Gold is “an overcrowded trade that’s overextended by every technical metric,” Nicky Shiels, head of research at precious metals refiner MKS Pamp SA, wrote in early October, getting ever more overbought.

The reckoning came last week and extended losses this week, with the precious metal back below $4,000…

Source: Bloomberg

The crash that everyone saw coming has now dragged the commodity well off the ledge of overboughtness…

Source: Bloomberg

The ‘dip’ has, however, brought out a new wave of buyers – from retail lurkers to central banks finally waking up.

Amid pictures of lines outside gold stores around the world flooding social media over the past month, Bloomberg reports that, in Bangkok’s Chinatown, the nation’s gold trading hub, Sunisa Kodkasorn, a 57-year-old textile factory worker, had no doubt about whether this move is a turning point in gold’s multiyear bull market, or just a dip?

“Gold is the best investment,” she said.

“We decided to gather all our money and come today because we knew prices had dropped.”

She’s not alone: from Singapore to the US, dealers told Bloomberg they had seen a rush of interest from people looking to buy gold as prices dropped this week. Kodkasorn’s attempt to buy the dip was stymied because the size of gold bar she could afford was sold out.

“Bull markets always need a healthy correction to weed out froth and ensure the cycle has duration,” Shiels, whose initial note came a fortnight before prices peaked, said this week.

“Prices should consolidate and revert to a more measured bullish trajectory.”

It remains hard to find a gold bear among precious metals analysts whose forecasts – for the most part – have been bullish but not bullish enough over the course of the last two years.

When the London Bullion Market Association carried out a survey of analysts at the start of the year, almost every respondent expected prices to rise, but none thought it could trade above $3,300 during 2025.

“We expect de-risking and profit taking by investors to be met by dip buying from other segments of demand including central banks and other physical buyers, ultimately keeping reversals relatively shallow,” Gregory Shearer at JPMorgan Chase & Co. said in a note this week.

Pete Walden, deputy chief executive officer at BullionStar, a dealership in Singapore, said his company had had its busiest day ever on Tuesday.

“We had a queue before opening, with many more buyers than sellers,” he said. “I think many are using it as an opportunity to buy the dip.”

In the US, Stefan Gleason of dealer Money Metals Exchange LLC, said his company had more interest from “bargain hunting” buyers than it could handle.

But it’s not just the retail market participant who is buying this precious metals dip…

Bloomberg reports that South Korea’s central bank is weighing plans to add to its gold reserves for the first time in more than a decade.

“The Bank of Korea plans to consider additional gold purchases from a medium- to long-term perspective,” said Heung-Soon Jung, director of the Reserve Investment Division at the bank’s Reserve Management Group.

The last time the bank added to its gold holdings was 2013, according to Jung, speaking at an event hosted by the London Bullion Market Association and London Platinum and Palladium Market in Kyoto on Tuesday.

His remarks offer a rare insight into the attitude of central banks to bullion reserves.

While their purchases have become an ever more important driver of prices in recent years, central bankers rarely speak in public about the gold market.

Jung said the Bank of Korea would monitor markets to decide the timing and size of any gold purchases.

Any decision would be based on the evolution of its international reserves, as well as the trajectories of gold and the Korean won, he added.

The Bank of Korea faced criticism domestically after purchasing gold in 2011-2013, just before the metal entered a multiyear price slump.

It hasn’t bought gold since, even as a wave of buying by other central banks has helped drive up prices in recent years.

Now may well be the time to follow retail in and BTFD for the next wave of global liquidity.

Authored by Michael Snyder via TheMostImportantNews.com,

It is already happening…

There has been a lot of talk that there will be a surge in demand at America’s overwhelmed food banks once funding for the food stamp program ends in early November, but the truth is that we are already witnessing a surge in demand.  So what is going to happen if the current government shutdown persists for an extended period of time?  On one recent evening, the line at a food bank in downtown Kansas City “snaked through the parking lot, down a driveway and into the street”…

On a recent Thursday evening, the line of cars waiting to pick up food at Redemptorist Social Services Center in midtown snaked through the parking lot, down a driveway and into the street.

Demand for free food is soaring across Kansas City, as job cuts increase, food inflation remains persistently high and federal food assistance is slashed by the Trump administration.

Julie McCaw, executive director at Redemptorist, called the situation “alarming.” Families with working parents, senior citizens and people who simply cannot find work increasingly are turning to food pantries like hers for help.

Sadly, this is just the beginning.

At one location in San Francisco the lines “typically extend a city block”, but the president and CEO of that facility openly admits that the lines are “about to get longer”…

Each week, as president and CEO of the San Francisco social justice nonprofit Glide, I walk past the lines of people who wait for our free meal program. Those lines typically extend a city block.

They’re about to get longer.

If you find yourself needing to go to a food bank during the weeks ahead, my recommendation would be to get there very early.

