Houthis Claim Fourth Attack On Saudi Aramco Refineries This Month
Yemen’s Houthis, or the Ansar Allah movement, released a statement Thursday announcing new military operations against Saudi Arabia which targeted an Aramco facility and an airport in Najran province, saying that forces “carried out two military operations using two drones.”
“The first targeted a sensitive target belonging to the Saudi enemy at Najran Airport, while the second targeted Aramco in Najran. Both operations successfully achieved their objectives, by God’s grace,” the Houthi statement declared.
Najran is a mid-sized city of around 400,000 and is located in southwest Saudi Arabia, bordering Saada province in northwest Yemen. The Saudis didn’t immediately acknowledge the attack, or whether there’s been damage or casualties from the launches has not been quickly forthcoming.
The Houthis are still complaining of Saudi airspace violations, while in the midst of a “siege for siege” operation.
The day prior the Houthis laid out three objectives imposed on the Saudis:
The first was described as “siege for siege,” referring to Ansarallah’s declared naval restrictions against Saudi shipping.
The second involved “striking Saudi troop buildups wherever they are,” while the third centered on “protecting Yemen’s sovereignty and confronting any enemy incursions.”
Ansarallah stated that its naval measures had imposed a tight blockade on Saudi interests, asserting that “not a single ship can pass through.”
Aramco facilities have been targeted several times over the past weeks, since the Saudi-Houthi conflict erupted again.
Iran has of late been much more open in boasting that its Yemeni ally is doing damage on US allies in the region.
For example, Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) spokesman Brig. Gen. Hossein Mohebbi told the semiofficial Mehr News Agency this week that the kingdom cannot defeat the group.
“How can Saudi Arabia, whose military capability is less than that of the Zionist regime, be able to cope with Ansar Allah and the Yemeni fighters? This is not possible,” he said.
The Thursday attack marks the fourth offensive on Aramco facilities this month…
🎯 🇸🇦Aramco has now been targeted by claimed Houthi drone strikes 3 times in 11 days.
Jizan refinery caught fire on August 9 (Saudi confirmed the fire, not the cause).
Najran was hit August 14. Houthi spokesman Yahya Saree is now claiming a third strike on Aramco… pic.twitter.com/aaiDLuLU8X
Like the Iranians, the Houthis have some natural leverage given the geography of oil transit chokepoints. Al Monitor observes this week: “Traffic in the Bab al-Mandeb Strait, which connects the Red Sea to the Gulf of Aden, may be on the rebound despite the Houthi blockade. The shipping data firm Kpler said 46 vessels crossed the strait on Tuesday, up 53% from the day prior. Around 50 ships typically crossed before the recent escalation.
It notes further, “Saudi Arabia has been rerouting oil exports through the Red Sea in response to the disruptions in the Strait of Hormuz.”
Ukrainian anti-corruption services launched searches under codename “Operation Forrest Gump,” targeting, among others, the deputy head of the Office of the President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelensky. The move expands the ongoing anti-corruption investigation which has seen a number of top officials in Zelensky’s cabinet flee to Israel shortly before police could raid their homes.
The National Anti-Corruption Bureau of Ukraine (NABU) and the Special Anti-Corruption Prosecutor’s Office (SAPO) announced they were conducting a special operation involving a criminal organization led by a current and former member of parliament, with the participation of high-ranking officials from the Office of the President of Ukraine.
“NABU and SAPO are conducting a special operation aimed at exposing a criminal organization that operated under the leadership of a current and former member of the Ukrainian Parliament, with the participation of high-ranking officials of the Office of the President of Ukraine and other individuals. Details – coming soon,” announced the anti-corruption services on Telegram.
The operation is codenamed “Forrest Gump,” also referred to as Forest Gump. Ukrayinska Pravda sources and other media reported that NABU and SAPO are conducting searches as part of this special operation at premises belonging to MP Vadym Stolar, who was elected to parliament on behalf of the currently banned Opposition Platform – For Life party.
In addition, Iryna Mudra, deputy head of the Ukrainian Presidential Office, is also targeted in the raids.
Stolar has confirmed the investigative actions at his home and stated he is fully cooperating without obstruction.
