Authored by Gerry Nolan via The Ron Paul Institute

From the podium, it’s Churchillian thunder: prepare for war, deter Russia, stand tall, lead the free world. Back in the engine room, it’s Whitehall with a calculator, sweating through its suit because the numbers simply don’t work. The Financial Times reports Starmer has delayed the Defence Investment Plan over “affordability,” kicking it into 2026, because the military’s wish list collided with the Treasury’s reality. Translation: the rhetoric is premium, the balance sheet is bargain-bin.

And then, because the universe has a sense of irony sharp enough to cut steel, enter Ajax; the £6-plus billion armored vehicle program that has become the British state’s spirit animal. Trials paused again. Fresh safety concerns. Soldiers injured. Crews sickened by vibration and noise. Endless reviews. Endless “lessons learned.” Endless press lines insisting this is all somehow progress.

If you want to understand modern Britain, don’t read strategy documents. Watch a procurement program that cannot stop hurting the people it is meant to protect.

Ajax was meant to be the backbone of Britain’s future armored forces, a next-generation reconnaissance and strike platform designed to replace ageing vehicles and restore credibility to the British Army’s maneuver capability. Instead, it has become a case study in institutional failure: spiraling costs, years of delay, fundamental design flaws, and a safety record so poor it forced repeated trial suspensions. Soldiers were not merely inconvenienced; they were physically harmed in testing, suffering hearing damage, sickness, and long-term health concerns.

This is not a marginal technical glitch. It is the predictable outcome of a system where industrial capacity has been hollowed out, accountability diffused, and procurement reduced to a paper exercise optimized for contracts, not combat. Ajax does not fail because Britain lacks engineers or soldiers. It fails because Britain no longer possesses a state machinery capable of translating ambition into functioning hardware at scale.

This is the farce at the heart of the Atlantic security sermon.

Britain speaks about Russia the way a fading aristocrat sneers at a rising industrial superpower… condescending, dismissive, utterly uncurious. For years we’ve heard the same insult recycled like a nervous tic: Russia is a “gas station,” a crude petro-state propped up by fumes and nostalgia. Yet here we are.

Russia the “gas station,” under the most comprehensive sanctions regime in modern history, has been forced—by Western institutions themselves—into an inconvenient admission: Russia now ranks as the fourth-largest economy in the world by purchasing-power parity.

So let’s pause and ask the question Britain’s elites refuse to face. If Russia is a glorified gas station, what exactly does that make Britain? A country that cannot publish a defence investment plan on time. A state that cannot field a functioning armoured vehicle without injuring its own troops. An economy that cannot sustain rearmament in spite of private finance gimmicks and accounting contortions. A political class that cannot reconcile its war talk with its industrial capacity.

If Russia is a gas station, Britain increasingly resembles a heritage museum complete with a gift shop, living off past glories while subcontracting its future.

Now let’s move to where the illusion truly collapses, production.

Wars are not won by hysterical speeches, theatrical bravado, summits, or moral pronouncements. They are won by output — steel, shells, access to critical minerals, drones, logistics, and the brutal arithmetic of throughput. On this front, the West has been dragged, kicking and screaming, into recognition of a reality it tried to meme out of existence.

Russia’s military-industrial base bureaucratically compressed, hardened, and scaled under pressure —now outpaces NATO’s collective ammunition production by a multiple. Western officials themselves have been forced to admit the gap, even as they scramble to promise future catch-up schedules that read more like aspiration than viable plan.

In sum, while Russia produces, Britain reviews glorified mission statements. And while Russia iterates, Britain delays indefinitely out of impotence. Russia fields game changing adaptations learned from battlefield within months. While Britain commissions another inquiry.

And this is where the mockery turns into indictment.

Because Britain is not merely weak. It is performatively Russophobic, a leading amplifier of a psychological contagion that has swept Western Europe. A political culture that replaced diplomacy with insult, respect with caricature, and strategic realism with adolescent moral posturing.

For decades, Russians asked for nothing exotic. Security guarantees. Recognition of reasonable red lines. A place in a shared European security architecture. Basic respect and dignity after the Cold War. They were met instead with NATO expansion, broken promises, regime-change evangelism, and the casual humiliation of a great civilization reduced to punchlines for Western domestic politics.

And now, after years of stoking this hysteria, inflaming this anger, and dismissing Russian concerns as paranoia, Britain offers the world a confession written in delays, budget shortfalls, and broken machinery.

For all the talk of deterrence, what they’re left with is cold reality, exposure. A state that talks war while failing at procurement is not projecting strength. It is advertising vulnerability at scale. A leadership class that cannot fund its own defence while demanding continental confrontation is not leading, but gambling with other people’s lives.

For a country in this position to posture as a peer adversary to Russia is not serious strategy. It is suicide pact dressed up as virtue. At this point, honesty would demand something radical in London: humility and sober realism.

A state in Britain’s position should not be lecturing the world, moralizing from the sidelines, or inflating its own strategic importance. It should be urgently repairing what it helped to destroy, namely trust, diplomacy, and the basic architecture of European security. It should be suing for peace, not performing toughness it cannot afford.

Because history is unforgiving to former empires that mistake memory for power.

Russia did not arrive at this moment through fantasy. It arrived through necessity, through sanctions, pressure, exclusion, and the steady realisation that the West no longer spoke the language of compromise, only command. Britain, by contrast, arrived here through illusion: convinced it was still a titan while outsourcing its industry, hollowing out its capacity, and replacing strategy with theatre.

This is the real danger now, not Russian strength, but Western self-deception.

A political class that cannot build, cannot fund, and cannot field its own defence has no business escalating confrontation with a civilization that can. When rhetoric races far ahead of reality, history does not intervene gently. It intervenes brutally. Britain is not preparing for a conflict with Russia. It is preparing for a reckoning with the reality of its own weakness.

And reality, unlike Whitehall briefings, legacy slogans, or moral posturing, does not negotiate.

In 2021 the establishment media was electrified by a discovery involving the ancient remains of a woman found over a century ago near a village in East Sussex in Britain.  The reason leftist journalists were so hyped?  A supposedly comprehensive study by “experts” in facial reconstruction had determined that the nearly 2000 year old skeleton belonged to a Sub-Saharan African person.