Because once the food is gone, there is nothing left to hand out.

That recently happened at the Capital Area Food Bank in Maryland, but fortunately a truck with more supplies showed up just in time…

The Capital Area Food Bank started the morning with 300 boxes, enough for 150 families to receive two boxes each. They ran out halfway through distribution.

Cheers erupted as another truck backed into the shopping center parking lot. Federal workers, in a line that wrapped around the shopping center and into the neighborhood, clapped and cheered at the sight of reinforcements arriving at the emergency food distribution site.

If the line at that food bank is long enough to wrap around a shopping center now, what is it going to look like in a few weeks?

In New Mexico, more than a fifth of the entire population is on food stamps, and demand at local food banks is rapidly increasing…

Marissa Brown, who runs the Roadrunner Food Bank distribution, says the line has increased by approximately 50 households to 225 each week. She estimated a line once composed mostly of unhoused people pushing carts is now probably 60% people with roofs over their heads.

“We are just seeing more of our neighbors who are housed coming, too, because it’s just hard for everyone,” Brown told Source New Mexico as people worked their way through the line Friday morning. “We’re really pleased that we can just expand that reach to anyone who might need it, but it certainly has expanded.”

Neighboring Texas is experiencing a similar surge in demand.

In fact, it is being reported that at food banks throughout the state the lines are “growing longer every day”…

The West Texas Food Bank is sounding the alarm. As the federal government shutdown continues, thousands of West Texans — including federal employees and families depending on SNAP benefits — are left wondering how they’ll put food on the table.

The Food Bank is stepping in to fill the gap, but shelves are emptying faster than they can be restocked. Demand has surged across the 19 counties served by the organization, with lines growing longer every day.

“We are seeing fear in people’s eyes,” Libby Stephens, CEO of the West Texas Food Bank, said in a news release. “Parents will skip meals so their children can eat. Families who have always been the ones giving help will find themselves asking for it. We will do everything we can, but our resources are already stretched to the limit. We desperately need the community’s help more than ever.”

We haven’t seen anything like this in a long time.

In our nation’s capital, federal workers that are suddenly without paychecks are lining up to get free food and supplies from a food bank in southeast DC…

Federal workers lined up around the corner outside of the Capital Area Food Bank in Southeast Washington, D.C., on Friday after missing their first full paycheck since the now 24-day government shutdown began.

The food bank, set up specifically for federal workers, provided boxed meals, household goods and personal hygiene items to over 250 federal employees on Friday, according to Wil Stroman, a local pastor who is helping organize a food bank for federal workers every Friday until the shutdown ends.

This is why it is so important to always have a sizable emergency fund.

If you suddenly lose your job or some sort of a temporary emergency happens, you will still need to pay your bills and feed your family.

Yes, it is great that the food banks are there.

But they can only do so much.

We haven’t even reached the month of November yet, and one food bank in Huntington, West Virginia is already rationing potatoes…

Cynthia Kirkhart, the CEO of Facing Hunger Foodbank in Huntington, West Virginia, has already had to explain to customers this year why the organization is rationing bags of potatoes.

The food bank, which also serves households in Kentucky and Ohio, has had to shrink its allotments as higher food costs and surging need strain its budget.

I never imagined that we would be talking about rationing potatoes in November 2025, but here we are.

When things start to go bad, they tend to do so very quickly, and you definitely don’t want to be caught without enough food when things really start hitting the fan.

These are such perilous times.

My hope is that the government shutdown will be resolved soon so that our food banks will not get absolutely crushed by a tsunami of new demand.

But right now we are being told that this shutdown is likely to last quite a bit longer, and that is not good news for any of us.

Michael’s new book entitled “10 Prophetic Events That Are Coming Next” is available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon.com, and you can subscribe to his Substack newsletter at michaeltsnyder.substack.com.

The Russian government is preparing to expand military conscription in order to ensure steady flow of manpower related to its Ukraine ‘special military operation’.

Russia’s State Duma (lower house) has approved legislation on Tuesday that will shift the country’s military to a year-round conscription model beginning next year, part of the broader push to boost troop numbers related to Ukraine, the regional monitor Moscow Times says.

A key change is that draft boards will be able to carry out medical examinations, psychological evaluations, and other enlistment procedures at any point throughout the year, instead of just during designated draft periods as the policy currently stands.

According to more from the publication:

Supporters of the reform say it is designed to ease the administrative burden on military recruitment offices and better distribute workload across the year.

The bill’s explanatory notes say the new system will improve the quality of conscription and reduce bottlenecks during the bi-annual surge.

All of this strongly points to the Kremlin anticipating that the deadly war will grind on possibly for years more to come. It has already been going for well over three years, since the full-scale invasion of Feb. 2022.

Prior to that, the Donbass civil war pitted pro-Russian autonomous republics against the Ukrainian army and its associated militias in the region. But at this point, Russia has still not officially mobilized society for what meets the (domestic) legal definition “war”, as it’s instead a Special Military Operation (SMO).

