Authored by Tom Ozimek via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

Immigration authorities have arrested nearly 550 people in the Chicago area in less than two weeks as part of “Operation Midway Blitz,” a major crackdown that officials from the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) describe as targeting dangerous criminals shielded by Illinois’s sanctuary policies.

“Operation Midway Blitz in honor of Katie Abraham has resulted in almost 550 arrests,” DHS Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin told The Epoch Times in an emailed statement.

“Every arrest is a testament to DHS and its law enforcement’s dedication to enforcing the laws of our nation. We will not be deterred by sanctuary politicians or violent rioters.”

Abraham was a 20-year-old Illinois college student killed in January in a hit-and-run allegedly caused by a drunk-driving illegal immigrant. Authorities charged Julio Cucul-Bol, a Guatemalan national living in the United States unlawfully, with leaving the scene of a crash resulting in death, aggravated DUI resulting in death, and reckless homicide.

DHS said the Chicago operation, launched Sept. 8, is aimed at removing individuals with serious criminal records and longstanding deportation orders.

“This operation will target the worst of the worst criminal illegal aliens in Chicago,” McLaughlin said at the time, alleging that Chicago had become a “magnet for criminals” due to sanctuary city policies.

“President [Donald] Trump and Secretary [of Homeland Security Kristi] Noem have a clear message: No city is a safe haven for criminal illegal aliens,” she said.

“If you come to our country illegally and break our laws, we will hunt you down, arrest you, deport you, and you will never return.”

The Trump administration has repeatedly criticized Illinois’s sanctuary policies, which restrict cooperation between local law enforcement and federal immigration authorities. Officials say such policies allow dangerous offenders to remain on the streets rather than being transferred to ICE custody to be deported.

Noem, who traveled to Chicago to highlight the operation, said recent arrests included suspects charged with assault, DUI, felony stalking, and murder.

“President Trump has been clear: if politicians will not put the safety of their citizens first, this administration will,” Noem said on Sept. 16.

“Our work is only beginning.”

Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker and Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson have condemned the operation, accusing the administration of politicizing law enforcement and spreading fear.

“This isn’t about fighting crime. That requires support and coordination—yet we’ve experienced nothing like that over the past several weeks,” Pritzker said in a statement.

“Instead of taking steps to work with us on public safety, the Trump administration’s focused on scaring Illinoisians.”

Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officials said that, as of Sept. 20, about half the arrests so far in the Chicago area were targeted—people already on ICE’s radar due to convictions or prior immigration violations—while the rest were “collateral arrests” of others found to be in the country illegally.

“It doesn’t mean that the collateral arrests are non-criminal,” Marcos Charles, acting head of ICE’s Enforcement and Removal Operations, said.

“Some of our collateral arrests … also have criminal convictions and arrests. They just weren’t the people we were looking for at the time.”

Demonstrations have flared across Chicago in response to the operations. Protests outside the ICE Broadview Processing Center on Sept. 19 turned violent, with federal officials saying rioters assaulted officers, slashed tires, and blocked entrances.

DHS has hardened its stance on immigration enforcement in Democrat-led states. On Sept. 20, the department sent follow-up letters to California, New York, and Illinois demanding they comply with immigration detainer requests, saying that failure to cooperate would put communities at risk.

“ICE detainers ask for something very simple: To notify ICE when criminal illegal aliens are released from jail or prison, to ensure that they go into ICE custody before they are released back onto our streets,” McLaughlin said in a statement.

“These sanctuary state politicians should do the right thing and side with law-abiding Americans over criminal illegal aliens.”

DHS says that, despite “resistance from sanctuary politicians,” the agency has arrested over 400,000 illegal immigrants so far, while 70 percent of those arrested by ICE have criminal charges or convictions.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

Following his government’s resounding loss in local elections – seen as a harbinger of next month’s congressional races – Argentine President Milei is facing a renewed crisis as the embattled South American country’s currency is collapsing amid fears that he will scrap his defense of the peso (which has already cost hundreds of millions of dollars) and let it plunge as so many of his predecessors have done.

“The market,” Milei said when collared by a local journalist for a brief interview late Friday, is “in panic mode.”