The remains became known as the “Beachy Head Woman” and images of her reconstructed black face circulating internationally.  This was proof, somehow, that progressives had always been right to support third world immigration.

The new data arrived conveniently in time to support a far-left campaign to defend the ideas of multiculturalism.  Part of this narrative asserts that Caucasian regions of the world have never actually been Caucasian and that western culture doesn’t really exist.  In fact, white Europeans have no claim to any lands anywhere, they have no home, and African/Asian migrants have “always” freely traveled throughout Europe.

The political left was enthralled, taking to social media and reposting the discovery millions of times over to “own the fascists”.  The BBC even paid to have a plaque constructed on the site where the bones were discovered proudly proclaiming that this is where the first Briton of “African origin” had been found.

School lessons were immediately developed in the UK, teaching students about the multicultural history of Britain.  This was scientific confirmation to back up the avalanche of European entertainment content depicting Sub-Saharan Africans as integral to the history of the continent, roaming the lands as tribesman or enjoying the finery of royal court.   

Leftists argue that their version of history justifies the expansion of open mass immigration, because “things have always been this way” and white people today who want to protect their histories and cultures from erasure are merely ignorant of the past.  

The problem is, Beachy Head Woman is not African or black.  Recently confirmed DNA evidence shows she was white with blonde hair and blue eyes.  She was not a migrant, but born in ancient Britain.

The narrative began to break down in 2023 when genetic studies indicated she might have come from Cyprus (a part of the Roman Empire) and was not of African origin.  More advanced DNA analysis, released this week, destroyed the claims of migration and also embarrassed the “experts” involved in the facial reconstruction of the skull.

The new study, led by researchers at London’s Natural History Museum, working in collaboration with University College London, used advanced ancient DNA sequencing that was not available a decade ago. By extracting a much larger quantity of high-quality DNA, they were able to place her ancestry within a broader Roman-era genetic framework. 

The results show that her DNA is most similar to that of individuals from rural southern Britain during the Roman period and to modern populations from England. There are no traces of recent sub-Saharan African or Mediterranean ancestry. Isotope analysis of her teeth and bones indicates that her early years were spent on the south coast of Britain, and her mobility patterns were similar to those of other local individuals from the same period.

It’s a perfect example of the growing problem of ideology mixing with science and poisoning the well of human knowledge.  The rules of scientific investigation require an objective mindset, letting the evidence show whatever the evidence shows.  However, with the invasion of woke cultism into every facet of academia, the goal of science is now to fulfill the demands of the multicultural narrative.

Luckily, the takeover of academia is not total and the truth still slips through the cracks on occasion.  

Woke “science” approaches investigation by developing a desired conclusion first, and then manipulating the evidence to support that conclusion.  In other words, science is nothing more than another propaganda tool.  This is why wokeness can no longer be allowed to spread into western academics or into STEM fields; it’s not just destructive to political discourse and social stability, it is also a cancer eating away at the pillars of human knowledge.  

If these people are allowed to continue their conquest of science, modern human civilization will crumble.

Authored by Peter Hanseler via ForumGeopolitica.com,

When German journalists Röper and Lipp were sanctioned, no one in Switzerland reacted—now one of the world’s most respected military analysts is being sanctioned—a Swiss citizen. Weltwoche is waking up, Switzerland is fast asleep.

Introduction

Terrorizing journalists with sanctions in order to suppress the truth is nothing new for the EU.

On May 20, 2025, the EU sanctioned two German journalists for the first time—Alina Lipp and Thomas Röper. At the time, we reported in detail on this case, “EU sanctions German journalists,” and also analyzed the case from a legal perspective.

The result was clear: punishment without crime or trial, disenfranchisement and expropriation without a hearing.

The EU is dangerously close to the Nazi regime of 1936, when Thomas Mann was expatriated.

Following the same pattern, action is now being taken against a Swiss citizen for the first time.

Jacques Baud – You Can’t Be More Objective Than He Is

Jacques Baud is one of the most objective and respected military analysts around. He is highly regarded and respected not only throughout Europe, but also in the US.

His work is not limited to analysis on the most prestigious YouTube platforms; he has also written numerous excellent books. His style is unique in that he does not concern himself with politics, but only with the analysis of warfare, in a calm and dispassionate manner. His analyses have never been anti-Ukrainian or pro-Russian, but objective.

He has long seen a NATO defeat on the horizon, not based on his wishes, but on the facts on the long front and the war strategy and tactics of the various parties.

This did not fit in at all with the Russophobic war cries of the EU, which still dreams of ultimate victory today, just like Adolf Hitler did in the spring of 1945.

The latest example comes from Friedrich Merz, whose lucidity must now seriously be called into question. To justify the theft of Russian assets, he said the following before the German Bundestag on December 15, 2025:

“To be very clear and very explicit here: we are not doing this to prolong the war. On the contrary, we are doing this to end this war as quickly as possible, ladies and gentlemen. Because this sends a clear signal to Moscow that continuing this war is pointless for Moscow.”

Friedrich Merz, December 15, 2025

Jacques Baud’s crime was therefore that his analyses were correct – no more and no less.

Die Weltwoche Stands up— Finally

When Alina Lipp and Thomas Röper were sanctioned, Weltwoche contented itself with an indifferent, lukewarm article and did not stand up for its colleagues – we were shocked.

It seems that the opportunistic Mr. Köppel has felt the heat from Ms. Kaja Kallas a little too closely for his liking: Köppel is finally standing up, because he could be next, and, as Martin Niemöller said, when it’s your turn, you’re wide awake.

“First they came for the Communists
And I did not speak out
Because I was not a Communist
Then they came for the Socialists
And I did not speak out
Because I was not a Socialist
Then they came for the trade unionists
And I did not speak out
Because I was not a trade unionist
Then they came for the Jews
And I did not speak out
Because I was not a Jew
Then they came for me
And there was no one left
To speak out for me

Holocaust Memorial Day Trust

Now Weltwoche is also reflecting on the lack of a fair hearing and politically motivated persecution, not in as much detail as in our article of May 25, 2025, but still.

