Authored by Michael Snyder via The Economic Collapse blog,

The cost of living has become absolutely suffocating for millions of Americans. For years, the bureaucrats in Washington have been feeding us numbers that show that the rate of inflation is low, but it is obvious to everyone that what they are telling us is simply not true. Many of the items that I regularly purchase at the grocery store have more than doubled in price over the past decade. Some have more than tripled in price. When I get to the register to check out, I feel like asking the cashier which organ I should donate to pay for my groceries.

We have reached a stage where grocery prices are causing extreme financial stress for families all over America. One man recently caused quite a stir on social media when he revealed that a grocery order from Target that cost $64.50 in 2020 is now $158.30 in 2026…

This post has already been viewed a million times.

The reason why it is so popular is because it instantly resonates with people.

Everyone knows that grocery prices have risen to absurd levels, and yet the statisticians in Washington keep assuring us that everything is fine.

I don’t believe them.

Do you?

The Washington Post just conducted a poll that found that 66 percent of Americans consider the cost of groceries to be unaffordable.

That figure has risen by 21 percent just since February…

Americans are feeling worse about the price of groceries than they were before the war with Iran began, a Washington Post-Ipsos poll finds.

About two-thirds, or 66 percent, of Americans say they would describe the cost of groceries as unaffordable, up sharply from the 45 percent who said the same thing in February before the conflict started.

Partisanship continues to play a big role in perceptions, with half of Republicans saying groceries are affordable in the latest poll, compared with about one-quarter of independents and Democrats.

Housing is even worse.

The median price of an existing home in the United States has now surpassed the $440,000 mark…

With a landmark housing affordability bill in political limbo, U.S. home prices have hit an all-time high.

The median price of existing homes in June was $440,660, up 1.8% from $432,700 a year ago, according to new data from the National Association of Realtors (NAR). Home prices have risen for 36 straight months.

“Housing affordability remains low under slowing wage growth and stronger home price growth,” Ershang Liang, an economist with PNC Economics Research, said in a report.

Who can afford to pay that much for a house?

Rental prices have also gone through the roof.

If you can believe it, the average rent on a one bedroom apartment in Manhattan is now a whopping $5,408 a month…

The city’s housing crisis has hit “DefCon 1” — with average rents for a one-bedroom in Manhattan hitting an all-time high of nearly $5,500 last month, and Brooklyn following suit, according to new data and critics.

“We need bold action. This is a crisis,’’ New York City Comptroller Mark Levine posted on X over the weekend, along with a link to the latest figures from the inhabit blog by real-estate giant Corcoran Group.

The dismal June stats reveal that renters paid an average of $5,408 for a one-bedroom in Manhattan, with studio prices not far behind at $4,014.

It isn’t a mystery why most Americans are struggling in this sort of an environment.

Many are turning to debt in a desperate attempt to make ends meet…

Many American families are struggling to make ends meet on their incomes alone and have resorted to credit cards, payday loans, and Buy Now Pay Later (BNPL) options for groceries, according to nonprofit research center Urban Institute.

The findings are based on a survey of 18-to 64-year-old working-age adults conducted in December 2025. About 8.7 percent of adults said they used a credit card for groceries and were unable to make the minimum payment, up from 7.1 percent in 2023, the Urban Institute said in a July 13 report. This suggests “worsening financial distress” among families.

Almost one in 10 used BNPL to pay for groceries, out of which more than a third missed a timely repayment last year.

Unfortunately, when you keep piling up debt a day of reckoning eventually arrives.

Coming into this year, alarmingly large numbers of Americans were getting behind on their credit cards…

And the number of foreclosures in the U.S. is way above the highly elevated pace that we witnessed last year…

Foreclosures across the U.S. ballooned in the first half of the year, a sign of the increasing financial strain facing the nation’s homeowners.

Foreclosure filings reached nearly 228,000 from January to June, up 21% from a year ago and 28% from two years ago, according to data released Thursday from real estate data company ATTOM.

Rising foreclosure rates indicate that more homeowners are in financial distress, Rob Barber, CEO of ATTOM, said in a statement. Homes go into foreclosure when the owner falls behind on mortgage payments, often due to extenuating life circumstances such as a job loss. ATTOM defines foreclosures as default notices, scheduled auctions or bank repossessions.

This reminds me so much of the conditions that we experienced just before the financial crisis of 2008.

Unfortunately, the cost of living is only going to go higher.

The cost of energy directly affects the cost of everything else, and it appears that the Strait of Hormuz is going to be closed for an extended period of time.

The average price of a gallon of gasoline in the U.S. has nearly reached four dollars again, and the average price of a gallon of diesel has already risen above the five dollar mark…

US gas prices have rocketed higher during the on-again, off-again war with Iran.

