Authored by Naveen Athrappully via The Epoch Times,

OpenAI is seeking to hire a candidate for the post of “Head of Preparedness” to tackle dangers posed by the proliferation of artificial intelligence (AI), CEO Sam Altman said in a Dec. 27 post on X.

OpenAI sparked initial public interest in AI chatbot interactions with the popular launch of ChatGPT in November 2022.

“This is a critical role at an important time; models are improving quickly and are now capable of many great things, but they are also starting to present some real challenges,” Altman wrote.

“The potential impact of models on mental health was something we saw a preview of in 2025; we are just now seeing models get so good at computer security they are beginning to find critical vulnerabilities.”

The post comes as OpenAI is facing a host of lawsuits on the subject of mental health. In November, seven complaints were filed against the company in California, alleging that its ChatGPT chatbot sent three people into delusional “rabbit holes” while encouraging four others to kill themselves.

According to the lawsuits, the four deaths occurred following the victims’ conversation with ChatGPT about suicide. In some cases, the chatbot romanticized suicide, advising the victims on ways to carry out the act.

As for computer security, multiple reports have flagged the risks posed by AIs.

For instance, a May report from McKinsey & Company warned that AI models capable of detecting fraud and securing networks can also infer identities, expose sensitive information, and reassemble stripped-out details.

The State of Cybersecurity Resilience 2025 report from Accenture warned that 90 percent of companies are not modernized enough to defend against AI-driven threats.

In its Aug. 27 Threat Intelligence Report, AI company Anthropic, which makes the Claude AI, said that AI was being weaponized to carry out sophisticated cybercrimes. In one operation, a hacker used Claude to infiltrate 17 organizations, with the AI used to penetrate networks, analyze stolen data, and create psychologically targeted ransom notes.

In his post, Altman said that while OpenAI has a “strong foundation” for measuring the growing capabilities of its AI models, the company is entering a world where a “more nuanced understanding and measurement” is required to assess how these capabilities could be abused and to limit downsides.

These are “hard” questions with very little precedent, he said. Many ideas that sound good have “edge cases,” which are extreme or unusual scenarios that test the boundaries of a system, such as an AI.

“This will be a stressful job, and you’ll jump into the deep end pretty much immediately,” Altman said.

The role, based in San Francisco, requires the person to build capability evaluations, establish threat models, and build mitigations, according to a post by OpenAI. The job offers $555,000 in annual compensation plus equity.

The head of preparedness will oversee mitigation design across major risk areas, such as cyber and biology, and ensure that safeguards are “technically sound, effective, and aligned with underlying threat models.”

As of September, ChatGPT had 700 million weekly active users globally.

AI Threat

In an interview clip released on X on Aug. 18 as part of the “Making God” documentary film, Geoffrey Hinton, a computer scientist known as the “godfather of AI,” said he was “fairly confident” AI would drive massive unemployment.

However, “the risk I’ve been warning about the most … is the risk that we’ll develop an AI that’s much smarter than us, and it will just take over,” Hinton said. “It won’t need us anymore.”

In a July 18 post from Charles Darwin University in Darwin, Australia, Maria Randazzo, an academic at the university’s law school, warned that AI puts human dignity at risk.

While AI is an engineering triumph, it does not exhibit cognitive behavior; these models have no clue what they are doing or why, she said.

“There’s no thought process as a human would understand it, just pattern recognition stripped of embodiment, memory, empathy, or wisdom,” Randazzo said.

“Globally, if we don’t anchor AI development to what makes us human—our capacity to choose, to feel, to reason with care, to empathy and compassion—we risk creating systems that devalue and flatten humanity into data points, rather than improve the human condition.

“Humankind must not be treated as a means to an end.”

Nearly five years after pipe bombs were planted outside the DNC and RNC headquarters on January 5, 2021, authorities arrested Brian Cole Jr. on December 4, 2025. The 30-year-old from Woodbridge, Virginia, now faces charges for allegedly planting those devices. Within hours of the arrest, major outlets rushed to frame Cole as a MAGA adherent. NBC News reported that Cole “believed conspiracy theories about the 2020 election.” Politico ran with the headline, “Justice Department says Jan. 6 pipe bomb suspect believed election conspiracy theories.”

