A white Christmas is one of those holiday experiences that feels universal—until you look at the weather history and actual odds of snowfall on Christmas Day across the United States.

This map, via Visual Capitalist’s Niccolo Conte, shows the historic probability across the U.S. of seeing at least one inch of snow on the ground on December 25, using data from the NOAA National Centers for Environmental Information (NCEI) is based on the latest U.S. Climate Normals (1991–2020).

These “normals” are three-decade averages built from observations at nearly 15,000 stations, offering a consistent baseline for what’s typical in different parts of the country.

Latitude Matters Most For a Snow on Christmas Day

If you want the simplest rule of thumb for a white Christmas, head north. The northern Plains, Upper Midwest, and large stretches of the interior Northeast generally sit in higher probability bands than the rest of the country.

The data table below features state averages of NOAA’s full 5,000+ row dataset of specific station probabilities of at least one inch of snow:

Areas around the Great Lakes can also improve their odds thanks to lake-effect snow, which can build persistent snowpack when cold air is in place.

Meanwhile, the further south you go, the more quickly the map shifts into darker shades—signaling that a white Christmas is historically uncommon.

Mountains Upgrade White Christmas Probabilities

Elevation can change the forecast more than any state line. The Rockies and the Sierra Nevada stand out as some of the most reliable places for holiday snow cover, with many high-altitude areas reaching the upper probabilities of Christmas Day snowfall.

The Cascades and ranges across Idaho also show strong odds, reinforcing how quickly temperatures drop with height.

Even in the East, the Appalachians make a visible difference—higher terrain can hold onto snow that the surrounding lowlands doesn’t.

Why the South and Coasts Often Miss White Christmas

Across the Gulf Coast, Deep South, and much of the Sun Belt, the map largely sits in the 0–10% range. Warmer winter temperatures mean snow is rarer to begin with—and even when it does fall, it’s less likely to stick around long enough to still be on the ground by Christmas morning.

Coastal climates often tilt milder as well, especially where ocean air moderates winter cold.

And for non-contiguous states, the story is mixed: Alaska’s station network is too sparse to confidently fill in the entire map, while Hawaii’s odds remain firmly at zero.

In other words, the classic “white Christmas” is real—but it’s also highly regional. If snow is the goal, history suggests two reliable strategies: chase colder latitudes, or climb into the mountains.

For more Christmas-related visualizations, check out this graphic which ranks Spotify’s most streamed Christmas songs on Voronoi.

Authored by Philip Wegmann via The RealClearPolitics,

White House Chief of Staff Susie Wiles directed President Trump to the teleprompter to deliver specific and scripted remarks in prime-time – rather than the off-the-cuff kind he favors on the stump – about affordability, the accomplishments of his first term, and the challenges ahead.

He delivered a rally speech in miniature Wednesday night, minus only his signature “weave.” Said the president of the myriad of problems facing the nation from high prices and lingering inflation to rising rents and unaffordable healthcare, “It’s not the Republicans’ fault – it’s the Democrats’ fault.” That was the throughline of the entire message. And it is one his party was desperate for him to deliver as they anxiously await the midterm elections next year.

While Trump provide little that was new in terms of policy, the president did change his tone. He admitted that problems persist for everyday Americans despite his best efforts.

“Eleven months ago, I inherited a mess,” he said of his predecessor, President Joe Biden, then immediately added “and I am fixing it.” A long list of accomplishments followed. Among them: Wages are up, inflation down, and the border sealed. Like a chairman of a corporate board delivering an end-of-year report, he ran through a list of promises made on the campaign and promises kept once returned to the White House.

“We’re doing what nobody thought was even possible, not even remotely possible. There has never, frankly, been anything like it,” he said, repeating a popular line from his rallies. “One year ago, our country was dead. We were absolutely dead. Our country was ready to fail – totally failed. Now we’re the hottest country anywhere in the world.”

