Read it.

The unusually high total stems from Biden’s ability to draw benefits from multiple federal retirement programs, reflecting his long career as a U.S. senator, vice president, and president.

Of course. Joe Biden never had a real job—he’s been suckling on the government teat all his life.

Read it.

It is six years now since the advent – and normalization of – sickness psychosis (also known as weaponized hypochondria) and it shows a remarkable persistence.

Because of course it has been normalized.

More than that, actually. It continues to be affirmed as a reasonable rather than aberrant behavior.

This business, that is, of seeing but pretending not to notice people walking around with a surgical mask over their porthole.

Newsbusters.

Race … GRIFTers! dah DAH dah….

One week after YouTuber Nick Shirley posted a video alleging mass fraud at children’s daycare centers in Minnesota, involving some in the Somali community, many in the liberal media are still casting doubt on the legitimacy of that video, and are still attacking Shirley personally, claiming he had previously created anti-immigrant and anti-Muslim videos, while never presenting any proof of that allegation. Last Friday’s edition of CNN’s NewsNight with Abby Phillip continued the attacks.

From the start of the segment on Shirley’s findings, which has resulted in a federal investigation, Phillip’s mission was to delegitimize his findings, and repeat vicious unsubstantiated claims of racism against him.

As they do.

Some lawmakers criticize Trump’s attack in Venezuela, fearing a costly new war (NBC News)  And apparently some don’t.

Maduro, wife face new indictment: What we know about the case (The Hill)  More accurately, what WE want YOU to THINK about the case….

The Brazen Illegality of Trump’s Venezuela Operation (Isaac Chotiner/New Yorker)  And, of course, people who write for the New Yorker are THE EXPERTS on what is illegal and what is not.

Furious Dems float retaliation over Trump’s “insane” Venezuela attack (Andrew Solender/Axios)  Bring it on.

‘An illegal war’: Democratic 2028ers scold Trump on Venezuela (Politico)

Statement on Illegal U.S. Strike on Venezuela (Matt Ortega/Matt Ortega for Congress)

Mamdani Called Trump to Criticize Venezuela Strikes (New York Times)  No doubt Trump patted him on the head and sent him home to his kidergarten on the Hudson.

CNN Fears Maduro’s Capture Will Start WWIII, Compares U.S. to Russia

FACT FOCUS: Trump repeats false claims as he discusses US raid to extract Venezuela’s president (Melissa Goldin/Associated Press)  Whenever the Narrative Media say “fact” you know they’re lying.

Saturday Morning Shows on Venezuela: ABC Claims It Could Inspire Terrorism, CBS Fumes

NBC’s Jackson Claims Maduro’s Arrest Will Harm Legal Case Against Him

Maduro likely headed for “inhumane” jail that housed Ghislaine Maxwell (Josephine Walker/Axios)

Donald Trump wants to run Venezuela, and dominate the western hemisphere (The Economist) I’m up for that.

US Strike on Venezuela to Embolden China’s Territorial Claims, Taiwan Attack Unlikely, Analysts Say

HHS escalates Minnesota fraud fight, prompting fear among daycare providers (Nathaniel Weixel/The Hill)  TRUMP! TRUMP! TRUMP!

Why Trump argues the US deserves Venezuela’s oil (Australian Financial Review)

How Trump Fixed On a Maduro Loyalist as Venezuela’s New Leader (New York Times)

In Venezuela Takeover, Trump Makes It All About The Oil (S.V. Date/HuffPost)

US attack on Venezuela raises fears of future Greenland takeover

Russia, China Demand That US Immediately Release Maduro From Custody

The ‘Putinization’ of US foreign policy has arrived in Venezuela (Julian Borger/The Guardian)

“It looks weak”: Dems fume at their party’s response to Maduro capture (Andrew Solender/Axios)  They don’t hold many cards….

How the internet drove down regard for actual facts — and education (Philip Bump/MS NOW)  Philip Bump is, of course, one of the Narrative Media’s chief shit-losers, so this is a little rich.

Rubio remains vague on transition plan for Venezuela (Cheyanne M. Daniels/Politico)  And rightly so—you don’t tell your enemies your plans.

For Trump, the Epstein Cover-Up Beats the Truth (Marc Elias/Democracy Docket)  EPSTEIN! EPSTEIN! EPSTEIN!

Trump Plunges the U.S. Into a New Era of Risk in Venezuela (New York Times)

Trump Threatens Venezuela’s New Leader With a Fate Worse Than Maduro’s (Michael Scherer/The Atlantic)

Democrats Claim Maduro Capture Is A ‘Distraction’

Read it.

They immediately qualified for an array of generous Federal and State programs….

Read it.

A treatment that blocks an age-related protein restored cartilage in aging and injured joints by reprogramming existing cells rather than using stem cells.