Additional figures linked by media and law-enforcement sources include former MP Maksym Mykytas, officials from the Ministry of Justice, and senior management of the state-owned Sense Bank including the chair of the board and supervisory board. Searches were also reported at the bank premises.
NABU has released excerpts of intercepted conversations.
Fragments reference “bags of money,” discussions of registering assets or proceeds in the names of children, including high tuition costs, the “Forrest Gump” name itself in a context of concealing theft, and mentions of the Office of the President.
As EuroMaidan writes, “The operation carries a mocking name, Forest Gump, drawn from the suspects’ own words. In a 47-second recording of intercepted conversations, one man ties the label to how the group allegedly hid money.”
The suspect mocks that one of the co-conspirators used his children’s own name to register the stolen money.
“We’ve got Saving Private Ryan, right? But only an idiot would register the theft of money – and their tuition on top of it – on their own children. That’s why, Forest Gump,” he said.
Ukrainian anti-corruption investigators reportedly chose the name “Forrest Gump” to mock these statements from their own criminal targets.
Other parts of the conversation reference cash and the presidential administration directly. “Well, there are four bags of money there,” one voice says on the tape.
Another chimed in, saying: “If we do this, you can drive to the Office of the President yourselves. Believe me. I can see it.”
Investigators allege the group gained effective control over Sense Bank around early June 2026.According to NABU/SAPO details released as part of the operation, the group organized money laundering of $3.5 million in cash (UAH 150 million).
The funds were introduced into legal circulation through accounts of shell companies and Sense Bank to post bail for one of the defendants in the earlier “Midas” case, which was linked to former Energy and Justice Minister Herman Halushchenko.
Cash was reportedly delivered in tranches, processed via controlled entities, and partially directed toward the High Anti-Corruption Court bail account. Allegations include that Mudra was expected to help arrange the raising of these funds and that unidentified individuals from the President’s Office tasked her with efforts related to bringing Sense Bank under greater control.
Investigators also seized a document described as an anti-crisis communications playbook outlining steps and messaging to shape public opinion around a Verkhovna Rada temporary investigative commission, framing it as an “audit, not attack” while shielding President Zelensky and his cabinet.
The probe has also documented alleged attempts to place controlled individuals in NABU and other law-enforcement bodies.
Incredibly, NABU has already posted these documents directly to Telegram.
Who is involved in the broader corruption scandal in Ukraine?
One of the main suspects in the related investigation is businessman Tymur Mindich. He is the co-owner of the Kwartal 95 production studio, which was founded and headed in the past by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.
Fearing arrest in the Energoatom affair (Operation Midas), Mindich fled to Israel. The Midas case centers on alleged large-scale kickbacks, approximately 10-15 percent of contract values, at the state nuclear company Energoatom, involving roughly $100 million in illicit funds, with the group using code names and cash deliveries.
During searches of Mindich’s premises in November 2025, investigators found large quantities of cash and a golden toilet, along with a golden bidet, in one of the bathrooms of his opulent Kyiv apartment – details that became a public symbol of excess and were widely referred to as the “golden toilet scandal,” which Remix News reported extensively on.
Mindich was not the only key figure to flee to Israel. His close associate, Oleksandr Tsukerman, also fled. The country does not extradite its citizens but Ukraine later imposed sanctions and issued international arrest warrants.
Among the suspects in the Midas scandal was the former head of Volodymyr Zelensky’s office, Andriy Yermak. The former head of the Ukrainian Presidential Office has been charged under the Criminal Code of Ukraine with laundering property obtained as a result of a crime. The alleged laundering of UAH 460 million, about $10.5 million, allegedly occurred during the construction of the Dynastia luxury housing complex in Kozyn near Kyiv.
According to investigators, some of the funds used for the construction may have come from corruption activities at Energoatom. The court then issued an arrest warrant for Yermak.
It stipulated that he would be able to be released if he paid bail of 140 million hryvnias. In mid-May, Andriy Yermak was released from custody after posting bail.
The Forrest Gump operation is now being presented as connected to the wider Midas network of allegations involving high-level influence over strategic state enterprises, money laundering, and related luxury projects. Developments remain ongoing, with NABU indicating further details would be released.