The president relishes the role of a cheerleader. It has led to blind spots, however, as his long-promised “Golden Age” has yet to trickle down to lower and middleclass tables. Yes, he succeeded in getting many of his marquee domestic policy priorities, encapsulated in the One Big Beautiful Bill, into law. No, the public is still not feeling it despite his insistence on an American renaissance. So say the polls.

Trump remains underwater with more Americans now disapproving, 53.8%, than approving, 43.6%, of his job performance. More worrisome for the White House, according to the RealClearPolitics Average, a majority of the country, 62.8%, disapprove of how Trump has handled inflation even as inflation has mostly stabilized one year into his second stint as president.

Inflation dropped to just 2.8% over the past year compared to its peak under Biden at 9%. Wages have increased as well, and some prices, like the cost of a gallon of gas or a dozen eggs, have come down. Despite those changes, Trump found himself in a position similar to that of Biden when he insisted that the economy remained healthy even as the public did not feel the improvement.

And like the president before him, Trump asked for patience in so many words. The best, he said, was yet to come: “We are poised for an economic boom, the likes of which the world has never seen.”

One thing Trump did not say? He did not argue that affordability amounted to “a Democratic hoax.” Earlier this month in Pennsylvania, he repeated that line before adding a canned explanation about how believing Democrats on questions of the economy was akin to “trusting Bonnie and Clyde with public safety.” The cheerleader in chief instead recognized on Wednesday night that Americans are feeling pain and promised speedy relief, especially come tax season.

Christmas will come in April, the president argued as he touted no tax on tips, no taxes on overtime, and no tax on Social Security benefits. “Under these cuts, many families will be saving between $11,000 and $20,000 a year,” he said, “and next spring is projected to be the largest tax refund season of all time.”

Democrats did not make much of Trump’s deflections.

“People are tired of him trying to throw President Joe Biden under the bus,” said House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries. During an interview on MS NOW (formerly MSNBC), the Democrat argued that Trump owned the anxieties of the current economy. “What’s been clear in public opinion, survey after public opinion survey, the American people know this is Donald Trump’s economy. This is the Republicans’ economy. And it’s been a complete and total disaster.”

Republicans are hoping that voters make up their minds as they file their tax returns, perhaps none more so than Speaker Mike Johnson who believes that tax cuts will “turbocharge the economy” and help him keep his House majority in the process. That’s not likely, however. Only two presidents in the last century, Franklin Delano Roosevelt and George W. Bush, have added to their congressional majority during midterm elections.

A foreign war could make that already difficult task much harder. Before the speech began, Secretary of State Marco Rubio was spotted by reporters pacing outside of the Oval Office. His presence fueled speculation that perhaps Trump would announce a further military escalation in the conflict with Venezuela. The administration continues to sink alleged drug boats coming from that country, and this week the president announced a blockade of Venezuelan oil tankers. But there was no new announcement. Caracas was absent from Trump’s remarks, other than a passing reference to ongoing actions against the cartels.

Families of U.S. service members likely gave a sigh of relief at that fact. Members of the military, meanwhile, cheered at the one bit of news that Trump delivered.

“Military service members will receive a special, what we call a ‘warrior dividend’ before Christmas – a warrior dividend,” he said. “In honor of our nation’s founding in 1776 we are sending every soldier $1,776.”

A one-time check is not likely to reverse ongoing fear about the economy. Trump’s populist project hangs in the balance if the national mood does not improve and Republicans do not defy history. Speaker Johnson has been blunt on this front. “If we don’t win the midterm,” the speaker said of Trump in an interview with RealClearPolitics last month, “he won’t have four years of a presidency. It will end at two.”

A number of House Republicans have already announced their retirement, among them Georgia Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene – once a stalwart Trump ally. She delivered the White House a stark warning in the form of a stinging rebuke last month during an interview with CBS News.

Iran on Monday is conducting live missiles drills across several areas and cities, with officials telling the world the military will remain steadfast in defending the country and that its missile program is strictly defensive.