“Opportunism is costing a 70-year-old military analyst his quality of life”

Weltwoche has published half a dozen articles on Jacque Baud, and Köppel is playing the Joan of Arc of journalists, styling himself in his own way as the Winkelried of his guild. It’s rather late in the day. Had Köppel reacted with the same force in May, the men and women in Brussels would probably have thought twice about sanctioning a Swiss citizen. Opportunism is costing a 70-year-old military analyst his quality of life.

Official Switzerland Remains Silent

It is nothing new that my home country no longer has any backbone when it comes to Brussels. Weltwoche writes:

“In Bern, they would prefer to have nothing to do with it and are passing the buck like a hot potato.”

Weltwoche, December 18, 2025

This is obviously worrying, but the Swiss government is behaving in exactly the same way as Köppel did in May this year when German colleagues were sanctioned. They wanted nothing to do with the whole affair.

The Next Litmus Test for Switzerland Is Coming Soon

The EU’s plundering of the Russian Federation’s frozen funds will soon be complete. Incidentally, this has nothing to do with war, but rather with the sheer financial and political survival of the EU and its criminal leaders, because without the stolen money, the EU is bankrupt.

Despite the clarity that the EU is a criminal organization, Switzerland is negotiating a comprehensive package of new agreements with the EU, including the integration of dynamic legal adoption processes. This means that Switzerland is actually discussing automatically adopting the laws of a criminal organization.

Patrick Baab Interviewed Jacques Baud

We would like to draw your attention to the interview recorded on December 16 by our author Patrik Baab with Jaques Baud.

Authored by Chris Summers via The Epoch Times,

The Trump administration recently suspended the processing of all immigration applications from 19 countries, including Afghanistan, citing national security and public safety concerns.

The Dec. 2 decision came a week after an Afghan national who had been allowed into the United States under a Biden-era program was charged with shooting two National Guard soldiers near the White House. The ambush killed one of the victims and left the other in critical condition.

The White House’s move comes amid a global migration crisis, in which millions of people have left their home countries in Latin America, Africa, and Asia for the affluent economies of North America and Europe.

Although the United States was founded by immigrants, experts say that times have changed, and the country has become too popular a destination that now action is needed to restore a functioning immigration system.

“How this country was founded, and the ethos and numbers of people in the 1600s, 1700s, and 1800s are very different than what we’ve been experiencing,” Lora Ries, director of the Border Security and Immigration Center at The Heritage Foundation, told The Epoch Times. “And so our immigration system has just been run away, whether it’s illegal or legal.”

“We need to pop this bubble and get control over our country, [with] a lawful, manageable and orderly immigration system.”

The countries affected by the Dec. 2 memorandum were Burma (also known as Myanmar), Chad, the Republic of the Congo, Equatorial Guinea, Eritrea, Haiti, Iran, Libya, Sudan, Yemen, Burundi, Cuba, Laos, Sierra Leone, Togo, Turkmenistan, and Venezuela. Most of these countries have high visa overstay rates or poor vetting procedures.

In August, the Pew Research Center analyzed Census Bureau data and said 53.3 million immigrants were living in the United States in June 2025.

According to the Migration Policy Institute, immigrants made up 14.8 percent of the population in 2024, a rate the United States has not seen since 1890.

“Our inn is not only full, it is overflowing,” Ries said. “So other countries need to step up and pitch in.”

Push and Pull Factors in Migration

In 2024, the United Nations’ population division published data that suggested a record 304 million people lived in a country other than their country of birth.

That figure—which represents 3.7 percent of the world’s 8.2 billion people—was up from 275 million in 2020.

That number would include the 42 million people who, in June 2025, the United Nations refugee agency said have left their home country due to “persecution, conflict, violence, human rights violations or events seriously disturbing public order,” plus 8.4 million who are claiming asylum in another country.

War and political violence are push factors in some parts of the world, says Paul Morland, demographer and author of “The Human Tide: How Population Shaped the Modern World,” but he said they were less significant than people’s age-old desire to improve their standard of living.

“A bigger story than the security one is the economic one, because that’s always there,” Morland told The Epoch Times.

He noted that the Congo, which has had an ongoing civil war for several years, has not generated large numbers of migrants to Europe or North America, while India and Pakistan—which have been largely peaceful—have seen large numbers move to the West.

Many times, migrants use the persecution justification to pursue the economic motive, Ries noted.

“There are 193 countries on this planet, so if you are truly fleeing for your life, then you should go to the first safe country that you enter,” she said, “You should not be able to country shop and go through multiple safe countries without getting protection there, just because you want to get to the U.S.”

Cultural differences play a role in immigration’s impact on the host country, said Morland.

“What has a very big impact is when people from very radically different cultures arrive,” he said, “They look very different, their practices are very different, their belief systems and values are very different. And the assumption has to be that they will take longer to integrate.”

In America, immigration has historically been associated with positive outcomes, Javier Palomarez, president and CEO of the United States Hispanic Business Council, told The Epoch Times.

“Since its inception, America has thrived by attracting the best and brightest from around the world to contribute to our innovation, economy, and society as whole,” said in a statement sent by email.

“After all, America was founded on the idea that you could leave your former life behind, start anew, and build something for yourself and your family.”

There are reasons behind that success.

“This idea is reliant on the invisible pillars that hold this nation together and attract contributors from around the world: freedom, opportunity, respect for family, patriotism, law and order, and a strong set of rules and guidelines that enable competition and encourage growth,” said Palomarez.

The “ubiquity of English” in much of Africa, Asia, and Latin America also made the United States and Britain attractive for many migrants, said Morland.

Birth of the Immigration Law Industry

In the 1990s, migrants and human traffickers began to realize that if they could get into their destination country and then claim asylum, they could use legal avenues to prevent being deported, Tony Smith, a former director general of the UK Border Force, told The Epoch Times.

“This gave birth to an industry of immigration lawyers who would support migrants who entered your country illegally,” Smith said. “That had the effect of preventing removals, at least temporarily, whilst that application was processed.”

He said the fact that the asylum-seekers had usually passed through numerous safe countries en route made no difference.

“You have people from all over the world coming in through Mexico because they want to go to the U.S.,” said Smith. “They’re not interested in getting refuge in Mexico or South America.”

A masked migrant illegally crosses into the United States outside of San Diego, Calif., on Dec. 5, 2023. John Fredricks/The Epoch Times

But President Donald Trump has upended the system.

