The War Zone.

Two days after passing through the Strait of Gibraltar en route to the Caribbean, the aircraft carrier USS Gerald R. Ford has not moved significantly from a position just west of Morocco in North Africa, the Navy confirmed to us Thursday. The flattop and elements of its strike group were ordered by President Donald Trump to join the ongoing enhanced counter-narcotics mission in the region, but it is unclear if plans have changed.

The relatively static position of the Ford and at least two of its escorts comes as reports are emerging that the Trump administration has decided, for now, not to carry out land strikes against Venezuela. It is unknown at the moment if there is a correlation, and the possibility remains that the carrier could still soon sail westward. We have reached out to the White House for clarification.

The War Zone.

A special operations team is pinned down in a valley deep inside contested territory. Ammo is running low, and close air support is nonexistent. Extraction forces are still hours out. The operatives have kept the enemy at bay, but their ability to do so is dwindling with every round they fire. Their stocks of 40mm grenades have long been exhausted; now their rifles will soon run dry too. The sky cracks with a sonic boom, which echoes across the valley, and fighting pauses for a split second as fighters on both sides look up. Soon after, the shooting resumes, but out of the blinding sun comes a capsule stuffed with ammunition hanging on a parachute and flying right toward the special operations team.

Help has arrived… From orbit.

The above is a scene that sounds like it’s ripped right out of a Call Of Duty: Modern Warfarevideo game, but one company is working to make it a reality.

California-based space startup Inversion has unveiled its design for a fully reusable, lifting-body spacecraft named Arc. The spacecraft is intended to deliver critical cargo from space to any point on Earth within an hour, landing on water, snow or soil with a precision of around 50 feet, the company says. The concept, aimed squarely at the defense sector, reflects longstanding U.S. military interest in using space-based systems to rapidly move cargo around the globe to meet commanders’ urgent needs.

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A two-day operation led to the arrest of 70 illegal immigrants in Oklahoma, which included 34 drivers operating a semi-truck or a commercial vehicle, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) said in a Nov. 4 statement.

The arrests were made in partnership with the Oklahoma Highway Patrol between Oct. 28 and 29, said the agency. It is part of Operation Guardian, which has “resulted in the arrest of many illegal aliens driving trucks that had been issued Commercial Drivers Licenses in states with sanctuary policies such as California, Illinois, and New York,” the agency said.

In places that follow sanctuary policies, local officials refuse to enforce immigration laws or comply with federal authorities.

Out of the 34 illegal immigrant truck drivers, 26 were issued a commercial driver’s license (CDL) while eight were “dangerously driving” vehicles without such licenses, ICE said.

Fox News.

Rep. Brandon Gill, R-Texas, is formally introducing impeachment articles against U.S. District Judge James Boasberg on Tuesday for his role in the “Arctic Frost” probe.

Republican allies of President Donald Trump have been criticizing Boasberg after news broke that he was the judge who signed off on subpoenas and other measures in former Special Counsel Jack Smith’s probe.

“Chief Judge Boasberg has compromised the impartiality of the judiciary and created a constitutional crisis. He is shamelessly weaponizing his power against his political opponents, including Republican members of Congress who are faithfully serving the American people within their jurisdiction,” Gill told Fox News Digital.

“Judge Boasberg was an accomplice in the egregious Arctic Frost scandal where he equipped the Biden DOJ to spy on Republican senators. His lack of integrity makes him clearly unfit for the gavel. I am proud to once again introduce articles of impeachment against Judge Boasberg to hold him accountable for his high crimes and misdemeanors.”

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Chances are, you’re already aware that birthrates are falling throughout the developed world, sagging well below the “replacement rate” and sparking worries about the implications of a future dearth of workers and consumers. However, the emphasis on economic implications has allowed a powerful political undercurrent to go almost entirely unnoticed: Birthrates are varying significantly by political orientation, a trend that has the potential to shape electorates and policies for generations to come — to the benefit of conservatives.

Replacement birthrates vary over time and place depending on shifts in related variables such as child mortality. In developed countries, sustaining populations without immigration currently requires reproduction at a rate of 2.1 births per woman of childbearing age. Except for an outlier replacement-level pace in 2007, the US birthrate has been sub-2.1 since the early 1970s. Last year, America hit a record-low 1.6, with even lower lows recorded elsewhere in the developed world: the birth rate in England and Wales fell to 1.41, while Scotland’s dropped to 1.25 and Italy’s to 1.2. Mainland France’s 1.59 was the lowest since World War I.