The semi-official Fars news agency confirmed that missile tests were observed in multiple locations, among them Tehran, Isfahan, Mashhad, Khorramabad and Mahabad. Videos were also widely circulated of missiles soaring through the air, visible from urban centers.

“Iran’s defensive capabilities are by no means an issue that can be discussed,” Foreign Ministry spokesman Esmaeil Baghaei stated Monday, at a moment of high tensions with Israel, which has denounced the Islamic Republic’s ballistic missile program.

The timing is interesting given Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and US President Donald Trump days ago confirmedd they are scheduled to meet December 29 at the Mar-a-lago estate in Florida.

Netanyahu is expected to press his US counterpart on greenlighting possible new strikes on Iranian ballistic missile sites, which Israel says constitutes a threat to the whole region. The US would unlikely directly back such a plan especially at moment its eye is focused on Venezuela.

All of this has sparked concerns that Israel could see the new Iranian test launches as a direct threat, given hundreds of Iranian missiles and drones rained down on Israeli cities and bases during the June 12-day war.

Axios, for example, reports that “Israeli officials warned the Trump administration over the weekend that an Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps missile exercise could be preparations for a strike on Israel, according to three Israeli and U.S. sources with knowledge of the issue.”

NEW: Missile-related activity reported across Iran, including loud sounds near Khorramabad and missile trails over Mashhad and other cities.

IRGC is likely holding a missile exercise. pic.twitter.com/vG7Y5O4jKA

— Clash Report (@clashreport) December 22, 2025

An Israeli official was cited as saying, “The chances for an Iranian attack are less than 50%, but nobody is willing to take the risk and just say it is only an exercise.”

And yet this is precisely what Tehran has now projecting – that it’s actions are ‘defensive’ in nature and that it does not act in the way of an aggressor. 

A further alarming statement from the Axios report is in the following: “The sources said the biggest risk is a war between Israel and Iran will break as a result of a miscalculation with each side thinking the other plans to attack and try to preempt it.”

The June war itself began as a surprise attack by Israel, which the US supported with its own follow-up bombings of three nuclear sites. Tehran was on the very eve of the conflict engaged in good faith negotiations with Washington, and has since complained of the betrayal and obliteration of any shred of trust.

Between the lines: The sources said the biggest risk is a war between Israel and Iran will break as a result of a miscalculation with each side thinking the other plans to attack and try to preempt it https://t.co/y7NdE224nG

— Barak Ravid (@BarakRavid) December 22, 2025

President Trump then touted that he oversaw a ceasefire, and likely US officials behind the scenes pressured Israeli to admit the complete ‘obliteration’ of Iran’s nuclear program, though this remains anything but certain or verified.

U.S. GDP is made up of many smaller, distinct state economies fueling national growth.

In 2025, states responsible for about a third of U.S. GDP are in recession, or face high recession risk.

Another third are expanding, including Florida and Utah, based on payrolls, employment, and other key economic data.

This graphic, via Visual Capitalist’s Dorothy Neufeld, shows recession risk by state in 2025, based on analysis from Mark Zandi, chief economist at Moody’s Analytics.

Where Recession Risk is Highest in America

To analyze recession risk, Zandi looks at state-level economic activity. This included a range of data such as unemployment, building permits, retail sales, industrial activity, delinquency rates, and tax revenues.

States were then categorized into three buckets based on these factors as of October 2025:

• In Recession/High Risk

• Treading Water

• Expanding

Currently, many coastal, Northeastern states are facing some of the worst economic conditions.

In Maine, for instance, year-over-year GDP growth is just 0.8% as of Q2 2025, compared to the U.S. average of 2.1%. Meanwhile, Washington, D.C.’s unemployment rate was 6.4% in July, significantly higher than the 4.6% U.S. average given sweeping federal cuts.

According to Zandi’s analysis, New York and California are “Treading Water”, together responsible for driving over 22% of U.S. GDP.