“He is doing things that actually will horrify some judges and some lawyers,” said Smith, “[but] he’s had a very significant effect, both in terms of reducing illegal migration across the southern border, but also in terms of the inland activity by [U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement] to arrest people who should not be in the U.S., and by exerting political pressure on those countries that have traditionally said, ‘We’re not taking our own people back again.’”

Morland said in countries with grinding poverty, long-distance migration is unlikely.

“Ironically, it’s when people get off the floor [that migration happens],” Morland said. “They get a bit of money. They get an iPhone. They can see what the world’s like. They can afford an airfare. They maybe have already got an uncle in London or Paris. That’s when they move, not when they’re absolutely dirt poor and ignorant sitting in the village.”

Morland said it is also unlikely that migrants would return to countries like Afghanistan, Syria, or Sudan even when peace is restored.

“If the Taliban were overturned, and a beautiful liberal democracy were formed in Afghanistan, I hardly think anyone could go back,” Morland said. “Over many, many years, if that then led to economic prosperity, maybe.”

He said “unforced remigration” is going to be fairly limited from countries such as the United States, Canada, and Germany, where per-capita incomes are $50,000 or more.

Sen. Shelley Moore Capito (R-W.Va.) holds a photo of Army Spc. Sarah Beckstrom, a West Virginia National Guard member who was shot near the White House on Nov. 26, in Washington on Dec. 2, 2025. Madalina Kilroy/The Epoch Times

National Security and ‘Open Border Welfare State’

Rahmanullah Lakanwal, 29, the Afghan national who has been charged with the first-degree murder of Army Spc. Sarah Beckstrom, 20, and assaulting Staff Sgt. Andrew Wolfe with intent to kill, in Washington, had worked with the CIA during the war in Afghanistan.

He was one of around 76,000 Afghans allowed to resettle in the United States under a Biden-era resettlement program, Operation Allies Welcome.

It has since faced intense scrutiny from Trump and other U.S. officials over allegations of gaps in the vetting process.

Ries said the president’s actions were a valid response to the Washington shooting, and what the Biden administration had done “in terms of opening the border, and mass paroling of hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of inadmissible aliens from around the world.”

Trump’s return to the White House this January also marked the culmination of many American voters’ frustration with the country’s immigration-related policies and concerns about national security, Ries noted.

“People got so fed up with the open border welfare state that we were living in that they voted against that last November,” she said.

“They wanted the border secure. They wanted the portable aliens removed, and they want taxpayer dollars to go to Americans first, not people who aren’t supposed to be here.”

Declining Birth Rate in the US

The global migration crisis also comes amid wildly contrasting fertility rates between the West and the Third World.

Africa has some of the highest rates in the world. Somalia, Chad, Niger, and the Congo all have fertility rates of six or above.

In 1960, the fertility rate in the United States was between four and five. By 2023, that number had halved to 2.2, approaching 2.1, the minimum level at which a population is able to replace itself from one generation to the next.

Macroeconomist Jesús Fernández-Villaverde called low fertility rates “the true economic challenge of our time” in a February report for the American Enterprise Institute.

Palomarez, the president and CEO of the United States Hispanic Business Council, said immigration has been part of the solution for this challenge.

“At the end of the day, especially given our declining birth rate, our nation is reliant upon a steady stream of immigrant workers and entrepreneurs,” Palomarez said.

Ries said the baby bust in the United States should be addressed at a fundamental level.

“The falling fertility rate in America is the result of a long-term destructive campaign against marriage, families, and having children, and so we just need to wake up from this decades-long nightmare of anti-family, anti-marriage, anti-children policies and agenda, and return to how God made us.”

The battle over artificial intelligence policy is moving from Washington hearing rooms to the campaign trail, where two rival political efforts are preparing to spend at least $150 million to shape the outcome of federal and state elections.

The clash pits industry-backed advocates for rapid AI development against a bipartisan group of former lawmakers calling for stronger regulation and tighter export controls. The scale of the planned spending exceeds the roughly $100 million deployed by crypto-aligned political groups during the 2024 election cycle, Punchbowl News reports.

Unlike the crypto push, however, the emerging AI fight features two organized camps preparing to go head-to-head: pro-industry “AI boomers” and regulation-minded “AI doomers,” each seeking to influence lawmakers and voters ahead of the 2026 midterms.

BOOMERS: AI To The Moon Under One National Framework

On the pro-AI side is Leading the Future, a group of industry-backed super PACs seeded with money from technology leaders and venture capital interests. The effort has received early backing from OpenAI President Greg Brockman, venture capital firm a16z, and Palantir co-founder Joe Lonsdale, and is preparing to spend up to $100 million.

Josh Vlasto, who is co-leading the group’s political strategy, said the goal is to elect candidates supportive of a national, federal-led approach to AI regulation.

“You will see a broad consensus in Congress to have the federal government lead on creating a national, pro-AI, pro-America regulatory framework,” Vlasto said.

That approach reflects industry concerns that a patchwork of state-level AI laws could hinder U.S. competitiveness, particularly in the race with China. While Vlasto said his group supports the idea of a federal AI standard, he indicated that policy specifics would be handled by a related advocacy organization.

Leading the Future is expected to support candidates who favor federal preemption of state AI regulations. Vlasto, who also served as a spokesperson for Fairshake – the crypto-aligned super PAC that backed more than 50 candidates in 2024 – declined to set a limit on how many races the AI-focused group might enter.

The group has already signaled its willingness to play offense, announcing plans to spend against New York State Assemblymember Alex Bores, a Democrat who has supported state-level AI regulation and is running for Congress.

Vlasto said the organization is designed to move quickly as policy debates evolve and has leaned heavily into digital advertising, though it has also purchased television spots.

“This is a highly dynamic moment in this policy debate,” he said. “We are built… to use our resources and bring the AI sector together to advocate for this agenda.”

In short, AI Boomers want:

1. Federal preemption of state AI laws: one national AI framework, not 50 state regimes. States like New York or California passing their own AI rules are seen as a threat to innovation.

2. Light-touch federal regulation: Support a “federal standard,” but generally oppose detailed, prescriptive rules. Policy specifics are often deferred to industry-friendly agencies or advisory bodies.