Media coverage has uniformly emphasized those top-line numbers. However, Financial Times columnist and chief data reporter John Burn-Murdoch recently waded deeper into the data and illuminated a sub-trend that could shape the future of the West. It turns out the drop-off in top-line birthrates is primarily the result of plummeting parenthood among progressive leftists, with conservative fertility slipping to a far smaller degree.

I’ve always said that people who have (and support) abortion are weeding themselves out of the gene pool. It’s only a matter of time (hopefully before they collapse civilization…).

The Financial Times.

A small start-up in New Zealand claims it has created plasma, the first step towards nuclear fusion, in under two years and for less than $10mn after experimenting with an unconventional reactor design.

OpenStar, founded by chief executive Ratu Mataira in 2021 in his Wellington apartment, said on Tuesday that it had created and contained a plasma cloud at around 300,000 degrees Celsius for 20 seconds in its first experimental reactor.

While much higher plasma temperatures are required to achieve nuclear fusion, OpenStar’s test stands apart for its unconventional reactor design, which the company said could be faster to scale and commercialise.

This was first published about a year ago, so they’re obviously not burning down the house turning it into a practical product.

The War Zone.

Even as the U.S. continues to build up forces in the Caribbean ostensibly for an enhanced counternarcotics operation that could include inland strikes, there are reported plans underway for attacks on cartels inside Mexico.

The San Antonio class amphibious transport dock ship USS Fort Lauderdale has left Mayport, Florida, and is returning to the Caribbean to rejoin the Iwo Jima Amphibious Ready Group (ARG)/22nd Marine Expeditionary Unit (MEU), a U.S. official confirmed to The War Zone Monday morning. The vessel left on Sunday and is now south of Miami in the Straits of Florida, according to an online ship tracker. It will provide additional air and troop support once it arrives on station. San Antonio class ships can launch and land two CH-53E Super Stallion helicopters or two MV-22 tilt rotor aircraft or up to four AH-1Z, UH-1Y or MH-60 helicopters at once. In addition, they can carry Landing Craft Air Cushion (LCAC) hovercraft or other landing craft and boats in their well deck, and can transport up to 800 Marines.

Watch it.

This has no chance of going anywhere of course; Democrats on the coast aren’t going to give up any part of their population (tax base), any more than the Soviet Union allowed free emigration. But I like the fact that they feel about it strongly enough to make the effort. (The only reason West Virginia exists is because Virginia had seceded and was in a state of rebellion, so Congress felt free to ignore it.)

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Automotive giant Stellantis is expanding its U.S. operations. Any sign of an investment turnaround in Germany, which Chancellor Friedrich Merz touted just weeks ago, is nowhere to be seen.

The European carmaker, home to brands like Opel, Peugeot, and Citroën, is turning away from its European sites. On Monday, Stellantis announced it will invest $13 billion in the U.S. over the next four years, increasing American production by 50%. The expansion will create 5,000 new jobs across plants in Illinois, Ohio, Michigan, and Indiana.

The concrete impact on German production remains unclear. Stellantis offered no comments on potential layoffs, but it’s safe to assume significant parts of production will shift to the U.S. in the coming years. High energy costs and U.S. tariffs likely influenced this decision.

CEO Antonio Filosa emphasized that this largest investment in company history will create American jobs and systematically expand U.S. manufacturing. The U.S. will now be Stellantis’ top priority.

The Economist.

In the history of medicine, a few drugs tower above all others. Humira for rheumatoid arthritis; Prozac for depression; statins to prevent heart disease and strokes. All have helped patients far beyond doctors’ initial expectations and continue to benefit millions of people every day. A new class of drugs is set to join their ranks and has the potential to eclipse them all—glp-1 receptor agonists.

These drugs mimic the action of a naturally occurring hormone, glucagon-like peptide (glp-1), and for decades have been used to treat diabetes. More recently they have become a wildly popular way for people to lose weight. But in March semaglutide (a glp-1 receptor agonist sold as Ozempic for diabetes and Wegovy for weight-loss) was approved in America for cardiovascular disease in overweight people. In April tirzepatide (sold as Mounjaro and Zepbound) showed positive results in late-stage trials for sleep apnoea, a breathing disorder. In other trials it seems to reduce chronic kidney disease.

This is just the start.