Researchers at Stanford Medicine report that blocking a protein linked to aging can restore cartilage that naturally wears away in the knees of older mice. In the study, the injectable treatment not only rebuilt cartilage but also stopped arthritis from developing after knee injuries similar to ACL tears, which are common among athletes and active adults. A pill-based version of the same therapy is already being tested in clinical trials aimed at treating muscle weakness associated with aging.

Human knee tissue collected during joint replacement surgeries also responded positively to the treatment. These samples, which include both the joint’s supporting extracellular scaffolding, or matrix, and cartilage-producing chondrocyte cells, began forming new cartilage that functioned normally.

Together, these findings point to the possibility that cartilage lost through aging or arthritis could one day be restored using a localized injection or an oral medication, potentially eliminating the need for knee or hip replacement surgery.

Thanks to multiple levels of government regulation, this treatment may be available to your grandchildren.

The Foundry.

Survey says: Yes.

The fundamental deal was that citizens gave the state a monopoly on violence and punishment, in exchange for the state keeping them safe. But is that deal still holding?

In Charlotte, North Carolina, in August, Iryna Zarutska was stabbed to death on a train by a fare-jumper who was out on bail after countless prior arrests. Her killer was walking free because a local judge didn’t think his obvious mental illness and violent past merited prison. And transit authorities, like many across America, didn’t enforce the requirement to buy a ticket.

In Chicago in November, another young woman, Bethany MaGee, was set on fire on public transport by another recidivist. In December, an illegal immigrant who had previously been deported allegedly stabbed a man on the same light rail line where Zarutska was murdered.

These are just three of so many tragic, preventable instances where the state failed its part of the bargain. It failed to keep dangerous, unstable people in jail or institutionalized. To enforce basic civility like having to buy a ticket to access buses and trains. To keep out dangerous foreign nationals who have no right to be here.

Read it.

A Milwaukee judge who was found guilty last month of obstructing federal agents by letting an illegal immigrant slip through a side door at her courthouse has resigned.

Saves them from having to impeach her.

Judge Hannah Dugan, who was convicted last month on a federal felony charge, was charged by federal prosecutors after she distracted federal agents who were trying to arrest Eduardo Flores-Ruiz, a Mexican citizen who had entered the United States illegally and was scheduled to appear before Dugan for a hearing in a state-level battery case.

The indictment, dated May 13, 2025, accused her of obstructing the law by assisting Floriz-Ruiz to evade arrest, and falsely advising ICE agents that they required a judicial warrant to arrest him.

Dugan was found guilty by a federal grand jury on Dec. 18, 2025 on one count of violating Section 1505 of Title 18 of the US code. Her resignation comes as GOP members of the Wisconsin State Legislature were preparing to impeach her and remove her from office following her conviction.

Read it.

Yesterday’s spectacle would have been unthinkable a generation ago.

How much misery would have been saved if Eisenhower would have done that to Castro in 1956? He would never have done it, of course.

Donald Trump retrieved Nicolás Maduro from Venezuela and brought him to New York to be arraigned in the Southern District. Venezuelans in the diaspora celebrated the symbolic end of a tyrant’s impunity. Meanwhile, in the United States, something stranger happened: American socialist organizations erupted in rage.

Not strange at all. A pillar of the American Left is embracing anyone who could be characterized as an enemy of freedom and/or the United States.

The Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) issued a statement condemning the action and demanding Maduro’s release. New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani—a DSA member—reportedly consulted with Ramzi Kassem, a lawyer infamous for representing al-Qaeda figures, and allegedly called President Trump to “register his opposition.” At the same time, Neville Roy Singham’s network hosted a pro-Maduro protest in Times Square, even as Venezuelan exiles celebrated freedom from the man who ruined their country.

So we must ask the obvious question: why? Why are ostensibly American organizations so emotionally invested in the fate of a foreign dictator? Why does the capture of a Venezuelan strongman trigger outrage in gentrified Brooklyn, rather than relief?

The first answer is ideological. Socialists, even those who insist on calling themselves “democratic”, do not fundamentally support American interests.

The branding is marketing. “Democratic socialism” is designed to sound like Scandinavia with better coffee. In practice, their heroes are Havana and Caracas, not Helsinki. They tell voters they want the Nordic model; what they defend, reflexively and ferociously, is the Cuban and Venezuelan model: centralized power, ideological conformity, and permanent opposition to the United States.

White people ought to sue them for cultural appropriation.

Read it.

In 1971, the world got its first look at an arcade machine, playing the little-remembered space combat game Computer Space. A year later, we got the all-time classic Pong in arcade machine form, and the first ever home console, the Magnavox Odyssey.

In the decades preceding, researchers at various institutes created several experimental games, which paved the way for these commercial successes that spawned a ~$189 billion industry. But the games were not the first to be created. The game widely considered the first true computer game, as it was made for entertainment purposes only, was created by American physicist William Higinbotham in 1958.

Pooh. In 1970 I was playing a space-invaders type game on the CATTC NTDS computers on the USS John F. Kennedy (CVA-67) in Norfolk, Virginia. Our DS personnel were bored, and so….

Read it.