However, the suspects’ own words belie that claim.

The Department of Justice filed a memorandum on December 29 in support of pretrial detention for Cole. The document dismantles the narrative the media pushed following Cole’s arrest. 

According to the filing, Cole initially denied assembling or planting the bombs during his videotaped interview. He claimed he drove his Nissan Sentra to Washington alone to attend a protest about the election outcome. Cole explained his reasoning: “I didn’t agree with what people were doing, like just telling half the country that they – that their – that they just need to ignore it. I didn’t think that was a good idea, so I went to the protest.”

He also described himself as someone who “has never really been an openly political person” and avoids discussing politics with family to prevent conflict. According to Cole, “no one knows” his political views, including his family. After the 2020 election, “when it first seemed like something was wrong” and “stuff started happening,” he began following the issue on YouTube and Reddit and felt “bewildered.” Cole believed that if people “feel that, you know, something as important as voting in the federal election is being tampered with, is being, you know, being – you know, relegated null and void, then, like, someone needs to speak up, right? Someone up top.”

Cole felt leaders on “both sides, public figures” should not “ignore people’s grievances” or call them “conspiracy theorists,” “bad people,” “Nazis,” or “fascists.” Instead, “if people feel that their votes are like just being thrown away, then . . . at the very least someone should address it.” 

After agents confronted Cole with surveillance video showing him planting the bombs, he admitted he was the individual in the footage. He then walked investigators through the entire process of constructing, transporting, and planting the devices.

Cole stated he assembled the devices in the hours before driving to Washington on January 5, 2021, and cleaned them with disinfectant wipes. He eventually admitted he did not travel to Washington to attend a protest but to plant the devices. 

“When asked why he placed the devices at the RNC and DNC, the defendant responded, ‘I really don’t like either party at this point,'” prosecutors said in their filing, describing the interview. “[Cole] also explained that the idea to use pipe bombs came from his interest in history, specifically the Troubles in Ireland. The defendant denied that his actions were directed toward Congress or related to the proceedings scheduled to take place on January 6.” 

Cole allegedly said in the interview that he had actually intended for the devices to detonate and set 60-minute timers on both after planting them outside of the DNC and RNC. After leaving them, he said he went to his car, picked up food from a restaurant in Virginia and then returned home. 

When agents returned to the subject of motive, Cole explained that “something just snapped” after “watching everything, just everything getting worse.” 

“In his own words, the defendant did so because he did not ‘like either party,’ but ‘they were in charge’ and thus were, in the defendant’s mind, an appropriate target for extreme acts of violence,” prosecutors explained. “The defendant’s choice of targets risked the lives not only of innocent pedestrians and office workers but also of law enforcement, first responders, and national political leaders who were inside of the respective party headquarters or drove by them on January 6, 2021, including the Vice President-elect and Speaker of the House.” 

The DOJ memorandum presents a picture of someone disenchanted with the entire political system rather than a MAGA activist. Cole’s stated motivation centered on frustration with both major parties for their handling of election concerns, and his confession reveals someone who felt compelled to act against the institutions themselves, not in support of one side against the other.

Authored by Ken Silva via HeadlineUSA,

Miami Herald reporter Julie Brown’s late 2018 series on sex offender Jeffrey Epstein contributed to the Justice Department reopening its case against Epstein the next year.

It looks like the DOJ also subpoenaed Brown’s flight records. Brown said she found her name in the recently released “Epstein files”—the trove of documents released by the DOJ earlier this month pursuant to congressional legislation.

“What I didn’t expect to see was an American Airlines flight record from 2019 with my full name on them, including my maiden name, which I don’t use professionally. It’s an unusual name, so it’s clear it’s me,” Brown wrote on her Substack.

“The document appears to be details of an itinerary for a series of flights I booked in July just before the SDNY and FBI arrested Epstein.”

According to journalist Michael Tracey, the DOJ may have been tracking Epstein accuser Annie Farmer. Brown and the Miami Herald reportedly booked a flight for her in July 2019.

Solved the mystery for you.