What were previously high hopes for President Trump to broker a Ukraine peace deal have faded, and the much talked about Budapest summit with Putin has been put on indefinite hold.

Putin could also be anticipating expanding battlelines based on the Western military alliance pouring more weapons into the conflict – for example long-range missiles from the US and UK.

Recruitment methods in Russia have been less controversial than the desperate tactics often on display in Ukraine…

Russia recruits by offering $73,000 USD for signing a contract, or about 6x the avg. annual wage.

Ukraine recruits by sneaking up behind random men and kidnapping them right off the street. pic.twitter.com/2jUPVbQ2gr

— Chebureki Man (@CheburekiMan) October 4, 2025

Moscow might also now be flexing back, showing that it can outlast its enemies in this war of attrition, even as the US and EU impose maximal sanctions, which just happened with the sanctioning of two Russian oil giants.

It’s the 9th war that Donald Trump has (ostensibly) ended, bringing peace to the galaxy.  The gaming wars are officially over and the political left lost.  The icing on the cake?  Leftists are now forced to scroll through Trump Halo memes posted by GameStop and the DHS. 

Woke activists and progressives are in meltdown after GameStop and the White House exchanged memes from the game “Halo” featuring Donald Trump.  The viral joke spread after GameStop published a declaration of the end of the console wars and appointing themselves the neutral adjudicators. 

The official White House “rapid response” X account reposted the declaration, stating that this was yet another war that Trump had helped to end. 

https://t.co/jI0ZrstLgz pic.twitter.com/VS32cV0RG7

— GameStop (@gamestop) October 27, 2025

GameStop posted an AI image of Trump shaking hands with Master Chief from Halo, and the memes exploded.

Power to the Players https://t.co/GqNu0qdgmw pic.twitter.com/4Hw6G7i7aW

— The White House (@WhiteHouse) October 27, 2025

Finishing this fight. pic.twitter.com/6Ezq9NUqMq

— Homeland Security (@DHSgov) October 27, 2025

The response from leftists has been exactly what we have come to expect:  Salt, outrage and accusations of political “hypocrisy”.  They believe that pop culture and the world of gaming belongs to them; controlling cultural expression is the lifeblood of progressive movements.   

FUCK ICE! and FUCK Donald Trump!
Get the FUCK outta here with using HALO for your shitty dehumanizing police state Propaganda! No one thinks your shit is cool besides low IQ hur hur MAGA cult members on X. Half of which are bots. Yall gonna find out soon in the next Election! 🇺🇸 pic.twitter.com/1WvzoeLDvN

— Joe Vargas (@AngryJoeShow) October 27, 2025

Ya know who LOVES this?

The same dumbfucks who said to
“kEeP pOlitiCs OuT of GAming” for the last 8 years. https://t.co/Pt7IwB3APM

— Shaun Bolen (@ShaunBolen) October 27, 2025

The argument that anti-woke champions called for “politics to be removed from video games” is not exactly accurate.  They called for woke politics to be removed from video games.  There’s a difference.  

The Trump/Halo memes are being heralded by Gamergate as the light at the end of the dark tunnel of leftist dominance within media spaces.  If a company like GameStop is unafraid to share jokes with the White House about Trump saving video games, it means that the woke mob has no power to frighten the industry with cancellation and boycotts.  It means the leftist stranglehold on culture is slipping.    

The invasion of the political left into pop culture spaces has been documented by conservatives for decades. However, if we are to be completely honest, it was Gamergate kids exposing the intersectional feminist subversion of the video game industry that ultimately brought the woke agenda into wider public awareness.

Woke activists infested the industry using far-left “consulting firms”, groups that extorted gaming companies, threatening them with potential lawsuits and cancellation if they didn’t integrate the progressive DEI checklist into all of their projects. 

As a result, game developers hired on numerous activists, fearing that they would be targeted by the mob and lose their customer base.  Once inside these companies, the activists hired even more of their activist friends and the assimilation was complete.  As a result, nearly every major console game was replete with DEI and LGBT indoctrination. 

The goal?  To saturate the market with woke propaganda and bombard children with “the message” until they were brainwashed into loving it. 

Instead, Gamergate grew in strength and influence, making it impossible for games companies to embed woke messaging without taking massive losses in sales.  Many of these companies are imploding today.  Many of the activist journalists who ran cover for them and attacked Gamergate have lost their jobs in the recent tech media bloodbath.  They’re lucky if they can get work at Starbucks.

Today, Trump is being memed in Halo armor and ICE is using Halo as a allegory for the illegal alien invasion of the US.  Who could have predicted ten years ago that this kind of political healing was possible?  The woke mob should have left video games alone.

Authored by Lawrence Wilson via The Epoch Times,

More than 41 million Americans won’t receive federal help buying groceries in November unless Congress reopens the government.