After a brief respite, the average price for gas has surged 15 cents in a week to $3.94 a gallon and appears headed north of $4 again. Diesel, which shows up in customers’ shipping costs, topped $5 a gallon again Thursday for the first time in 3 weeks, according to AAA.

It serves as a painful reminder of how the military conflict in the Persian Gulf has a direct effect on your wallet.

Of even greater importance is what the closure of the Strait of Hormuz means for the global fertilizer market.

As Mike Adams has pointed out, without sufficient quantities of nitrogen fertilizer we won’t even come close to producing enough food for everyone…

Admittedly, I have failed to explain the stakes clearly enough. For months, I have written about fertilizer supply chains, the Haber-Bosch process, and the vulnerability of the Strait of Hormuz. But the gravity of this crisis has not sunk in for most people. Let me put it as plainly as I can: The global population of more than 8 billion people depends on a fragile web of natural gas, oil, and downstream chemistry that took 60+ years to build on this planet. If we lose 25 percent of these critical substances, we lose 25 percent of the population. That is 2 billion people. Here is why that math is inescapable.

As I documented in my article “The Haber-Bosch House of Cards,” the single chemical reaction that fixes nitrogen from the air into fertilizer is responsible for feeding roughly half of humanity [1]. That process requires vast quantities of natural gas. The Persian Gulf region, especially Qatar and Iran, supplies much of that gas. When the Trump administration launched its war on Iran in February 2026 and the Strait of Hormuz was effectively closed, the global fertilizer supply chain began to collapse. This is not a prediction of future famine. The famine is already baked in. But it could still get a whole lot worse depending on how things go from here.

We could be facing multiple years when global food production is at depressed levels.

That means that food prices will go even higher in wealthy countries, and in poor countries there will be shortages.

Famine is one of the major trends that I am tracking, and what we are already witnessing in some parts of Africa is absolutely heartbreaking.

There is no magic button that we can press that is going to make these problems go away.

A crisis of historic proportions is now upon us, and we are still only in the very early stages of it.

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.

Authored by Rob Sabo via The Epoch Times,

The number of automobile owners trading in vehicles with negative equity continues to rise, with 29.6 percent of trade-ins in the second quarter showing more money owed on existing auto loans than the vehicles were worth, according to automotive insights platform Edmunds’s July 16 vehicle transaction report.

Negative equity also pushed average monthly payments on “underwater” trade-ins to $944 in the quarter, the highest figure on record, the report said.

That’s $167 more per month than trade-ins without negative equity considerations, and those higher loans are expected to account for an additional $16,270 in interest paid over the loan term—another record high that’s nearly $6,500 more than the average new-vehicle loan issued during the quarter.

“Consumers are incurring more debt than ever when trading in vehicles that are underwater,” said Jessica Caldwell, head of insights at Edmunds.

“Buyers who financed at 2022’s peak prices are starting to come back to trade in, and they’re bringing thousands of dollars in old debt with them. With interest rates still elevated, this is creating a costly snowball effect for consumers.”

It’s the highest number of underwater trade-ins recorded in the second quarter since 2020, Edmunds researchers noted. Trade-ins with negative equity eased slightly from the first quarter, when they tallied 30.9 percent, but they were up 3 percent from the second quarter of 2025.

The average amount of negative equity—$6,884—was a record high for the second quarter of any year, though it pulled back from the $7,183 notched in the first quarter, Edmunds researchers noted.

As buyers roll over negative equity into new auto loans, the principal amount owed on their new vehicles swells, Caldwell added. Buyers often rely on longer-term loans to lower their monthly payments, but that coping mechanism only results in a larger total interest paid over the life of the loan.

Paying down negative equity also lengthens the time it takes for automobile owners to reach positive equity in their vehicles, or the financial position where their car is worth more than the principal amount owed, the Federal Trade Commission’s (FTC) consumer advice portal noted.

It’s important for consumers to know their equity position in a vehicle before trading it in, the FTC added. Equally important, the FTC said, is to closely examine new automobile contracts for the amount of negative equity that may be rolled into new loans before signing documents at dealerships.

Negative equity positions have been on the rise since 2022, Edmunds said, when high used-vehicle prices caused by a global shortage of computer chips buffered consumers from rolling over debt from one vehicle to the next.

However, as vehicle prices normalized, more vehicle owners found themselves underwater on their loans as they attempted to upgrade their cars through new-vehicle purchases.