In a desperate attempt to satisfy demand for hard currency and prevent the peso from cratering, the three-day intervention figure rose to $1.1 billion, a staggering amount in a country that, by economists’ best estimates, has less than $20 billion in liquid foreign reserves.

As Bloomberg reports, on Friday, he vowed to defend the peso at all costs, echoing the words of his top economic aide the day before.

 “We will do everything we must do to protect the quality of life of Argentines.”

Milei is “spending currency reserves at a frenzied pace to prop up the peso that is in free fall,” Derek Holt, vice-president and head of capital markets economics at Scotiabank, wrote in a note.

“Fixing at this exchange rate would risk returning the country to rampant hyperinflation which Milei promised to end. The very essence of his reforms are in jeopardy and with that the unfortunate hopes of Argentinians too used to policy failures.”

Longtime Argentine observers see few options for Milei to stem the tide and regain confidence.

A strong showing in the Oct. 26 vote would be one. A fresh injection of cash from the International Monetary Fund or some other foreign aid agency would be another. Having just cut a $20 billion IMF deal in April, that may be unlikely though Milei intimated, after being asked Friday about financial aid from the US Treasury, that something may be in the works with some overseas institution.

Argentina bonds and stocks are also tumbling as investors are pulling money out of the country at a rapidly increasing clip.

“We trust in the program and we’re not going to move away from the program,” Economy Minister Luis Caputo said late Thursday on a podcast.

“We’re going to sell up till the last dollar in the ceiling of the band.”

As Bloomberg points out, it’s a stark change of fortunes for Milei, whose deep spending cuts and sweeping reforms had been welcomed by global investors soon after the libertarian economist took office in late 2023, setting off rallies across its financial markets. Inflation soon began to ease, falling below 100% and shoring up support for Milei for a while. But as he’s started to suffer political setbacks that hurt his ability to keep pushing through his agenda, the country’s bonds, stocks and currency have all come tumbling back down.

“It’s probably too soon to say that the story is crumbling, but certainly the new pieces of information that we’ve gotten in the last week have all been negative,” Christine Reed, emerging market local currency debt portfolio manager at Ninety One in New York, said in an interview.

“The outlook going into midterms has worsened dramatically.”

In the past few days, Milei’s rivals in the lower house of Congress ratcheted up their pushback against his austerity agenda. They rejected two controversial vetoes on education and health-care spending. The Senate is seen as even more hostile to the administration, meaning the higher spending will likely pass. The votes led to further slides in the country’s assets as they spell trouble for the second half of Milei’s term. 

“We expect continued foreign exchange and asset price volatility between now and the national mid-term vote on October 26th,” Gramercy Funds Management said in a research note Friday.

“The challenging political backdrop and near-term implications for the macroeconomic landscape through the foreign exchange market has increased the probability of a liability management exercise next year.”

With his popularity tumbling, the victory by the left-wing Peronist opposition in the country’s main province, Buenos Aires, unnerved investors.

“We knew this year was going to be very complicated and we had already started developing strategies to cover next year’s debt payments,” Milei said.

“We’ve been working, those negotiations take time, but until something isn’t confirmed we don’t make announcements. But we are working very hard, we’re very advanced, and it’s also a matter of time.”

Time is not on Argentina’s side. 

* * *

* * * Order by tonight for Monday shipping * * *

Authored by Jacob Burg via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

Prosecutors called their last witness on Sept. 19 in the trial of Ryan Routh, the man accused of attempting to assassinate then-presidential candidate Donald Trump, and sought to triangulate the suspect’s movements in the weeks leading up to the incident using cellphone location data.

The trial began with jury selection on Sept. 8 and is running ahead of the scheduled three-and-a-half-week timeline that District Judge Aileen Cannon had originally blocked off.

Jurors have heard seven days of testimony from government witnesses, including FBI agents, the Secret Service agent who allegedly first spotted Routh in the treeline at Trump International Golf Club in West Palm Beach, Florida, in September 2024, and the civilian who identified Routh as the suspect following his arrest.

Routh, who is representing himself, has pleaded not guilty to multiple charges, including assaulting a federal officer, attempting to assassinate a major presidential candidate, and several firearm violations.

Here are five takeaways after the prosecution rested its case in the trial of the second Trump assassination attempt suspect.