“The well has run dry,” the Department of Agriculture wrote on its website on Oct. 27.

The department oversees the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), which serves about 12 percent of the U.S. population.

The government shutdown began Oct. 1 after the Senate failed to advance a stopgap funding resolution introduced by Republicans, which would have temporarily funded the government while Congress completed 2026 spending legislation.

Nearly all Democrats have rejected the measure until Republicans come to terms on their proposals to extend health care funding expiring end of the year. Republicans contend that those negotiations should happen in the context of regular spending negotiations, not as a condition for reopening the government.

Here’s a look at which states stand to lose the most if the shutdown extends another week, and how that could affect both parties.

States Receiving the Most Funding

SNAP funding totaled more than $7.8 billion in May 2025, the last month for which data is available.

Nearly half of all SNAP funds went to 7 large-population states in the month of May.

California drew the largest share at more than $1 billion in federal funding—about 13 percent of the total.

New York received $647 million, and Texas received $614 million. The next highest amounts went to Florida, $536 million; Illinois, $368 million; Pennsylvania, $368 million; and Ohio, $356 million.

Those states together received 49 percent of the food assistance benefit for May 2025, and they served about 49 percent of those receiving benefits.

Total spending for SNAP reached $99.8 billion in fiscal year 2024.

States are now preparing for the possibility of no SNAP funding in November.

A New York State Department of Social Services website carried this warning: “Due to the ongoing federal government shutdown, November SNAP benefits may be delayed. SNAP benefits cannot be issued for November unless the federal government shutdown ends or other federal action provides necessary funding.”

The site promised those receiving assistance an update by Nov. 1.

California Gov. Gavin Newsom warned residents on Oct. 20 that its food assistance funds would likely be delayed in November if the shutdown lasted beyond Oct. 23.

States With Highest Rate of Participation

On average, about 12 percent of Americans receive SNAP benefits. In some states, that percentage is much higher. These states stand to lose fewer federal dollars, but the impact could be greater, affecting a relatively larger share of their population.

Sixteen states and the District of Columbia have higher-than-average participation in SNAP.

Of those, New Mexico has the highest rate, with 21 percent of its 2.1 million people receiving food assistance. The District of Columbia is next with 20 percent of its 700,000 residents participating in SNAP. Oregon is next with 18 percent participation, followed by Louisiana and Oklahoma at 17 percent each.

About 15 percent of the population receives SNAP benefits in West Virginia, Nevada, Massachusetts, Pennsylvania, New York, Illinois, and Michigan.

Political Speculation

Leaders in both political parties have blamed the other for the impending loss of food aid.

“Forty-two million people across America are going to suffer from [losing] those SNAP benefits that they count on right before Thanksgiving because [Senate Minority Leader] Chuck Schumer and Democrats are so angry with President [Donald] Trump that they just want to find a way to say no,” House Majority Whip Steve Scalise (R-La.) told reporters on Oct. 22.

Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.) said in an Oct. 25 statement: “The Administration is choosing not to feed Americans in need—choosing to inflict pain on families—despite knowing that it has the authority to do so. That is unacceptable. Hunger isn’t a bargaining chip.”

Any loss of SNAP funding is expected to affect the constituencies of both parties similarly.

Schumer and House Majority Leader Hakeem Jeffries are both Democrats from New York, a state having higher-than-average participation in SNAP and ranking second highest in total SNAP funding.

House Majority Leader Mike Johnson and House Majority Whip Steve Scalise are both Republicans from Louisiana, where 17 percent of the population receives SNAP assistance, well above the national average.

In states where a majority voted for Trump in the 2024 presidential election, the combined rate of SNAP participation was 12 percent.

In states that voted for then-Vice President and presidential candidate Kamala Harris, the rate was slightly higher at 13 percent.

The Trump administration has said that “contingency funds are not legally available to cover regular benefits” for SNAP, so congressional action will be needed to prevent a loss of benefits.

And there is no legal pathway to reimburse states that expend their own money to cover November’s SNAP payments, should they choose to.

“Despite their willingness, States cannot cover the cost of benefits and be reimbursed,” the department said in a statement.

Dozens are dead, including four police officers, following a major narcoterrorism operation targeting organized crime in Rio de Janeiro. The government operation comes less than two weeks before globalists gather for the COP30 global warming conference in Belem, Brazil.

“We stand firm confronting narcoterrorism,” Governor Claudio Castro wrote on X. He said 2,500 security personnel and 32 armored trucks were a part of the operation across the Alemao and Penha favela regions.

Broadcasters GloboNews and CNN Brasil reported that at least 60 people have died, including police officers, during the raids against drug cartels. 

Rio de Janeiro appears to be in a state of chaos. 