Julie K. Brown wrote in her book “Perversion of Justice” that the Miami Herald, Brown’s employer, paid to fly Annie Farmer — a purported Epstein victim — to Little Rock, AR in July 2019. The itinerary shows a round-trip flight for a passenger… https://t.co/fQYf8KKO5h

— Michael Tracey (@mtracey) December 29, 2025

“Julie K. Brown now says she personally booked this flight. It stands to reason that the DOJ would’ve subpoenaed American Airlines, and other entities, for travel records pertaining to Annie Farmer, as she’d been identified as a purported victim of Epstein/Maxwell,” Tracey said on Twitter/X.

“It further stands to reason that Julie K. Brown’s name would appear in these records, as the person who booked the flight on Annie Farmer’s behalf.”

Epstein was arrested in July 2019 and found dead in a prison cell a month later.

Meanwhile, the DOJ has yet to release all the Epstein files. The DOJ said last week that it’s found 1 million more records, and is going through them to redact sensitive information.

Ken Silva is the editor of Headline USA. Follow him at x.com/jd_cashless.

Allegations of welfare fraud involving Minneapolis daycare centers tied to Somali operators have circulated in the news cycle for years with limited traction; however, it was not until a high-visibility, bombshell investigation by citizen journalist Nick Shirley that the topic was reignited and thrust back into the news cycle. The focus is now shifting from Democrat-run Minneapolis to what is being framed as a potentially nationwide welfare fraud epidemic.

On Sunday, Breitbart News published an interview with Ohio attorney Mehek Cooke, who alleges that members of the Somali community in Ohio have defrauded millions of dollars from the state’s Medicaid program.

“So these individuals tried to report the fraud that was happening in Ohio and eventually came to me saying that we are watching providers rubber-stamp paperwork for home health.

And there are many states like this, Pennsylvania and others too, where you can go in and say, ‘My aging parent needs home health care. I want to provide it.’

The state will, as long as a doctor has approved it, continue to pay you. It could be for 10 hours, 12 hours, up to 24 hours when it is critical care.

So you could sit at home without caring for an elderly parent who really does not need it and make about $75,000 to $90,000 a year. Now you add two parents, that is $180,000. Now you add your in-laws, $250,000.

You continue to add this and you wonder, what services are actually being provided? So a lot of providers came to me and said fraud is occurring because we refused to rubber-stamp this paperwork.

So they went to other providers in their home health care networks saying, ‘We will make it worth your while.’ Well, that sounds like a kickback to me.

So we really need to investigate the Medicaid system, how much it has expanded since the Somali population arrived, and who truly needs critical care, because that is meant for the disabled, the elderly, and people who genuinely need it, not for people to live off the system.

And that is what is happening in Ohio. I think it is ridiculous. I think it is despicable. But authorities are now looking at it, from the Attorney General’s office to the U.S. Attorney’s office.

I flagged them all because these are Ohio tax dollars and we have to take it seriously. I am tired of people telling me, ‘Well, this is the way it has always been. It is subjective, and we cannot really check.’

No, you can. Audit America. Audit Ohio now.”

.@MehekCooke: Taxpayer-funded medical fraud is also widespread in Ohio.

“We really need to investigate the Medicaid system and how much it’s increased since the Somalian population came.” pic.twitter.com/8pJCzjK4qo

— Breitbart News (@BreitbartNews) December 28, 2025

Elon Musk, the former DOGE head who was investigating this kind of fraud on the federal level, noted, “The fraud of your taxpayer money is happening nationwide and is liberally applied to attract illegal (and some legal) immigrants who will reliably vote Democrat. The more you look, the more you find. And you don’t need to be a world-class detective to figure it out. This is brazen, daylight robbery.”

Rep. Ismail Mohamed (D-OH):

Bragging about naming a street in Ohio after the Father of Somalia…

Bragging about Somalian’s infiltrating the City, State, and Federal level, and says he’s in a Group Chat with them and their main objective “Our main objective is to discuss all… pic.twitter.com/vidX6mCKPh

— Papo (@Papo352) August 15, 2025

Remember, it was the Democratic Party that threw a fit when DOGE began investigating fraud, waste, and abuse on the federal level. And now we know why. What comes next is likely an expansion of DOGE-esque investigations (perhaps with an army of citizen journalists) aimed at blue states suspected of massive welfare fraud schemes.

