrollment decreased by about 10 percent over four years.

Enrollment was bolstered by enhanced subsidies starting in 2021, more than doubling to 23.4 million by 2025.

The scheduled expiration of the enhanced subsidies in December 2025 sparked heated debate in Congress on the affordability of the program without them.

Congressional Democrats sought to make the enhanced subsidies permanent. That effort failed to advance in the Senate despite Democrats’ willingness to withhold federal government funding throughout the fall in an attempt to force negotiations.

The enhanced subsidies were implemented in 2021 as a two-year measure to ensure the affordability of health coverage during the COVID-19 pandemic era. They were later extended through 2025.

Health insurers judged that middle-class Americans who had opted into Obamacare in recent years would opt out again when the subsidies expired, dramatically changing the risk profile of remaining enrollees and shifting it toward those with chronic conditions or higher medical needs.

In response, insurers raised premiums by an average of 27 percent, according to data from health policy research group KFF.

Drop Less Than Predicted

Many observers predicted a huge drop in enrollment in 2026 based on both the decrease in subsidies and the increase in premium costs.

Jason Levitis, senior fellow at Urban Institute, told senators in November that 4.8 million people would lose health coverage in 2026 if the enhanced subsidies expired, based on a report from his organization.

The expiration of the subsidies would “leave millions uninsured or forced to make impossible choices,” according to the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities.

Although the initial 3.5 percent drop of 830,000 enrollees is significant, it does not approach those predictions.

At 22.8 million enrollees, the 2026 figure is 12 percent ahead of 2024 and 43 percent ahead of 2023.

Over the past four years, the number of plan selections increased by an average of 3.7 percent during the final two weeks of open enrollment. In 2025, the increase was 2.4 percent.

On the current track, the number of 2026 plan selections would be the second-highest ever.

Further Decline Likely

Yet some analysts say there will be a further drop after open enrollment closes.

“While we do eventually expect to see declines in Marketplace enrollment, following the expiration of the enhanced premium tax credits at the end of 2025, it is too soon to tell how much it will change,” said Jared Ortaliza, a policy analyst at KFF studying the Affordable Care Act.

The data available now indicate marketplace plan selections, which become “effectuated” enrollments when consumers begin paying premiums.

The vast majority of 2026 plan selections so far—20 million—are 2025 customers who were automatically reenrolled in the plan, according to the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services.

Those automatic plan selections do not always become premium-paying enrollees, according to Ortaliza.

“The extent of [Affordable Care Act] enrollment changes likely won’t be known until this summer, when effectuated enrollment data are typically released,” he said.

In 2025, the number of effectuated enrollments was about 4 percent less than the number of plan selections.

Brian Blase, president of Paragon Health Institute, theorized that much of the decline in plan selection, and a likely further decline in effectuated enrollments, is attributable to improper or fraudulent enrollments.

“The decline in enrollment from ’25 to ’26 means that some of the fraudulent enrollment exited the market,” Blase wrote on social media.

Blase estimated that about 5 million enrollments in 2024 and 6.4 million in 2025 were improper, with many being fraudulently enrolled in plans with $0 premiums. He said many will disappear as people do not effectuate coverage, which involves paying a premium.

“This means that people who are unaware of their enrollment, in other coverage, or ‘fake’ people will not pay their share of the premium and should (assuming insurers follow the rules) be removed,” Blase wrote.

An effort to reinstate the enhanced subsidies is ongoing in Congress.

Open enrollment in Kentucky and Maine closes on Jan. 16 and in Massachusetts on Jan. 23. Open enrollment closes in California, New Jersey, New York, Rhode Island, Washington state, and Washington on Jan. 31.

Tyler Durden Wed, 01/14/2026 - 17:30

Is It Time To Realign State Borders?

Is It Time To Realign State Borders?

Authored by John Kudla via American Thinker,

Let’s pretend you are a liberal living in a red state.  If you feel aggrieved about the condition of the world and believe that conservatives are to blame, you can find a few like-minded souls, print up some signs covered in half-clever phrases, and go protest.  In most cases, unless you chain yourself to a railing on the courthouse steps or attack the police, you will usually be ignored.

Image: Don Hankins via Flickr, CC BY 2.0 

On the flip side, let’s pretend you are a conservative living in a deep blue state.  If you don’t like the school policy, E.V. mandates, high electricity prices, or restrictive gun laws, and you dare to complain, not only will you not be ignored, but you might be harassed, shunned, or canceled.  Your solution to the hard blue insanity is a four-letter word: move.

Now let’s pretend you live in a state with a blue megalopolis somewhere over the horizon, but you don’t want to move.  Let’s also pretend you have lived in your community all of your life and have roots there — a job or a farm or a business that would be difficult to replicate somewhere else.  Why should you suffer because once upon a midnight dreary, councilors to a long dead king or a few drunk senators drew a line on a map that ignored rational boundaries?

Generally speaking, I don’t have a problem with people living the way they want to.  That is called freedom.  However, I object to some of our more right-leaning or left-leaning citizens forcing their ideas on everyone else, then treating those who disagree with them as second-class citizens.  In some cases, this has prompted states to heavily gerrymander congressional districts, which disenfranchises both liberal and conservative voters.  One solution is to adjust state boundaries to more adequately reflect local political values.

Ever since the founding of the republic, various groups and political movements have sought to redraw state boundaries.  Some have been successful.  Maine was originally part of Massachusetts, and the states of Kentucky and West Virginia were created from land originally part of Virginia.  Other partitions to existing boundaries have been suggested, but none has been adopted.  The reason is that the Constitution requires both the blessings of the partitioned state and the U.S. Congress.

Ask yourself a simple question.  Why would any state governor or legislature willingly give up territory if it is not forced to?  The serfs — excuse me, taxpayers — there help balance the state budget.  How they feel about their lives or the number of potholes in their roads is secondary to ensuring that state budgets are met and the state programs, even those for non-citizens, continue.

Despite the obstacles, secession movements continue.  Let’s look at three of the more recent secession ideas.

In 2014, residents of western Maryland, reportedly unhappy with taxes and gun control policy, started signing petitions to secede from Maryland and form a new state.  Later in 2021, Republican lawmakers in Allegany, Garrett, and Washington counties in Maryland sent a letter to the West Virginia legislature asking if the Mountain State would be willing to annex them.

The Maryland panhandle, an artifact of English colonial land grants, is a mountainous area more similar to West Virginia than the rest of Maryland.  The three counties have a combined population of just over a quarter of a quarter million.  That is probably not enough to take a congressional seat from Maryland or give one to West Virginia.  Will it change the U.S. political structure if these counties are allowed to switch states?  Not really.

The state of Oregon is divided almost in half by the Cascade Mountain Range.  The majority of the population lives on the western or Pacific Coast side of the mountains, either in the city of Portland or towns in the Willamette Valley.  In 2021, five counties in eastern Oregon, unhappy with the liberal state government, voted to take steps to secede from Oregon and join Idaho.

By 2024, a total of thirteen Oregon counties had voted to join Idaho.  The population in these counties is roughly 240,000, or about 5.5% of Oregon’s population — again, probably not enough to change the number of congressional seats between the states.