Rio de Janeiro is under a state of terror. The Comando Vermelho (CV) gang has enforced a citywide lockdown in retaliation for police operations targeting crime in the state. pic.twitter.com/7Mc3D84dID

— Cartel Watch (@CartelWatchNet) October 28, 2025

🇧🇷🇺🇸 @StateDept
To whom it may concern:
These are the narcoterrorists shooting in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.
The cartel known as CV is connected to the Venezuelan cartels. A real threat to the United States. pic.twitter.com/lvqsYCKAos

— Rafael Fontana (@RafaelFontana) October 28, 2025

Faixa de Gaza? Não. É o Rio de Janeiro no dia de hoje! pic.twitter.com/ecyuQ7tBkT

— Valeria Bernardo (@ValeriaBnews) October 28, 2025

Castro outlined the operation:

1. SECURITY: The Government of the State of Rio launches, this Tuesday (10/28), the “Operation Containment”. The joint action of the state security forces mobilizes 2,500 civil and military police in the Complexes of Alemão and Penha

2. OBJECTIVE: The operation aims to combat the territorial expansion of the Comando Vermelho and to capture criminal leaderships from Rio de Janeiro and other states. The action also involves the participation of prosecutors from the State Public Prosecutor’s Office.

3. INVESTIGATION: The “Operation Containment” was launched after more than a year of investigation conducted by the Narcotics Repression Police Station (DRE). Throughout the day, arrest warrants and search and seizure warrants obtained from the Judiciary will be served.

4. MOBILIZED FORCES: @PMERJ participates with the Special Operations Command (COE) and operational units from the capital and Metropolitan Region. @PCERJ mobilized agents from CORE, specialized police stations, district stations, Money Laundering Combat Dept., and Intelligence Subsecretariat.

5. STRUCTURE: The operation features a strong technological and logistical apparatus, including drones, 2 helicopters, 32 armored land vehicles, and 12 demolition vehicles from the PM’s Special Operations Support Unit, in addition to ambulances from the Rescue and Salvage Group.

Timing of the raids comes one week before the C40 summit of global mayors and Prince William’s global environmental Earthshot Prize, which will feature celebrities, according to Reuters. Also, globalists are holding their COP30 global warming summit in Belem, northern Brazil, from Nov. 10 to Nov. 21.  

Such large-scale operations in favelas to combat drug cartels have been seen ahead of previous international events in Rio, including the 2016 Olympics, the 2024 G20 summit, and the recent BRICS summit.

Update(1457ET): Israel’s Defence Minister Israel Katz has alleged Hamas fighters attacked IDF troops despite an ongoing ceasefire. “Hamas will pay a heavy price for attacking soldiers in Gaza and for violating the agreement to return the bodies of the hostages,” Katz said as heavy bombardments in the Strip have been reported. He declared Hamas’ actions are “crossing of a bright red line, to which the [military] will respond with great force.”

Gaza’s civil defense agency has confirmed several airstrikes in a statement to Al Jazeera. Hamas is denying the accusations, in a statement saying “Israel must realize we are committed to the agreement, and they must stop falsely accusing us of violating it.” This as Al Jazeera writes, “For the past 30 minutes, there has been major activity in the air over Gaza’s skies, with drones hovering above.” A series of airstrikes have hit Gaza City in particular.

In response to these developments the US is insisting it believes the ceasefire will hold. “Despite the clashes today, the ceasefire agreement in Gaza will continue,” Vice President J.D. Vance said Tuesday afternoon.

Several strikes reported within the last hour by the Israeli Air Force against the area in and around Gaza City in Northern Gaza. pic.twitter.com/PWec6tZivl

— OSINTdefender (@sentdefender) October 28, 2025

* * *

“Prime Minister Netanyahu instructed the military echelon to carry out immediate and powerful strikes in the Gaza Strip,” a statement issued moments ago by the Prime Minister’s office indicates.

“Following security consultations, Prime Minister Netanyahu instructed the military to immediately carry out powerful strikes in the Gaza Strip,” a statement from his office says. Netanyahu has accused Hamas of committing a “clear violation” of the ceasefire deal.

Though the past over 2-weeks in which the Hamas ceasefire has held has witnessed intermittent flare-ups in fighting, this could be the big one which unravels the whole thing.

Less than an hour before the new strikes were ordered by Netanyahu, Fox News’ Trey Yingst reported, “Hamas violated the ceasefire by attacking IDF soldiers in Rafah, I’m told by an Israeli military official.”

And Al Jazeera says, “In a sign of the fragility of the ceasefire, Israeli troops were shot at in the southern city of Rafah on Tuesday and returned fire, an unnamed Israeli military official told The Associated Press.”

• SHEKEL HITS SESSION LOW AS NETANYAHU INSTRUCTS ON GAZA STRIKES
• HAMAS SAYS POSTPONES TODAY’S HANDOVER OF ISRAELI HOSTAGE BODY

Expect the blame-game to begin, as IDF strikes resume in the Gaza Strip once again. Since the ceasefire has been on, however, some 100 Palestinians have died. Thirteen bodes of hostages remain in Gaza.