New York  Post.

A Dallas-based biotech company has nearly completed its reconstruction of the Tasmanian tiger just two years into its de-extinction project.

The last known thylacine, commonly referred to as the Tasmanian tiger, died in captivity on Sept. 7, 1936. None have been spotted across Tasmania since, despite countless expeditions attempting to rediscover the tiger.

Without the top predator intact to maintain order and keep the foof chain in check, its former habitat has buckled under pressure as wildfires, disease and invasive species thrived unopposed.

Ars Technica.

Like nuclear fusion, the idea of space-based solar power has always seemed like a futuristic technology with an actual deployment into communities ever remaining a couple of decades away.

The concept of harvesting solar power continuously from large satellites in space—where there are no nights, no clouds, and no atmosphere to interfere with the collection of photons—is fairly simple. Large solar arrays in geostationary orbit collect solar energy and beam it back to Earth via microwaves as a continuous source of clean energy.

However, implementing this technology is not so simple. In recent years, in search of long-term power solutions and concerned about climate change, the European Space Agency has been studying space-based solar power. Some initial studies found that a plan to meet one-third of Europe’s energy needs would require massive amounts of infrastructure and cost hundreds of billions of dollars. At best, such a system of very large satellites in geostationary space might come online by the middle of this century.

In short, the plan would require massive up-front costs, with no guarantee that it all would work out in the end.

This was one of Jerry Pournelle’s fondest dreams.

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At first glance, the 400 acres of soybeans growing on the Preston family’s dairy farm in southern Michigan looks like a typical field. But these aren’t ordinary soybeans. They represent a breakthrough partnership with Michigan State University that’s saving the family tens of thousands of dollars a month in livestock feed costs—and it could change the dairy industry forever.

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President Trump said on Friday that he’s yet to make a final decision on launching a military attack on Venezuela, but President Nicolás Maduro is not waiting around while taking the US leader’s word on it.

Maduro is reportedly urgently reaching out to Russia, China, and Iran for any possible military aid, including defense items which may have already been negotiated or are in the works. The Washington Post says it’s obtained internal documents showing such recent and high-stakes requests.

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A GOP led House Oversight Committee has submitted a report to Attorney General Pam Bondi asserting that former president Joe Biden’s “cognitive decline” was so severe he may not have been aware of pardons he allegedly signed by autopen.

Republicans argue that the proper course is to err on the side of caution given evidence of Biden’s decaying mental condition – Even if the President was made aware of the sweeping documents rather than his aides using his autopen signature to falsify the pardons, it is likely that he still had no understanding of what the documents actually contained.

Conservatives on the committee advise Bondi that the 4,245 presidential pardons and commutations issued by the Democrat, 82, should therefore be placed under review and could be considered invalid. Republican Senator Josh Hawley chimed in on the issue, expressing deep concerns over some of the Biden signatures, including commuted sentences for multiple criminals who victimized children.

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A new European Union deal to liberalize trade with Ukraine took effect Wednesday, but Poland, Hungary and Slovakia are defying it, maintaining their protectionist bans on imports from the country. Their defiance comes amid mounting grievances over EU prioritization of the West’s proxy war on Russia over the prosperity of EU member states and their citizens.

Approved on Oct 13, the new EU arrangement expands tariff-free Ukrainian access to European markets, replacing a temporary lowering of trade barriers adopted after Russia invaded Ukraine in 2022. “We believe (the agreement) is a stable, fair framework, that can be reliable both for the EU and for Ukraine, to ensure a gradual integration in our single market, while providing stable trade flows,” said European Commission spokeswoman Ariana Podesta. The European Commission (EC) is the EU’s principal executive branch.

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Airship Industries is designing its vehicle to dominate transoceanic air freight. It checks all the right boxes. It shortens end-to-end freight delivery time. It lowers freight handling costs, delays, and breakage. It’s highly profitable on a unit basis. It lowers fuel burn and carbon emissions by 75 percent without any sustainable fuel breakthroughs.

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With college costs climbing and artificial intelligence reshaping office work, a growing number of Gen Zers are turning to construction, a new report shows. According to industry professionals, “They’re showing up in droves.”

The share of Generation Z workers—those aged 18 to 28—in the construction labor force more than doubled from 2019 to 2023, rising from 6.4 percent to 14.1 percent, according to an Oct. 10 report by the Home Builders Institute.