3. Speed over precaution: The belief is that slowing deployment risks losing the global AI race, especially to China. Safety, bias, and misuse concerns are viewed as manageable after deployment.

4. Industry-driven governance: AI companies should have a major role in shaping the rules that govern them. Regulatory capture is not how they describe it; they frame it as “technical expertise.”

DOOMERS: Control AI before it reshapes society

On the opposing side, former Reps. Chris Stewart (R-Utah) and Brad Carson (D-Okla.) are launching two separate super PACs aimed at boosting candidates who favor stronger AI regulation and export controls.

Together, the PACs aim to raise $50 million for the 2026 cycle – roughly half the amount promised by Leading the Future, but enough, organizers say, to compete with tech industry spending.

“Most people are anxious about AI. They’re not opposed to it, they’re anxious,” Carson said, arguing that public concern about the pace of AI development is being underestimated.

Carson criticized what he described as tech companies’ “accelerationist YOLO agenda” and said his PACs would disclose their donors in the coming months.

The groups plan to support candidates for the House and Senate and are also considering investments in state legislative races and gubernatorial contests. Carson said spending decisions will be made across television, digital platforms, and other media as appropriate, with endorsements coming from both political parties.

Two policy issues are central to the effort: AI regulation and export controls on advanced AI chips bound for China.

Carson said the PACs will support candidates “who favor strong export controls,” and he reiterated opposition to President Trump’s decision to allow Nvidia to sell advanced AI chips to China. Carson, who serves as president of Americans for Responsible Innovation, has argued that export restrictions are critical to national security.

The PACs will also back candidates who believe government has a role in regulating AI, including allowing states to act in the absence of a federal framework.

Doomer priorities:

1. Meaningful regulation, not just federal symbolism: They want enforceable rules on: Model deployment. Safety testing, Transparency, Accountability for harm. 

2. State authority as a backstop – not a takeover: States should be allowed to regulate AI if Congress fails to act.

   • This mirrors how states regulate: Consumer protection, Data privacy, Product safety, State involvement is seen as a pressure mechanism, not the ideal endpoint.

3. Export controls and national security: They strongly support restricting advanced AI chips to China. They view unfettered exports as a strategic and military risk.

4. Public trust as a strategic asset: Their argument is that if voters lose confidence in AI, politicians will overcorrect. Early guardrails are framed as pro-innovation, not anti-innovation.

Competing visions for AI’s future

While Carson and Stewart reject the label “anti-AI,” they argue that guardrails are necessary to maintain public trust in the technology.

“Big tech has lost the confidence of the American people,” Carson said. “And if the American people don’t believe in [AI], you’re going to see politicians turn against it in a very severe way.”

Authored by Larry Johnson via Sonar21.com.

Sy Hersh’s latest Substack article on the prospects a successful outcome of the US attempt to broker a peace deal between Russia and Ukraine is important because it reveals the pathetic incompetence of the CIA. It appears that Sy reported what senior Trump officials told him about the on going negotiations with the Russians and Ukrainians, and that those officials were sharing their understanding of the capabilities of Russia and Ukraine based on intelligence reports and intelligence analysis provided principally by CIA analysts.

Here are some of the more egregious claims by these officials:

Both nations are on the verge of economic and military collapse…

Putin is facing economic, political, military, and public pressure…

Putin is facing increasing political, economic, and military opposition in Moscow—mortgage rates are soaring and the Russian military is in serious disarray—has realized that he must end the war…

Ongoing warfare is not going to change the balance of forces. Putin is under pressure to end the war from his military and from a public staggered by its continuing costs, and inflation is at 8.4 percent…

Some of the most senior Russian generals, while still loyal to Putin, urgently want the depleted Russian Army to get out.

Putin is staying afloat by borrowing money from Russian banks that are not permitted to lend to the population.

Rather than debunk each of these claims, I will focus on the last two.

Regarding the claim that Russian banks “are not permitted to lend to the population.” Wrong! Russian banks are fully allowed—and actively do—make loans to Russian citizens . According to Russia’s Central Bank and news reports from Reuters , Bloomberg , and The Moscow Times , there are no prohibitions on domestic lending to Russian individuals under current regulations (as of December 2025). Consumer lending (unsecured loans, mortgages, car loans, credit cards) is a major part of the Russian banking sector, with retail loan portfolios growing continuously because Russian wages have increased more than the rate of inflation — 20% — and are greater than the high interest rates. How could the Trump intelligence community get such an easy fact to verify so wrong?

Then there is the assertion that the Russian army is “depleted.” Russia’s active-duty military personnel strength as of December 2025 is approximately 1.32 million. This figure comes from the 2025 Global Firepower Index (reviewed January 2025) and cross-verified sources like Statista , which cites ~1.32 million active troops (part of a total force of ~3.57 million including reserves and paramilitary). My sources in Russia put the number at greater than 1.5 million. In February 2022, according to IISS Military Balance 2022 and Global Firepower , Russia’s active-duty military forces were 900,000.

In terms of Russia’s ground forces, they have grown from 300,000 in February 2022 to 623,000 in just the Ukrainian theater, according to Ukraine’s General Syrsky. Total Russian ground forces now exceed 1 million men. Does that sound like depletion to you?

So why does the CIA persist in peddling provably false information. I blame former CIA Director John Brennan. John Brennan, as CIA Director (2013–2017), initiated a major reorganization in March 2015 that integrated analysts (from the Directorate of Analysis) and operations officers (from the Directorate of Operations) into hybrid mission centers.

This “modernization plan” aimed to break down traditional silos — ie, previously analysts and operations officers worked in separate units — by creating 10 new mission centers (focused on regions/threats like counterterrorism and cyber), where analysts, operators, digital experts, and support staff would work side-by-side under unified leadership. Brennan announced the overhaul on March 6, 2015 , with implementation beginning shortly after (eg, assistant directors named April 30, 2015). The ostensible goal was better integration for modern threats like cyber warfare, modeled partly on the existing Counterterrorism Center, but the actual effect subordinated independent analysis to the covert programs directed and managed by the operations officers.