Axios reviews of the latest developments:

• The Trump administration has been focusing over the last several weeks on stabilizing the ceasefire and pressing both parties to avoid steps that could detonate it.
• As part of that mission, the White House sent several top officials to Israel and established a U.S. command center in Israel to oversee it and monitor the situation on the ground.
• But a deepening dispute over the return of deceased hostages by Hamas, and a firefight on Tuesday in the city of Rafah, intensified calls in Israel for military action. The strikes Netanyahu ordered could rupture the ceasefire altogether.

The question over the remaining deceased hostage bodies has renewed put pressure on the Netanyahu government to not move on to the second phase of ceasefire:

The families of Israeli hostages on Monday demanded that the next steps in the US-brokered Gaza peace plan be put on hold until Hamas returns the remaining bodies of dead captives.

“Hamas knows exactly where every one of the deceased hostages is held. Two weeks have passed since the deadline set in the agreement for the return of all 48 hostages, yet 13 remain in Hamas captivity,” the Hostages and Missing Families Forum said.

Further, the Israeli military has accused Hamas of staging a propaganda campaign which lies about efforts to recover slain hostages:

Hamas are lying about our hostages and here’s the proof:

Yesterday, Hamas terrorists were filmed removing body remains from a prepared structure and re-burying them nearby, before summoning Red Cross representatives to stage a false “discovery” for photographers.

Despite… pic.twitter.com/c9CkJo3msW

— Israel Defense Forces (@IDF) October 28, 2025

developing…

Authored by Naveen Athrappully via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

OpenAI must face allegations of copyright infringement made by authors in a consolidated class action lawsuit, District Judge Sidney H. Stein of the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York said in an Oct. 27 order.

In the June 13 consolidated complaint, the plaintiffs – writers who own copyrights for various books – accused OpenAI and Microsoft, which funds OpenAI, of having engaged in “flagrant and harmful infringements of their copyrights.”

“Defendants copied Plaintiffs’ works and then fed them into their ‘large language models’ or ‘LLMs,’ algorithms designed to generate human-like text responses to users’ prompts and queries. These algorithms are at the heart of Defendants’ massive commercial enterprise. And at the heart of these algorithms is systematic theft on a mass scale,” the lawsuit said.

OpenAI asked the court to dismiss the plaintiffs’ accusations of copyright infringement.

In the Oct. 27 order, Stein sided with the authors by denying the motion, observing that the allegations made by plaintiffs “satisfy the elements of a prima facie claim of infringement as to at least some outputs of ChatGPT.”

To train ChatGPT, OpenAI used datasets that included copyrighted words of the plaintiffs, the judge wrote. When prompted, ChatGPT can then generate accurate summaries of books authored by the plaintiffs.

In a court filing, OpenAI said plaintiffs failed to plausibly allege “substantial similarity” between their works and the content output by ChatGPT and that the complaint failed to cite even a single example of the alleged copyright infringement in ChatGPT’s outputs.

OpenAI argued that not all summaries of content qualify as infringement. For instance, summarizing the final chapter of “The Door” by Mary Roberts Rinehart as “the butler did it” cannot be considered as infringement of the author’s copyright, the company said.

Stein dismissed such arguments. For one, the complaint adequately alleges that OpenAI accessed plaintiffs’ works and the infringing outputs made by ChatGPT are based on the authors’ works, which satisfies the requirement of “actual copying,” he wrote.

Stein then detailed a ChatGPT summary of “A Game of Thrones,” the first book in the “A Song of Ice and Fire” series by George R. R. Martin. The AI summary described the setting, prologue, main plot points, and ending of the book.

“A more discerning observer could easily conclude that this detailed summary is substantially similar to Martin’s original work, including because the summary conveys the overall tone and feel of the original work by parroting the plot, characters, and themes of the original,” Stein wrote.

Martin is one of the plaintiffs in the lawsuit. Other plaintiffs include authors John Grisham and David Baldacci.

The Epoch Times reached out to OpenAI for comment but did not receive a response by publication time.

Authors Versus AI

The court ruling comes after AI company Anthropic, the maker of Claude AI, agreed to pay $1.5 billion over copyright infringement last month, according to a Sept. 5 post by law firm Banner Witcoff.

Anthropic was accused of using pirated copies of around 500,000 copyrighted works to train its AI, the post said. A court had previously issued a summary judgment on the issue, ruling that the use of pirated copies for training AIs does not qualify as “fair use.”

In a Sept. 25 statement, The Authors Guild, an advocacy group for published writers that is also a plaintiff in the OpenAI lawsuit, welcomed the preliminary approval of the Anthropic settlement.