Polish state media outlet TVP reported: “The latest operation could further intensify scrutiny of the political establishment as President Volodymyr Zelensky’s government faces pressure to demonstrate progress in tackling corruption while Ukraine continues its war with Russia. It also poses a fresh headache for Zelenskyy after ousted defense chief Mykhailo Fedorov called for wartime elections in a bombshell statement late on Tuesday.”
The question now remains: Is the noose tightening around Zelensky himself, or will he emerge from this massive corruption scandal of close associates squeaky clean?
Pennsylvania will give data center projects preferential permitting treatment if they commit to a set of power supply, environmental and cost-responsibility requirements under an executive order issued Tuesday by Gov. Josh Shapiro, D.
The state Department of Environmental Protection will develop the new review process. To receive a faster state permitting review, data center projects in Pennsylvania must source their electricity from new power supplies, including from growing amounts of firm clean power, according to the order, whichaffects proposals for projects with a peak demand of more than 25 MW.
The order “should further close the door” to the idea that independent power producers like Talen Energy, Vistra and PSEG Power will be able to sell power from their existing generating assets under long-term contracts to data centers in Pennsylvania, Jefferies equity analysts said in a note on Wednesday. However, Talen’s legacy deal to sell power from its majority-owned Susquehanna nuclear power plant to an Amazon data center appears safe, according to the note.
Shapiro’s executive order comes amid a wave of action by state and local governments aimed at setting limits on data center development. At least 81 cities and counties have moratoria on data center development, according to a National League of Cities database unveiled Wednesday.
Under the permitting framework set by the executive order, data center developers that sign a consent order and agreement requiring them to abide by the state’s infrastructure development standards unveiled in February will receive preferential treatment compared to those that don’t.
For example, applicants that execute a consent order and agreement will have their projects reviewed by DEP on a rolling basis, whereas for developers that don’t sign, the state won’t consider their applications until they have all local permits in hand as well as any needed water withdrawal or wastewater discharge authorizations.
“We have so much speculation in Pennsylvania — like, gold rush speculation on these data centers,” Katie Blume, political and legislative director for Conservation Voters of Pennsylvania, told Utility Dive in an interview. “A lot of this [order] is going to be weeding out those bad actors because they’re not going to want to spend five years in the permitting process.”
But Dan Diorio, executive vice president for state policy and government affairs for the Data Center Coalition, sounded a note of caution in an emailed statement.
“It’s important that rules are not changed midstream impacting ongoing investment in verified and responsible data center projects,” Diorio said. “Data centers take compliance and accountability seriously, building only where they are authorized to do so under local, state, and federal rules and regulations.”
The infrastructure development standards include requiring data centers to pay for “all costs caused in whole or in part by the interconnection, service, or load of a [data center] project, including any costs associated with energy and ancillary services, transmission, distribution, network upgrades.”
Besides requiring data centers to be supplied by new generating resources from the same local PJM Interconnection zone where the facilities are built, they must be supplied from growing amounts of firm clean energy such as solar, advanced nuclear and battery storage, Shapiro said when he signed the executive order.
The firm clean energy requirements ramp up from 10% on Jan. 1 to 14.5% three years later and 32% by Jan. 1, 2035.
The executive order directs the Pennsylvania DEP to expedite permitting for clean energy and storage facilities on brownfield sites. The DEP must also facilitate the use of advanced reconductoring and other advanced transmission technologies on existing transmission rights-of-way.
In prepared remarks, Shapiro pointed to the speed of data center development in the state, which he said has “seen an unacceptable number of speculative proposals … many of them led by developers who have no regard for local communities.”
PPL Electric has about 20.7 GW of potential data center load with electric service agreements in Pennsylvania, according to an Aug. 7 investor presentation. FirstEnergy utilities in Pennsylvania have data center contracts totaling nearly 1 GW, the company said in a July 28 presentation.
It is unclear how those data center projects will be affected by the executive order, but slowing data center development could affect utility transmission spending in the state, the Jefferies analysts noted.
Exelon, FirstEnergy and PPL are “materially increasing their transmission investment with data center demand a key driver,” the analysts said. “If the pace of data center growth slows, we see downside pressure to the pace of transmission investments.”
Currently, data center-driven transmission costs are being shared with residential and other utility customers, they noted.
Shapiro’s executive order directed the state Office of Transformation and Opportunity to remove any existing data center project from the PA Permit Fast Track Program, established in 2024, and rescinded their eligibility for the program. It also barred state agencies from entering into confidential agreements with data center developers.