Vehicles with model years 2020 or newer showing the most negative equity include Toyota Tundra (-$8,929), GMC Sierra 1500 (-$8,566), Chevrolet Silverado 1500 (-$8,516), and Ram 1500 (-$,8347). However, Edmunds also lists a handful of sedans and sport utility vehicles with negative equity of $5,000 or more, including the Kia Sportage, Honda Accord, Toyota RAV4, Jeep Grand Cherokee, Nissan Rogue, and many others.

Often, negative equity is more about onerous financing structures than vehicle depreciation, said Ivan Drury, director of insights at Edmunds.

“Some of the biggest dollar losses we’re seeing are on trucks and sedans that traditionally hold their value better than most,” Drury said.

“When historically safe residual value bets are showing up underwater, it’s clear this is a financing problem, not always a vehicle choice problem. These examples are a harsh reminder that a great vehicle choice can still be completely undermined by a punishing loan structure.”

Summary:

• FBI New York Joint Terrorism Task Force is investigating the incident
• FBI Tells Fox News “individual deployed an incendiary device” 
• Immigration agents and FBI rushed out, guns drawn, and FPS apprehended the suspect
• Explosion Hits Outside 26 Federal Plaza in Lower Manhattan

The FBI tells Fox News’ Bill Melugin:

“This morning an individual deployed an incendiary device outside of 26 Federal Plaza. The individual has been taken into custody and the FBI New York Joint Terrorism Task Force is investigating the incident.”

Melugin continued:

NYPD tells FOX there was a “found firearm” in relation to this event, but couldn’t confirm if it was found on the suspect.

FBI statement to @FoxNews:

“This morning an individual deployed an incendiary device outside of 26 Federal Plaza. The individual has been taken into custody and the FBI New York Joint Terrorism Task Force is investigating the incident.”

NYPD tells FOX there was a “found… https://t.co/bUdDbryRxC

— Bill Melugin (@BillMelugin_) July 20, 2026

The attack at 26 Federal Plaza, which houses offices for agencies including DHS, ICE, USCIS, the FBI, and the Social Security Administration, comes days after Secretary of State Marco Rubio warned of far-left terrorism across the West.

Explosion Reported Outside 26 Federal Plaza In Lower Manhattan

New footage shows what appears to be a fire and a person being arrested outside 26 Federal Plaza in Lower Manhattan.

“Moment of EXPLOSION that went off outside of the 26 Federal Plaza in NYC around 8:30am this morning, with Immigration agents and FBI Rushing out guns drawn and FPS apprehending the suspect. Sidewalk has been shut down and building evacuated,” FreedomNews wrote on X. 

NOW: Moment of EXPLOSION that went off outside of the 26 Federal Plaza in NYC around 8:30am this morning, with Immigration agents and FBI Rushing out guns drawn and FPS apprehending the suspect. Sidewalk has been shut down and building evacuated.

NYPD on scene confirmed it was… pic.twitter.com/aihTqsFpcN

— FreedomNews.Tv FNTV (@FreedomNTV) July 20, 2026

Notably, the building houses several federal agencies, including the Department of Homeland Security, Immigration and Customs Enforcement, the FBI, the Social Security Administration, and U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services.

There is no additional information at this time.

By Diana DiGangi of UtilityDive,

The Texas Public Utility Commission on Thursday unanimously approved rules that will require large computational loads, like data centers and crypto-mining facilities, within the Electric Reliability Council of Texas footprint to stay stable and connected to the grid through disruptions.

Modern computational loads, Kenteel Engineering said in a June blog, are “engineered to protect extremely sensitive and expensive equipment,” and during a voltage dip are programmed to disconnect or enter momentary cessation.

However, this presents a reliability problem, Kenteel Engineering said, as when “several hundred — or several thousand — megawatts of computational load all detect the same sag and drop simultaneously, the grid experiences a sudden, large loss of demand.”

“As LCLs increase on the ERCOT System, similar events would be expected to increase in magnitude and frequency, leading to frequency instability and other reliability problems absent frequency and voltage ride-through requirements,” the Texas PUC rules state. 

The rules don’t immediately penalize facilities that fail to ride through a qualifying event, Kenteel Engineering noted, but instead put them “on the clock” to investigate and report the root cause within 90 days of ERCOT’s request, “develop a corrective plan within 90 days of completing that investigation, and implement the approved plan within 180 days unless ERCOT grants more time.”

“Overriding all of that, if ERCOT judges that continued operation poses an imminent risk to local or system reliability, it can order the [large electric load] — and keep it disconnected — until the Customer demonstrates compliance to ERCOT’s satisfaction,” Kenteel Engineering said.

In comments, the Data Center Coalition argued that the PUC lacks the statutory authority to “impose the binding and ongoing operational requirements contained in [the rules] directly on retail customers — a category of entity that the Legislature deliberately excluded from ERCOT’s authority.” 