The UK government’s digital ID push is escalating into outright dystopia, with ministers privately floating the idea of assigning digital identities to newborns right alongside their health records.

In the U.S., we call them Social Security Numbers. Don’t leave home without it….

The New Neo.

It seems this was the culmination of months – or more? – of planning, with signals and warnings for Maduro to go into exile or else. Now we see the “or else.”

There are also rumors that it’s all staged and Maduro cooperated. I definitely don’t think that’s the case.He almost certainly could have absconded to one of his sponsor states instead. They may not be paradises, but they’re better than US prison.

Read it.

Dominic Cummings, the political strategist who oversaw Brexit, has dropped a bombshell warning to Nigel Farage: the UK establishment is plotting to crush him and Reform UK by any means necessary, including illegal tactics, to prevent a populist takeover.

As Reform surges in polls and eyes major gains in the 2026 local elections, Cummings has revealed how insiders view Farage as the next Trump-style threat they must eliminate early and ruthlessly.

Speaking on The Spectator’s Quite Right! podcast, Cummings told hosts Michael Gove and Madeline Grant: “They’ll leak medical records, they’ll leak tax records.They’ll bug his phone and leak that. They’ll do anything that they need to.”

Read it.

2026 started with a bang for pdsroponents of the human right of armed self-defense, as a US appeals court on Friday ruled that California’s de facto statewide ban on openly carrying firearms violates the US Constitution. However, there’s reason to think it will flip the other way as the litigation proceeds to the next phase. For now, though, leftists are recoiling. California governor and likely 2028 presidential candidate Gavin Newsom said “Republican activists on the Ninth Circuit” want to “return to the days of the Wild West.”

If we were still in the days of the Wild West, Newsom would have been swinging from a tree long ago.

I’d have put the start of adulthood at 25, where the insurance actuaries do, but yeah.

A Diminished Congress Weighs Whether to Reassert Its Power (Carl Hulse/New York Times)

Elon Musk indicates he’s ‘going all in’ on financing the GOP ahead of the midterms: ‘America is toast if the radical left wins’ (Io Dodds/The Independent)

Marjorie Taylor Greene bets the Republican troll era is over (Amanda Marcotte/Salon)  Amanda Marcotte, on the other hand, demonstrates that the proglodyte troll era is alive and kicking.

Mar-a-Lago Was Key to Jeffrey Epstein’s Criminal Enterprise (Jeet Heer/The Nation)

The latest effort to hold Gregory Bovino accountable for his disregard of the rule of law (Chris Geidner/Law Dork)

Bannon says Trump’s Iran threat echoes Hillary Clinton’s playbook (Ryan Mancini/The Hill) Funny how they only quote Bannon when they want to bash Trump.

Rep. Bacon: Congress Risks Becoming Trump’s ‘Lackeys’  Hey, they were Democrat lackeys for five decaces before Newt Gingrich kicked their asses. How about remembering what team you are on for a change?

Trump says the job market is booming for U.S.-born. The data doesn’t show it. (Lauren Kaori Gurley/Washington Post)  Certainly  not any data they would publish in the Washington Poop.

Trump’s snatching of Maduro shows a new level of unrestrained global power (Nick Paton Walsh/CNN)  Long-awaited.

Trump faces quick criticism from Democrats over Maduro capture (Andrew Solender/Axios) My, what a surprise. If’ it had been Obama, they’d be licking his ass.

Trump’s Risky War in Venezuela (Conor Friedersdorf/The Atlantic)  Whenever they can’t think of any other complaint, they trot out the ‘risky’ (AlGore’s favorite word.)

Trump’s Venezuela Attack: It’s All About the Oil, Stupid! (Mehdi Hasan/Zeteo)  Because that’s what it would be about if you were doing it, Mehdi, doesn’t mean that’s why Trump is doing it.

Russia, Iran, China Outraged At US ‘Flagrant Armed Aggression’ On Venezuela As EU Shrugs  No better recommendation.

CNN Tries And Fails To Find Any New Negative Health Info On Trump From His WSJ Interview

Updated: Headfirst Into War (Jennifer Rubin/The Contrarian)  Jennifer Rubin loses her shit.

‘Iraq 2.0’: Democrats seethe at Trump’s surprise Venezuela strike (Politico) Seethe, Democrats, seethe!

World leaders denounce U.S. operation to capture Maduro (Lauren Floyd/Axios)

Trump’s Critics Are Falling Into an Obvious Trap (David Frum/The Atlantic)  So obvious even David Frum can see it.

Maduro Capture Operation and the President’s Duty to Faithfully Execute U.N. Charter (Ryan Goodman/Just Security)  I wasn’t aware that the U.S. President had any duty to ‘faithfully execute’ the U.N. Charter. The U.S. Constitution, yes, but the U.N. Charter?

Inside ‘Operation Absolute Resolve,’ the U.S. Effort to Capture Maduro (New York Times)  Jesus, where do they come up with these twinkie names?