“Let’s Downsize”: Antifa Uses Instagram To Put ‘Luigi-Style’ Hit On Flock Camera CEO
Karlyn Borysenko, who describes herself as an anti-communist analyst and observer of the far-left, posted a screenshot of an Instagram post from an account called “3chordpolitics.” The post could be interpreted as a targeted, implicitly violent communication directed at Garrett Langley, founder and CEO of Flock Safety.
With high confidence, the 3chordpolitics post deliberately invokes violence against CEOs. As Borysenko wrote on X, “Antifa on Instagram is issuing death threats to CEOs, referencing bullets and Luigi Mangione, and essentially using the platform to call for more CEO assassinations.”
Antifa on Instagram is issuing death threats to CEOs, reference bullets and Luigi Mangione and essentially using the platform to call for more CEO assassination.
— Karlyn Borysenko, anti-communist cult leader (@DrKarlynB) August 19, 2026
Here are the threat indicators present in the post:
CEO Garrett Langley is individually named and pictured.
A black bar obscures his eyes, creating a targeting effect.
Three bullets appear alongside a Luigi character, likely a coded reference to Luigi Mangione and the killing of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson.
The slogan “No CEO Left Behind” appears to imply hostility toward Langley and CEOs as a class.
The caption “Let’s downsize” functions as a double entendre, suggesting the physical elimination of a CEO.
The account’s prior posts suggest it is aligned with the far-left, given its apparent sympathy for Luigi Mangione, calls to dox ICE agents, advocacy for work stoppages, and encouragement of rioting. These positions broadly reflect elements of both reformist socialism and far-left revolution.
Borysenko recently published a five-tiered “rainbow cake” depicting her view of the American left, ranging from establishment Democrats who favor incremental reform within capitalism to revolutionary socialists who seek to abolish the existing system and destroy the nation from within.
As a reminder, the DSA cult sits on the far-left.
As of Thursday morning, Instagram had yet to remove the post.
Broadcom CDS Explodes As It Seeks Up To $100 Billion In Massive Off-Balance Sheet Debt Deal
Amid the growing angst about hyperscaler CapEx (and more specifically, the historic flood of new debt issuance to fund it), attention among the always-bullish equity talking-heads has shifted – and rightfully so – to the bond markets as alarm signals flare up with an increasing frequency. Of course, for ZeroHedge readers, this is not a new topic, it is something we have been warning of for the past year, ever since we explained that debt was the true AI bubble last October:
Then, last week we explained why – as Nomura’s Charlie McElligott also joined the credit chorus – the unprecedented flood of AI corporate debt had started to crowd out demand for US government paper, an ominous development as it meant continued massive capex would lead to even higher treasury yields… as well as even more inflation, a toxic mix to the Treasury.
What’s worse, the market had finally started to pay attention, as one look at the surge in treasury swaption vol of vol made abundantly clear, which is why last week we warned – correctly – that Bessent was about to get very busy as bearish bets hit levels last seen during previous trasury market crises.
One week later Bessent did in fact, get busy, and shocked the market with a “cringingly executed” (to quote McElligott) buyback directive announcement, one which lasted all of 23 hours before the entire move was reversed and yields are now trading 4 bps higher than where they were before the Treasury announcement.
But while Bessent can address the market again any time he wants and threaten Treasury shorts (“By At LeAsT dOuBlE”), the bigger problem facing the Treasury is that the deluge of AI debt is really just starting – recall there is another $6-8 trillion in capex that has to be spent by 2030, most of it in the form of corporate debt, which will lead to relentless pressure higher on US interest rate for the foreseeable future.
Some AI companies realize that it is only a matter of time before Bessent chills this AI debt diarrhea indefinitely; which explains why Bloomberg reported today that Broadcom is preparing another gargantuan SPV deal, and is in talks with a group of lenders to raise more than $60 billion in debt for an AI chip financing deal that will benefit Anthropic PBC and other companies.
The financing, which is still being ironed out, may also include a roughly $30 billion junior debt tranche, said some of the people, who asked not to be identified because the information is private.