“The settlement marks a milestone in authors’ fights against AI companies’ theft of their works. It sends a clear signal to AI companies that infringement of authors’ rights comes at a steep price and will undoubtedly push AI companies towards acquiring the books they want legally, through licensing,” the association said. “The case is also significant in that it serves as an example of how class actions can be a successful vehicle for seeking justice for mass copyright infringement.”

Multiple other legal battles have been waged by authors over the use of their works by tech companies for training artificial intelligence models.

On Oct. 15, two authors filed a lawsuit against cloud computing company Salesforce, alleging that the business “pirated hundreds of thousands of copyrighted books to develop its XGen series of large language models.”

A similar copyright infringement case filed by 13 authors against Meta went in the company’s favor in June.

The court ruling dismissed the plaintiffs’ argument that Meta copied their works to create a product that could flood the market with similar works, observing that the authors presented “no evidence about how the current or expected outputs from Meta’s models would dilute the market for their own works.”

Authored by Roger Kimball via American Greatness,

The Democrats appear to be a never-ending source of pitiable entertainment these days. Last week, it was the pathetic “No Kings” (what some mischievous wag called “No Brains”) rallies across the country. Those 2,700 anti-Trump therapy sessions for aging, anencephalic boomers were funded to the tune of $294 million by such public-spirited individuals and entities as Arabella Advisors, the Tides Foundation, George Soros, and Warren Buffett. Such streams of cash funneled millions through dozens of left-leaning entities, including the American Civil Liberties Union, the National LGBTQ Task Force, the Sierra Club Foundation, the Democracy Forward Foundation, and other havens for the perpetually aggrieved.

It was a noisy but preposterous temper tantrum, full of sound and fury, signifying stupidity. The union of Kumbayah gestures with rage-filled pantomimes was both inadvertently comic and repellent, the odor of rotting pseudo-idealism wafting over the proceedings everywhere.

The insurmountable problem all of those protestors faced was the incontrovertible fact that Donald Trump is not a king. He is a duly elected president who handily won both the Electoral College and the popular vote. He campaigned precisely on the issues that the unhappy pot-bangers and sign-wavers bewailed: closing the border, expelling illegal migrants, dismantling the woke DEI apparat in academia and the federal government, and resuscitating and Americanizing the U.S. economy.

If Trump were a king, why would he not simply outlaw such puerile displays of maliciousness as the “No Kings” rallies? Why wouldn’t he simply decree the government open again? No, the whole thing was ridiculous. I doubt that even the participants could have taken their make-believe protests seriously. But they probably feel they have to do something to make themselves heard these days. In the face of the perpetual-motion machine that is Donald Trump, what is an underemployed Democrat to do?

Just as nature abhors a vacuum, so the wokerati abhor an absence of outrage. It is an addiction, a sickness, a craving that cannot be denied. “Outrage or burst”: that’s their motto. So no sooner had the hangover of the “No Kings” fiasco begun to dissipate than a new draught was necessary. Trump supplied it with the news that he was going ahead with his plans to add a new ballroom—paid for with private funds—to the White House.

In fact, Trump has been promising to do just this—build a beautiful ballroom so that large gatherings at the White House would not have to be held under a tent—at least since 2016. But somebody in the Democrat Central Committee pretended to canvass the focus groups and decided that the engine of outrage could be primed with the Trump-is-desecrating-this-sacred-public-monument meme.

Again, the outpouring of manufactured outrage was both hilarious and pathetic. The people who suddenly became hypersensitive architectural preservationists had spent the last decade cheering on the people who tore down or desecrated important historical statues, smashed or ripped or sullied artworks, and substituted their noxious woke fantasies for the clear light of historical truth.

Such woke marauders also completely ignored the actual history of the White House and its many reconstructions, additions, renovations, and renewals. The comedy was endless. Hillary Clinton, who should know better than to wax moralistic about anything having to do with the White House, pretended to be outraged and posted, “It’s not his house. It’s your house. And he’s destroying it.” To which the president replied, “I may name it the Monica Lewinsky ballroom.” Connoisseurs of the Clinton libido will savor the double entendre.

The great Scott Adams had fun with the charade. Everyone agrees that a ballroom at the White House is needed, he notes. But the Dems just demonstrated that they can get their base to go insane over anything.

“All they have to do is say it over and over.”

All of a sudden, “Trump is going to renovate the White House” becomes “Trump is going to destroy the White House.” 

One poor baby said, “It feels almost the same as when I saw the Pentagon damage on 9/11.” Yes, really. It is insane.

But Adams was loving it: “I think you should respect that the Democrats are willing to take on the challenge of living in a country where there is a building being renovated.”

Heroes!