Trump’s Selective Drug Enforcement in Latin America (emptywheel)  This is not ‘drug enforcement’. This is foreign policy. Nobody in ‘journalism’ appreciates the distinction between prophasis and aitia.

Schumer: Trump’s Venezuela Plans Should Alarm Americans  Especially Chuck Schumer.

Mamdani Calls Trump’s Venezuela Action Illegal  Name the law, Mr Mayor.

Democratic lawmakers say they were misled on Venezuela (Reuters) I wonder why? Trump Cites Leaks for Skipping Briefing on Venezuela Raid  Oh, I guess that’s why. (Democrats? Leak? Heaven forfend….)

Someone made a huge profit predicting Maduro’s capture. Here’s what happened (Herb Scribner/Axios)  And all that matters is that some evil white person made a profit.

Republicans largely back Trump on Venezuela action, Democrats decry it as unjustified (Associated Press)  This is news?

Democrats Melt Down Over Capture And Arrest Of Dictator Maduro  Had he been a ‘right-wing’ dictator, and had the President been a Democrat, they’d be falling all over themselves to kiss his ass.

Hegseth: Maduro ‘f’d around and he found out’ (Ryan Mancini/The Hill)  Not your AWFUL mother’s government.

A Criminal Empire — The United States launches a conquest and occupation of Venezuela to extract its oil wealth. (Spencer Ackerman/FOREVER WARS)  Some people have oil on the brain. If we switch to nuclear power, are they going to be wringing their hands all the time about uranium?

How Trump’s threats against Venezuela unfolded (Financial Times)

The Economist.

Prickly pear line the perimeters of brick-red fields. In a few there are crops, but in many the cactus is the only hint of green. Small children, who should be in school, herd Zebu cattle along dusty tracks. Women sell bags of charcoal outside flimsy wooden huts by the main road. It is the tail end of the dry season in southern Madagascar; locals are yearning for rain. They are short of cash and often hungry. They are also lonely.

Many people think loneliness is a first-world problem: that rich societies become atomised as people chase wealth rather than social connections. But surveys suggest this is wrong. Western, individualistic societies, where more people live alone and religion is marginal, tend to be less lonely. People in poor countries are much likelier to be lonely. And the loneliest region of all, surprisingly, is Africa, the home of ubuntu, the sociable notion that “people are people through other people.” In 2024 over a quarter of Africans surveyed said they had felt lonely the previous day.

The Foundry.

This year doesn’t just mark the 250th anniversary of the United States—it also means another year of President Donald Trump’s second term and impending midterm elections.

Last year, we saw the same leftist groups that staffed and advised the Biden administration gear up to oppose the president’s agenda, from filing lawsuits to block his executive orders to advising illegal aliens on how to evade immigration officers.

Trump is remaking the executive branch and planning another bill for the reconciliation process, but the Left won’t just bend over. Here are a few left-wing activist groups to watch in the year ahead.

Read it.

Kyle Hedquist, a convicted murderer who was sentenced to life in prison for shooting a teenage girl to death in cold blood, has been reappointed to serve on Salem, Oregon’s police review board – all in the name of his so-called “perspective” on the criminal justice system.

Hedquist, an Oregon native, was convicted of the aggravated murder of 19-year-old Nikki Thrasher, whom he lured down a remote rural road and shot in the back of the head to prevent her from revealing his involvement in a series of robberies. In 2022, then-Governor Kate Brown (D) played a key role in securing Hedquist’s early release, insisting that the killer “shouldn’t be locked up for life” simply because he was 17 years old at the time he executed Thrasher.

At the time of the commutation, Nikki’s mother, Hollie Thrasher, rightly condemned the decision to free her daughter’s murderer.

You can’t make this stuff up.

Newsbusters.

“Democratic socialist” Zohran Mamdani has been sworn in as the Mayor of America’s biggest city. The city that is famously home to the capitalism of Wall Street and all manner of millionaires and zillionaires, not to mention hard working, everyday Americans. And yes, New York is also the home of “legacy media” like the three broadcast TV networks, PBS, The New York Times and The New York Post et al.

Now it’s put up or shut up time for American socialists. With the “legacy media” on the scene to record the results.

Mayor Mamdani, whether he likes it or not, is now going to be under the media microscope if for no other reason then that it’s right there in New York watching the Mayor everyday. If socialism is the success Mamdani and his fellow Bernie Sanders-style Democrats insist, the media both — in New York and nationally — can be counted on to spread the word.

And if Mamdani’s socialist “solutions” crash and burn? However much the legacy media may want to downplay it, the woes of socialism will out.

Reuters, News Service of the Crust.

And the hits just keep on comin’….

Read it.

A group of New York state Senate Republicans is calling on Gov. Kathy Hochul to immediately commission an independent audit of state social service programs, citing “disturbing reports” and warning that weak oversight may have allowed significant misuse of taxpayer funds.