GDP, released last week, showed that the economy grew by a larger-than-expected 4.3%.

Powering the strong economic growth was personal consumption, which rose by 3.5%.

Consumers are spending!… What’s unusual about that statement is that consumer sentiment remains historically weak.

Typically, there is a strong correlation between personal consumption and consumer sentiment.

As RealInvestmentAdvice.com shares below, the University of Michigan and the Conference Board consumer sentiment indexes are at or near 10-year lows.

Moreover, they are generally worsening, yet personal consumption continues to grow strongly.

Can such a divergence continue?

To help answer that, consider the five bullet points below, which explain why personal consumption has been strong.

• Wealth Effect: U.S. stock markets will post their third 20%+ increase in a row.

• Non-discretionary Spending: The mix of spending is leaning towards non-discretionary items. For instance, spending on housing, healthcare, insurance, and travel is increasing as a share of total spending. Many of these expenditures are unavoidable, not confidence-driven impulse purchases. For example, healthcare spending accounted for nearly 20% of consumption.

• Credit: Rising use of credit cards, buy-now-pay-later, and home equity loans boosts spending in the short term.

• Savings: Real personal income was flat, thus consumers are using savings, which fell to a historically low 4.7% rate, or credit to meet their needs. Neither is sustainable over the longer run.

• Inflation: Even if the inflation rate is normalizing, the higher prices of goods and services weigh on consumers’ psyche, in turn making sentiment worse. However, its impact on consumption is not as significant.

But here’s the real deciding factor…

Russian President Vladimir Putin has made clear to both his citizens and to the world that the ‘special military operation’ in Ukraine will continue on until all goals are achieved, and that his forces are advancing ‘confidently’.

He chaired a televised meeting with the country’s top military officials, focused on a status update regarding Ukraine, and crucially coming the day after Presidents Trump and Zelensky met in Florida in a failed effort to reach breakthrough on the proposed peace deal. Moscow is pressing ahead with its goal of fully capturing and pacifying the four Ukrainian regions it declared part of the Russian Federation in fall of 2022 via a ‘popular referendum’.

“The goal of liberating the Donbas, Zaporizhia and Kherson regions is being carried out in stages, in accordance with the plan of the special military operation,” Putin described before underscoring, “The troops are confidently advancing.“

At the meeting it was also announced that Russian troops have made more gains in the last 24 hours, especially the capture of Dibrova village in Donetsk region.

According to an update of the meeting via RT translation, battlefield gains of the past month are significant:

In December, Russian forces liberated over 700 square kilometers of territory, taking some 32 settlements under control, Gerasimov said at the meeting. This month, the military has shown the highest rate of progress in the entire outgoing year, he noted, adding that troops are advancing “along virtually the entire frontline.”

“The adversary is not undertaking any active offensive actions. They have concentrated their main efforts on strengthening their defenses and are attempting to slow the pace of our advance by conducting counterattacks in isolated areas and using drones en masse,” Gerasimov said.

The Kremlin has at the same time reiterated that it is not interested in a ‘Plan B or Plan C’ in terms of a peace deal, but that it only seeks lasting political settlement. This will of course include international recognition of its territories in the Donbass.

According to highlights the Russian president’s speech after his meeting with top defense officials, via a TASS and Al Jazeera compilation:

• Attempts by Ukraine to interfere with the Russian army in Kupiansk must be decisively suppressed.
• The capture of Siversk allows for the development of offensives towards the cities of Sloviansk and Kramatorsk.
• Prospects for the complete capture of the Donbas territory have been discussed.
• Expansion of the security zone along the Russian-Ukrainian border is on the table.
• Troops have broken through the Ukrainian defences and are advancing towards the city of Zaporizhzhia.

Putin tells Russian generals:

It’s necessary to continue the operation to gain control of the city of Zaporizhzhia. pic.twitter.com/AT0XkCbkV5

— Clash Report (@clashreport) December 29, 2025

Putin, surrounded by his generals, is making clear to the world that he remains in the driver’s seat – with all the leverage on the field of battle – and that Zelensky has no cards to play.