Under the proposed plan, Broadcom would guarantee a portion of the senior-secured tranche, which could range from about $60 billion to $70 billion. The numbers under discussion would potentially bring the total to as much as $100 billion, which would make it the largest SPV deal ever funded.
The agreement would add to a rush of deals aimed at financing artificial intelligence infrastructure. AI companies like Anthropic are taking a bigger role in the build-out, aiming to ensure they have enough computing capacity. Broadcom, meanwhile, is looking to sell more chips and other data center equipment, challenging Nvidia in this lucrative market.
Since AI infrastructure SPV require private credit backers, Blackstone and Apollo – the same firms that backstopped Nvidia’s recent $500 billion compute collateralized deal – are in talks with Broadcom to participate in the chip financing, following a partnership the three companies struck in June to help finance computing infrastructure. The debt – as one would expect ever since Meta set the standard with its Beignet off-balance sheet deal – would be issued by a special-purpose vehicle, or SPV, most of which won’t appear on any balance sheet.
The potential deal would help firms including Anthropic access chips and other key AI infrastructure, according to Bloomberg which broke the news. It could be similar to the $35 billion debt agreement that kicked off the group’s AI XPV partnership, they said.
In the first deal for the AI XPV platform two months ago, we explained that Broadcom backstopped most of the debt and investors including Apollo and Blackstone financed the purchase of custom AI chips to lease to Anthropic. And in a sleight of brilliant financial engineering where everyone pretends there is no actual debt being issued, this enabled the senior debt tranches to win investment-grade ratings at lower borrowing costs.
However, that is just the start… of both the debt issuance runway and Bessent’s headaches. The partnership, which plans to finance more than 20 gigawatts of computing power, will require hundreds of billions of dollars. That level of capacity would roughly equal the output of 20 nuclear plants.
The unprecedented scale of the borrowing now under discussion underscores the capital requirements of the AI boom, which has prompted a slew of novel debt deals at a pace and scale that’s simultaneously unnerved some investors. In what was actually a huge nothingburger, Nvidia earlier this month announced that a coalition of major financial firms including BlackRock and Goldman Sachs Group were lining up more than $500 billion to help fund the AI build-out, although the agreement was only an MOU and was at best intended to provide some comfort to credit markets. It failed, since Nvidia CDS is now trading at all time wides.
Broadcom’s chief executive officer said in March that the company expects AI chip sales to top $100 billion next year. The chipmaker has also struck other partnerships, including an accord with Apple that’s expected to be worth more than $30 billion. Broadcom’s valuation has soared in recent years, propelled by agreements to make custom AI chips for firms like OpenAI.
After briefly declining, Broadcom shares rose as much as 1.1% in late trading after Bloomberg News reported on the discussions. The stock had climbed 5.2% this year through the close. But forget about the stock: these days all the action is in the bond trading and/or Credit Default Swap land, and is why Broadcom’s massive new bond deal illustrates the US Treasury’s uphill task in containing long-bond yields
Broadcom’s debt is interesting because its recent competition for Google’s TPU business has been accompanied by a spike in CDS. And, as Bloomberg notes, the monster debt deal will do little to alleviate that pressure and will likely feed down to the CDS of other chip/hyperscaler credit.
As we noted in our EOD wrap, hyperscaler CDS is already back near the July all-time wides, with names that issue new debt seeing clear spikes in CDS pushing their default risk slowly but surely every higher.
The problem is that unlike equities, where there apparently is an infinite number of greater fools using other people’s money to force daily gamma squeezes, there will come a time – and yield – when the bond market simply refuses to keep funding these endless AI boondoggles, especially when China can now do pretty much everything faster, cheaper and almost as effectively. At that point, the AI bubble will finally burst.
What was once the paranoid whisper of conspiracy has become the marketed convenience of ‘life logging’ – yet beneath the promise of perfect memory lies the total erasure of privacy, turning every shrew into a unwitting performer on the surveillance stage.
(If you haven’t read enough of my work to know what a “shrew” is, read this: Sheep and Shrew)
During a recent three-hour ramble with my sister – one of those wide-ranging, idea-sparking talkathons we’ve shared for years – the little recording device I had just bought, attached to my phone, quietly drank it all in. Every tangent on culture, politics, family, and the state of the world was captured, summarized, and later served back as a tidy slideshow of “highlights.” It auto-suggested calendar entries, pulled up past chats on demand, and generally made itself indispensable.