A third secession movement is active in Illinois.  Since 2011, more than one attempt has been made to separate the city of Chicago from the rest of Illinois or individual counties from the state.  The issue here is the dominance of Chicago and Chicago politics over the rest of Illinois.  As of 2024, 33 counties had voted to secede, about a third of the state’s counties.

In 2025, lawmakers in Indiana discussed annexing those counties, although only twenty-seven of them are contiguous with the Indiana border.  The others are on the western side of Illinois and would be a better fit with Missouri.  The twenty-seven counties represent nearly half a million residents.  This would almost certainly take a congressional seat from Illinois and add one to Indiana.

Besides liberal political values, another reason people are moving from blue states or seeking to join red states is that blue states typically have higher tax burdens than red states.  Call it an issue of affordability. 

There is an easy way to check this.  Let’s take the median income in the U.S., which was roughly $84,000 in 2024, multiply it by the average tax burden in the blue state of origin, do the same for the red state destination, and then subtract the two numbers.

The following results are based on a combination of income taxes, property taxes, and sales taxes.  If the Oregon counties join Idaho, residents earning $84,000 would save about $250 per year, or about 0.3 percent of their income.  If the Illinois counties join Indiana, their residents would save over $750 per year or about 0.9 percent of their income.  And if the three Maryland counties joined West Virginia, residents there would save about $924 per year or about 1.1 percent of their income.  Remember, these are ballpark numbers and will change depending on income and other individual circumstances.

As the country approaches the 250th anniversary of its founding, perhaps it is time to consider a constitutional amendment to facilitate changes to state boundaries.  After all, most of our state boundaries were arbitrary to begin with.

Counties wishing to become a separate state would have to follow the rules for statehood.  Imagine Chicago as the 51st state, along with New York City plus Long Island as the 52nd.  Upstate New York and downstate Illinois could then breathe a sigh of relief.

Until then, you can still move.

On a similar note, I hear the Canadian province of Alberta is thinking about leaving Canada.  Maybe Trump can talk the Canadians into a straight-up swap of Alberta for Minnesota.  It couldn’t hurt to try.

Tyler Durden Wed, 01/14/2026 - 16:30

Need To Escape Socialism? Come To Florida!

Need To Escape Socialism? Come To Florida!

Authored by Jeffrey Folks via American Thinker,

The difference between red and blue states is not just a matter of degree; it is a qualitative difference based on the loss of freedom in blue states and an entirely different attitude in the red states.  The best example is the contrast between what now exists in New York and Florida.  Whereas New York, especially New York City, is slipping into a socialist nightmare, Floridians are living the dream.  In New York, freedom is constrained by high taxes and regulations, and things are only getting worse.  In Florida, taxes are low and getting lower, and the sun almost always shines.

Image: Donkey Hotey via Flickr, CC BY 2.0.

Florida voters understand the importance of limited government, and they have created a well governed, fiscally sound state.  Eliminating the state income tax in its entirety was only the beginning: Now there is movement toward lowering property taxes or eliminating them altogether, which would benefit nearly everyone in the state.

Gov. Ron DeSantis is perhaps the biggest supporter of property tax reform.  The governor proposed eliminating property taxes for all Floridians in his 2025 State of the State address, in which he said forcing citizens to pay property taxes for life is like “renting one’s property from the government.”  The governor’s proposal would apply to all property, including commercial and rental property.  There is widespread support for some form of property tax relief, but the devil is in the details.

An interim plan to rebate approximately $1,000 to owners of primary residences was proposed in March 2025.  In response, Senate Bill 7034 was introduced to create a legislative commission to study the feasibility of eliminating all or part of the state’s property taxes and with the likelihood of a state constitutional amendment to appear on the 2026 ballot.  Other legislative proposals include an increase in the state’s homestead exemption (currently totaling $50,000 for the primary residence), a tax exemption of $100,000 on all types of property, or a reduction in the state’s sales tax.  Republican lawmakers generally support some form of tax relief, whereas Democrats oppose it, but since Republicans outnumber Democrats by 84 to 33 in the state House and 27 to 11 in the Senate, it seems likely that some form of tax reform will become law.

Meanwhile, states like California and New York are moving the opposite direction.  The marginal income tax rate in California is 12.3%, and this on top of state property taxes, sales taxes of 7.25%, and numerous other local taxes and fees.

As for New York, the statewide income tax is a marginal 10.9% (14.78% for high earners in New York City), with state and local sales taxes as high as 8.875%, property tax rates averaging more than twice those in California, and numerous other state and local taxes and fees (including a ludicrous $9 “congestion zone” fee for entering lower Manhattan).  On top of this, New York is one of a handful of states that still charges a death tax, with a marginal rate of 16% on qualifying estates, and this on top of the marginal federal estate tax of 45%.

Mayor Mamdani has vowed to raise corporate taxes from 8.85% to 11.5% and to impose a 2% surcharge on those earning over one million, on top of existing taxes.  According to the Cato Institute, “the income-tax increase would tempt high earning New Yorkers to relocate to Long Island and the lower Hudson Valley, where they can still be close to the city,” if not out of state altogether.

To recap, Floridians pay a total of 6% in state taxes and average property tax rates that are already half of what they are in New York and may be further lowered in 2026 or 2027.  Adding it up, affluent New Yorkers pay marginal rates of at least 36% (including the estate tax) or nearly 40% in New York City — and all of this on top of federal income and estate taxes.  There is not much left for individuals, and this level of taxation is an assault on personal liberty.  There’s not much difference between communism, where the state owns everything, and an American city where government takes 80%.

One should also note that the public debt ratio in New York is already 442%, while California has twice as much debt in absolute terms ($500 billion).  Under Gov. DeSantis, Florida’s debt ratio is 2.6%, a 25-year low.

Clearly, New York and California are moving in the wrong direction, whereas Florida is moving very much in the right direction, and this because Florida is a well run conservative state filled with well informed voters.  What will be the effect of these continuing high and potentially higher taxes in blue states?  Migration of wealthy and middle-class residents, and it’s already happening.  Affluent citizens are leaving New York “in a steady stream.”  Between 2019 and 2020 alone, nearly 10% of high earners left New York City.  More recently, the exodus has continued.

California is experiencing its own outward migration of wealthy and middle-class residents, and not merely for tax reasons.  California ranks 6th in the nation for “high violent crime” and 8th for property crime.  The cost of living is the third highest in the U.S.  Homelessness is at a record high, with 24% of the nation’s homeless living in California.  And California’s public schools, once near the top, now come out well below average.

One could cite many other blue states, including Illinois, as evidence of liberal mismanagement, and other red states like Texas and Tennessee for proof of sound conservative governance.  The fact is that all human beings want much the same thing: safety, security, prosperity, and freedom (including freedom from government restrictions and high taxes).  Today in America, Florida offers that freedom.  New York and California do not.