In comparison, Texas, which fuels 9.4% of U.S. economic growth is expanding. Unemployment rates of 4.0% in July remain below the U.S. average. Additionally, the Texas economy is growing faster than the nation, while income growth rose 6.3% annually as of Q2 2025, outpacing the national average.

To learn more about this topic, check out this graphic on unemployment by state in 2025.

Authored by Charles Hugh Smith via OfTwoMinds blog,

A rebalancing of the economy and society will ultimately prove very positive, but first we must navigate the model collapse of insane financial extremes.

I’ve endeavored to explain how self-referential models veer into hallucinations that are accepted as accurate reflections of the real world. Models are by definition synthetic abstractions of the real world, and as these “train” on their own output, they drift away from authentic understanding without the users being aware that their “world” is both artificial and self-reinforcing: each iteration reinforces their belief in the model’s accuracy.

Patient users of AI programs can force AI to admit its output was a hallucination, at which point AI tends to abjectly apologize. But human pride–especially strong among those with high opinions of their intelligence and mastery of life–precludes recognition of catastrophic error (i.e. believing in a hallucination) and apologizing for the error.

Human hubris leads us to double-down when faced with evidence we’ve placed our faith in a hallucination. We deny that our system/model is a self-reinforcing hallucination even as we go over the falls. The faint cries of “save me!” are short-lived.

Models collapse from their own internal dynamics. They don’t need our approval. Our disapproval doesn’t stop their collapse. Our choices boil down to 1) go over the falls as models collapse; 2) snap out of the hallucination or 3) enter the netherworld of hyper-normalization, the state of mind where we embrace two contradictory “truths”: the hallucination is forever and we’re not surprised when it collapses.

Model collapse manifests in many ways: people and systems break down. Anti-social behaviors become normalized, and extremes are accepted as normal as we habituate to dysfunction and breakdowns.

I call this Anti-Progress: what we’re sold as “progress” actually reduces our quality of life. In my book The Mythology of Progress, I describe Progress as a powerful mythology, but it can also be understood as a model that is collapsing into a hallucination we cling to with hubristic tenacity.

In everyday life, these extremes manifest as Ultra-Processed Life, a synthetic world in which artificial substitutes have replaced authentic life and experiences because the model increases profits via unhealthy addictions in both the consumer and digital realms.

But people break down in this Mouse Utopia of ultra-processed abundance, and the model’s self-reinforcing iterations veer ever farther from authentic experiences.

Which brings us to my latest podcast with Richard Bonugli, Insane Financial Imbalances and a Social Revolution (36:34 min). The word “insane” is jarring, for the dominant model of the global order holds that financial extremes are not just sane, they’re proof that all is well, and so calling these extremes “insane” is what’s insane.

This is classic model collapse: up until the point of breakdown, the model seems to be functioning perfectly, because being self-referential, there is no other possible output other than the system is performing nominally.

In my new book Investing In Revolution, I describe the two structural flaws in the current model: 1) due to its success in generating abundance, the model’s adaptive capacity has decayed, leaving it incapable of adapting to rapidly changing real-world conditions, and 2) the dominance of the financial model has fatally imbalanced society and the economy, an extreme imbalance that will be rebalanced by the pendulum swinging to the opposite extreme.

I call this systemically predictable rebalancing a social revolution, as meet the new boss, same as the old boss is no longer sufficient: the values and incentives that maintain a sustainable balance between society and the economy must change. This Reformation is not financial or political, it is fundamentally social in nature.

This imbalance is visible in the widening divide between the share of the economy going to labor and capital: wage earners’ share has been declining for decades, reducing their capacity to afford a secure quality of life without piling up debt:

The earnings generated by ownership of capital go mostly to the very top of the wealth-power pyramid: the majority of income from capital flows to the top 0.25%, with the rest dribbling down to the top 5%.

The bottom 50%’s share of financial assets amounts to signal noise–2.6%.

This imbalance is so extreme that it will catalyze social disorder, yet to call it unsustainable is “insane.”