For a moment, I felt the rush: This is the future. No more forgotten details, no more scrambling for notes. Pure magic.
I will disclose immediately that I have purchased several of these odd devices mostly out of curiosity, but also out of an attempt to record various “having fun moments” of my life (like a recent dog adventure to a local pond, and our three-day trip to New York City to see Swan Lake). I won’t go into my personal experience (with the intentions just stated) out of fear it will bore you; ask in the comments if you would like to know.
Here I will make my general comments on what I feel the impact such devices will have on our human culture. What masquerades as personal empowerment is a profound archetypal shift toward total surveillance, eroding privacy, authenticity, and human freedom – normalizing the sheeple’s willing submission while shrews must stay vigilant.
Woo-hoo, what else is new?
During my conversation with my sister, the shrew in me stirred almost immediately. That ancient archetype of the All-Seeing Eye – once reserved for gods, tyrants, or paranoid fantasies – had slipped into the room wearing the friendly face of convenience. What felt like an innocent companion was, in truth, a silent recorder turning private exchange into permanent data. And I had invited it in.
This is how the trap springs. Not with jackboots and cameras in every corner (though those exist too), but with sleek little devices marketed as extensions of ourselves. Wearable AI pins, smart glasses, neck discs – they promise perfect memory while quietly building the most intimate profile imaginable: where we go, what we say, who we say it to, and how we feel about it all. Street cameras and smartphone sensors already blanket the public square; these wearables drag the surveillance indoors, into our conversations, our homes, our unguarded moments with loved ones. The panopticon goes portable.
We’ve seen this pattern before. Remember when “just a phone” became a pocket tracker? Or how contact-tracing apps during the scamdemic morphed from “temporary emergency tools” into permanent fixtures in the biosecurity state? The same sleight of hand is at work here. Tech companies dangle the carrot – Never forget a name! Relive every precious moment! Let AI organize your chaos! – and the sheeple flock to it, bleating about how “empowering” it all feels. The sheep, yes, and at least one sheep-like shrew. Me.
Meanwhile, the other shrews (you) feel the water getting warmer. You are more aware than me that every logged conversation is fodder for training models, targeted ads, behavioural predictions, or worse – subpoenas, hacks, or authoritarian overreach. Deepfakes already erode trust in video evidence; add always-on personal recording, and alibis become meaningless, private truths become contestable, and authentic human connection withers under the gaze of the machine.
My sister and I laughed about it at first. Then the unease settled in. What if one of those “helpful” summaries gets shared without consent? What if the data shapes how others (or algorithms) perceive us? The archetype of the all-seeing eye doesn’t just watch – it consumes. It flattens the rich, contradictory mess of human life into clean, marketable data points.
From a Jungian perspective, this is no mere gadget problem. It is the externalization of the Self’s shadow – the watcher within projected onto silicon. Privacy is not just a legal right; it is the sacred space where the psyche breathes, where shadow integrates, where anima and animus dance unseen. Strip that away, and we become performers, constantly curating our words for an invisible audience. The sheepsters may not notice – they’ve grown accustomed to the slowly boiling pot. But the shrew feels the contraction of soul.
This is the latest chapter in the long war on autonomy waged primarily by the advocates of transhumanism and technoculture. Digital passports, social credit systems, vaccine mandates – each promised safety or convenience while tightening the noose. AI wearables complete the circle: they don’t just monitor the body or the public square; they ingest the mind itself, turning inner dialogue into training data for the next generation of control.
We are not far from the logical endpoint – stylish glasses with always-on cameras, or worse, neural implants that record thoughts before they become words. The marketers will call it “seamless augmentation.” The shrew calls it the end of anything resembling private life. But here we go.
Woo-hoo again, what fun!
Obviously, we have known about all this techno-joy for quite some time: science fiction novels, 50’s SciFi movies, superhero comic books, Star Trek, Outer Limits and Battlestar Galactica TV series, among many other media enticements. All techno gadgets presented in these resources have been emblazoned into our feeble brains (not you, of course!), always looking for the next exciting and fun thing to engage with.