Authored by Lance Roberts via RealInvestmentAdvice.com,

There is a rising market risk in 2026 that is largely overlooked as we wrap up this year. As discussed in the “Fed’s Soft Landing Narrative,” optimism about 2026 is running high.

Currently, investors are pricing in strong economic growth, robust earnings, and a smooth path of disinflation. Notably, Wall Street estimates suggest a significant acceleration in corporate profits, particularly among cyclical stocks and small- to mid-cap sectors. To wit:

“Wall Street currently expects the bottom 493 stocks to contribute more to earnings in 2026 than they have in the past 3 years. This is notable in that, over the past three years, the average growth rate for the bottom 493 stocks was less than 3%. Yet over the next 2 years, that earnings growth is expected to average above 11%.”

“Furthermore, the outlook is even more exuberant for the most economically sensitive stocks. Small and mid-cap companies struggled to produce earnings growth during the previous three years of robust economic growth, driven by monetary and fiscal stimulus. However, next year, even if the Fed’s soft landing narrative is valid, they are expected to see a surge in earnings growth rates of nearly 60%.”

There is nothing wrong with having an optimistic outlook when it comes to investing; however, “outlooks can change rapidly,” which is a significant market risk, particularly when expectations and valuations are elevated.

Notably, these forecasts rest on an assumption that the economy will not only avoid recession but reaccelerate in the face of waning inflation. As noted, equity markets have responded by pushing valuations higher across major indexes, with price-to-earnings ratios well above historical medians. Simultaneously, investors have rewarded narratives built on the idea of a soft landing and a return to pre-pandemic trends.

However, this narrative appears to overlook the trends in recent economic data. Inflation expectations have moderated, not because of increased demand, but due to weaker consumption and cooling labor dynamics. As recent economic data indicate, disinflation has accompanied slower GDP growth and a decline in personal consumption momentum. If the economy were indeed set to reaccelerate, these trends should be increasing rather than returning to historical averages.

The soft landing thesis posits a benign cycle in which inflation declines, growth remains stable, and earnings increase. Yet, that outcome would be historically rare. When inflation falls this quickly, it typically reflects a slowdown in demand rather than policy success. Additionally, the strong relationship between economic growth and earnings should not be dismissed. That disconnect exposes investors to market risk if growth does not materialize as expected and valuations are reconsidered.

With analysts expecting strong revenue growth and margin expansion despite rising input costs, global uncertainty, and declining employment, a market priced for perfection leaves little room for earnings misses or growth shocks. If those optimistic assumptions fail, market risk could rise abruptly.

Let’s dig in.

Structural Headwinds

As noted above, earnings growth is fundamentally tied to economic growth. When demand exceeds supply, companies expand output, raise prices, and increase profits. As discussed recently, this is why, without inflation, there can not be economic growth, increasing wages, and an improving standard of living. In other words, for there to be stronger economic growth and rising prosperity, prices must increase over time. Such is why the Fed targets a 2% inflation rate, thereby supporting 2% economic growth and stable employment levels.

However, the employment data over the last year doesn’t tell a story of substantial employment, rising wages, or a trend suggesting a more robust economic outlook. Instead, the latest data confirmed a deceleration in economic activity, as full-time employment (as a percentage of the population) declined.

The importance of full-time employment should not be readily dismissed. Full-time employment pays higher wages, provides family benefits, and allows for an expansion of consumption. The decline in full-time employment currently is normally associated with recessions rather than expansions. Economic growth, inflation, and personal consumption are trending lower, given that employment, particularly full-time employment, supports economic supply and demand.

Furthermore, economic growth relies heavily on consumer spending, which accounts for nearly 70% of U.S. GDP. For that consumption to persist or grow, consumers must have rising incomes, which come from employment and wage growth. Without job creation or real wage increases, consumption growth stagnates, and the earnings narrative breaks down. As shown, when economic growth declines, so do earnings growth rates.

Recent employment data show cracks in this cycle. While headline job numbers suggest continued hiring, the quality and composition of those jobs are weakening. Today we see part-time workers filling full-time positions, often with lower pay and fewer benefits. Labor force participation remains below pre-pandemic levels, and many prime-age workers are not returning. Most notably, the negative revision of every monthly employment report in 2025 further undermines the “strong economy” narrative.