In a letter dated Jan. 2 addressed to the governor at the State Capitol, lawmakers raised alarms over alleged misuse of public funds tied to sham child care centers and other illegitimate entities exploiting taxpayer-funded assistance programs.

The senators warned that vulnerabilities in New York’s oversight systems could allow fraud, waste, and abuse to flourish unchecked.

If Minnesota is corrupt, can New York be far behind?

Newsbusters.

On Friday, ABC’s Good Morning America celebrated a new chapter in their hometown politics of New York City: the inauguration of far-left extremist Mayor Zohran Mamdani. The network couldn’t hide their excitement as fill-in anchor and chief White house correspondent Mary Bruce pivoted away from a deadly Swiss night club fire, with a huge smile on her face to talk about the communist mayor. Of course, there was also mention of his controversial comment.

“And now to a new era in New York City. Zoran Mamdani is sworn in as mayor on Thursday,” Bruce beamed, parroting Mamdani’s “new era” slogan. “The 34-year-old is the first Muslim and first person of South Asian descent to lead the nation’s largest city.”

While ABC had called President Trump’s plans ‘controversial,’ that wasn’t tone given to Mamdani’s despite widespread concern. “The new mayor’s first act involved affordable housing, just part of an ambitious progressive agenda that Mamdani insists will set an example for the world,” touted correspondent Aaron Katersky.

Bias? What bias?

Politico, a Voice of the Crust.

If Zohran Mamdani represents the rise of progressive politics in America, San Francisco is fast becoming the deflating counterpoint for the left.

It isn’t just that liberal lion Nancy Pelosi is on her way out or that moderate Democrats, backed by wealthy tech investors, have trounced the left in election after election over the last five years. It’s that San Francisco progressives who have been lost in a fog here — paying the price for voters’ frustrations over street conditions, homelessness and a drug addiction epidemic — have seen liberals in another big city suddenly supplant them.

At a series of meetings organized by socialists and other progressive groups here in recent months, the contrast with New York hung over the gatherings, stirring a sense of envy and anger. Many in San Francisco said it feels as if their city now belongs to the billionaire class.

I’ll bet you didn’t know that there was a distinct ‘billionaire class that acts in lockstep.

Somebody tell George Soros to get with the program.

Read it.

A divided federal appeals court voted to revive a lawsuit by school district employees who say they were forced to self-censor and make statements they disagreed with to finish so-called anti-racism training.

On Dec. 30, 2025, the full U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit voted 6–5 in Henderson v. Springfield R-12 School District to reactivate the employees’ lawsuit, holding that the chilling effect from the mandatory 2020 training gave them standing to sue for First Amendment violations.

Standing refers to the right of someone to sue in court. The parties must show a strong enough connection to the claim to justify their participation in a lawsuit.

Read it.

This year, the fight over free expression in American higher education reached a troubling milestone. According to data from the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression, efforts to censor speech on college campuses hit record highs and across multiple fronts—and most succeeded.

Read it.

A federal judge has granted a Lexington, Kentucky, father a preliminary injunction excusing his kindergartener from lessons featuring LGBTQ themes that conflict with his Christian values, reports Universal Hub.

“While defendants contend that implementing the notice and opt-out procedures contemplated by plaintiff’s proposed injunction would burden them to some degree, any potential harm they face does not outweigh that faced by plaintiff — particularly where defendants concede that [the parent’s son] must be opted out of at least some materials,” U.S. District Court Judge F. Dennis Saylor IV wrote in his order Tuesday.

The father, who sued under the pseudonym “Alan L.” in mid-October, said it goes against his religious beliefs to allow his child to be instructed in content that touches on “diversity, equity, and inclusion issues, including issues of race, gender, and sexuality, taught from a secular worldview.”

Read it.

Pro-Palestinian activists attacked machinery and spray-painted slogans at a Scottish aerospace factory, footage shared online has shown.

Protesters smashed their way into the Bruntons Aero Products site, on an industrial estate outside Edinburgh, shortly after midnight on New Year’s Day.

The firm appeared to have been targeted because it supplies specialist parts for defence companies Leonardo and BAE Systems, both of which have been heavily criticised for their alleged links to Israel.

The War Zone.

A major U.S. military operation, which included airstrikes and the use of special operations forces, resulted in the capture of Maduro.

…

CBS reports that Delta Force captured Maduro. They were very likely at the center of the operation, but it’s possible, if not probable, that other elements, including those from FBI, were also directly present during the operation.

Jim Jordan Buries His Own Cowardice in a Cowardly Document Dump (emptywheel)

House Republicans Buried the Jack Smith Transcript on New Year’s Eve. I Read It So You Don’t Have To. (Parker Molloy/The Present Age)  After all, your tiny brains might get the Narrative wrong. Can’t have that.

MAGA Voters F-Ed Around. In 2026, They’re Finding Out. (Julie Roginsky/Salty Politics …)

‘More Dangerous Than Francis’: MAGA Fury at Pope Leo’s Christmas Message (Christopher Hale/Letters from Leo)

Another Trump Tariff Retreat (Wall Street Journal)  Mistaking a maneuver for a retreat suggests that these people really haven’t been paying attention.