The share of millennials (age 29 to 44) grew to 37.7 percent from 35.7 percent over the same period. Conversely, the share of Baby Boomers (age 61 to 79) dropped to 14.2 percent from 20.6 percent as older workers moved into retirement.

The median age of construction workers during this period was 42.

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As we have been writing about for the better part of the last 2 years, growing electricity needs from artificial-intelligence data centers are pushing tech giants back toward nuclear power.

On Monday, NextEra Energy and Google announced a deal to restart the Duane Arnold Energy Center near Cedar Rapids, Iowa, which closed in 2020 after 45 years of operation. The 615-megawatt plant is expected to return to service in early 2029 under a 25-year power purchase agreement with Google, Reuters reported.

Shares of NextEra rose more than 1% after the announcement. The move adds to recent nuclear-supply arrangements tied to hyperscale cloud operators, echoing plans at the former Three Mile Island facility in Pennsylvania aimed at Microsoft data centers. As we have written about extensively on Zero Hedge, companies including Google, Microsoft, and Amazon have also signed agreements to buy future energy from advanced nuclear projects such as small modular reactors and fusion systems.

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One of America’s most influential economists finally had the moxie to admit what any American with half a brain could see about the Trump tariffs: The elitist, stuck-up doom prophets were all wrong.

Wharton School Professor of Practice Mohamed El-Erian joined the October 27 edition of Fox News’s America Reports to discuss President Donald Trump’s ongoing tariff negotiations with communist China. “What the U.S. has managed to achieve on tariffs was something most economists didn’t think was going to happen,” El-Erian told co-anchor Sandra Smith.

We thought there would be massive retaliation against the U.S. — there hasn’t been. Europe, the U.K., a number of Asian countries have all signed framework agreements. The only outstanding ones are India, Canada and China and there’s clear progress on China,” El-Erian continued.

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Read it.

President Trump has overseen the signing of an expanded ceasefire deal between the leaders of Thailand and Cambodia after his intervention in the border conflict between the two nations.

The conflict is one of those that Trump claims to have brought to an end “within less than a day” after he called the then leaders of the two countries, urging them to end hostilities, or risk their respective trade talks with Washington being put on hold.

The simmering conflict flared up after a Cambodian soldier was killed in a clash between patrols at the end of May and, in July, two Thai soldiers were badly injured by what they insist were newly laid landmines, a charge that Cambodia rejects.

The Guardian, a Voice of the Crust.

Researchers have peered into the brains and bodies of living animals after discovering that a common food dye can make skin, muscle and connective tissues temporarily transparent.

Applying the dye to the belly of a mouse made its liver, intestines and bladder clearly visible through the abdominal skin, while smearing it on the rodent’s scalp allowed scientists to see blood vessels in the animal’s brain.

Treated skin regained its normal colour when the dye was washed off, according to researchers at Stanford University, who believe the procedure opens up a host of applications in humans, from locating injuries and finding veins for drawing blood to monitoring digestive disorders and spotting tumours.

Freethink.

Could solar energy be the key to unlocking a future free from fossil fuels and extreme poverty? Casey Handmer, founder and CEO of Terraform Industries, believes so. His company is pioneering technology that could revolutionize how we produce and consume energy, potentially solving climate change and global energy inequality in one fell swoop.

Terraform Industries is developing machines that create synthetic natural gas from sunlight and air. It sounds like science fiction, but the technology is rooted in simple chemistry and powered by the rapidly advancing field of solar energy.

But Handmer’s vision extends beyond just replacing fossil fuels. He sees solar energy as the catalyst for a new era of human progress. By providing cheap, abundant energy to every corner of the globe, we could potentially eliminate extreme poverty within our lifetimes. It’s an ambitious goal, but one that Handmer believes we have a responsibility to pursue.

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Scientists have used an eye implant to improve the vision of dozens of people left functionally blind by age-related macular degeneration (AMD). The implant, which measures 2 millimetres by 2 millimetres, and is just 30 micrometres thick, is surgically inserted beneath the retina to replace the light-sensitive cells that have been lost to the disease.

The clinical trial, which is described today in The New England Journal of Medicine1, involved 38 people with advanced AMD whose retinas had degenerated severely. One year after device implantation, 80% of participants had gained a clinically meaningful improvement in their vision.

“Where this dead retina was a complete blind spot, vision was restored,” says trial leader Frank Holz, an ophthalmologist at the University of Bonn in Germany. “Patients could read letters, they could read words, and they could function in their daily life.”