The health of the non-elites has reached crisis levels, yet this too is unremarkable because the model has a “solution”: more costly medications that must be taken for life: highly profitable, so all is well.

The hallucination that this is all wonderfully sustainable reveals the dominance of the financial model of how the world works. That society is breaking down is of no concern because natural gas is so abundant that we can easily power up AI data centers, and GDP is rising.

The problem is we only manage what we measure, and all the financial analysis “trains” on its own output. Those staring at screens of soaring stocks and corporate profits declare this is the best possible world while the social order breaks down around them.

A rebalancing of the economy and society will ultimately prove very positive, but first we must navigate the model collapse of insane financial extremes, extremes that are unrecognized in the current hallucination. The collision of the self-reinforcing hallucination with the real world will be challenging.

If we accept that the dominant models have lost their capacity to adapt, and that the imbalance between economic forces and society have reached extremes that demand rebalancing, we can return to the real world in good order. If we cling to the hallucination, then over the falls we will go.

*  *  *

My new book Investing In Revolution is available at a 10% discount ($18 for the paperback, $24 for the hardcover and $8.95 for the ebook edition). Introduction (free) Check out my updated Books and Films. Become a $3/month patron of my work via patreon.com. Subscribe to my Substack for free

Sometimes comedians fall flat, especially when they write jokes about a recently murdered person without understanding the fundamental facts of their life.  Is it possible to make comedy about a recent assassination and be legitimately funny?  Probably.  However, Chappelle missed a golden opportunity to expose some truth and instead tried to play it safe and ride the political fence. 

In Chappelle’s latest Netflix comedy special entitled “The Unstoppable”, the comedian touched on the issue of Kirk’s murder but never provided any profound insights.  He did try to put himself in Kirk’s shoes, admitting his fears that he could end up in the same position due to his criticisms of trans ideology.

“This is another reason it’s hard to talk in America, ’cause, you know, if you talk for a living and see Charlie Kirk get murdered that way, I’m gonna be honest, ni*ga, I was shook. I mean, Charlie Kirk is the wholesome white guy, and they killed this motherfucker.”  

“…When all the information was still shoddy, they came out, they were like, ‘Apparently, there were transgender messages inscribed on the bullets.’ I was like, ‘Oh no! I’m dead as fried chicken!’”

The brass cases were actually inscribed with Antifa slogans and a “furry” meme, though the prime suspect, Tyler Robinson, is a far-left gay man who was living with his transgender boyfriend at the time.  According to the charging record, Robinson’s conservative parents confronted him about the killing and said that he confessed to committing the crime.  They convinced him to surrender to police after he indicated he might commit suicide.    

It’s unfortunate that Chappelle so carefully avoided the elephant in the room by ignoring this fact, as well as the widespread celebration among leftists over Kirk’s death.

In the wake of the event there was a relentless progressive propaganda campaign designed to misinform the American public that Tyler Robinson is a “MAGA conservative” instead of a gay leftist.  This culminated in a propaganda screed by another “comedian”, Jimmy Kimmel, who used his network platform to spread the same falsehoods.  Chappelle defended Kimmel instead of acknowledging why his show was punished by the network. 

Like Kirk, Chappelle also faced an attack when a gay man carrying a knife rushed him on stage because of a routine about transgender people.  The comedian says he is now fearful of going on stage and being killed.

“My voice has become more powerful than I intended it to be, and I cannot let these n*ggas do me like Charlie Kirk. Or even worse than that, what if these n*ggas trip me up somehow, co-opt me, and then make me say the things that they want me to say? We can’t have that.”

Chappelle also claimed that “white people” compared Charlie Kirk to Martin Luther King, and then he mocked the notion. 

Dave Chappelle trashes Charlie Kirk in his new standup special, acting like Charlie was purely an online influencer instead of someone who toured and shared his message in person and amplified those IRL interactions via social media pic.twitter.com/h1fA6v6yWb

— Breitbart News (@BreitbartNews) December 20, 2025

Critics argue that comparing Kirk to MLK was never an actual point of contention among conservatives (or white people in general) and that Chappelle has constructed a strawman to pander to liberals and “centrists.” 