Cellphone Location Data, Alleged Surveillance of Trump

Prosecutors spent much of Friday retracing Routh’s movements in the months and weeks leading up to the alleged assassination attempt on Trump on Sept. 15, 2024.

According to FBI supervisory special agent Kimberly McGreevy, Routh was found with multiple “burner” cellphones, including one with an area code to West Palm Beach, Florida, and another registered in Greensboro, North Carolina.

Describing Routh’s alleged movements and activity between March and September 2024, McGreevy alleged that it amounted to “surveillance” of Trump. Location data tracked Routh’s black Nissan Xterra to Palm Beach International Airport, where prosecutors alleged he was conducting surveillance of Trump’s private plane coming and going from the airport on multiple occasions.

Airport cameras showed a man who appeared to be Routh walking inside without a bag and looking out a window as Trump’s plane was about to depart. Routh also allegedly took photos of Trump’s plane on the tarmac from one of his burner phones, McGreevy said.

Numerous traffic camera photos also show Routh’s Nissan Xterra on streets near Trump’s West Palm Beach golf club, utilizing multiple license plates to avoid detection, prosecutors say. He would eventually take up residence at a Marathon truck stop not far from the golf club, where receipts indicated he paid for overnight parking.

Routh also allegedly conducted surveillance for up to 16 hours at a time at Trump’s golf club before the day of the incident.

Weekslong Planning

Prosecutors showed evidence that Routh allegedly planned to assassinate Trump for months before the day he was ultimately arrested. Routh had sent text messages to several associates, allegedly indicating his desire to see Trump eliminated before the election.

McGreevy alleged that Routh was essentially “stalking” Trump’s schedule with as many digital tools as he had at his disposal. Routh allegedly searched Trump’s campaign schedule repeatedly and tried to obtain tickets to attend an event.

Routh was also accused of using flight tracking software to surveil the president’s plane coming and going from Palm Beach International Airport, which prosecutors say allowed Routh to watch the plane leave in the video surveillance footage.

Prosecutors also accused Routh of searching Palm Beach County’s live traffic cameras at the intersection of Southern Blvd. and Congress Ave., where they say he would have been able to see Trump’s motorcade coming and going from the airport, which is less than a mile from the golf club.

The web searches, which included one for “how fast does it take cops to get a DNA result,” were made from Routh’s phone using a Google account tied to one of his three aliases—“John Smith”—according to prosecutors.

Escape Plan

Routh was considering an escape plan in the event he was able to flee from his hideout near the 6th hole at Trump’s golf club on Sept. 15, 2024, prosecutors alleged.

The government showed searches from one of Routh’s burner phones for flights out of Miami International Airport to cities like Mexico City and Bogota, Colombia. Routh also allegedly searched for driving directions from West Palm Beach to the Miami airport, and did a search for how many miles it would take to drive from South Florida to Laredo, Texas, which sits on the U.S.–Mexico border.

The FBI said it found a written note in Routh’s Nissan Xterra with various international flights out of the Miami airport, including flight times and numbers. Days before his arrest, Routh allegedly messaged a friend in Mexico City saying he might fly there on Sept. 16, 2024, and asked how far the man lived from the area.

DNA Evidence

This week, an FBI analyst testified that DNA sampled from the scope affixed to the SKS-style rifle found at the hideout near the 6th hole at Trump’s golf club matched Routh’s.

Routh’s DNA was also found on more than two dozen other items collected at the crime scene, prosecutors said.

Last year, when Routh was first arrested in relation to the crime, investigators said they had matched a fingerprint found on a piece of tape attached to the rifle that seemingly matched Routh’s.

On Friday, Routh asked McGreevy why a particular bullet casing and a piece of fence wire found in his vehicle were not DNA tested, which led prosecutors to follow up by stating that some surfaces, particularly smooth surfaces like metal, are not ideal for DNA testing.

Trial Moving Rapidly, Brief Cross-Examinations

Routh’s trial is moving ahead of Cannon’s original three-and-a-half-week schedule. He is expected to call his first witness on Monday.

Part of the reason for the rapid pace is the briefness of Routh’s cross-examinations of several government witnesses.