In America, the red states are keeping the American Dream alive.  Personal liberty includes freedom from government confiscation of wealth, whether that confiscation takes the form of Soviet-style direct  confiscation or seizure through taxation.  Voters in New York and California have not learned the lesson that high taxes and regulation lower the quality of life and infringe on freedom.  Fortunately, we live in a country, unlike communist China or North Korea, where one can relocate freely to another state.  Freedom may be dying in New York, but the sun is still shining in Florida.

Jeffrey Folks is the author of many books and articles on American culture, most recently Heartland of the Imagination (2011).

Tyler Durden Wed, 01/14/2026 - 15:40

Trump Appears To De-Escalate Iran Rhetoric, 'Killing Has Stopped' - Oil Tumbles

Trump Appears To De-Escalate Iran Rhetoric, 'Killing Has Stopped' - Oil Tumbles

There are reports that President Trump is listening to the non-interventionists in his cabinet, as he says Wednesday afternoon he's been told that the killing in Iran is stopping, and with no plan for executions. WTI futures immediately dropped on the newswires: 

  • WTI fell from USD 62.30 to lows of 59.80/bbl over 7 minutes.
  • Brent fell from 66.80 to 64.20 over the same time frame.
  • With Trump noting Iran has no plans for executions, it drastically reduces the chances of the US attacking Iran, particularly a kinetic attack.
  • Expectations of an attack had been building today with reports suggesting it could happen within 24 hours, which saw crude gain throughout the session; several nations urged citizens to leave Iran.
  • S&P 500 ENERGY INDEX PARES GAINS AFTER TRUMP IRAN COMMENTS
  • Iran FM: There is calm, we are in full control, Fox News reports

Via Bloomberg... Trump has an "out" and Iran strikes appear to be off:

President Donald Trump said he had been assured that Iran would stop killing protesters, in a signal he could hold off on a threatened military response to the repression of widespread demonstrations in the nation. “We’ve been told that the killing in Iran is stopping - it’s stopped,” Trump told reporters Wednesday in the Oval Office. “And there’s no plan for executions or an execution.”

The US president said he would be “very upset” if the information proved untrue and the violent crackdown continued. The comments come after Trump urged Iranians to continue protests against the government of Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and said he would “act accordingly” after being briefed on how many demonstrators have been killed. He posted on social media that “help is on the way” to those protesting in Iran.

Dangerous indicators there was (before this 'change of mind') about to be a strike?

The bulk of the US Navy's strike group has remained in the Caribbean Sea after the Trump-ordered Venezuela operation to oust Maduro, and there's as yet nothing to signal a new build-up of naval power in the Mediterranean or anywhere in the Central Command (CENTCOM) area of operations. However there are signs that logistics transport flights have increased.

However, there are other signs President Trump might be serious about an attack on Iran. Various news sources including Reuters is reporting Wednesday that the United States is pulling some staff out of major regional bases as a precaution amid rising tensions related to the Iran protests and a potential US military response.

via Associated Press

This comes after a senior Iranian official earlier stated that Tehran has warned neighboring countries hosting US forces that American bases would be targeted if Washington launched strikes.

Reuters writes, "Earlier today, some personnel were advised to leave the US military's Al Udeid Air Base in Qatar by this evening. Al Udeid is the Middle East’s largest US base, housing around 10,000 troops. Ahead of the US airstrikes on Iran in June some personnel were moved off US bases in the Middle East."

In the last instance where Iran faced attack by the US and Israel, Iran launched ballistic missiles at Al Udeid Air Base outside Doha. All or most were intercepted, with no reports of troop casualties. This attack occurred on June 23, one day after the US struck three Iranian nuclear facilities with deep penetrating bunker-buster bombs.

The aforementioned warning from a senior Iranian official stated as follows: "Tehran has told regional countries, from Saudi Arabia and the UAE to Turkey, that US bases in those countries will be attacked if the US targets Iran."

While the week started with talk of some kind of dialogue between Washington and Tehran toward de-escalation, Trump quickly changed his mind, and by Tuesday said he cancelled all meetings with Iranian officials, citing the brutal crackdown on protesters. He wrote on Truth Social that "help is on its way" for Iranians.

"Iranian Patriots, KEEP PROTESTING - TAKE OVER YOUR INSTITUTIONS!!! Save the names of the killers and abusers. They will pay a big price," Trump wrote.

"I have cancelled all meetings with Iranian Officials until the senseless killing of protesters STOPS. HELP IS ON ITS WAY. MIGA [Make Iran Great Again]!!!" he added.

However, there's ample evidence that many dozens of security personnel have been killed and wounded as well. Clearly in many locales rioters have deadly weapons, and Tehran says it is facing the beginnings of a foreign backed terror operation and insurgency.

But it should be obvious by now that organizations like the CIA, MI6, and Mossad are constantly looking for ways to take advantage of the situation and destabilize the country, ripening it for regime change. Trump has just dodged another interventionist disaster in the Middle East by choosing not to pull the trigger.

Tyler Durden Wed, 01/14/2026 - 15:26

"Everything's On The Table": JPM CFO Signals Possible Fight With Trump Over Credit Card Rate Cap

"Everything's On The Table": JPM CFO Signals Possible Fight With Trump Over Credit Card Rate Cap

Wall Street has benefited greatly from the Trump administration's economic policies and "Make America Great Again" agenda and has largely been supportive of the president. That relationship abruptly fractured last Friday when the president called for a one-year cap on credit card interest rates at 10%.

All it took was President Trump's Truth Social post prioritizing working-class Americans over Wall Street, in which the president said, "AFFORDABILITY! Effective January 20, 2026, I, as President of the United States, am calling for a one-year cap on credit card interest rates of 10%," to put big bank CEOs on notice, with some now preparing to mount a fight against the White House.

Leading that charge appears to be JPMorgan Chase CFO Jeremy Barnum, who signaled during an earnings call on Tuesday that banks could challenge Trump's move to cap credit card interest rates for a year.

"If you wind up with weakly supported directives to radically change our business that aren't justified, you have to assume that everything's on the table," Barnum told analysts following JPMorgan's fourth-quarter earnings report (read here). "We owe that to shareholders."

Barnum argued that a rate cap would backfire by shrinking credit availability rather than lowering borrowing costs, ultimately hurting consumers, spending, and the broader economy. His warning echoed concerns raised earlier this week by UBS analysts Erika Najarian and Tim Chiodo.

"Our belief is that actions like this will have the exact opposite consequence to what the administration wants for consumers," Barnum said. "Instead of lowering the price of credit, we'll simply reduce the supply of credit, and that will be bad for everyone: consumers, the wider economy, and yes, at the margin, for us."

Additional color via X user The Transcript ...

The average U.S. credit card APR is about 20%, according to the latest data from Bankrate. Rates are much higher for subprime and store cards.

A stalled bill proposed by Josh Hawley and Bernie Sanders would have imposed a 10% cap for 5 years, versus Trump's 1-year cap. Consumer-heavy industries beyond banking warned of ripple effects of less credit in the system, such as Delta Air Lines.

House Speaker Mike Johnson urged caution, warning that efforts to lower costs could have unintended consequences: "We have a lot of work to go [on] consensus around it, but you got to be very careful as we go forward in that in our zeal to bring down costs ... you don't want to have negative secondary effects."