Chappelle calls Kirk an “internet personality” and seems completely oblivious to his numerous campus talks and the size and scope of the Turning Point USA movement.  If there are any similarities (beyond assassination) between MLK and Kirk, it is that they both engaged with the public and students regularly on college campuses to defend their ideals. 

And, if we’re talking about religious devotion or Christian virtue, at least Kirk was faithful to his wife.  MLK was a notorious adulterer.

It should be mentioned that Charlie Kirk defended Dave Chappelle’s comedy routines on the transgender issue when Chappelle was facing career cancellation by the political left.  He also condemned the lack of charges against the man who attacked Chappelle onstage, warning that it would encourage further political violence. 

Dave Chappelle exposes the truth about trans as only he can. This is brilliant. WATCH: pic.twitter.com/bV71LaM6E1

— Charlie Kirk (@charliekirk11) January 1, 2024

The very idea that comedians today have a fear of violent reprisal for political jokes shows that, unfortunately, assassinations can be very effective in squelching free speech simply by compelling people to self censor.  Leftists know this well, it’s the reason they cheered for Kirk’s death and called for more killings. 

Chappelle, like most celebrities, may be greatly overestimating his political influence.  If Charlie Kirk is no MLK, then Dave Chappelle is definitely no Charlie Kirk.  That said, the weak response by public figures like Chappelle against the political left’s violence only emboldens them.   

Authored by Jonathan Turley,

More than five years ago, I wrote in these pages of a growing trend on the left toward compelled speech – the forcing of citizens to repeat approved views and values. It is an all-too-familiar pattern. Once a faction assumes power, it will often first seek to censor opposing views and then compel the endorsement of approved views.

This week, some of those efforts faced setbacks and challenges in blue states like Washington and Illinois.

In Washington state, many have developed what seems a certain appetite for compelled speech. 

For example, Democrats recently pushed through legislation that would have compelled priests and other clerics to rat out congregants who confessed to certain criminal acts.

Despite objections from many of us that the law was flagrantly unconstitutional, the Democratic-controlled legislature and Democratic governor pushed it through.

The Catholic Church responded to the enactment by telling priests that any compliance would lead to their excommunication.

U.S. District Court Judge Iain D. Johnston enjoined the law, and the Trump Administration sued the state over its effort to turn priests into sacramental snitches. Only after losing in court did the state drop its efforts.

In the meantime, the University of Washington has been fighting to punish professors who refuse to conform to its own orthodox values. In 2022, Professor Stuart Reges triggered a firestorm when he refused to attach a prewritten “Indigenous land acknowledgement” statement to his course syllabi. Such statements are often accompanied by inclusive and tolerant language of fostering different viewpoints in an academic community. However, when Reges decided to write his own land acknowledgment, university administrators dropped any pretense of tolerance.

Reges was not willing to copy and paste onto his syllabus a statement in favor of the indigenous land claim of “the Coast Salish peoples of this land, the land which touches the shared waters of all tribes and bands within the Suquamish, Tulalip, and Muckleshoot nations.” Instead, he wrote, “I acknowledge that by the labor theory of property, the Coast Salish people can claim historical ownership of almost none of the land currently occupied by the University of Washington.”

His reference to the labor theory is a nod to John Locke, who believed in natural rights, including the right to property created through one’s labor.

In my forthcoming book, “Rage and the Republic: The Unfinished Story of the American Revolution,” I explore the foundations of the American Republic, including the influence of Locke. The Framers would have been appalled by efforts to compel speech as an example of “democratic despotism.”  The Framers saw the greatest danger to our system as coming not from a tyrant but the tyranny of the majority.

Reges came face-to-face with the rage of a majority faction defied. He was told that although the university land acknowledgment was optional, his own acknowledgment was not allowed because it contributed to “a toxic environment.”