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John Roverts: “The way to stop discrimination on the basis of race is to stop discriminating on the basis of race.”

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The average retail prices for gasoline in the U.S. are nearing the sub-$3 mark, but food inflation has remained sticky as the Trump economic team embarked this week to correct the worst cattle shortage the nation has experienced in a generation, a crisis that sent prices sky-high well before Trump’s second term. The good news this upcoming Thanksgiving holiday season won’t be the absence of American spirit at the White House, but also Walmart offering an affordable holiday meal package at price levels not seen since 2019.

Thank you,  Donald Trump.

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A federal court has invalidated a Biden-era rule that expanded federal anti-discrimination law to cover “gender identity,” a move that would have required hospitals and Medicaid programs to fund and perform sex-change procedures.

U.S. District Judge Louis Guirola Jr. in Mississippi ruled that the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) exceeded its authority by redefining “sex discrimination” under Title IX and the Affordable Care Act.

His decision, granting summary judgment to 15 states, stated that neither the agency nor the court could expand the statutory meaning of “sex” without congressional authorization.

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US modular nuclear technology pioneer, NANO Nuclear Energy, is hosting a milestone ceremony today at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign to mark progress on the research and prototype development of its KRONOS MMR Energy System, a micro nuclear reactor. The ceremony is being live streamed on the company’s website….

Cue crazy leftist environmentalists to try to shut it down by suing and holding protests, as they traditionally do for anything that smacks of nuclear power.

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A Tasmanian scientist has claimed he knows the location of the missing Malaysian plane MH370.

In 2014, Malaysian Airlines flight MH370 vanished from radar after departing from Kuala Lumpur. Among the 239 passengers on board the craft, the majority, 153 were Chinese, six were Australians, and three were Americans. One of the Americans included Philip Wood, an IBM executive, according to the BBC. Also on the plane were 20 staff members from the U.S. technology company Freescale Semiconductors; 12 were Malaysian, and eight were Chinese.

But now, Tasmanian researcher Vincent Lyne has said he may know their location.

Scientific American.

The persistence of memory is crucial to our sense of identity, and without it, there would be no learning, for us or any other animal. It’s little wonder, then, that some researchers have called how the brain stores memories the most fundamental question in neuroscience.

A milestone in the effort to answer this question came in the early 1970s, with the discovery of a phenomenon called long-term potentiation, or LTP. Scientists found that electrically stimulating a synapse that connects two neurons causes a long-lasting increase in how well that connection transmits signals. Scientists say simply that the “synaptic strength” has increased. This is widely believed to be the process underlying memory. Networks of neural connections of varying strengths are thought to be what memories are made of.

In the search for molecules that enable LTP, two main contenders emerged. One, called PKMzeta (protein kinase Mzeta), made a big splash when a 2006 study showed that blocking it erased memories for places in rats. If obstructing a molecule erases memories, researchers reasoned, that event must be essential to the process the brain uses to maintain memories. A flurry of research into the so-called memory molecule followed, and numerous experiments appeared to show that it was necessary and sufficient for maintaining numerous types of memory.

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“Hair cortisol offers a non-invasive, easy-to-collect biomarker that could one day be used to screen children and track whether treatments or support programs are helping to reduce stress,” study co-author Mark Ferro, a professor in the University of Waterloo’s School of Public Health Sciences, said in a press statement.

An estimated 40 percent of children in Canada live with chronic physical illnesses (CPI)—a number that has been increasing over the past decades.

As George Citroner details below for The Epoch Times, those with higher cortisol levels are more likely to develop mental health problems at rates ranging from 20 percent to 50 percent, significantly higher than the prevalence in healthy children, researchers noted.

These conditions can lead to lower quality of life, suicidal thoughts, and greater use of health care services.

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The National Guard will remain in the nation’s capital indefinitely — possibly through the summer of 2026 — according to a recent court filing.

The filing, submitted Friday by District of Columbia Attorney General Brian Schwalb, said internal documents show National Guard officials are planning for a “long-term persistent presence,” potentially lasting through the nation’s semiquincentennial celebration next summer.

News of the filing came after a 9th Circuit Court of Appeals panel ruled Monday to allow the Trump administration to deploy National Guard troops to Portland, Oregon.