Read more about why UBS analysts say Trump's 10% one-year cap on credit card interest rates is "unlikely" here.

Trump's incoming fight with big banks on capping credit card rates is not unexpected given his administration's massive push for affordability this year.

Tyler Durden Wed, 01/14/2026 - 15:15

Minnesota Stealing: Reason To Rethink Government Welfare

Minnesota Stealing: Reason To Rethink Government Welfare

Authored by Larry Elder via The Epoch Times,

As for the estimated $8 billion in government (taxpayer) money stolen by crooks in Minnesota, people demand answers to many questions.

But the 800-pound elephant/question goes unasked: Why is government in the business of welfare in the first place?

Where in the Constitution does it permit the federal government to extract money from taxpayers for charity?

Years ago, I worked full time one summer as a “loaned executive” for the United Way of Cleveland. My job was to meet with CEOs of companies, tell them the story of the United Way and hopefully arrange for me to make a presentation to the company’s employees, take questions and then ask for donations.

Through this process, the United Way raised and donated money to other nonprofits involved in community activities such as preschooling, counseling “at-risk” youths, after-school academic programs, care for the sick and elderly and youth sports programs, among other local initiatives. There was a rigorous application process before the nonprofit could receive any money. There was regular and rigorous follow-up to make sure the money was spent properly and efficiently based on previously agreed-on criteria. If, after receiving funds, the nonprofit did not meet these goals, it lost its funding.

The reason for the rigorous review and follow-up was simple. Donors are more likely to give if they feel their money is being spent effectively to achieve the promised result. In fact, “How do I know my money will be spent properly?” was my most frequently asked question.

Because so many worked for the United Way as volunteers, as I did, nearly 90 percent to 95 percent of each dollar donated reached the intended beneficiaries. Government welfare programs, riddled with waste, fraud and abuse, do not come close to this level of efficiency.

Government welfare represents what economist Milton Friedman called the least efficient, least effective and most wasteful spending: somebody else’s money on somebody else. Through most of our country’s history, charity was people to people—house of worship to people, nonprofit to people—not government to people.

James Madison, known as the Father of the Constitution, opposed a 1794 bill that would appropriate $15,000 for French refugees. “I cannot undertake to lay my finger on that article of the Constitution which granted a right to Congress of expending, on objects of benevolence, the money of their constituents,” Madison said.

In 1831, Madison said: “With respect to the words ‘general welfare,’ I have always regarded them as qualified by the detail of powers (enumerated in the Constitution) connected with them. To take them in a literal and unlimited sense would be a metamorphosis of the Constitution into a character which there is a host of proofs was not contemplated by its creators.”

Frenchman Alexis de Tocqueville, who traveled to America in the 1830s, marveled at the large number of volunteer “mutual aid societies.” Tocqueville wrote: “Americans of all ages, all conditions, all minds constantly unite. ... Americans use associations to give fetes, to found seminaries, to build inns, to raise churches, to distribute books, to send missionaries to the antipodes; in this manner they create hospitals, prisons, schools. Finally, if it is a question of bringing to light a truth or developing a sentiment with the support of a great example, they associate.”

There is a question of whether no-questions-asked public welfare induces dependency and negatively affects the work ethic. A Center for Immigration Studies profile of Somalis in Minnesota found nearly half of working-age Somali adults who have lived In American more than 10 years cannot speak English “very well.”

You cannot watch television without seeing a pitch for money for wounded soldiers, for police officers and firefighters wounded in the line of duty, for a children’s hospital that does not charge patients, for cats and dogs in need of rescue and so on. Imagine the solicitations in a world where government got out of the business of welfare and allowed its citizens, the most generous in the world, to step in and step up.

Private welfare, compared to public welfare, is less likely to create a sense of entitlement, will get a bigger bang for a buck and is less dependency-inducing than no-questions-asked public welfare.

Tyler Durden Wed, 01/14/2026 - 14:50

Nuclear Reactors On The Moon By 2030

Nuclear Reactors On The Moon By 2030

First it was data centers in space. Now it's nuclear reactors on the moon.

The global space race is heating up again, but it’s more than about just reaching the moon. International partners are teaming up to develop and establish remote posts on the moon utilizing nuclear reactors as the primary energy supply. The Russians are teaming up with the Chinese, the French are teaming up with the Italians, and the Americans are teaming up with… well, more Americans.

The US announced an intention to develop lunar nuclear reactors last summer along with a similar announcement from China and Russia. This was eventually followed up with an executive order titled Ensuring American Space Superiority which explicitly directed the initial establishment of a permanent lunar outpost, including the launch of a lunar reactor, by 2030.

The latest development involves the DOE and NASA signing an MOU to collaborate on deploying reactors on the moon. Instead of pairing up with an international ally in the same way other countries have, the US intends to accomplish this new mission on its own.

“History shows that when American science and innovation come together, from the Manhattan Project to the Apollo Mission, our nation leads the world to reach new frontiers once thought impossible,” said U.S. Secretary of Energy Chris Wright. “This agreement continues that legacy.”

It’s important to note that this is not the first time moon reactors have been discussed. Years ago, NASA launched a fission surface power project with the target of deploying a 40 kW reactor on the moon. The concept introduces unique challenges: due to the low gravity, the fluids used for coolants won’t behave exactly as they do on earth, and surface temperature swings on the moon introduce additional problems on top of that.

Premium subs are already well informed on the potential participants in the new space race, but this latest venture for deploying reactor technology on the lunar surface introduces new potential beneficiaries.

The earlier moon reactor program incorporated six major participants organized into three teams: Lockheed Martin paired with BWXT, Westinghouse joined Aerojet Rocketdyne, and X-energy teamed up with Intuitive Machines.

Given the environment on the moon, the reactor is most likely to be a high-temperature, gas-cooled design, limiting the field of possible reactor developers. There are other novel concepts being developed by companies like Antares Industries, but here are some potential public market participants to consider: BWXT, Westinghouse (Cameco), Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman, Boeing, Nano Nuclear, and Terra Innovatum.

Tyler Durden Wed, 01/14/2026 - 14:10

In Some Minnesota Schools, The Focus Is Reading, Writing, And Resistance

In Some Minnesota Schools, The Focus Is Reading, Writing, And Resistance

Authored by Aaron Gifford via The Epoch Times,

In the Twin Cities, schools play a key role in fostering a culture where resistance and anti-authoritarianism thrive.

A Minneapolis charter school located near where 37-year-old Renee Nicole Good was shot and killed last week by an Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agent is centered on social justice and has a long history of left-wing political activism, according to its website.

“We integrate social justice into every grade level, telling the stories of the people, not the people in power, and helping students understand history and their role in making the world a better place,” says the website for Southside Family Charter School.

The ongoing ICE protests coincide with a new statewide mandate requiring ethnic studies, which the state Department of Education defines as analyzing ways in which “race and racism have been and continue to be social, cultural, and political forces, and the connection of race to the stratification of other groups.”