However, Routh spent considerable time cross-examining McGreevy on Friday, disputing the claim that he was visiting Palm Beach International Airport to surveil Trump’s private plane and instead suggesting he was there to simply watch planes in general.

After the government presented a set of song lyrics Routh wrote that allegedly described his intentions to “put a cap in” or shoot Trump, which featured lines like “bullets fly round and round” and “time to get out of town before they chase me down,” Routh said the song was an attempt at art and protected by the First Amendment.

When asked, McGreevy said that a piece of art is not necessarily protected by the First Amendment and could become criminal evidence if it’s tied to a specific threat to a specific person. She said Routh’s lyrics amounted to a direct threat to Trump’s life.

Authored by Steve Watson via Modernity.news,

An American woman living in Britain got a taste of what it’s like to have your freedom of speech taken away when a police officer visited her house to interrogate her over a Facebook post that he claimed had “upset someone.”

Yes, really. The officer demanded that she apologise about the post, without informing her what the post was about or who she was supposed to apologise to.

The Free Speech Union posted the remarkable video filmed by the woman herself, and has more…

🚨🚨🚨BREAKING: An American cancer patient and Trump supporter was confronted by British police and told to apologise for her online posts or face an investigation.

Deborah Anderson, a mother of two, was visited at her home in June by an officer from Thames Valley Police. He… pic.twitter.com/CaQZVUScQY

— The Free Speech Union (@SpeechUnion) September 17, 2025

An American cancer patient and Trump supporter was confronted by British police and told to apologise for her online posts or face an investigation. Deborah Anderson, a mother of two, was visited at her home in June by an officer from Thames Valley Police.

He told her someone had lodged a complaint about her social media posts. She told him she was an American citizen and a member of the Free Speech Union and he should be investigating burglaries and rapes, not hurty words on social media. 

Chillingly, he told her he was there to get her to apologise to the person who was offended by her posts. If she refused, she’d be questioned down at the station.

What was Deborah’s supposed crime? The policeman didn’t tell her. Was it her passionate support of President Trump and the MAGA movement on her Facebook and X pages?

To make it worse, Deborah is in the midst of cancer treatment, including chemotherapy. She ought to be have been convalescing. Instead, she was harassed for her tweets.

The FSU took on her case and, as a result, the police have now dropped their investigation. But they still haven’t told Deborah which of her posts got her into trouble, claiming they’ve accidentally deleted the record of the complaint. 

Thames Valley Police are responsible for guarding President Trump this week. What would he make of the fact that those same officers are visiting the homes of his supporters – including US citizens – and threatening them with arrest.

Tyrant: “We are investigating your potential commission of thought crime?”

You: “What was the thought?”

Tyrant: “I am not at liberty to say. Are you going to apologize or what?”

You: “…” pic.twitter.com/EF2Gvu5HOX

— Zetarcos (@Zetarcos_314159) September 17, 2025

Mrs Anderson rightly pointed out that while this officer was interrogating her, actual crimes are going uninvestigated, prompting the officer to state that it’s not his responsibility to do that “today.”

How do plod even take themselves seriously if they think this constitutes law enforcement?

— PublicEnemy (@publicenemy2024) September 18, 2025

Disturbing, but not surprising in the least considering the state of the UK.

Thames Valley Police responded to the incident, claiming they are duty bound to follow up “on allegations of threats or violence”

This video shows one of our officers following up on a report from a person who felt threatened by online comments directed at them.

After engagement with both parties, no further action was taken. It is our duty to respond to allegations of threats or violence.

— Thames Valley Police (@ThamesVP) September 18, 2025

That just made people more angry…

You’re not police, your bullies picking on average people who have expressed opinions because your too cowardly and useless to do your actual job of going after criminals. You and all your officers should apologizing to your citizens for your bullying and threatening them them.…

— Techie Photographer (@AspexPhoto) September 18, 2025

The statement from your officer” “the alternative [to the provision of an apology] would be that I have to call you in for an interview” was nonsense, then.

It was an expressed threat to induce capitulation.

What makes that acceptable in this case?

— Ron Good (@rdgrongoodnet1) September 18, 2025

The video shows a policeman asking a citizen to apologize to another person because their feeling were hurt as if he was a parent.