Even where wages are rising nominally, inflation-adjusted wages tell a different story. Real wage growth has been flat or negative in several key sectors. As housing, energy, and service prices remain high, the squeeze of disposable income increases. As such, consumers compensate by drawing down savings or using credit, both of which are unsustainable long-term strategies.

The market risk in 2026, is that for corporate earnings to accelerate and meet Wall Street’s expecations, the consumer must be healthy. That means rising real wages and broad-based job creation. Without those pillars, top-line revenue growth slows, and margin pressures increase. Analysts projecting double-digit earnings growth into 2026 are assuming a demand-driven economy without the income growth needed to support it. That assumption is increasingly fragile. Without real economic growth, earnings become a product of financial engineering or cost-cutting, not organic expansion. Markets are pricing in a demand surge that the employment data do not confirm.

If this disconnect persists, Wall Street will revise earnings expectations lower.

Valuation Fragility

That last sentence is the most crucial. With valuations near cycle highs, (the S&P 500 trades at over 22x times forward earnings, which is well above its long-term average), such assume strong earnings growth and low discount rates. Yet both assumptions are vulnerable. If economic growth undershoots, earnings revisions will follow. Historically, earnings have tended to lag behind the economic cycle. As consumption softens, revenue growth stalls. Margins then compress, especially for companies with high labor or financing costs, and with narrow market breadth and concentration in mega-cap names, the market risk is a sudden repricing of those expectations.

Credit risk premiums remain compressed across all asset classes, from high-yield to investment-grade, which reflects a belief in Fed control and continued monetary easing. If those beliefs are shaken, volatility will return. Market participants are not expecting a scenario where all risk assets decline simultaneously, including stocks, crypto, precious metals, and international markets.

Implications for Investors

The market risk for investors is not a 2008-style collapse. However, a far more likely scenario is a long period of underperformance. That underperformance will likely be a function of earnings disappointment, weak growth, and multiple compression. Market analysts are currently pricing the market for acceleration. But those views may struggle is stagnation, and the “path of least resistance,” shifts from upward momentum to sideways drift or correction.

As such investors should continually monitor and assess the risk they are taking in portfolios.

• Reassess exposure to high-multiple equities and overconcentrated sectors. While technologty drives index performance, valuations are high and if growth expectations are too high, tech earnings will likely fail to meet them. The same applies to consumer discretionary stocks tied to fragile spending.

• Consider a more defensive position, focusing on free cash flow, balance sheet strength, dividends, and pricing power.

• Add bonds to your portfolio to protect prinicpal and create income. Furthermore, in the event of a risk-off rotation, investors will seek the safety of bonds to reduce portfolio risk. Being there before the correction occurs can be beneficial to outcomes.

• Liquidity should always be a priority. If risk aversion returns, liquidity conditions can tighten quickly. Investors consider a scenario where risk assets (stocks, commodities, metals, and cryptocurrencies) decline sharply as risk resets

A prudent approach is to reduce exposure to narrative-driven assets and increase allocations to quality. Investors should favor sectors with consistent earnings, low leverage, and stable dividends. Cash remains underappreciated as a strategic tool, and with real yields positive and volatility likely to rise, liquidity is a source of optionality.

The next two years will test the soft landing thesis. If growth falls short, earnings disappoint, or inflation returns, markets will face a reset. That reset may not be dramatic, but it will be painful for those overexposed to the current consensus.

The best defense is valuation discipline, risk awareness, and a willingness to question the prevailing narrative.

Trump’s military strikes against Islamic terror groups in Nigeria have been met with overall applause by Nigerian citizens and migrants residing in the US.  Authorities say the groups have links to jihadist networks in Mali and Niger and their members have settled in border communities, recruiting young people and imposing brutal controls.

Associated Muslim militants were responsible for numerous attacks on Christian communities and schools in the country in early 2025, including the coordinated massacre of 280 Christian farmers in the village of Yelwata; many victims burned alive or hacked to death. It was one of the worst single incidents of Christian slaughter in the past decade.