Texas Industrial Energy Consumers made similar comments, writing, “Unlike Market Participants who must agree to comply with and be bound by all ERCOT Protocols as a condition of participating in the wholesale market, pure retail loads have made no such commitment and have no such obligation.”

TIEC also argued that ERCOT lacks the expertise to “develop reasonable operational requirements for complex, costly manufacturing equipment. It is completely inappropriate to give ERCOT the ability to directly regulate businesses who are not participating in the wholesale market and are not otherwise regulated entities.”

In a staff memo from the PUC’s R. Floyd Walker, senior counsel with the commission’s market analysis division, Walker dismissed concerns over the PUC’s authority. Those commenters “seem to be working under the assumption that explicitly statutory authority is required,” he wrote. “Staff respectfully submits that delegated authority is sufficient.”

“There is no debate that voltage and frequency excursions on the transmission network create reliability concerns, which increase with the interconnection of each new large computational load,” Walker said. “Accordingly, if approved by the Commission, the provisions of [the rules] would be within ERCOT’s authority by virtue of that approval.”

Comments from the Texas Blockchain Council argued that proposed mitigation approaches for LCLs, such as the installation of dedicated battery storage, “are neither practical nor economical at scale.”

“While battery solutions have been suggested, we are not aware of any that have been successfully tested or deployed at the scale required for [LCLs],” the group wrote. “Even if pursued, mandating dedicated batteries for each facility would be unlikely to fully resolve the underlying technical challenges and would impose substantial costs, currently estimated at more than $1.6 million per MW, making such an approach economically prohibitive for most operations.”

ERCOT staff approved of the rules, writing in a market impact statement that they provide “necessary requirements to reduce the reliability risk posed by LCLs unexpectedly tripping or transferring to backup generation when frequency and voltage excursions within a specified range occur.”

In official comments, ERCOT wrote that LCL loss wasn’t a hypothetical, and ERCOT “has experienced 28 events involving LCL trips of at least 100 MW due to voltage and frequency excursions since the beginning of 2023. This risk will increase exponentially with the significant growth of LCLs expected in the ERCOT Region.”

Developers have requested studies for more than 438 GW of large load projects within ERCOT’s footprint, and “even if only a small fraction of these projects materialize, this will significantly increase the risk that cascading outages could occur due to LCL failures to ride through typical voltage or frequency disturbances,” ERCOT said.

“I’m not living in Communist America… I’ve read the quotes from the DSA platform, from their own mouths. Don’t tell me I’m not seeing what I am seeing,” Bill Maher told ABC News’ Jonathan Karl in an exclusive interview that aired on Sunday.

Bill Maher: “I’m not living in Communist America… I’ve read the quotes from the DSA platform, from their own mouths. Don’t tell me I’m not seeing what I am seeing.” pic.twitter.com/grWslcyxD9

— America (@america) July 19, 2026

Karl asked Maher, “Could you see yourself voting for JD Vance?”

Maher responded: “Yes. If this is the Democratic side, yes.”

Establishment Democrats are freaking out over the Democratic Socialists of America’s attempted hijacking of their party because this anti-American, far-left Marxist movement, with possible ties to foreign subversion, risks dooming the party in the midterms and beyond.

The problem for Democrats is that years of letting socialists and Marxists into their DEI kingdom have only now produced dire consequences. Status quo Democrats are watching their power evaporate as DSA candidates defeat mainstream Democrats in primaries across New York, Colorado, Pennsylvania, and other states.

About two weeks ago, Mark Penn, the former Clinton adviser and White House pollster, used a recent Wall Street Journal op-ed to sound the alarm over the rise of DSA.

Penn warned: “Lawmakers, law-enforcement agencies and journalists should investigate the DSA to see if it is being funded by foreign governments and interests.”

Then Jamie Metzl, who served in the Clinton White House, sounded the alarm about DSA in an X post, stating, “Every Democrat and every American should recognize that the DSA represents a fundamental threat to our party and our country.”

I am a lifelong Democrat. I served on President Clinton’s National Security Council and in the State Department under Madeleine Albright. I am also a lifelong human rights and civil rights advocate.

But every Democrat and every American should recognize that the DSA represents a…

— Jamie Metzl (@JamieMetzl) July 18, 2026

Why is DSA a liability for Democrats? Well, their agenda is to destroy America:

DSA leaders promote “destroying America from within” …

Another DSA member says she is totally fine with national socialists. National socialists are commonly known as Nazis.