When I started working as an analyst in the fall of 1986, the Directorate of Intelligence occupied the north wing of the CIA headquarters and the Directorate of Operations occupied the south wing… We were in our respective silos. I was the Honduras analyst when the war in Central America was a top priority for the Reagan administration. Funding the Contras and fighting the Sandinista was a major covert action program of the Director of Operations… The Central American Task Force (CATF) to be precise. The case officers in the CATF had every incentive to make the program look like it was being successful.

I vividly recall a briefing that I, along with the Nicaragua branch military analyst, gave to members of Congress on March 12, 1988 about a developing situation on the border of Honduras and Nicaragua. We were accompanied by the Chief of military operations for the CATF. We had intelligence that the Sandinistas were prepared to launch military operations against Contra forces in the Las Vegas salient of southern Honduras. During the course of that briefing we received news from headquarters that the Sandinistas had allegedly overrun a Contra base and were killing the CIA-backed Contras. What a disaster!

As we filed out of that briefing got into the van to take us back to headquarters, the CATF military chief began berating me and the military analyst for the Nicaraguan branch as having contributed to this alleged disaster for the Contras because our analysis did not enthusiastically support the CATF covert program. When I arrived back at headquarters and had a chance to look at the actual intelligence, I discovered that we had been told a lie. Instead of the Sandinistas swarming a Contra camp like Mexican troops attacking the Alamo, the intel report simply stated that a Contra patrol had skirmished with a Sandinista patrol 15 km south of the Contra base. The point of telling this anecdote is to illustrate the kind of pressure that we as analysts faced from the operations side of the house to spin a narrative that portrayed the Contra’s in the best possible light while downplaying the competence of the Sandinista forces.

I think a similar phenomena has been at play since the start of Russia’s Special Military Operation in February 2022. I believe that the analysts responsible for reporting on the Ukrainians and Russians are fully embedded in a Mission Center , something akin to the CATF, and that analysts face daily pressures from operations officers to paint the Ukrainians as victors and the Russians as losers who are on the verge of economic and political collapse.

It is simple human nature… If you want to get promoted, don’t tell the truth, just go along with the program.

I also have learned that the primary source material the analysts are using is generated by the Ukrainians, who are working in concert with CIA officers deployed in Ukraine. I believe that the combination of peer pressure from operations officers to support a covert mission and a steady supply of tainted information from biased Ukrainian sources explains why the US officials who spoke to Sy Hersh are painting such a false and distorted picture of the war in Ukraine and are describing the Russians as incompetent, depleted and on the verge of crumbling. Garbage in, garbage out .

If the CIA has any hope of being able to provide something approaching objective, truthful analysis, the Mission Centers created by Brennan must be dismantled. There was a press report last February that current CIA director Ratcliffe was reviewing whether to reverse Brennan’s changes due to perceived negative impacts on human intelligence (HUMINT) and core missions. Let me assure you that the negative impacts are real, not perceived.

So far, Ratcliffe has not acted to reverse Brennan. Maybe the defeat of Ukraine by Russia will finally convince Ratcliffe to take action to rescue analysts from the clutches of the operations officers.

The Khan family is alleging a politically motivated set-up by longtime enemies of Pakistan’s former prime minister Imran Khan.

This after he and his wife, Bushra Bibi, were sentenced to 17 years in prison on Saturday after a court convicted them of unlawfully keeping and selling high-value state gifts, which caps the lengthy court case centered on several corruption allegations. He’s at the center of a series of cases, which have already resulted in past convictions.

The couple was in this instance charged with selling official gifts, including jewelry received from the Saudi government, at prices far below their market value.

Khan’s party, Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf, has blasted the trial as a “sham” on social media, and Khan’s supporters say the current government has tried to throw anything at him to see what sticks. It also said that a closed door trial is not a fair trial, and that essentially this was a secret court.

And Aleema Khanum, Khan’s sister, has released a statement saying the charges have been fabricated and are ridiculous. “Do you really believe Imran would spend 10 years in prison over an underpriced necklace?” she said. “Seventeen years for this conviction? This is clearly a setup. It shows a judicial system that has collapsed.”

Prosecutors argued that the couple greatly profited from dealing in official state gifts. According to more details:

Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman presented a jewelry set made by the Italian luxury brand Bulgari to Khan and his wife in May 2021.

Prosecutors said Khan and his wife had said the value of the gifts was just over $10,000, well short of their real market value of $285,521 (€243,780).

According to Pakistani law, government officials and politicians are allowed to keep gifts received from foreign dignitaries if they are under a certain value. To keep the gifts, they must purchase them at market value and declare the proceeds from any sale. Khan and Bibi were sentenced to 10 years for criminal breach of trust and seven years for corruption.

Khan has in the last year gotten some international support and backing amid the saga, with a United Nations panel of exports having announced last year that his detention “had no legal basis and appears to have been intended to disqualify him from running for political office“.

Current Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif, who emerged victorious in the last elections while Khan had languished in jail, was seen more as the “military’s man” in Islamabad, while Khan’s legacy has sought to be erased by those same elite powers.

🇵🇰 NO COURTROOM, NO DEFENSE, NO JUSTICE: IMRAN KHAN AND HIS WIFE SENTENCED TO 17 YEARS IN JAIL

In yet another blow from the Pakistani establishment, Imran and his wife Bushra Bibi have been sentenced to a further 17 years in prison each over gifts they legally received while in… pic.twitter.com/y0kgXGCOXT

— Mario Nawfal (@MarioNawfal) December 20, 2025

DW notes that “Saturday’s sentencing is separate from an earlier case against the couple. In that case, Khan and his wife were sentenced to 14 and seven years, respectively.” He’s already in jail for that prior conviction, and has been incarcerated since 2023.

Authored by Steve Watson via Modernity.news,

Michelea Ponce, the leftist caught on video unleashing a tirade against an elderly Target employee for daring to wear a “Freedom” shirt featuring Charlie Kirk, has issued a public apology. But with her job on the line and police involved, many see it as a desperate bid to salvage her reputation rather than genuine remorse.

This comes after the video exploded online, exposing the kind of unhinged intolerance conservatives face daily from those who preach “kindness” but deliver harassment.