Health subsidies expire, launching millions of Americans into 2026 with steep insurance hikes (Ali Swenson/Associated Press)  I guess the Affordable Care Act wasn’t really all that affordable, was it. “Here, Lucy, hold this football for me.”

‘Mighty mad’: Democrats prepare to harness public anger over expired Obamacare subsidies (Nicholas Wu/Politico)  Guess they aren’t getting the Free Stuff that the Democrats promised them.

Medicaid, ICE and a ticking clock for undocumented Californians (Rachel Bluth/Politico)  Bias? What bias?

Why Trump Is Quickly Losing Hispanic Support (Wall Street Journal)  Is he really? Or is that just your wishful thinking expressing itself?

Trump’s wealth grew in 2025, but his investors took lumps (Ben Berkowitz/Axios)

After Watergate, the Presidency Was Tamed. Trump Is Unleashing It. (Matthew Purdy/New York Times)  No, Republican Presidency was tamed. Democrats have always done whatever they wanted. Now the shoe is on the other foot, and it’s proglodyte ass that is getting kicked.

Elon Musk created a monster that’s tearing the right apart (Andrew Prokop/Vox)  Sure he did.

The Worst Foreign Policy Blunders of 2025 (Jennifer Rubin/The Contrarian)  Jennifer Rubin loses her shit.

Maduro urges Trump to abandon ‘illegal warmongering’ and start ‘serious talks’ (Tom Phillips/The Guardian)  Don’t hold your breath.

The blame for alleged fraud in Minnesota belongs to conservatives (Lisa Needham/Public Notice)  I guess that’s the New Narrative.

Trump and top Iranian officials exchange threats over protests roiling Iran (Jon Gambrell/Associated Press)

Trump gives away the game on his motivations for the first vetoes of his second term (Steve Benen/MS NOW)  If you think you understand Trump, you don’t understand Trump.

Read it.

To have a better understanding of the meaning of political Islam, we can turn to a scholar who has taken a scientific approach to analyzing Islam. He provides five principles that describe the nature of political Islam. He explains that 51% of the doctrinal texts are about politics:

• All of Islam is based upon the Trilogy—the Koran, the Sira (Mohammed’s biography) and the Hadith (His Traditions).

• Most of the Islamic doctrine is political, not religious.

• Islam divides the world into Muslims and Kafirs (non-Muslims)

• Political Islam always has two different ways to treat Kafirs—dualistic ethics. Kafirs can be abused in the worst ways or they can be treated like a good neighbor.

• Kafirs must submit to Islam in all politics and public life. Every aspect of Kafir civilization must submit to Political Islam.

Keep in mind that he came to these conclusions by studying the doctrinal texts, making sure that his ideas were as objective as possible.

Read it.

German prosecutors have filed charges against two 21-year-old Syrian men in connection with a knife attack on an American tourist aboard a tram in Dresden. Nearly four months after the incident, the Dresden public prosecutor’s office announced that the men are accused of dangerous and serious bodily harm. The Dresden Regional Court will now decide whether to admit the charges.

The attack took place during the night of August 24th on a tram near Neustädter Markt. According to investigators, the 20-year-old American victim intervened after the two suspects allegedly harassed women on the tram. Prosecutors say one of the accused initially struck the victim in the face. A short time later, the second suspect joined the assault and used a knife to inflict deep cuts to the victim’s lip, nose, and mouth.

The American suffered serious injuries and required surgery. Authorities have stated that the resulting scars are expected to remain permanently visible.

Quillette.

Say what you will about Benjamin Netanyahu, but he has a talent for catching audiences off guard. On 26 December, in a move almost no one anticipated, he formally recognised the Republic of Somaliland as a sovereign state. Israel is thus the first country to extend formal recognition to the fledgling nation, issued “in the spirit of the Abraham Accords” and, according to Netanyahu, at the direct behest of President Donald Trump.

Somaliland was a British protectorate from 1884 until it gained its independence in 1960 before voluntarily uniting with Somalia that same year. On 18 May 1991, following the collapse of the Somali state due to the disastrous and ultimately genocidal policies of the Siyad Barre government, Somaliland unilaterally declared independence, severed its ties with Mogadishu, and established its own system of government. For nearly three decades, Somaliland has received neither the international protection nor the large-scale aid and concessional lending extended to other embryonic postcolonial states.

Whereas many now consider Somalia a “functional failed state” plagued by warlordism, rampant corruption, prolonged tribal warfare, and sexual violence, Somaliland has emerged as a comparatively successful model of grassroots state-building. Since 1991, the aspiring state has overseen four presidential transitions through competitive elections and largely peaceful transfers of power. It has adopted a formal zero-tolerance stance toward the practice of female genital mutilation and has cultivated a private-sector-led economy sustained by diaspora remittances, domestic entrepreneurship, and relative internal stability: an unusual combination in the Horn of Africa.