In a national statement, Nigeria’s information ministry said “precision strike operations” had been carried with the “explicit approval” of President Bola Tinubu and with “the full involvement of the armed forces of Nigeria”.  Trump brought global exposure to the attacks on Christians in the region, accusing the Nigerian government of apathy in the face of genocide. 

The event is being framed as a “joint operation” between Nigeria and the US, however, it is likely that international attention forced the hand of the current regime to cooperate with US military operations.  Nothing would have been done about the militants had Trump not stepped in.

Many Christian Nigerians abroad and migrants in the US are optimistic about the country’s prospects for peace and have applauded the strikes.  Nigeria is 56% Muslim and 43% Christian.  The northern provinces, controlled by Muslims, have instituted Sharia Law despite the country having a “secular constitution.”  This has created religious tensions across the nation and helped to enable escalating Islamic militant attacks. 

It’s good to see at least one group of third world migrants showing appreciation for US efforts.  

The establishment media in the west, however, is not happy about Trump’s efforts in Africa, and has been working diligently to deny that the conflict is driven by religious motives.  Though they are forced to admit that the strikes have had a positive effect on Nigeria’s Christian population, they continue to frame the killings of villagers as “land disputes” (take note of the seemingly scripted propaganda planted in the AP report below).

The motives of the media are obvious; third world immigration is an integral part of the multicultural agenda to destabilize the west and admitting that Islamic migrants might be a security hazard hurts that agenda.  They could not be more transparent, given the fact that journalists immediately tried to make the issue about immigration once news of the strikes hit the new feeds.

Western journalists have accused Trump of hypocrisy because of his block on immigration from a number of African nations including Nigeria.  They argue that Trump does not really want to help Christians because he won’t allow Nigerians to come to the US to escape the sectarian violence.

However, simply claiming to be Christian is not enough to gain US citizenship.  Trump’s position is clear – Third world populations need to fix their own countries rather than running to the US.  Despite the socialist “melting pot” narrative, America has never been obligated to take on the refugees of the world.  The Trump Administration’s intervention in Nigeria only shows that the President is serious about those people staying where they are so they can repair or replace their broken government.   

In July as Trump ramped up criticism of the Nigerian government’s handling of the situation, NPR attempted to paint the attacks as a “land dispute” over access to cattle grazing areas. They repeated the Nigerian Foreign Ministry’s claims that the events had “nothing to do with religion.”  In almost every case of Christians being hunted by Muslim militants, the media is on the side of the governments that allow the attacks to happen.   

A number of western media platforms dismiss or marginalize the attacks on Christian villages in Nigeria, claiming that “most victims are Muslims.”  What they don’t mention is that most Muslim “victims” are largely rival militants fighting for a superior position.  Christians have not involved themselves in the power struggle, yet, they are specifically targeted for extermination.  

Reports from the International Society for Civil Liberties and Rule of Law (Intersociety) state that over 7,000 Christians were killed in Nigeria in the first 220 days of 2025.  The bottom line is, Christians are disproportionately targeted by Islamic violence in Africa and African governments are content to let it happen.  

Update(1115ET): The Trump-backed effort to forge ahead on achieving peace in Ukraine may have just been completely derailed by a major development. Just as Trump described Monday morning that he had a ‘positive’ phone call with President Putin about Ukraine, the Kremlin is alleging that Ukraine launched a major drone attack on President Putin’s “official residence” in the Novgorod region from Sunday night into Monday. It is presumably one of many of his residences, and there’s no indication he was there when the alleged attack wave occurred.

Fresh words of Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov indicate that Ukraine fired 91 drones targeting Putin’s residence in what’s being described as a sustained attack spanning hours, but that all of them were destroyed by the significant anti-air defenses.

PUTIN TOLD TRUMP ABOUT ATTACK ON ONE OF HIS RESIDENCES: IFX

Moscow now says it will “revise” its negotiating position on ending the war in Ukraine, after what it dubbed the overnight “terrorist attack.” The Ukrainian government immediately rejected the allegation, calling it a “fabrication”:

Lavrov said there was no damage or casualties resulting from the incident but that Russian armed forces had selected targets for “retaliatory strikes.” Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky immediately rejected the claim as “a complete fabrication” from Russia.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov blames Ukraine for an attempted drone attack on Putin’s “Dolgiye Borody” residence in Valday, Novgorod Oblast of Russia on the night of December 29.