One would assume all other crimes in Thames have been in order to allow for this level of free time, yes?

— The Middle Aged Baby (@MiddleAgedBaby2) September 18, 2025

We know what you’re doing, it’s despicable. So you prioritise visiting a cancer patient for saying “mean words” rather than investigate burglary, murders, r*pes, which are “going on as well” as your officer so condescendingly put it, disgusting

— Shirley_Not (@Shirley_Notsrs) September 18, 2025

I’m offended

— Troy Oak (@troisoak) September 18, 2025

“What was her supposed crime? The policeman didn’t tell her.” 👀 pic.twitter.com/MLSDfFBSuH

— Brian Norton (@BWNort) September 18, 2025

Don’t let the police into your home unless they have a warrant. Don’t let them sit down on your chair. Stop engaging with them entirely. Say nothing. If they insist then arrange a meeting with a lawyer at a police station. This is just harassment

— Seb Hudson🗽🚀🕊 (@sebserlo) September 18, 2025

As we’ve relentlessly highlighted, this kind of thing is happening all the time now.

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

Authored by Andrew Korybko via Substack,

Hungarian Foreign Minister Peter Szijjarto warned in a Facebook post last month after talks with his Slovak and Serbian counterparts that Brussels is plotting regime change against them. This comes after Russia’s Foreign Intelligence Service (SVR) reported that the EU and Ukraine are backing the Hungarian opposition ahead of next spring’s parliamentary elections. The larger context is that they’ve all defied EU pressure to cut ties with Russia and are considering the creation of a new regional integration platform.

From the EU’s hegemonic perspective, those three’s current governments do indeed pose “an increasingly serious obstacle to a ‘united Europe’” as SVR described Hungary as being vis-à-vis Brussels, with that country being the main one followed by Slovakia and then Serbia to a much lesser extent. Long-serving Prime Minister Viktor Orban is a populist-nationalist icon on the continent, while his Slovak counterpart Robert Fico only recently returned to office but immediately followed in Orban’s footsteps.

Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic is an altogether different story, however, since he presents himself as a populist-nationalist but in many ways behaves as a liberal-globalist. For instance, SVR recently accused his government of indirectly arming Ukraine, which followed its votes against Russia at the UNGA. He also claims that recurring protests against his rule are a Color Revolution, which Russia has thus far agreed with, yet there’s also no denying that some bonafide populist-nationalists fiercely oppose him.

That’s because of his aforesaid anti-Russian moves, his concessions to the NATO-occupied Autonomous Province of Kosovo and Metohija, and his obsequious attitude towards the EU. At the same time, he also hasn’t fully capitulated to all of the West’s demands either, ergo why some of its ruling liberal-globalists want to depose him. Therefore, while it’s dishonest to describe him as a populist-nationalist in the same vein as Orban or Fico, it’s still true that all three don’t fully tow the EU’s line on Russia.

Circling back to Szijjarto’s recent post after clarifying the situation with Vucic, the EU’s regime change plots against all three are being advanced through a combination of information warfare and support for anti-government (Brussels-organized) “NGOs” (BONGOs). The purpose is to turn voters against the ruling parties (or whichever presidential candidate they endorse like in Vucic’s case after he said that he won’t amend the constitution to run again) so that their leaders can later be “democratically” deposed.

Prior to the next elections as well as in the scenario that this plot fails, infowars and BONGO protests are weaponized to discredit these figures as the pretext for justifying more direct EU pressure against them and their countries. Regardless of whatever form this takes, the end goal of regime change remains the same. It’s simply unacceptable from the EU’s hegemonic perspective for them to oppose Brussels on such important issues as Russia even in non-member Serbia’s case since this undermines its authority.

Looking forward, all eyes will be on Hungary’s spring elections, which will be the first chance for the EU to “democratically depose” one of these three leaders unless Serbia holds early elections before then.

In Serbia’s case, whoever Vucic endorses might take his pro-Western pivot to its conclusion, so it might not matter whether they or the opposition win.

It’s more difficult to predict what’ll happen in Hungary’s case, however, but the ruling party’s loss would be a powerful blow to populist-nationalists in Europe.

For many European countries, housing costs are eating up a larger share of workers’ paychecks.