Read it.

Germany’s conservative Christian Social Union (CSU) has called for a sharp tightening of migration policy, including large-scale deportations of Syrians on commercial flights starting in 2026.

In a position paper released ahead of the party’s parliamentary retreat at Kloster Seeon in Bavaria, the CSU’s Bundestag group argues that the Syrian civil war has ended and that the country is now entering a reconstruction phase. As a result, the party says, the protection grounds for most Syrian migrants in Germany no longer apply.

The CSU is demanding a nationwide “deportation offensive with scheduled flights,” explicitly including returns to Syria and Afghanistan. To facilitate this, the party wants federal departure centres established across Germany and faster enforcement of removals, including against the will of those affected.

Read it.

The Mayor of Antwerp, Els van Doesburg, has confirmed that federal police officers will continue to assist the Antwerp Local Police Service in securing the city’s Jewish Quarter. The announcement follows Interior Minister Bernard Quintin’s earlier plan to withdraw federal officers from the area from January 1, 2026.

Speaking on VRT Radio 1, Mayor Van Doesburg stressed the importance of the federal police presence. “Security in the Jewish Quarter is ensured by federal officers together with officers from the local police service. It is a fifty-fifty split between the federal and local police. Withdrawing the federal police officers would mean that half of the total number of officers deployed would suddenly go,” she said.

Quintin defended his initial decision, stating that the federal police assignment had always been temporary, and that soldiers would soon be able to take over these duties under a new law. Following discussions, the minister agreed to maintain the current deployment until military personnel can be assigned.

Read it.

Despite UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s pledge to smash people smuggling gangs, small boat crossings to the UK remained at historically high levels last year with growing criticism from opposition figures that government measures have failed to deter illegal migration.

A total of 41,472 migrants arrived in the UK after crossing the Channel in 2025, up from 36,816 the previous year and 41% higher than the 29,437 recorded in 2023. Since Labour came to power in the summer of 2024, around 65,000 migrants have reached Britain via sea.

On December 13th, 737 migrants were confirmed to have crossed in 11 small boats, after a 28-day hiatus. The arrivals pushed the annual total past 40,000, exceeding last year’s figure of 36,816.

Read it.

wave of euphemism is sweeping the country.

What is being euphemized is Islam. Whenever adherents of the Religion of Peace do something really, really bad in the name of their faith, their actions are not generally ascribed to Islam. Prominent public figures invariably refer to one of several obfuscations to modify the word “Islam”: “Radical Islam”, “Islamism”, or “Political Islam”. Sometimes mention of Islam is even completely elided by citing “Radical Extremism” or something similar.

Extreme what? Radical what? No one knows — the noun modified by the adjective remains unmentioned. “Allahu Akhbar” is usually our only clue.

All Islam is radical—if you’re not a Muslim. All Islam is estremist—if you’re not a Muslim.

Read it.

In 1965, Ronald McKinley Everett changed his name to Maulana Karenga, in 1966, he invented the fictional holiday of Kwanzaa, in 1969, members of his US black nationalist organization got into a gunfight with Black Panthers at UCLA, in 1971, he was arrested for torturing two women, and in 1989, he was hired as the chair of the black studies department at a California State University college where he currently teaches on subjects such as “the socio-ethical thought of Malcolm X” and “Ancient Egyptian Maatian Ethics” (after the goddess Maat).

The story of Kwanzaa and Karenga is a small part of the larger story of how California’s public colleges, its UC (University of California) and CSU (California State University) systems, incubated, financed and inflicted some of the worst racial political extremism on America.

When Chancellor Charles Young (later the head of the Qatar Foundation) took office, UCLA had a 12% minority population. Young, like many radical administrators, was on a mission to rapidly increase the minority population through affirmative action and make it more appealing to them with identity politics courses of the kind being championed by the Ford Foundation.

Read it.

New York Governor Hochul has been saying for months that the regulations required by law to meet the Climate Act will be ruinously costly to New Yorkers. The draft regs were reportedly finished a year ago. The Governor must be citing their official cost assessment.

So where are the numbers? Why has Hochul not released the cost numbers so New Yorkers can see who gets hammered and how much? Keeping these ruinous cost numbers secret is outrageous. It should be an election issue.

To begin with the legislature, the Assembly, needs to see these big numbers immediately. Clearly the Climate Act must be changed and the Assembly is just gearing up their 2026 session. Hochul should submit a detailed assessment of the ruinous costs to the Energy Committee. Time is of the essence.

If this cost assessment is not forthcoming the Energy Committee should hold hearings and demand to see the numbers. I am not familiar with New York law but under federal law the Committee could subpoena these findings.

The Assembly cannot fix the Climate Act until they know how it is broken.

Read it.

In the coming weeks, school boards across the Land of 10,000 Lakes state will decide on curricula to meet ethnic studies mandates for the 2026–2027 academic year.