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Using observations from a NASA suborbital rocket, an international team of scientists has, for the first time, successfully measured a planet-wide electric field thought to be as fundamental to Earth as its gravity and magnetic fields. Known as the ambipolar electric field, scientists first hypothesized over 60 years ago that it drove how our planet’s atmosphere can escape above Earth’s North and South Poles. Measurements from the rocket, NASA’s Endurance mission, have confirmed the existence of the ambipolar field and quantified its strength, revealing its role in driving atmospheric escape and shaping our ionosphere — a layer of the upper atmosphere — more broadly.

Understanding the complex movements and evolution of our planet’s atmosphere provides clues not only to the history of Earth but also gives us insight into the mysteries of other planets and determining which ones might be hospitable to life. The paper was published Wednesday, Aug. 28, 2024, in the journal Nature.

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Good. I’m hoping they get around to Clapper soon.

UPDATE: John Brennan Hit With Criminal Referral Over Steele Dossier Lies

UPDATE: House Judiciary Refers Former CIA Director John Brennan to DOJ for Criminal Prosecution

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During the 2018-2019 government shutdown (the longest federal shutdown in US history lasting 35 days), Donald Trump’s first term administration was ill prepared for the tactics used by the establishment media, Democrats and even saboteurs within his own cabinet. The narrative spin was highly effective in painting Trump as the villain, subverting his efforts to achieve lasting security at the southern border.

The 2018 shutdown hinged largely on the fight between Republicans and Democrats over funding for a border wall that would ensure far lower illegal immigration numbers well after Trump left office. The construction cost of $5.7 billion seems like a pittance compared to the projected cost of $350 billion to deport alien migrants over four years.

Currently, the US is enjoying the lowest immigration numbers in over 60 years as border encounters plummet, but this is largely contingent on Trump’s presence in the White House and cuts to subsides for illegals. His original wall proposal remains a necessary measure to help prevent future mass migrations.

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On October 19th, Sunday, Bolivians elected centre-right senator Rodrigo Paz Pereira as their new president, ending two decades of Socialist rule that left the South American nation deep in economic crisis.

With 97.8% of ballots counted, the Supreme Electoral Tribunal said Paz had 54.6% of the vote.

The result sparked celebrations across La Paz, where crowds gathered with fireworks and music. “We came to celebrate the victory with great hope of a new direction for Bolivia,” said Julio Andrey, a 40-year-old lawyer.

Paz, 58, the son of a former president, has pledged what he calls “capitalism for all”—a mix of decentralization, lower taxes, fiscal discipline and continued social spending. In his victory speech, he declared that Bolivia was “reclaiming its place on the international stage.”

Paz also said he had received a congratulatory message from U.S. president Donald Trump, while Secretary of State Marco Rubio stated that Washington “stands ready to partner with Bolivia on shared priorities.” Rubio added that “after two decades of mismanagement, President-elect Paz’s election marks a transformative opportunity for both nations.”

Under former Socialist president Evo Morales, Bolivia nationalized industries, broke ties with Washington and aligned with other leftist governments. Paz’s victory marks a sharp political and economic turn for the country.

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revolutionary bionic microchip is restoring sight to people who have lost their vision due to age-related macular degeneration (AMD) — marking what experts call a “new era” in artificial vision.

According to The Telegraph, more than 80% of patients fitted with the tiny, wireless chip saw major improvements in their vision during a global clinical trial led by Moorfields Eye Hospital and University College London.

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Every new discovery in space begins as a mystery. Some mysteries might take longer than others to understand, and some of the most fantastic remain a secret for many years. Some mysteries will remain so long after humanity has disappeared. Here are just a handful of the mysteries discovered by NASA.

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Nobel Prize winner María Corina Machado, a Venezuelan opposition leader, might have beaten out President Donald Trump for the coveted award, but she says she is on the same team as Trump in striking at the corruption, repression, and persecution under dictator Nicolás Maduro.

“President Trump has made decisions regarding the dismantling of a narcoterrorist structure and I want to insist on this, it was Maduro who declared the war on us,” Machado told NBC News, from her undisclosed hideout, where she has been for 14 months fearing Maduro’s reprisal.

“If Maduro will stop this war by moving out and facilitating a transition to democracy. We do need the help of other countries and the leadership of President Trump to stop this war, because it is about saving millions of lives.”

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he planned Cascade Advanced Energy Facility in Washington, which will be built by Energy Northwest with funding from Amazon, will deploy 12 small modular reactors, Amazon said in a Thursday release.