Around the time of the Black Lives Matter protests in 2020, several schools in Minneapolis and St. Paul took it upon themselves to require one high school semester of ethnic studies courses before it became a state mandate.

The ethnic studies offerings in the Minneapolis district currently include a course on race and identity, and “culturally sustaining” African American, Chicanx/Latinx, American Indian, Asian American, Hmong, and Somali studies, according to its website.

Moreover, private schools and taxpayer-funded charters like Southside attract families seeking more progressive social justice-related curriculum than the public schools offer.

“Activist-bent parents chose the school knowing what they’re going to get,” Katherine Kersten, a senior fellow at the Minnesota-based Center of the American Experiment think tank and policy center. “Kids are being told to study left-wing activism and view the activists as models to follow.”

Other Twin City area schools that prioritize social justice beyond the level of traditional public schools include the St. Paul School of Northern Lights, the Angela Day School for Liberation and Progressive Education, and the Prairie Creek Community School.

Kersten said “identity and resistance” are two main pillars of the ethnic studies mandate. Approved instruction for stand-alone high school ethnic studies courses that must be implemented ahead of the fall semester—in addition to the embedded requirement for all other subject areas in K–12, as they are reviewed and then updated periodically—most likely include definitions and examples of identity and resistance, she said.

University of Minnesota’s Center for Race, Indigeneity, Disability, Gender, and Sexuality Studies developed a free curriculum for the state mandate endorsed by teachers unions and state officials. Its middle school instructional materials, “Protest Art & the Movement for Black Life,” require students to learn about the 13 guiding principles of the Black Lives Matter movement, create protest art “for a cause of their choice,” and “describe how mural artists transformed the landscape of Minneapolis during the 2020 Uprising,” according to the center’s webpage.

This kind of classroom rhetoric only emboldens anti-authoritarian sentiment in the community, even if protesters don’t fully understand their cause, Kersten said.

“We’ve seen people crossing the line, and destruction of property, and our elected leaders are encouraging this—[saying] that authority figures are racist and that this resistance is noble,” she said. “To have the state working with and relying on some of the most extreme, self-interested activists to create standards is so egregious.”

Kersten’s organization is urging public school districts across Minnesota to consider less extreme instructional materials that are endorsed by nonpartisan academic institutions and will still meet the state requirements, including 1776 Unites and the Foundation Against Intolerance and Racism (FAIR), both of which oppose identity politics.

The Center for the American Experiment recently presented its suggested instructional materials to Anoka-Hennepin schools, the largest district in the state, and was greeted outside by a long line of protestors summoned from Minneapolis and St. Paul, Kersten said.

“Anyone who criticizes is automatically called a racist,” she said, adding that, beyond a few parents who took advantage of a state law that allows them to opt their child out of instructional materials they find objectionable, there has been very little pushback against Minnesota’s ideological education movement.

“It’s so damaging to celebrate these events as a great Civil Rights statement,” she said. “It’s important for schools to push back and make the case for reasonable academic learning.”

In social media posts last week, Rep. Buddy Carter (R-Ga.) called on the executive branch to revoke all federal funding to the Southside Family Charter School.

“This institution radicalizes students and pushes a left-wing agenda that demonizes ICE agents,” his Jan. 9 posts on Facebook and X said. “The federal government should not subsidize anti-American education.”

The Epoch Times reached out to the Southside Family Charter School, Gov. Tim Walz’s office, the Minnesota Department of Education, and the Minneapolis and St. Paul school districts. No responses were received in time for publication.

Tyler Durden Wed, 01/14/2026 - 13:55

Trump Freezes All Visa Processing For 75 Countries: The Full List

Trump Freezes All Visa Processing For 75 Countries: The Full List

The US government announced Wednesday it will pause or suspend immigrant visa issuance for 75 countries, with Iran among the countries listed, at a moment President Trump is said to be mulling some kind of US military intervention after two weeks of protests - but which largely seemed to have died down at this point.

The new visa pause order will take effect January 21, and will also impact Iraq, Russia, Afghanistan, Brazil, Egypt and Nigeria, and dozens of others.

"The State Department will use its long-standing authority to deem ineligible potential immigrants who would become a public charge on the United States and exploit the generosity of the American people," State Department spokesperson Tommy Piggott said in a statement. 

"Immigration from these 75 countries will be paused while the State Department reassess immigration processing procedures to prevent the entry of foreign nationals who would take welfare and public benefits." Somalia and Minnesota should of course come to mind in this context.

A State Dept memo "directs consular officers to refuse visas under existing law while the department reassesses screening and vetting procedures."

According to Fox News, the full list of countries includes the following in alphabetical order...

Afghanistan, Albania, Algeria, Antigua and Barbuda, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Bahamas, Bangladesh, Barbados, Belarus, Belize, Bhutan, Bosnia, Brazil, Burma, Cambodia, Cameroon, Cape Verde, Colombia, Cote d’Ivoire, Cuba, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Dominica, Egypt, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Fiji, Gambia, Georgia, Ghana, Grenada, Guatemala, Guinea, Haiti, Iran, Iraq, Jamaica, Jordan, Kazakhstan, Kosovo, Kuwait, Kyrgyzstan, Laos, Lebanon, Liberia, Libya, Macedonia, Moldova, Mongolia, Montenegro, Morocco, Nepal, Nicaragua, Nigeria, Pakistan, Republic of the Congo, Russia, Rwanda, Saint Kitts and Nevis, Saint Lucia, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Senegal, Sierra Leone, Somalia, South Sudan, Sudan, Syria, Tanzania, Thailand, Togo, Tunisia, Uganda, Uruguay, Uzbekistan and Yemen. 

Some of these countries have been focus of geopolitical headlines of late - such as Nigeria, Somalia, and Syria - all subject to bombings of military operations by US forces.

But it's unclear why some like the Bahamas, Georgia, or Modolva would make the list. Presumably this also impacts Americans who have married or gotten engaged to someone abroad, and where said US citizen wants to bring them to the United States. But it's unclear as yet whether there will be exceptions made for certain categories of visas.

Already, visa services at embassies abroad have been very slow moving under Trump, but this ensures what will be a likely permanent backlog.

Tyler Durden Wed, 01/14/2026 - 13:40

US Designates Chapters Of Muslim Brotherhood As Foreign Terrorist Organizations

US Designates Chapters Of Muslim Brotherhood As Foreign Terrorist Organizations

Authored by Jill McLaughlin via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

The Trump administration has followed through on its stated goal of designating three branches of the Muslim Brotherhood as terrorist organizations, sanctioning the groups and their members in accordance with President Donald Trump’s plan to strengthen national security.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio speaks during a press conference as President Donald Trump and Secretary of War Pete Hegseth listen at Mar-a-Lago club in Palm Beach, Fla., on Jan. 3, 2026. Joe Raedle/Getty Images

The Lebanese, Jordanian, and Egyptian chapters of the Muslim Brotherhood were designated by the U.S. State Department as foreign terrorist organizations on Jan. 13.

The designations are a first step in support of Trump’s November order that aims to eliminate chapters of the organization that pose security threats to the United States and its allies.