Why do we have to move back into the techno-less past in our effort to survive? Why can’t we take this fun ride into a more convenient, more joyous, more exciting future with interesting “things” to fiddle with? Primarily because there is likely an evil intention behind it all. We can never forget the agenda, and one of the prime tools of manipulation the agenda thrives on is private information.
So, what do we do? Do we stop participating in this new science-fiction-turned-reality world? Do we just get the hell off the grid, and live in some backward fourth-world country drinking milk out of a coconut? That’s one way to do it; another is to simply become more aware and conscious.
Awareness itself is resistance. Turn the All-Seeing Eye inward. Use these tools sparingly, consciously, and never without remembering what they truly cost. Talk with your pack. Document the unease. Keep the conversations that matter offline when you can.
The water is heating, my dear shrew. But we still have legs to jump – and voices to warn the others before the lid clamps shut for good.
Todd Hayen PhD is a registered psychotherapist practicing in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. He holds a PhD in depth psychotherapy and an MA in Consciousness Studies. He specializes in Jungian, archetypal, psychology. Todd also writes for his own substack, which you can read here.
According to a Statista Consumer Insights survey conducted between January and July 2026, 53 percent of U.S. adults said that the high cost of living was one of the biggest challenges they currently face – making it by far the most common answer ahead of mental and physical health at 26 percent each.
It is a common misconception that prices come down when inflation cools, when in reality a period of high inflation leaves a legacy of high prices.
According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, U.S. consumer prices have increased 26.7 percent since January 2021, with some categories seeing even steeper price increases than that.
Food prices are up 27.2 percent, rents have increased more than 30 percent and transportation prices are up 35 percent.
And yet, nominal wages have only grown 25.7 percent since January 2021, leaving many people worse off than they were five years ago.
Western Woman Travels To India And Finds The Misery Of Cultural Enrichment
It’s been a long time since the Beatles convinced an entire generation of western youth in 1968 that “enlightenment” and personal peace could be found in the third world backwaters of India’s ashram retreats. As it turned out, the world famous band and the yogi scammers of that era would end up creating a trend that would sucker gullible liberals for decades to come.
The hippies were not smart, they were merely impressionable.
Today, the streets of India are likely the same in most places as they were back in the 1960s – Filled with trash and feces and not very safe. The country remains one of the most dangerous tourist markets on the planet for women – Around 90% of rapes go unreported due to law enforcement apathy and a culture of reprisal for women who come forward. Any travel outside of tourist enclaves is considered high risk.
British content creator Amy On The Move discovered this on her first trip to India, but she says she was willing to give the country a second chance. What she found was even more multicultural misery.
She had entered India on a longer-term (year-scale) visa intending a solo cycling trip from Kolkata toward Kerala and up the west coast. After roughly two weeks, including time in Bhadrak, Odisha, she posted videos documenting her experiences there.
It’s a common story which liberals tend to ignore in their search for anything better than the “evils” of the capitalist west. They say the grass is greener elsewhere, but they can’t seem to find any legitimate examples. The “rape culture” and “patriarchy” of the west that the political left constantly complains about doesn’t hold a candle to the unfiltered predatory nature of the third world.
The UK vlogger complained that she was “getting scammed non-stop” as beggars and shopkeepers targeted her relentlessly. She noted a common tourist scam in which beggars ask travelers to buy them food, then take them to a shop where the owner overcharges and pockets the extra cash.
The average yearly salary on Indian citizens is around $4000 USD and the poverty rate is 28%. To put this in perspective, one US dollar is equivalent to 2.5 hours of labor in India. Ripping off western tourists is a lucrative industry.
The country is world famous for it’s garbage problem and municipal government mismanagement is usually blamed. However, evidence suggests that this issue is a product of culture, not just of government. Western tourists discover that throwing trash in the streets us “just what they do in India”.
These kinds of examples underscore why it is important for western nations to carefully limit the kinds of people that are allowed within their borders. It’s not just a matter of environment, it’s a matter of culture and culture does not change. In other words, import the third world into the west and the west will become the third world.
Abu Dhabi National Oil Company (ADNOC) has just issued its ninth spot tender offering crude oil to buyers for October and November loadings, as the United Arab Emirates (UAE) continues to push its oil production and exports higher despite the Hormuz crisis.