The “modular nature” of the plant means that three 320-MW sections will together comprise a 960-MW plant within the space of a few city blocks, in contrast to “traditional nuclear power facilities whose single GW plant can take up more than a square mile of land,” Amazon said.

The SMRs will be supplied by X-energy, which received $500 million in Series C funding from Amazon last year, using X-energy’s advanced nuclear reactor design. The Cascade facility will be built outside Richland, Washington, near Energy Northwest’s Columbia Generating Station.

Richland is in Benton county, on the Red side of the Blue state.

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President Trump confirmed a “very productive” phone call with Russian President Putin on Thursday, according to a post on Truth Social. The two leaders are now expected to meet in the near term in Budapest, Hungary, with discussions centered on potential pathways to end the war in Ukraine.

Trump’s latest threat to supply Ukraine with Tomahawk missiles may have been a key driver prompting Moscow’s sudden willingness to engage in talks at the highest level. While full details of the call remain undisclosed, the tone shift signals possible upcoming breakthroughs in negotiations to end the three-year war in Eastern Europe, which has resulted in some casualty figures on both sides at 1.4 million, according to a recent New York Times report, citing U.S. and British government estimates, among other sources.

What comes out of Budapest remains to be seen. But already, Russian sovereign wealth fund head Kirill Dmitriev is posting on X about Elon Musk’s Boring Company potentially building a 70-mile undersea rail tunnel linking Russia and Alaska through the Bering Strait – a proposed $65 billion megaproject.

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such as cocaine into the United States from Central and South America.

The operation aims to stop drug trafficking and human smuggling by cartels and criminal organizations.

The Coast Guard has seized an average of about 1,600 pounds of cocaine every day since starting the operation, prohibiting about 34 vessels from reaching the United States and apprehending 86 suspected drug traffickers.

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China’s major expansion control measures on its rare earth minerals appear to be backfiring, as on Thursday Japanese Finance Minister Katsunobu Kato called for the Group of Seven nations to “unite and respond” to China’s actions from last week. This after the Trump administration slammed the “global power grab” efforts by China as it seeks to have a “chokehold on the world of rare earth and rare earth materials.”

Germany’s finance minister has as a result signaled that a coordinated response from the bloc is likely coming, and Australia’s Prime Minister is expected to hammer out an agreement on critical mineral supply chains during an upcoming trip to Washington. China’s ‘retaliation’ is fast alienating those Beijing thought it could rally to its corner after Trump first unveiled steep tariffs, marking a sharp reversal from the global mood of six months ago.

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Kitchen sponges — a network of soft polymeric rods — can act as memory devices, an experiment has shown. The memory can also be erased and rewritten, potentially helping mimic the architecture and functioning of the human brain, allowing memory storage and computation in the same location.

I’ll bet you didn’t know that.

That may explain why my head is full of useless trivia.

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As soaring demand for electric power threatens to rapidly overtake America’s supply, the US Army on Tuesday announced a plan to install nuclear microreactors at bases across the country. “What resilience means to us is that we have power, no matter what, 24-7,” said principal deputy assistant secretary of the Army Jeff Waksman after the program was unveiled at the Association of the United States Army (AUSA) Annual Meeting Warriors Corner panel.

Pursuant to what has been christened the “Janus Program,” the Pentagon is charged with bringing the first reactor online no later than September 30, 2028, and is currently identifying the first nine posts that will receive two reactors each. Those reactors will generate less than 20 megawatts of power, according to the Wall Street Journal. That’s comparable to the demands of a single, small town. In addition to preserving the installations ability to function in the face of overwhelmed grids, the reactors will also serve as a safeguard against cyberattacks and weather catastrophes. The program is empowered by Executive Order 14299, “Deploying Advanced Nuclear Reactor Technologies for National Security,” which was signed by President Trump in May.

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A federal grand jury in Washington, D.C., could decide as soon as Wednesday whether to indict John Bolton, who served as national security adviser in the first Trump administration, over allegations that he shared highly sensitive classified materials through a private email server.

Department of Justice officials told The New York Post that they expect an indictment either Wednesday or Thursday, with one describing the case against Bolton, 76, as “airtight.”

The grand jury proceedings follow FBI raids in August at Bolton’s suburban Maryland home and D.C. office, where agents searched for evidence tied to the alleged theft of “highly sensitive national security” information.

Let’s go on a RINO hunt!