The group’s leader, Muhammad Fawzi Taqqosh, has also been named as a specially designated global terrorist.

The Department of the Treasury also named the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood and Jordanian Muslim Brotherhood as specially designated global terrorists for providing material support to the Hamas terrorist group.

“These designations reflect the opening actions of an ongoing, sustained effort to thwart Muslim Brotherhood chapters’ violence and destabilization wherever it occurs,” Secretary of State Marco Rubio said in a statement on Jan. 13. “The United States will use all available tools to deprive these Muslim Brotherhood chapters of the resources to engage in or support terrorism.”

The State Department designated the Lebanese branch a foreign terrorist organization, the most extreme label, which makes providing support to the group a criminal offense.

The Jordanian and Egyptian branches were listed by the Treasury as specially designated global terrorists for providing support to Hamas.

“The Muslim Brotherhood has inspired, nurtured, and funded terrorist groups like Hamas, that are direct threats to the safety and security of the American people and our allies,” said Under Secretary of the Treasury for Terrorist and Financial Intelligence John Hurley in a statement.

Following the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas attack in Israel, the Lebanese Muslim Brotherhood, also known as al-Jamaa al-Islamiyah, reactivated its al-Fajr Forces and launched rockets in coordination with Hamas and the Hezbollah terrorist group from Lebanon into northern Israel.

In March 2024, the Israel Defense Forces launched an attack against the Lebanese operatives who were preparing terrorist attacks against Israel, according to the State Department.

The Lebanese Army dismantled a covert military training camp in July 2025 that was used by the Lebanese Muslim Brotherhood and Hamas fighters. Under Taqqosh’s leadership, the brotherhood has pushed for a more formal partnership with Hezbollah and Hamas.

Jordanian demonstrators waving green Muslim Brotherhood flags and other banners shout anti-Israel slogans during a mass rally held outside the parliament building in Amman, Jordan, in this file photo. Khalil Mazraawi/AFP via Getty Images

Hamas, formed in 1988, is a self-described wing of the Muslim Brotherhood in the Palestinian territories and a designated specially designated global terrorist organization since 2001, according to the State Department.

The Muslim Brotherhood was formed in Egypt in the 1920s and was one of the most influential Islamist organizations in the world, mixing religious teaching with political activism and social welfare programs, according to the Council on Foreign Relations.

Trump considered the idea of a terrorist designation during his first term, supported by U.S. House Republicans on the National Security Committee. Florida and Texas designated the group as a terrorist organization this year.

Egypt, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, and Bahrain have also designated the Muslim Brotherhood as a terrorist organization.

Tyler Durden Wed, 01/14/2026 - 13:20

Disruptions Reported At Major US Cellular Carriers, Downdetector Shows

Disruptions Reported At Major US Cellular Carriers, Downdetector Shows

Downdetector, the website that tracks real-time outages and service disruptions across the internet, reported moments ago that users of Verizon, T-Mobile, AT&T, Verizon Fios, and U.S. Cellular are experiencing disruptions and outages that began within the last hour.

At a more granular level of the Verizon outage, reports indicate that outages and disruptions are being logged across the Washington-Baltimore region, New York, Chicago, Atlanta, Houston, and areas near Seattle.

Reports of AT&T outages and disruptions appear more widespread in the central US.

Reports of T-Mobile outages appear widespread as well.

This report is based solely on Downdetector data and has not yet been confirmed by the carriers.

*Story is developing...

Tyler Durden Wed, 01/14/2026 - 13:06

Crude Stocks Rise Most In Two Months As US Oil Production Finally Drops

Crude Stocks Rise Most In Two Months As US Oil Production Finally Drops

While oil prices keep rising on mounting geopolitical tensions in Iran, the production glut refuses to go away, and as today's DOE report showed, there was a material increase across almost all products, with the exception of Distillates which were flat. Of note, amid expectations for a modest crude draw, we saw a 3.4MM barrel increase, the largest since the start of November. 

Here is what the EIA reported in its weekly inventory report

  • Crude +3.391MM, Exp.-1.682MM
  • Gasoline +8.977MM, Exp. +2.0MM
  • Distillates -29K, Exp. -662K
  • Cushing +745K

Of note here is that while we saw a sizable build in most products, with Crude rising the most in two months, it was gasoline where the stocking was most notable: the nearly 9 million barrels added were the most since December 29, 2023.

Some more details:

Crude Build

  • Nationwide crude stockpiles rose to 422.4 million barrels. The weekly gain of about 3.4 million barrels is the largest build since early November. Stockpiles at Cushing, Oklahoma, continue to climb. The storage hub has seen a rise in inventories for the fourth consecutive week. Stocks now sit at about 23.6 million barrels, the highest since September.

Imports

  • The build in crude inventories can be partly explained by an increase in imports. They rose to the highest since November of 2024. Imports from the Middle East edged higher, driven by a 62% increase in the amount of crude arriving from Iraq. Inflows from Brazil, Mexico, Colombia and Ecuador all jumped.

Refinery Runs

  • Refinery runs have now risen in 9 of the past 10 weeks countrywide, inching closer to the highest since the pandemic. In the Midwest, refineries are processing the most crude on record on a seasonal basis. West Coast refinery runs are now at the highest level since late-September.

While Cushing draws reversed for a 4th consecutive week, stocks remain not too far from tank bottoms.

Yet there is some hope that US production is finally moderating: while US Crude production hovers near record highs despite the continuing decline in rig count, last week saw a notable drop in total production, dropping by 58K barrels to 13.753 million, the lowest since the end of October.

Despite the sizable build in crude stock, WTI is holding gains as attention remains glued to what happens in Iran next...

On the bright side, the broadly weaker trend on crude oil prices has dragged gas (pump) prices down to their lowest since May 2021...

While it's not exactly 'drill, baby, drill', it's certainly what Trump wanted (the question is, will the lower price push shale producers to cut production... and round and round we go).

Tyler Durden Wed, 01/14/2026 - 11:03

Are Central Bankers Willing To Truly Upset Markets So Trump Backs Off?

Are Central Bankers Willing To Truly Upset Markets So Trump Backs Off?

By Michael Every of Rabobank

Officially it’s 2,000, but reportedly as many as 12,000 Iranian protestors could have been killed by their own government over the past few days. While the West has seen none of the mass protests that the last two-plus years have been full of, President Trump told those on Iran’s streets to keep going and that “Help is coming,” adding if the government starts hanging those it’s arrested, matters will be even worse. What might this mean though? It’s unclear. The Wall Street Journal reports that US Gulf Allies, led by Saudi Arabia, have been lobbying the US not to get involved (as the Trump admin labelled three Muslim Brotherhood branches as terrorist organisations).

The intricacies of the Middle East defy the space available here (or on protesters’ placards), but alongside tensions in Yemen/South Yemen and Somalia/Somaliland, a key takeaway is that the Western assumption of a more moderate Saudi-led GCC is perhaps being called into question. Rather, it looks as if there is a Saudi-UAE split, with the former moving closer to Qatar, Turkey, and Pakistan as it loses fear of Iran as a regional hegemon and instead works with those it sees as able to fill that power vacuum who aren’t Israel (see ‘From partners to rivals: What the Saudi-UAE rupture means for Europeans’). That will matter hugely ahead, if so; and for now it’s wait and see on what the US will do in Iran.