White DSA Member Inadvertently Exposes Socialist Playbook: “Secret Nazis” Are Fine If They Advance Agenda https://t.co/BqzDHEYQjs

— zerohedge (@zerohedge) July 19, 2026

New polling indicates that Americans across the political spectrum overwhelmingly reject communism, reinforcing the view that the DSA represents a major political liability for Democrats.

The anti-American Marxist movement’s growing influence also comes as the State Department intensifies efforts to identify and dismantle far-left extremist organizations seeking to undermine the country in subversion efforts.

Australian mining billionaire Andrew Forrest, founder and executive chairman of iron ore giant Fortescue, has agreed to acquire Oaktree Capital’s entire 16.8% stake in the Sydney-listed tungsten producer EQ Resources.

Shares of EQ Resources in Sydney surged 34% on Monday following news of the transaction, which is valued at about 190 million AUD ($133 million) based on Friday’s close. The deal covers 862.1 million shares and 35.6 million options.

Forrest’s most likely reasoning for the deal is that EQ Resources controls one of the largest operating tungsten platforms outside China. Tungsten is a critical metal used in armor-piercing munitions, aerospace components, cutting tools, electronics, and semiconductor manufacturing.

Bloomberg noted that, outside of China, Australia has the world’s largest tungsten reserves, accounting for about 80% of global production.

Prices of tungsten in Europe reached a new all-time high of $3,025 per ton after a year-long rally, following Beijing’s decision to place certain tungsten products on its export control list. Beyond China, stockpiling has accelerated and war demand is driving a squeeze in physical markets.

George Heppel, vice president of commodity research, told Bloomberg earlier this year: “In my 12 years working across the commodity space and dealing with a lot of weird and wonderful metals, I have never seen a market as tight as tungsten is right now, aside from maybe lithium in 2021.” 

The US military is bombing Iran for what is now the ninth straight day of renewed fighting, in a campaign which has expanded to include both civic and military infrastructure, also as Iranian retaliatory attacks keep up the pressure on the Gulf states, and have reached into Jordan, which deadly effect on an American base there.

Iranian authorities have said at least 50 people were killed and more than 500 after the return to war in the last three weeks. State media has reported that eight were killed in a single bridge strike on Friday.

American deaths have become evident as well, with US soldiers confirmed killed in a Saturday CENTCOM announcement. The Pentagon said Sunday a third US servicemember was killed in northern Iraq Sunday, in what’s being described as an accidental death during a “controlled detonation” of a downed Iranian attack drone.

The US has identified that Lieutenant Tyler James Feehan, 25, of Ewa Beach, Hawaii, and Private Isabella Gonzales, 19, of Carrollton, Texas, were killed in the Jordan attacks Friday. They were there as part of the ongoing ‘counter-ISIS’ mission, the Pentagon further indicated.

Despite what has been several days of running escalation, Iran has it has received mediation proposals to restart negotiations with the United States, according to Foreign Ministry spokesperson Esmaeil Baghaei on Monday. Baghaei told state media that the country will continue to defend itself resolutely.

“I emphasize once again that the diplomatic apparatus continues to pursue its tasks jointly and in line with the defenders of the homeland in the armed forces. The proposals submitted through mediators have been communicated to us and have been received,” the spokesman said. 

This as a new ceasefire proposal is said to be in the works, with the headline resulting in a drop in oil prices:

MEDIATORS PROPOSE 10-DAY CEASEFIRE BETWEEN IRAN, US: REUTERS

According to more details of the fresh push for regional ceasefire via The Wall Street Journal:

Mediators were working to push the U.S. and Iran into a new ceasefire Monday, fearful the two foes could settle into a pattern where they keep conflict below the level of all-out war but disrupt regional economies indefinitely and run the risk of a miscalculation that escalates the fighting.

The efforts come after the U.S. carried out a ninth straight night of attacks, Iran retaliated against Arab allies including Kuwait and Bahrain, and another vessel in the Strait of Hormuz was hit by a projectile that started a fire and led the crew to abandon ship.

Qatar has floated the idea of a 10-day ceasefire and an end to restrictions on shipping in the strategic waterway, mediators said. It wasn’t clear whether either side was ready to accept a new halt to the fighting after the preliminary peace deal they signed in mid-June collapsed earlier this month, they said. 

Joachim Klement, head of strategy at Panmure Liberum, has newly commented that investors “still think the US and Iran will go back to the negotiation table,” and stipulated that “Only once the US is no longer willing to negotiate do we expect markets to price higher oil prices for longer.”

However, statements out of Iran do not suggest de-escalation, with President Masoud Pezeshkian having said Monday his country is engaged in a “full-scale war” with the US and that Iranians must be ready accept the repercussions of the conflict.

“The reality is that today the Islamic Republic of Iran is engaged in a full-scale war. We must be realistic and accept the natural consequences of this resistance,” Pezeshkian said.