The incident unfolded in a Chico, California Target store, where Ponce confronted 72-year-old employee Jeanie Beeman over her shirt. As we previously reported in our coverage of the meltdown and the subsequent police investigation, Ponce labeled Beeman as “racist” and “ignorant,” escalating into a public spectacle that left the senior worker shaken.

Ponce, an employee at Enloe Health, filmed the encounter herself, apparently seeking viral clout. Instead, it backfired spectacularly, drawing widespread condemnation for bullying an innocent woman simply expressing her support for conservative values.

The Chico Police Department also investigated the incident after it went viral but determined Ponce’s actions did not constitute criminal conduct.

In their official statement, they noted: “While the interaction was tense and inappropriate, it did not rise to the level of criminal conduct. The customer’s actions, though discourteous, were protected under the First Amendment as freedom of speech. As a result, there are no criminal charges appropriate to file in this case.” You can read the full statement here.

While no charges were filed, the probe underscored the fine line between free speech and outright harassment, a reminder that conservatives often endure such attacks without legal recourse.

In her ‘apology’ statement, Ponce wrote: “I want to take full responsibility for my actions and say clearly and sincerely that I was wrong. I behaved badly, and I regret it deeply.

“I want to directly apologize to Jeannie. I am truly sorry for approaching you at your workplace and putting you in an uncomfortable and unfair position. You did not deserve that, and my behavior was wrong,” the statement continues.

Ponce adds, “I also apologize to Jeannie’s family for the stress and attention my actions caused. I apologize to Target as her employer, I apologize to Enloe, and I apologize to the Chico community. I understand that what I did reflected poorly on myself and disrupted a sense of safety and respect that should exist in a workplace and in our community.”

“I did not handle the situation the way I should have. I allowed my emotions to take over instead of choosing restraint and empathy. That was my failure, and I own it,” She further claims.

The statement concludes, “I regret my actions, and I am genuinely sorry for the harm they caused. I wish I can go back and undo what happened, but I can acknowledge it honestly, learn from it, and commit to doing better moving forward.”

The apology surfaced via a post on X, sparking immediate skepticism. Critics pointed out its polished, almost scripted tone, with one user calling it “fake as F” and another dismissing it as insincere, saying Ponce is only “regretting the consequences of her actions.” Many echoed that she’s not sorry for the act but for getting caught, especially with her employment in jeopardy.

?BREAKING: Michelea Ponce, who harassed an elderly Target employee, Jeanie Beeman, over her wearing a Charlie Kirk “Freedom” t-shirt. Issues an apology.

“I behaved badly, and I regret it deeply.” pic.twitter.com/0reb89Bzln

— The Patriot Oasis™ (@ThePatriotOasis) December 18, 2025

Enloe Health, Ponce’s employer, faced massive backlash, including over 6,000 calls demanding action. CEO Mike Wiltermood addressed the controversy in a video statement, condemning the behavior but refusing to disclose if Ponce had been terminated, citing privacy concerns.

Enloe Health’s CEO, Mike Wiltermood, just spoke out following a video that went viral yesterday of their employee, a vile, hateful and toxic liberal woman named Michelea Ponce, who verbally accosted and harassed an elderly Target employee, Jeanie Beeman, over her wearing a… pic.twitter.com/SYI43nluWj

— Based Bandita (@BasedBandita) December 17, 2025

A follow-up statement from Enloe reiterated their disapproval but again stopped short of confirming her status. Rumors swirled on social media that she may have been fired, but as of now, it’s unconfirmed. This opacity has fueled calls for transparency, with users insisting that someone with such evident bias shouldn’t be in healthcare, where vulnerable patients—including conservatives—deserve unbiased care.

Approximately 2 hours ago, rumors on social media began to spur that Michelea Ponce lost her job at Enloe Health. While it’s unclear if it’s true, Enloe coincidentally issued another statement online condemning Ponce 2 hours ago and saying they couldn’t say anything else. pic.twitter.com/OWyylG9JfW

— Greg Hoyt (@GregHoytLET) December 18, 2025

In a heartening update, Jeanie Beeman spoke out, showing remarkable forgiveness. “Two wrongs don’t make a right. She wronged me, but I don’t want to wrong her. I really wouldn’t want to see her lose her job over it,” she said in a video interview.

NEW: Ms. Jeanie Beeman speaks out after being harassed over her Charlie Kirk shirt at Target and says she does not want her attacker fired.

“Two wrongs don’t make a right. She wronged me, but I don’t want to wrong her. I really wouldn’t want to see her lose her job over it.”… pic.twitter.com/FZumZoSjd9

— David J Harris Jr (@DavidJHarrisJr) December 18, 2025

This honorable stance highlights the difference between conservatives, who often extend grace even to their tormentors, and the intolerant left, quick to attack but slow to reflect. Beeman’s response embodies the spirit of resilience and dignity.

The online community rallied around Beeman, launching a GiveSendGo fundraiser to give her a well-deserved vacation. At time of writing, it has raised over $230,000, far surpassing initial expectations.

This outpouring stands in sharp contrast to the hate Ponce unleashed, proving that freedom-loving Americans stick together against bullies.

Incidents like this expose the deep-seated bias against conservatives in everyday life. Ponce’s apology, whether sincere or not, won’t erase the damage, but it does spotlight the need to protect free expression from those who weaponize “tolerance” as a tool of control.

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

A fire at a Pacific Gas & Electric substation in San Francisco sparked widespread power outages across areas of the northern half of the city, from the Richmond and Sunset districts through Haight-Ashbury and into the downtown area.

SFFD is on scene of a 1 alarm fire at a PG&E substation located at 8th St. and Mission St. we are working collaboratively to shut shut down power and extinguish the fire with carbon dioxide. Please avoid the area , Heavy traffic. #sffd pic.twitter.com/1CmcK0CTIW

— SAN FRANCISCO FIRE DEPARTMENT MEDIA (@SFFDPIO) December 20, 2025

It’s the 8th and Mission Street @PGE4Me Substation. pic.twitter.com/heNFDLyMPB

— Matt Dorsey (@mattdorsey) December 21, 2025

Anyone wondering about the S.F. wide power outage I am watching where it happened from my window pic.twitter.com/2LHZnEFxtH

— snwy (@snwy_me) December 20, 2025

Firefighters responded to a blaze at a PG&E substation on 8th and Mission Street on Saturday evening. The latest data from Poweroutage.US says about 125,000 customers are without power.