The UAE’s national oil company is offering Upper Zakum, Umm Lulu, and Das crude grades pumped at fields inside the Persian Gulf in its ninth spot tender since June, sources in the trade industry told Reuters on Thursday.
In the previous eight spot tenders this summer, ADNOC is estimated to have sold more than 100 million barrels of crude to buyers.
As in the previous tenders, the ninth spot tender offers buyers the opportunity to buy cargoes on a free-on-board basis at UAE’s Fujairah Storage, Zirku, or Das Island, or arrange ship-to-ship (STS) transfers at the Fujairah-Sohar range outside the Strait of Hormuz, according to Reuters’ sources.
Since June, ADNOC has sold an estimated more than 100 million barrels in spot tenders, as the Gulf producer that has just left OPEC pushes to sell increased crude volumes to international markets.
The UAE has managed to boost its oil exports to pre-crisis levels as early as June, as it has kept pushing crude through the Strait of Hormuz and beyond.
The UAE is estimated to have produced 4.1 million barrels per day (bpd) of crude oil in June, its highest output ever.
The UAE, which left OPEC on May 1, has found workarounds to the blockage at the Strait of Hormuz.
It has been shuttling crude through the chokepoint to load it on larger vessels outside the Strait, maximizing the use of its onshore pipeline to ship crude from the west to the east of the country, bypassing Hormuz, and shipping tankers through the Strait in dark mode.
Towards the end of every calendar year, various collegespublish lists of overused words and phrases. Though it is only August, here’s an obvious entrant for 2026: “big tent party.”
Invoking that tired phrase is part of the sophistry that “establishment” Dems contrive to outwit dumb fake-news hosts. It is an attempt to obfuscate concerns about the commie takeover of their party. Publicly and performatively, they pretend to welcome the commies because they are a “big tent party.”
Wrong! They are a “folding tent” party when it comes to their historical raison d’être; indeed, common-sense Republicans have co-opted much of their traditional ethnic and working-class base.
Even if their big tent bulges at the seams, what’s the point if the big top ring is swamped with commie clowns who turn it into a chaotic circus?
What’s the point of a party that lacks a clear mission or coherent principles?
The answer: to spite common-sense conservatives. To thwart Republicans for the sake of it. But what’s the point of that?
As the commie clowns usurp the circus ringmaster, they’re effectively chucking sticky pies into the faces of the supposedly establishment Dems. Even leftist Hakeem Obama-wannabee Jeffries has been splattered with sugary goop. He admits he’s against several of the commie demands; in fact, he doesn’t support the DSA platform at all.
Again, I ask: what’s the point in welcoming in commie clowns who run amok? I know TDS is debilitating, but do they really hate an America First President more than soul-destroying commies? They are anti-American, but are they also anti-human? Get some perspective, please.
When it comes to the more “moderate” Dems, perhaps the likes of Jared Moskowitz (D-FL) and John Fetterman (D-PA), the policy gulf is even wider. If one considers the political spectrum, they may tilt somewhat closer to conservative than commie (admittedly, Fetterman votes Dem most of the time, but I can’t see much comity with the commies).
This is not to say that a big tent can’t remain steadfast. Ronald Reagan managed it, and President Trump expanded traditional Republican constituencies. The difference is they coalesce around all-American common-sense principles that have helped make us the most inventive and prosperous country ever. Genius combined with copious common sense made America great.
The Dem big top tent is crumbling under the weight of the commie onslaught. The DSA-endorsed candidates may have a “D” by their name, but it should be “C.” After all, there was once a time when even Dems supported America; conversely, the commies they now invite in want to overthrow us. How do they belong on the same playing field, let alone in the same tent?
I’m an average, commonsense dude, but I’m telling the pretentious intellectuals and highfalutin linguists right now: recommend ditching the phrase “big tent party.” It was useful for Reagan, and even Trump, who both ushered in a bright “Morning again in America,” but has become a ludicrous trope for the demented Dems. They are lacking a positive platform, so the Communist Manifesto will fill the vacuum.
One presumes the ultimate purpose in their big tent is simply to defeat Republicans. Be careful what you wish for — the commies within will turn on you. They always do. As the old saying goes: “United we stand, divided we fall.” As with communism, the Dem big tent is doomed to fall. They’d be advised to break commie camp in a more orderly fashion.