A few days ago, the Qataris submitted a proposal to regulate the Strait of Hormuz.
A response from the leader was supposed to arrive yesterday, but it did not.

The proposal includes establishing a new, designated corridor through which ships could pass, while imposing a…

— Amit Segal (@AmitSegal) July 20, 2026

The situation on the ground does suggest this, amid reports that the US side is concealing or downplaying the true extent of damage on its regional bases as casualties mount:

Dozens of US military personnel were wounded and helicopters damaged during three Iranian strikes on American forces in Jordan last week, The New York Times reports.

Citing anonymous US officials, it said the Pentagon did not disclose the casualties and damage inflicted during the attacks, which came before Iran’s strike that killed two soldiers and left one missing on Friday in Jordan.

The total number of US personnel killed in the US-Israel war on Iran now stands at 17 with more than 400 wounded since the war was launched on February 28.

“Central Command is not required to release information about injured service members,” a US military official told the Times as part of the weekend report.

⭕️ Iran FM Araghchi: Wars End Either Through Total Victory or Negotiations…

Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi:

🔹 A war must be ended precisely at the point when you hold the upper hand on the battlefield. Ending a war is possible either through total military victory or… pic.twitter.com/kHeYhShsXC

— Drop Site (@DropSiteNews) July 20, 2026

Overnight Developments

• US and Iran engaged in another exchange of strikes after an Iranian attack on Jordan killed two US service members on Friday, while Tehran said it was suspending its commitments under the interim peace deal as strikes ramped up.
• US President Trump said we hit Iran very hard again tonight and hit Iran in honour of probably three patriots who died, adding we are ending any chance of Iran having a nuclear weapon.
• US Central Command announced the ninth consecutive evening of strikes against Iran, in which targets included Iranian military command centres, air defence and coastal surveillance sites, maritime capabilities, missile and drone launch sites, and communication networks, to further diminish Iran’s ability to attack commercial vessels and civilian mariners transiting the Strait of Hormuz. CENTCOM also announced it redirected 6 commercial vessels and disabled 1 to ensure full compliance, as of July 19th.
• Explosions were heard in Iran’s Tabriz and the city of Jask in the Hormozgan province in southern Iran, while explosions were also reported in Sirik and Khormoj, southern Iran. Furthermore, there were explosions in Delijan in the southern Markazi province and Arak in western Iran, while air defences were activated in Konarak city, Sistan and the Baluchestan province in southeastern Iran.
• Iran launched missiles from its Lorestan province in western Iran towards enemy targets, and blasts were reported at US bases in Kuwait and Bahrain, while explosions were also reported in the UAE’s Ras Al-Khaimah.
• US is said to be planning for a wider war, according to a US official familiar with internal administration discussions, cited by The Washington Post.
• US Secretary of State Rubio said the US remains open to a diplomatic resolution regarding Iran, while Rubio also stated that his meeting with the Lebanese President was very positive.
• Iran’s nuclear agency condemned a US attack on the site of the nuclear power plant under construction in Darkhovin, which it said violated international law, according to Mehr News Agency, although it didn’t mention when the strike took place.
• Iran’s Deputy Foreign Minister Gharibabadi said the US strike on the under-construction power plant was a dangerous attack on Iran’s peaceful infrastructure, and the US must bear full responsibility for any escalation and the resulting insecurity and instability.
• IRGC said it destroyed 20 warehouses used by US forces in the Azraq region of Jordan, resulting in the deaths of dozens of soldiers, according to Al Jazeera Mubasher.
• IRGC said two ships were involved in an “accident” after attempting to transit the Strait of Hormuz via an unsafe route, and that two other vessels abandoned the route, while it warned that vessels influenced by the US and entering unsafe routes will certainly face accidents. It was later reported that IRGC said two oil tankers were blown up after attempting to transit the southern route in the Strait of Hormuz.
• UKMTO said it has received a report of the incident eight nautical miles northwest of Oman’s Khumsar, with a vessel on fire, but the cause has not been verified yet.
• Tehran Times noted reports of an unprecedented rise in opposition to the war within various ranks of the US military, while it noted that refusals by US personnel to carry out orders from superiors are increasing at an unprecedented rate, citing multiple intelligence sources.
• Kuwait’s Defence Ministry said Iran conducted sustained strikes against civil and critical infrastructure on Kuwaiti territory, which caused multiple fires and severe damage.
• Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Baghaei said negotiations with the US could be pursued based on national interests and that intermediaries have shared messages with Tehran in recent days. Mediators are continuing their efforts to prevent escalation, and we have received proposals from them, but we will not go into details now. He added that they will not abandon talks with the US but Iran’s sovereign rights over the Strait of Hormuz are non-negotiable.
• Al Jazeera source in Pakistan’s Interior Ministry said the Iranian Interior Minister arrived in Pakistan’s capital Islamabad today. Iran and Pakistan will hold extensive consultations on border management, cross-border security and the implementation of the Islamabad MoU, alongside other issues of mutual concern, Journalist Mallick reported.
• The Yemeni Armed Forces said an announcement of an important position to be released at 3pm Sana’a time (13:00BST).
• Explosions were sounded in Isfahan, however reports state they were caused by controlled explosions. Additionally, Iran’s Bushehr Governor said Bushehr was targeted twice by the American enemy.
• Unofficial reports indicate that one drone struck the grounds of Kuwait’s main power plant, Tasnim reported.