Not the first time. 

Historical fun fact: today is not the first time @PGE4Me plunged large swaths of San Francisco into darkness on the Saturday before Christmas — among the busiest shopping days of the year — and today’s outage would appear to involve the same substation to blame 22 years ago. pic.twitter.com/XHT4WfJSZ1

— Matt Dorsey (@mattdorsey) December 21, 2025

Officials have yet to say what sparked the substation fire.

*Developing…

Submitted by Gun Owners of America,

Gun owners’ number one fighter in Washington, D.C., Representative Andrew Clyde, along with five senators and 35 other House members, have sent a letter to Attorney General Pam Bondi.

In this letter, they’ve made it clear that the DOJ is out of line with Congress’ intent.

🚨BREAKING🚨@Rep_Clyde just led 5 Senators and 36 House Representatives in condemning @AGPamBondi‘s mishandling of GOA’s Big Beautiful Lawsuit.@TheJusticeDept should not be defending federal gun registration now that Congress reduced the NFA “tax” to an unconstitutional $0. pic.twitter.com/mjOPzOAKpq

— Gun Owners of America (@GunOwners) December 18, 2025

Specifically, they cite the Justice Department’s recent defense of the National Firearms Act in the Gun Owners of America case that we’re affectionately calling the “One Big Beautiful Lawsuit.”

The case itself, Silencer Shop Foundation v. ATF, centers around the recent removal of the $200 tax from items regulated by the National Firearms Act. Specifically, short-barreled rifles, short-barreled shotguns, AOWs (short for “any other weapons,” a catch-all term for items that don’t fit neatly into the other categories of regulation), and silencers.

Previously, purchasing one of these highly regulated items would require a $200 tax payment, a background check including fingerprints and passport photos, and a lengthy wait.

But thanks to the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, signed by President Trump in July, that $200 tax payment was removed from those aforementioned items.

Unfortunately, the registration requirements of the National Firearms Act remain. That’s why we at Gun Owners of America are suing ATF and the Department of Justice to remove the registration requirements on these items.

The National Firearms Act and its registry, the NFRTR or National Firearms Registration and Transfer Record, have been declared a legitimate use of Congress’ article 1 power of taxation.

Keyword: “Taxation.”

The NFA registry is a registry of tax payments, and those tax payments are associated with firearms. This is a sneaky way to get around calling it a gun registry, instead – it’s a tax registry.

But what do you do when the tax has been decreased to zero dollars?

Well, the Department of Justice wants to keep the registration requirements in place, along with the penalties for noncompliance.

That’s like if the IRS abolished the income tax but demanded that you still complete your W2 or 1099 tax forms every year, otherwise face prison time and hundreds of thousands of dollars in fines.

To make matters worse, the DOJ used common anti-gun talking points to justify their defense of this unconstitutional registration scheme.

Here are some of the highlights:

• DOJ Referred to NFA regulated firearms as “Weapons of War” a meaningless gun control lobby term meant to strike fear into the minds of those uneducated on firearms policy. The reality is, any weapon is a “weapon of war,” and the Second Amendment was specifically written to protect those same types of weapons!

• DOJ stated that NFA items were “especially susceptible to criminal misuse,” a line taken straight from Biden-era Justice Department briefs meant to justify bans of certain firearms.

• Finally, DOJ is claiming that because other parts of the NFA still generate revenue, the entire act along with the registration requirements for untaxed items is constitutional.

Rep. Clyde and 40 other members of Congress disagree. In fact, here’s what they had to say:

The registration requirements under the NFA are, in fact, inseparably linked to its taxation provisions. Registration serves as the mechanism by which the ATF accounts for the tax paid on each firearm, identified by its serial number.

The tax stamp affixed by the ATF to an NFA transfer and registration application reflects both the firearm’s serial number and the amount of tax paid for the transfer.

Moreover, the NFA’s criminal provisions pertain exclusively to the failure to pay or register the payment of this tax with the ATF. Any reinterpretation of the NFA that allows registration to persist once taxation has been removed contradicts the statute’s text, its structure, and Supreme Court precedent.

Following the OBBBA’s elimination of the tax on a broad class of firearms regulated under the NFA, the constitutional foundation for applying the NFA’s transfer and registration requirements to those $0-tax firearms no longer exists.

These requirements now operate without any corresponding exercise of Congress’s taxing power. As the Supreme Court upheld the NFA’s provisions only as “in aid” of that power, and since the relevant excise taxes have been repealed, the transfer and registration requirements should likewise be understood as repealed with respect to firearms now subject to a $0 tax.

The Department’s recent filing ignores this reality and instead offers a theory that would convert the NFA from a tax statute into a free-standing federal gun registry – an outcome Congress has never authorized and has repeatedly rejected.

In our lawsuit, we establish that thanks to two Supreme Court cases from the 1930s, US v. Sonzinsky & US v. Constantine, the Supreme Court has said that the NFA is an exercise of Congress’ taxing power, and in addition, a tax that generates no revenue is therefore not a tax at all.

Rep. Clyde also states this plainly in his letter, saying:

As you are well aware, Congress enacted the National Firearms Act in 1934, imposing an excise tax of $200 — equivalent to nearly $5,000 today — on the manufacture and transfer of certain firearms. The NFA also established burdensome registration requirements for gun owners seeking to transfer NFA-regulated firearms…

Congress enacted the NFA pursuant to its taxing power under Article I, Section 8 of the Constitution. The Supreme Court, in Sonzinsky v. United States, held that the NFA’s registration provisions were “supportable as in aid” of Congress’s proper exercise of the taxing power. Furthermore, the Supreme Court in United States v. Constantine held that a tax that doesn’t generate revenue cannot be justified as a tax.

The National Firearms Act’s legal foundation is that it’s an outgrowth of Congress’ taxing power. But when that tax is removed, does the federal government still get to maintain a registry?

The answer is obviously no.

We want to work with the Department of Justice to abolish unconstitutional gun control, not fight them tooth and nail as they defend it. At any time, they can decide if they want to be on the side of the Second Amendment.

Maybe this letter from Congress will help the DOJ see that!