Given rising unaffordability, protests have erupted across Spain, Lisbon, and Berlin as the gap between wages and rent widens. In Hungary, for instance, home prices have soared 234% between 2010 and 2024 – far outpacing the EU average of 55.4%.

This graphic, via Visual Capitalist’s Dorothy Neufeld, shows the housing cost burden of European countries in 2024, based on data from Eurostat.

Which Countries Have the Highest Housing Cost Burden?

In the table below, we rank EU countries by the share of the population that pays more than 40% of household income, net of tax and pension contributions, on housing:

Data for Switzerland as of 2023.

With the third-lowest wages in the EU, paired with rising home prices, the share of overburdened residents in Greece is nearly triple the EU average.

In 2024, the home price-to-income ratio reached 12.7—its highest level since 2007. Not only has sustained inflation contributed to this trend, an influx of foreign buyers has further driven up prices.

Meanwhile, Denmark ranks in second, with 22.7% of the population overburdened. Since June 2024, the central bank has cut interest rates eight times, fueling higher housing demand. In Copenhagen, the Danish capital, home prices have doubled over the past decade.

By contrast, Germany’s higher wages cushion the impact of higher living costs, with 13.1% of the population facing home costs that exceed 40% of income. Overall, wages in Germany are about 35% higher than the EU average.

On the other hand, Croatia and Lithuania rank among the most affordable, driven by high home ownership rates that help insulate residents from fluctuating housing costs.

To learn more about this topic, check out this graphic on the world’s most unaffordable housing markets.

Submitted by Thomas Kolbe,

The collapse of the German economy continues unabated. The German Engineering Federation (VDMA) now expects a dramatic decline in production this year and lashes out at the federal government.

A rebound in the German economy this autumn has failed to materialize. Just a week ago, the Federal Statistical Office revised the country’s GDP decline for Q2 2025 from –0.1% to –0.3%. Now, the German machinery association follows suit with its forecast for the full year, confirming the ongoing downward trend in production: “We had previously expected a decline of 2 percent, now we anticipate minus 5 percent for 2025,” says VDMA President Bertram Kawlath, who expects production to grow by just 1 percent in 2026. Was 2025 really the trough?

Kawlath Goes Political

Kawlath warns that the industry is facing a critical moment – both economically and socially. He describes the situation as a “tipping point,” where the economy is faltering and the political center continues to erode. “If action is not taken now, voters will be pushed into the arms of the political extremes,” he cautions.

Without explicitly naming them, the VDMA chief pointed to the AfD, which recently climbed to 27 percent nationwide in Sunday polls. Remarkably, even at this stage of the crisis, where the structural damage caused by ideology-driven policies is obvious, Kawlath speaks out politically for the first time yet still refrains from naming the culprit: the Green Deal’s ecological transformation is left untouched by his critique.

Meanwhile, the “silent cartel” of business elites continues to call for cosmetic deregulation and subsidies, rather than tackling the root of the problem.

Problems Are Now Impossible to Ignore

The issues are glaring: weak orders, crushing bureaucracy, lengthy approval processes, excessive taxes and labor costs, as well as severe location disadvantages in Germany. Add to that the massive burden of U.S. tariffs: roughly 40 percent of EU machinery exports to the United States are currently hit with a 50 percent duty on the metal content. Unstable, unpredictable rules, Kawlath says, force many companies to halt exports entirely.

He calls for lower taxes and levies, reduced bureaucracy, faster approvals – and above all, a stronger defense of German industry against Chinese competition. China, he points out, has not only caught up but also heavily subsidizes its industry, distorting global competition.

Industry Collapse

The situation continues to worsen. The VDMA’s optimistic forecast for next year is likely to be revised downward as no structural improvements are in sight. Meanwhile, policymakers remain in summit mode, with reforms nowhere in evidence.

If the predicted 5 percent decline in production for 2025 materializes, it would mark the peak of a catastrophic trend. Since 2018, machinery production – and roughly speaking, the entire German industrial sector – has fallen by about 20 percent. This has consequences for employment: over 200,000 industrial jobs have been lost since 2020, 68,000 of them just last year. And this may only be the beginning of a devastating employment crisis.