Constellation Energy already runs the largest nuclear fleet in the United States and has spent the last couple of years signing big power deals with data center operators and retailers to restart reactors and keep existing plants online longer. 

With Microsoft taking the restarted Three Mile Island unit and Meta locking up output from Clinton, Constellation is now looking for developers to help them bring new capacity online faster.

Their most recent move is a strategic equity investment in Blue Energy through Constellation Technology Ventures (CTV). This targets Blue Energy’s shipyard-based prefabrication and project financing model for small modular reactors. 

As we reported earlier on the GE Vernova collaboration, Blue Energy is advancing a phased gas-to-nuclear approach at a planned Texas site. Two GE Vernova gas turbines would deliver roughly 1 GW starting around 2030, with the steam supply later shifting to GE Vernova Hitachi BWRX-300 reactors targeting up to 1.5 GW of nuclear capacity. Early site works could begin this year ahead of a final investment decision in 2027. 

The CTV check marks the first investment by that unit in an American nuclear developer focused on SMRs. Terms remain undisclosed, but based on CTV’s deal size across prior energy tech investments ($4 million in SWTCH), this one likely lands in the single-digit millions.

The real value sits in the partnership signal rather than the capital itself. Constellation runs 21 reactors across multiple sites with capacity factors above 90%. An operator with that track record lending credibility to a new deployment model carries more weight than another venture check.

Blue Energy’s approach attacks the construction and financing bottlenecks that have plagued new nuclear for decades. Large modules get fabricated in existing shipyards using robotic methods borrowed from offshore oil, gas, and LNG projects, then barged to site. The design keeps a clean split between the nuclear island supplied by the vendor and the balance-of-plant work done under fixed-price commercial contracts. 

That structure, paired with the NRC-approved licensing topical report, is meant to unlock project financing on a meaningful chunk of capex for the first time on a nuclear project. 

The goal remains power in 48 months or less via the gas bridge instead of the conventional decade-plus timeline.

Authored by Jonathan Turley,

This week, Darializa Avila Chevalier was asked if there has ever been a “successful model of socialism anywhere in the world outside the United States in terms of both human rights and widespread economic justice.”

The member of the Democratic Socialists of America responded by citing Sweden and Norway.

It is a common false claim made by socialist Sen. Bernie Sanders and others.

I address the claim head-on in Rage and the Republic. 

DSA figures have been claiming that the socialist measures that they are pushing are proven successes in other countries. They often raise the Scandinavian myth. Here is an excerpt from Rage and the Republic:

‘Leaders such as Senator Bernie Sanders have heralded the alleged success of “democratic socialism” in Europe, a pitch that is obviously taking hold with many younger Americans. Sanders and others often refer to the prosperity of Scandinavian socialism, including Sweden and Norway. It is a dangerous myth that is promulgated by many in the media. The question is not whether Scandinavian socialism can work in the United States (it cannot) but whether Scandinavian socialism can work in Scandinavia. Sweden is a particularly curious choice as a model for democratic socialism. In reality, Sweden shows not only the success of capitalism but also the limits of socialism even in a relatively small nation. Sweden turned away from the type of socialist theories increasingly in vogue in the United States.

…

The Scandinavian countries also differ from the United States in other key ways. For example, Norway has largely sustained large public welfare systems through oil revenues. The country imposes a corporate income tax rate of 78 percent on extractive activities to fund its public welfare programs…

Countries like Denmark and Sweden are strong adherents to capitalist principles and are listed among the most capitalist nations on Earth. Indeed, leaders often express surprise by American references to their socialist principles. In 2015, the Danish Prime Minister Lars Rasmussen observed, “I know that some people in the U.S. associate the Nordic model with some sort of socialism. Therefore, I would like to make one thing clear. Denmark is far from a socialist planned economy. Denmark is a market economy.” Likewise, Social Democratic Minister of Finance Kjell‐Olof Feldt stated “That whole thing with democratic socialism was absolutely impossible. It just didn’t work.”