That isn’t the only energy story, as two Russian tankers were hit by drones in the Black Sea; that’s as 70% of Kyiv’s power went down as Russia goes all out to try to plunge Ukraine into darkness. Europe is also going to redouble efforts to stop China and India buying Russian oil: how, without sanctions or Trump-style tariffs? (One asks, as the EU is now close to dropping tariffs on Chinese EVs in favor of a minimum price – which effectively means the EV is the same price for the consumer but the tariff flows to China instead of the EU. Realpolitik is hard for some.)

On Greenland and NATO, tensions remain high. Greenland’s PM said the territory chooses Denmark over the US, which Trump rejected; Russia trolled that Greenland might vote to join it, not the US; US senators introduced a bill to prevent the US from invading NATO territory; and France continued to lobby for the EU military aid package for Ukraine to only be spent on EU weapons – which they cannot provide in the volumes required, in the same way that the US underlines that they can’t actually provide adequate forces to cover Greenland.  

Meanwhile, help came for embattled Fed Chair Powell. Not the CPI print of 0.3% m-o-m and 2.7% y-o-y headline and 0.2% and 2.6% core, which frankly don’t matter much against the current backdrop. Rather, we saw ‘Central bankers of the world, unite!’ as the BIS, ECB, BoE, RBA, Riksbank, SNB, BCB, BoK, BoC, and the Norges Bank  --all institutionally opposed to unionization, "because markets" -- said they “Stand in full solidarity" with Fed Chair Powell, who is facing a possible criminal investigation by the DoJ. (Something that isn't new to one of those central bankers.) “The independence of central banks is a cornerstone of price, financial and economic stability in the interest of the citizens that we serve. It is therefore critical to preserve that independence, with full respect for the rule of law and democratic accountability," was their defiant collective message.

(Of course, this overlooks that their track record on those fronts is questionable, and that for most of global history we didn't have independent central banks and did fine - better than recently, in fact, if you look at post-WW2 growth and inflation.)

But where was the BoJ? That omission speaks volumes about realpolitik and a central bank with a balance sheet amounting to a terrifying % of GDP (as a snap February election looms, JPY falls, and the 5-year JGB yield just hit the highest since 2000: somebody can’t afford to annoy the US right now).

Where was the RBI, as India is close to trade deal with the EU, and German Chancellor just stated he wants to build deep economic and defense relationships with it.

Where was the PBoC, from the world's second largest economy and the largest in PPP terms? That obvious absence speaks volumes about how little the West grasps that its 'liberal world order’ doesn't speak for the world – and, increasingly, all liberals.

Where was this collective outrage when Bank of Poland Governor Glapinksi was being leaned on by his liberal government? Is Poland --which just overtook the UK in GDP per capita, and which will soon have the second most powerful conventional army in Europe at a time when that really matters-- 'just an EM'? Protests are variable, it seems.

On the specifics of the Powell case, the US DoJ stated, “None of this would have happened if they had just responded to our outreach,” which makes the case that the Fed doth protest too much. However, the FT claims Powell sent a letter to US senators with details of his Fed refurbishment project following his testimony, which makes the investigation look political. (At least this isn’t happening in South Korea, where the impeached former president now faces the death penalty for his recent actions.)

Yet in reality everyone is rallying round Powell, not Poland, because if the Fed is part of economic statecraft, not neoliberal global establishment monetary policy, then there isn't a neoliberal global establishment.

Free trade has gone – as Canada’s Carney walks a tightrope on a trip to Beijing to try to diversify away from the US, while Trump stated the USMCA is “irrelevant” during a Ford Motor factory tour. Free movement of people is going.

Free movement of capital is declining. The fiscal rules are being ripped up as fiscal dominance rules. And, as shown back in 2016's 'Thin Ice', if central bank cooperation collapses, it's game over. Realistically, what would the ECB and BoE, etc., do if the Fed was politicised under US neo-mercantilism?

Equally logical is the fact that the Fed is a vital part of any true Gramscian revolution, and would ideally be flipped well before the looming mid-term elections. Did you not notice Trump using an executive order to de facto institute MBS QE last week? Those are the real stakes.

Yet given Powell is gone in a few months anyway, what will this resistance achieve vs Trump that the slew of lawfare didn't in the run-up to the 2024 election? That’s as BlackRock's Rieder emerges as a new Fed Chair tip in the home stretch: is that the gamekeeper turning poacher or vice versa? Do central bankers really think Trump will retreat when called out? Or are they willing to truly upset markets so he backs off?

In short -- and unlike in Iran, where things are hard to call -- this looks like a battle that the establishment probably can't win. Indeed, while a brighter day might be on the horizon for the Iranian people, no help is coming for the liberal world order.

Tyler Durden Wed, 01/14/2026 - 10:30

FBI Raids WaPo Reporter's Home In Classified Docs Case

FBI Raids WaPo Reporter's Home In Classified Docs Case

The FBI executed a search warrant on the home of Washington Post reporter Hannah Natanson as part of a probe into "a government contractor accused of illegally retaining classified government materials," the paper announced Wednesday. 

Natanson, was at her Virginia home when the agency showed up with a warrant. According to the outlet, "law enforcement was investigating Aurelio Perez-Lugones, a system administrator in Maryland who has a top secret security clearance and has been accused of accessing and taking home classified intelligence reports that were found in his lunchbox and his basement." The journalist's home and devices were search. 

According to her X bio, Natanson covers "the Trump administration's reshaping of the government and its effects."

Perez-Lugones is a US citizen who was born in Miami and now resides in Laurel, Maryland according to the FBI's criminal complaint. He has been a government contractor since 2002 and holds top secret security clearance. 

According to the complaint, at least one document found in Pererz-Lugones' basement was related to national defense. WaPo reports that Natanson has been part of its most sensitive coverage in the 2nd Trump administration. She told WaPo that the FBI seized a phone and a Garmin watch. 

According to AG Pam Bondi: "his past week, at the request of the Department of War, the Department of Justice and FBI executed a search warrant at the home of a Washington Post journalist who was obtaining and reporting classified and illegally leaked information from a Pentagon contractor. " 

Developing...

Tyler Durden Wed, 01/14/2026 - 10:08

"Defining Moment": Saks Global Files For Bankruptcy After Botched Neiman Marcus Takeover

"Defining Moment": Saks Global Files For Bankruptcy After Botched Neiman Marcus Takeover

Luxury department store conglomerate Saks Global filed for bankruptcy protection late Tuesday night, in one of the largest US retail collapses since the Covid era and, among other things, what appears to be a casualty of the menacing K-shaped economy.

Saks Global has been weighed down by heavy debt following its $2.7 billion, debt-fuelled acquisition of Neiman Marcus and Bergdorf Goodman in 2024. Slowing luxury sales, a K-shaped economy, and dwindling cash levels led Saks to delay payments to suppliers, prompting some vendors to halt shipments or demand cash on delivery, which further pressured sales. The retailer missed a $100 million interest payment in December.