There appear to be limited alternatives to the free instructional materials developed with taxpayer dollars and endorsed by the state teachers’ union.

That curriculum instructs 6th graders to learn the 13 guiding principles of the Black Lives Matter movement; 7th graders on how protesters have breached federal buildings; and higher schoolers to “identify plans of action that people have used to resist, refuse, and create alternatives to oppressive systems,” according to the materials developed by the University of Minnesota’s Center for Race, Indigeneity, Disability, Gender and Sexuality Studies (RIDGS).

“Students will be able to explain how race is socially constructed and how that social construction has been used to oppress people of color, specifically in relation to Jim Crow, segregation, and racial covenants,” reads the description for the 11th and 12th-grade Jim Crow of the North course.

Time to leave.

Newsbusters.

It was a terrible year for the British Broadcasting Corporation, which still has such an overhyped global reputation as the gold standard for media. Several websites tagged the BBC as the worst outlet in 2025, and it wasn’t really about its mangling of Donald Trump’s January 6, 2021 speech that caused Trump to file a defamation lawsuit.

It was about the BBC’s horribly biased coverage of Israel and Gaza. Brittany Bernstein of National Review put the BBC at the top of their list of “Worst Media Misses of 2025.” The pro-Israel media watchdog Honest Reporting tagged the BBC as the “Dishonest Reporter of the Year.” And the dishonesty started early.

Both NR and Honest Reporting noted that in February, BBC executives pulled its documentary Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone after an investigative journalist found the film’s narrator Abdullah — “the emotional centerpiece of the film” — was the teenage son of a Hamas minister. Oops. And his mother had been paid by the production company responsible for the program.

Read it.

A Somali TikToker (account now defunct), first highlighted by Libs of TikTok, mocked Americans about alleged Somali-linked fraud in Minnesota and pushed dangerous rhetoric suggesting Elon Musk was “about to die.” Such statements fit a broader alarming pattern surrounding the Democratic Party’s normalization of assassination culture against Musk and President Trump supporters.

“I wouldn’t worry too much about him. He [Musk] about to die,” TikToker “dowza.z” stated in a short 30-second clip. The account has since been taken down, and it remains unclear whether the TikToker deleted the account or whether the dangerous rhetoric directed at Musk violated the platform’s terms of service.

One of the disadvantages of being a billionaire is that you automatically accrue a host of idiots as enemies, and you never know where they are.

One of the advantages of being a billionaire is that once they are identified your toolbox with which to deal with them is quite extensive.

Read it.

Small Business Administration Administrator Kelly Loeffler announced late Thursday that nearly 7,000 Minnesota borrowers have been suspended over suspected fraud. The move follows a bombshell report last week by citizen journalist Nick Shirley, who detailed alleged large-scale fraud tied to daycare centers operated by Somali-linked networks. The revelations sparked national outrage, with many Americans angered that their taxes are funding what appears to be industrial-scale migrant welfare fraud.

Oh, say it ain’t so….

Read it.

The Democrat-led state of California has delayed the cancellation of approximately 17,000 commercial truck driver’s licenses issued to illegal migrants.

California’s Department of Motor Vehicles announced it will postpone a planned Jan. 5 cancellation of thousands of non-domiciled commercial driver’s licenses (CDLs) for 60 days, pushing the deadline into March and setting up another flashpoint with the Trump administration and federal transportation regulators, the Washington Examiner reported.

The delay comes as the administration ramps up enforcement of long-standing federal rules designed to keep unsafe and unqualified drivers off America’s roads — including the requirement that commercial drivers demonstrate English language proficiency so they can read and obey traffic signs.

Read it.

As additional investigators surge to fraud-plagued Minnesota, federal agents have already arrested 500 illegal immigrants and probed 1,000 immigration-fraud cases during the past two months, a Homeland Security official estimated.

…

Fraud was substantiated in about half of the immigration-fraud investigations, she said, and many of the arrested illegal immigrants were from Somalia.

Somalis dominate the list of nearly 100 people federally charged in various schemes to defraud the government, authorities have said.

Read it.

German Twitch streamer Kunshikitty set out on New Year’s Eve to demonstrate that the streets of Cologne are safe for women, streaming live to her audience. Instead, the broadcast captured two separate attacks on camera, forcing her to end the stream in distress.

Will she learn anything from this? I think not.

WIll anybody in Germany learn from this? I fear not.

Read it.

I don’t care if you support Donald Trump, Ron DeSantis or the Easter Bunny, any American who doesn’t realize the tenuous future of our union, after reviewing the information within this testimony, is going to forever live in a collapsed dystopian nightmare, if they vote for any political representative who supports it.

The House Judiciary Committee has released the [VIDEO] and [TRANSCRIPT] of special prosecutor Jack Smith’s deposition. What is outlined within it is alarming in the extreme. I strongly urge anyone with any platform to review the details and quickly highlight the content therein. There is no time to waste.

I’ve thought hat since I was an undergraduate and had to listen to a lecture by James Tobin.