As I discuss, these countries are not only committed to capitalism but also ranked among the most free-market economies in the world. These countries are also very different from the United States:

“When socialism was tried in larger nations in Europe, such as France under François Mitterrand, it failed, and capitalist measures had to be restored. In 2025, the populations of Denmark, Sweden, and Norway are approximately 5.9 million, 10.6 million, and 5.6 million—smaller than many American states.”

The DSA and the American left, including many in the media, continue to sell the public a bill of goods on the success of Scandinavian socialism. Ironically, it is the type of disinformation that the left often cites to justify greater censorship.  Despite denials from these very countries, socialists in the United States continue to spread this false claim that there is a socialist paradise over the ocean where collectivists labor in picturesque Nordic fishing villages.

The promulgation of such myths is a central feature of Marxism.

Lenin stressed that “we must not confine ourselves exclusively to propaganda in the narrow sense of the word.” Stalin likewise warned that “If our Party propaganda for some reason or other goes lame…then our entire state and Party work must inevitably languish.”

The fact is that socialism has repeatedly failed throughout history.

The only way to get a people to embrace it is to rewrite that history. That is precisely what we see not only in the United States, but in the recent claims of incoming British Prime Minister Andy Burnham, who condemned the privatization policies of Margaret Thatcher: “The country surrendered control of the essentials — housing, water, energy, transport — and left people exposed to higher costs.” What he does not mention is that she followed the collapse of socialist policies under Labour Prime Minister James Callaghan in 1977–78 during the so-called “winter of discontent,” which I also discuss in the book.

Chevalier is a true believer who has praised Marxism and the concept of “seizing the means of production.” She won her primary despite comments bragging about her using the American flag to wipe her hands and criticizing the dating of white women as Black and Arab men “Fetishizing ugly colonizer women.”

Given that history, the adoption of the Scandinavian socialism myth is par for the course. Like Zohran Mamdani, she is rallying young, disillusioned, college-educated voters who are told that their struggles stem from the failures of the free market. Instead, they are offered free stuff and the illusion of an economic nirvana where lattes and Pilates are virtually costless.

Indeed, the Scandinavian socialism myth is so enticing that I expect Scandinavians must wonder where they can also find it.

Jonathan Turley is a law professor and the New York Times best-selling author of “Rage and the Republic: The Unfinished Story of the American Revolution.”

Visible maritime traffic through the Hormuz chokepoint remained subdued into the new week after Iranian forces allgedly targeted tankers attempting to transit the narrow waterway, including routes close to Oman. This comes as the US and Iran have been locked in a dangerous tit-for-tat escalation that has entered its ninth day.

UK maritime authorities reported an unverified vessel fire near Oman late Sunday. Reuters reports that Iran’s Revolutionary Guards claimed two crude oil tankers exploded and were immobilized while using what Tehran called an unsafe southern route in the Hormuz.

Bloomberg ship-tracking data shows that vessels crossing the Hormuz chokepoint have come to a near standstill as Gulf escalation has surged for the ninth day, with Iran targeting not just the maritime chokepoint but also US military assets at Jordan’s Aqaba airport with ballistic missiles, as well as US assets at Kuwait’s Al-Adiri camp and Ali Al Salem Air Base, and in Syria. Iran also hit civilian infrastructure, notably power generation and water desalination plants in Kuwait.

There is a power struggle for control over the critical strait. The US launched a series of airstrikes along the waterway to degrade Iran’s offensive capabilities.

US Central Command said overnight that it had begun “a new wave of strikes” aimed at “degrading” Iran’s ability to attack ships in the strait.

US Secretary of State Marco Rubio was quoted overnight by the outlet as saying that US forces would continue targeting Iran while it attacks global shipping lanes in the strait.

“The Strait of Hormuz are international waterways, and they continue to launch against the ships in that international waterway,” Rubio said.

He continued, “As long as Iran insists on controlling an international waterway, we’re gonna have to respond to that. The United States always remains open to a diplomatic solution.”

In markets, Brent crude futures are flat this morning around 06:30 ET. Brent trades around $88 a barrel, while WTI futures are around $82.

Brent briefly traded above the $90 handle for the first time since early June in the overnight hours but has since reversed the move.

“A near-term escalation in the Mideast now appears to be the key left tail risk which could tip the index lower. Broader infrastructure strikes or a Houthi-led Red Sea disruption likely sees Brent over $100 again,” UBS analyst Justinus Steinhorst noted, adding, “The desk’s preferred hedges are long Mideast Resilient {UBXEMERR} and E&Ps {UBXEXPO}.”