These figures no longer describe an ordinary recession but the onset of an economic depression. The core of the German economy, industry, has been severely damaged by the self-inflicted energy crisis and grotesque regulatory excesses under the Green Deal. It should not be forgotten that countless service sectors, supply chains, and value chains depend directly on industry. German prosperity fundamentally derives from this sector – the very source that supports social programs and helps maintain social stability amid a worsening environment.

Machinery accounts for roughly 3 percent of Germany’s GDP. With a 27 percent share of the global market, it ranks among the heavyweights of European industry. About one million highly skilled workers earn their livelihoods here – jobs once considered secure now caught in the storm.

Production fell by 7 percent in 2024, and a further steep decline looms for 2025. Orders dropped 8 percent year-on-year, and revenue forecasts continue their downward slide.

Germany’s Industrial Base Systematically Devalued

Under these conditions, industrial production in Germany is effectively impossible. Industrial electricity prices are roughly three times higher than in the U.S., a country actively promoting its manufacturing base, cutting red tape, and selectively supporting industry.

When Lower Saxony’s SPD economy minister Olaf Lies calls for subsidized industrial electricity amid the steel crisis and complains about cheap Chinese steel, it is little more than whistling in the wind. The exodus from Germany is already underway – and it is irreversible: once companies leave, they rarely return.

The steel sector is suffering particularly badly. It ranks among the most energy-intensive branches of German industry, and its subsidized dream of “green steel” has been buried after multiple bankruptcies. From machinery to chemicals, construction to steel, the same picture emerges: Germany’s industrial decline is accelerating unchecked.

What we are witnessing is an ideology-driven, systemic failure. Even U.S. tariffs cannot fix it: the problems have accumulated over years and are homegrown. Yet Brussels and Berlin stubbornly cling to climate fanaticism, dreaming their way through the crisis.

* * * 

About the author: Thomas Kolbe, a German graduate economist, has worked for over 25 years as a journalist and media producer for clients from various industries and business associations. As a publicist, he focuses on economic processes and observes geopolitical events from the perspective of the capital markets. His publications follow a philosophy that focuses on the individual and their right to self-determination

Authored by Jeremy Portnoy via RealClearInvestigations,

Topline: The Veterans Health Administration has lost an estimated 5% of its reusable medical equipment worth at least $211 million — including exam tables, computers and microscopes — and “will continue to do so if processes are not improved,” according to a new audit from the Veterans Affairs inspector general.

Key facts: VA hospitals own over 2 million pieces of nonexpendable equipment that is meant to be used for two years or more, valued at $12 billion. Federal auditors recently visited hospitals to see if the VA was properly tracking the equipment and found that thousands of items had disappeared.

The auditors estimated that a third of the equipment — 537,000 items — is in a different location than inventory records claim, and an additional 75,500 items are missing entirely.

It’s possible there is even more missing equipment, because the VA is only required to keep track of inventory worth more than $5,000.

Some of the nonexpendable equipment is tracked using electronic tags, but some of the tags have dead batteries or only show what building the item is in and not what room.

The VA also uses an “inventory by exception” system in which items that have their location recorded during routine maintenance do not need to be included in annual inventory reports for up to 24 months, even though most items are required to be logged every 12 months. Auditors wrote that “a lot can go wrong, including losing equipment,” because of the inventory-by-exception system.

There are also staffing issues contributing to the missing equipment. Some VA employees working on inventory could not search for items because they did not have the keys to all the rooms in the hospital. Some hospitals have staffing levels below 40%, which employees said made it harder to fill out inventory reports on time.

Search all federal, state and local salaries and vendor spending with the world’s largest government spending database at OpenTheBooks.com. 

Background: All 139 Veterans Health Administration facilities had staffing shortages in 2025, with 4,434 unfilled positions. In 2024, there were only 2,959 unfilled jobs, according to the inspector general.

The Health Administration is just one component of the VA, which plans to shed 30,000 employees in the coming months. VA Secretary Doug Collins announced in September he plans to eliminate “excess positions” throughout the department.

Summary: Missing inventory is nothing new for the federal government, but a hospital having supplies readily available could be a matter of life and death.

The #WasteOfTheDay is brought to you by the forensic auditors at OpenTheBooks.com