The White House itself posted a helpful timeline of significant renovations and events at the residence through the years. By now, many readers will know that in 1902, Teddy Roosevelt added the West Wing to the White House. In 1909, William Howard Taft expanded the West Wing and added the original Oval Office. In the 1930s and ’40s, FDR moved the Oval Office to its current location, built the East Wing, and added an indoor swimming pool. FDR’s successor, Harry S Truman, gutted and totally rebuilt the interior of the White House. Richard Nixon converted the White House swimming pool into the press briefing room and added a bowling alley. Barack Obama, though part of the witches’ chorus now, desecrated a tennis court to build a basketball court.

But that pedestrian inventory does not include some of the more piquant items that the White House included in its records. My favorites were the slides regarding the discovery of cocaine and the transgender day celebration at the White House.

And by the way, most renovations stuck taxpayers with the tab.  Trump’s new ballroom will cost the taxpayers nothing—zero, zilch, nada. It is entirely privately funded.

Among other things, this week’s Democrat exercise in feckless melodrama reminds us that all the political initiative now is with Donald Trump. It’s not just that the Democrats are wholly reactive, responding like Pavlov’s dog to any bell that Trump might ring. There is also the fact that Trump has consumed all the political oxygen available in the body politic. His MAGA agenda is shaping everything—from his peace initiatives on the world stage to his efforts at the border and with the economy and cultural fabric of the country.

 All the Democrats have now is the screech of Elizabeth Warren and her tribe, resounding like a gigantic set of fingernails drawn harshly across the blackboard of the nation’s attention. It is a horrible, disagreeable sound. No one heeds it. Everyone recoils from it. It’s not much, but it’s all the Democrats have now, a sort of endless reenactment of Edvard Munch’s “The Scream” in lieu of any constructive action.

The US is prepared to roll back some tariffs on China if Beijing cracks down on the export of chemicals that produce fentanyl, under a trade framework that President Trump and Chinese leader Xi Jinping are set to discuss Thursday, the WSJ reported citing people familiar. 

According to the report, China is expected to commit to more controls on the export of precursor chemicals used to make fentanyl. In return, the U.S. could cut its 20% fentanyl-related tariff on Chinese goods by as much as 10%, the people said.

If Trump lowers the fentanyl-tariff on Chinese goods to 10%, it would bring the average tariff on most Chinese imports, currently around 55%, to about 45%. That would put China’s average tariff rate closer to those of other trading partners, potentially reducing the price competitiveness of goods manufactured outside of China. Indicatively, goods from India and Brazil face 50% tariffs, and the Trump administration has said Chinese goods transshipped through Southeast Asian nations would face 40% tariffs, much higher than the 19%-20% rate for other goods from the region.

Bringing the total tariffs on China closer to the 40% levies threatened on Southeast Asian nations would reduce the incentive for Chinese firms to transship goods through those economies to the U.S., while potentially motivating more direct trade between China and the U.S.

The administration reached two trade agreements and two frameworks with Southeast Asian nations this week that included provisions to prevent China from exporting goods through their economies at below-market prices.

The U.S. and China are also expected to reduce port fees on each other’s ships, the report goes on.

Separately, China is also expected to commit to significant purchases of American soybeans, Bessent said in a CBS News interview on Sunday, potentially bringing relief to U.Sp. farmers hit hard by the loss of Chinese buyers this year.

If Beijing agrees, the framework would ease market-rattling tensions between the world’s two biggest economies. Earlier this month, China tightened controls on rare earths, a sector it dominates, potentially jolting global supply chains that rely on them to manufacture everything from electric vehicles to jet fighters. In turn Trump threatened another 100% tariffs on China. Now, under the new framework, the U.S. expects China to delay the new rare-earths rules.

“I believe that they are going to delay that for a year while they re-examine it,” Bessent said in an interview with ABC News on Sunday.

The expected deferral of China’s latest rare-earth controls means Trump’s threat to impose a 100% tariff on all Chinese goods by Nov. 1 is now “effectively off the table,” Bessent told CBS News.

There’s more: Chinese negotiators are also expecting the U.S. to freeze potential new policy actions deemed as harmful to China, such as controls on exports of products made with U.S. software. Bessent told CBS News on Sunday there have been no changes to U.S. export controls.

It is unclear how the framework would affect a different set of rare-earths restrictions that Beijing announced in April. The established licensing system suggests authorities could ramp up rare-earth restrictions again if the U.S. were to impose new trade policies deemed harmful to China.

Chinese Vice Commerce Minister Li Chenggang, a senior member of China’s trade delegation, said the two sides have reached “preliminary consensus” on issues including export controls, reciprocal tariffs, fentanyl-related tariffs, cooperation on fentanyl, an expansion of bilateral trade and port fees. Both sides will then go through domestic approval processes, he said.

“The current turbulences and twists and turns are the ones that we do not wish to see,” Li said.

Federal Bureau of Investigation Director Kash Patel is set to travel to Beijing to discuss the fentanyl issue with Chinese authorities, said people familiar with the matter.

The expected agreements are subject to change and dependent on the meeting of the two leaders. Details are expected to be hammered out in subsequent negotiations.