Lavrov:

🗣️ “Russia’s negotiating position will be revised taking into account the Kyiv… pic.twitter.com/GurqsmcYgp

— Status-6 (Military & Conflict News) (@Archer83Able) December 29, 2025

There’s a likelihood that the capital of Kiev is going to have a bad night, as this means more missiles and drones could rain down on the city once again, possibly even targeting key government headquarters buildings – as happened at least once before.

* * *

European defense stocks moved lower on Monday after President Trump and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky made progress in talks aimed at ending the Russia-Ukraine conflict.

On Sunday evening, after the talks, Trump told reporters, “I do think we’re getting a lot closer, maybe very close.”

Zelensky told reporters the peace talks were a “really great discussion” in which U.S.-Ukraine security guarantees were “100% agreed” upon. He added, “We agree that security guarantees are a key milestone in achieving lasting peace.”

Zelensky said Trump will host another meeting next month with Ukrainian and European officials to advance a peace deal that is nearing completion. Trump confirmed that he spoke with Russian President Vladimir Putin ahead of the Zelensky talks and plans to hold another call with Putin.

The full summary of the Trump-Zelensky “great meeting” is available here.

The Goldman Sachs European Defense Index fell by roughly 2% on Monday following overnight developments.

Larger timeframe. 

Since Russia invaded Ukraine in early 2022, the GS European Defense Index has delivered outsized annual returns.

UBS analyst Tricia Wright commented on the moves:

“Defense stocks were among the top fallers in Europe after the Trump-Zelensky meeting. The Italian defense group Leonardo declined by 4.4%, topping the STOXX Europe 600 fallers list, while Germany’s Rheinmetall and Hensoldt were both down by about 3%. Talks to end the Ukraine war on Sunday spurred fresh optimism from U.S. President Trump, yet there are no clear signs that the two sides have reached a breakthrough, as Russia continues to push for land gains and reject a ceasefire,” The Wall Street Journal reported.

Even as a potential peace deal in Eastern Europe nears, we expect defense stocks to remain elevated given record defense spending.

UN Secretary-General António Guterres recently wrote in a report on the rise in military expenditure: “The world is spending far more on waging war than on building peace.”

Authored by Jeremy Portnoy via RealClearInvestigations,

Topline: A then-employee at the City of Austin’s energy utility allegedly paid $980,000 in taxpayer funds to fictional companies with bank accounts belonging to his family members, according to a new report from the city auditor.

Key facts: Mark Ybarra was given a city credit card from 2018 to 2023 to hire repair companies for city buildings. He used it to pay 30 different vendors, but the city auditor could only verify that eight of them were real companies, according to the report. 

Ten of the companies reportedly had the same address, which the city auditor said is the home of one of Ybarra’s relatives. The businesses received $400,000 from the city. One of them had Ybarra’s email address listed as its contact information, according to the report.

The remaining $580,000 went to businesses that “appeared to be fake,” many of which were missing basic information like an address and phone number, according to the report. 

Ybarra resigned in October 2023 after Austin Energy officials asked questions about the invoices, according to the report. He was indicted for felony theft this September. 

Records obtained by Open the Books show Ybarra earned $534,797 in taxpayer-funded salary during the six years he was allegedly defrauding the city.

The city auditor claimed the alleged fraud went undetected because of Austin Energy’s “inefficient purchasing controls.” Most of his purchases were approved by former Facility Service Supervisor Sammy Ramirez, who never raised questions about the missing addresses and phone numbers on Ybarra’s invoices, according to the report.

Mark Ybarra’s wife, Ambrosia Ybarra, worked at the city’s Watershed Protection Department. She was questioned by the city auditor about her husband’s invoices but allegedly left the interview before it was over, according to the report. She resigned this November.

Ambrosia Ybarra made $70,174 in 2024. Ramirez made $87,262 in 2022, his last year of employment, but made as much as $104,698 in 2021.

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

Summary: Austin’s scandal is yet another reminder that the government agencies spending huge amounts of money relative to the population of the areas they serve are often the ones most vulnerable to mistakes and fraud. 

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