Despite the bankruptcy filing, Saks secured $1.75 billion in financing, including $1.5 billion from senior secured bondholders, and appointed former Neiman Marcus chief Geoffroy van Raemdonck as CEO. The restructuring will wipe out existing equity holders, including newer investors such as Amazon and Salesforce.

"This is a defining moment for Saks Global, and the path ahead presents a meaningful opportunity to strengthen the foundation of our business and position it for the future," said van Raemdonck, adding, "In close partnership with these newly appointed leaders and our colleagues across the organization, we will navigate this process together with a continued focus on serving our customers and luxury brands. I look forward to serving as CEO and continuing to transform the Company so that Saks Global continues to play a central role in shaping the future of luxury retail."

The future of the Saks Global empire will be much clearer in the weeks and months ahead as bankruptcy proceedings begin and new investors enter the picture. It's important to note that van Raemdonck is a luxury retail veteran who has played key leadership roles in Louis Vuitton and Ralph Lauren.

Saks' demise appears to stem from slowing luxury sales and the Neiman Marcus deal, as well as ...

"In a market where luxury brands are moving direct-to-consumer and shoppers expect personalization and speed, that (merger) was always going to fail," said Brittain Ladd, a strategy and supply-chain consultant at Florida-based Chang Robotics, who was quoted by Reuters.

In markets, the Goldman Luxury European Index (GSXELUXG), a sell-side benchmark tracking luxury heavyweights including LVMH, Hermès, Richemont, Burberry, Ferrari, and others, has traded largely sideways since 2022.

Morningstar analyst David Swartz recently noted, "Rich people are still buying ... just not so much at Saks."

Tyler Durden Wed, 01/14/2026 - 09:55

How Independent Is The Federal Reserve?

How Independent Is The Federal Reserve?

Authored by Jeffrey Tucker via The Epoch Times,

The Department of Justice has opened an investigation into cost overruns in the Federal Reserve’s renovation project, with particular focus on Fed Chairman Jerome Powell and his testimony to Congress in June 2025. The question is whether he perjured himself concerning what he knew and when.

Powell responded with a highly unusual video message to the public. He defended himself and further speculated that this investigation is merely a tactic to interfere with the Fed’s independence.

“The threat of criminal charges is a consequence of the Federal Reserve setting interest rates based on our best assessment of what will serve the public, rather than following the preferences of the president,” he said. “This is about whether the Fed will be able to continue to set interest rates based on evidence and economic conditions—or whether instead monetary policy will be directed by political pressure or intimidation.”

He speaks to a long-running dispute on the relationship between the Fed and the executive branch. The organizational chart of the federal government puts the central bank clearly under the authority of the president. That said, there is a long-running understanding that its operations would be politically independent and that presidents would not and could not interfere.

The courts have affirmed its independence in passing, but the status of the institution in constitutional law remains murky.

Powell’s certain supposition that this is not really about the renovation project might in fact be incorrect. In July 2025, Rep. Anna Paulina Luna (R-Fla.) referred Powell for criminal investigation over false testimony. Powell had denied to lawmakers that the renovation involved a “VIP dining room, premium marble, water features, and a roof terrace garden.”

But Luna found the plans submitted to the National Capital Planning Commission that clearly had all those features, requiring cost overruns of $600 million. Looking through the plans, the sheer opulence and scale are what stand out. Powell grants that costs have ballooned but blames unexpected discoveries of new needs and, ironically, inflation.

Contrary to Powell’s dismissals, this is actually serious. The subpoena is based on genuine grievances that Powell simply lied to Congress.

Independence is one thing, but spending $600 million without congressional authorization is another matter entirely.

In his statement, Powell said, “I have carried out my duties without political fear or favor, focused solely on our mandate of price stability and maximum employment.”

Here we have another problem. We have just lived through the second worst inflationary bout in a century of monetary policy. The great inflation of 2021–2024 reduced the overall purchasing power of the dollar by 25 percent to 30 percent for a broad index of goods and services. Some particulars show far higher price increases. You can probably think of examples in which the posted price has doubled since 2019.

In other words, this is not the most opportune time for Powell to cite the Fed’s dedication to price stability.

What’s more, the inflation that shocked the country was a direct consequence of Powell’s decision in March 2020 to flatline interest rates to make possible vast funding that would flow as part of the COVID-19 pandemic response. He had spent the two previous years gradually increasing rates as a means of patching up the Fed’s broken balance sheet.

The problem he had sought to solve with higher rates traced all the way back to 2008 under the leadership of Ben Bernanke. The Fed adopted a zero interest rate policy to bail out financial institutions following the collapse of the market for mortgage-backed securities. Part of the scheme involved paying banks for deposits at a higher rate than the market would bear, thus forestalling inflationary pressure.

The downside of such a policy involved grave distortions in industrial production structures plus a Fed holding on to useless debt assets. Powell had been determined to reverse this error and at least get the Fed on a sound financial footing.

All was going well until the first week of March. Someone, somehow, got to him and persuaded him to completely reverse course. The result was a default back to zero interest rates for the next two years, with disastrous results.

The rate of money creation during this period broke all records. Unlike the quantitative easing of 2005, the new money was sent directly to Americans’ bank accounts and became hot money on the street. This fueled inflation never before experienced by anyone younger than 45. Far from being transitory, it was devastating, wiping out the whole value of the stimulus payments.

There can be no question that the Fed was responsible.

As the inflation roared, Powell stepped in with the fastest rate increases on record. This policy likely contributed to the taming of the inflationary beast. And yet just as we were approaching the national election of 2024, he reversed policy yet again, in a manner that could easily be interpreted as a boon to then-Vice President Kamala Harris’s presidential campaign and the Democrats.

Looked at in total, these are not the actions of an independent Fed but rather one that changes policy based on political pressure. Powell denies it, but the evidence is rather clear.

This was perhaps not the best time for the Fed to renovate its headquarters with luxury accommodations and $600 million in cost overruns. Even leaving aside the sheer power of the central bank to manipulate political outcomes, it surely needs some oversight from the people’s elected representatives. For the central bank to claim that it is an institution dedicated entirely to economic science and the public interest is a real stretch.

The Constitution includes no mention of an independent central bank. Its mentions of money include only a provision that only gold and silver can be coined as money by states, an implicit rebuke of unsound money. This is why the institution of a national bank has invited so much controversy over the years.

On July 10, 1832, President Andrew Jackson issued a veto of the chartering of the Second National Bank. It is one of the most famous presidential vetoes in U.S. history. It was also a genius move, bolstering his standing and guaranteeing his reelection. The United States was thereby protected against a central bank until one emerged in secret in 1913.

The truth is that central banking has never been popular in U.S. history. This is for good reason. Inflation is a genuine trauma. Since the Fed’s creation, the value of the dollar has been on a long downward slide, and is now worth about 3 cents from 1913. This is not a record about which any chairman of the Fed should feel pride.

Tyler Durden Wed, 01/14/2026 - 09:40

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