This week, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit ruled in Reges’s favor and allowed his lawsuit to move forward.

Judge Daniel Bress wrote that “student discomfort with a professor’s views can prompt discussion and disapproval. But this discomfort is not grounds for the university retaliating against the professor.”

Reges’s lawsuit, brought with the help of the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression, is a major victory for free speech.

However, the desire to both silence and compel speech continues to grow in tandem.

In Illinois, Democrats have taken up the cudgel of compelled speech on the issue of abortion. Again, over objection that the law was unconstitutional, Democrats and Gov. JB Pritzker passed a law that said that all healthcare providers, including pro-life and religious pregnancy help centers, must extoll to their patients the “benefits” of abortion, even if they have faith-based objections to abortion.

The Catholic Conference of Illinois and other religious organizations are represented by the Becket Fund, a leading defender of religious liberty in the courts.

A district court recently struck down the law, but Illinois refuses to give up. It is appealing the case in the hope of forcing pro-life health professionals to espouse the benefits of abortions.

Cardinal Blase Cupich, Chicago’s archbishop, warned this week that “The Church’s pro-life mission is under attack in Illinois” and called on every Catholic to oppose “this inhumane mandate.”

Note that neither the constitutional guarantee of free speech nor that of free exercise deterred these efforts to compel speech.

It is the very face of democratic despotism as the majority brushes aside disfavored views and values as “toxic” or “harmful.”

It shows how, 250 years after our founding, the seeds for majoritarian tyranny remain in this (like in any) democratic system.

Jonathan Turley is the Shapiro Professor of Public Interest Law at George Washington University. He is the author of the forthcoming “Rage and the Republic: The Unfinished Story of the American Revolution” on the 250th anniversary of the American Revolution.

Authored by Jacki Thrapp via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) and the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) announced two pilot programs on Dec. 19, as the Trump administration tests new ways to lower out-of-pocket drug costs for Americans on Medicare.

The first pilot program, Guarding U.S. Medicare Against Rising Drug Costs (GUARD), would apply an alternative approach to calculating prescription drugs for people on Medicare.

GUARD will examine drug prices in other countries, and if the United States discovers a drugmaker is charging more for the item in America, it may have to pay the government back.

The United States will reference prices in Australia, Austria, Belgium, Canada, the Czech Republic, Denmark, France, Germany, Ireland, Israel, Italy, Japan, the Netherlands, Norway, South Korea, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, and the United Kingdom.

“Existing research finds that the prices of drugs sold in the United States are much higher than the prices of the same drugs sold in other countries,” the pilot program stated.

“One study finds that overall, the U.S. health care system spends substantially more on outpatient drugs for older adults with complex conditions, such as heart failure, diabetes, and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), who are mostly covered by Medicare, than 11 other economically similar countries (including, for example, Australia, France, Germany, Canada, and the United Kingdom).”

The GUARD model would include drugs like antidepressants, antivirals, blood glucose regulators, cardiovascular agents, and gastrointestinal agents.

Spending on Medicare Part D drugs doubled in less than a decade, ballooning from $121 billion in 2014 to $276 billion in 2023, according to the Medicare Payment Advisory Commission (MedPAC).

The GUARD model would begin on Jan. 1, 2027, and end on Dec. 31, 2033. The “payment period” would be extended through December 2035.

The second test program, called Global Benchmark for Efficient Drug Pricing (GLOBE), will examine global price data to set patients’ out-of-pocket costs for certain drugs included in Medicare Part B, which would impact costs for treatments related to cancer, autoimmune diseases, eye disorders, and hormonal conditions.

GLOBE will launch on Oct. 1, 2026, and run through 2031.

The Dec. 19 announcement came as the Trump administration also said nine drugmakers had agreed to lower prescription drug costs in America.

“This represents the greatest victory for patient affordability in the history of American health care, by far, and every single American will benefit,” Trump said alongside health care executives at a ceremony inside the Roosevelt Room on Dec. 19.

“So, this is the biggest thing ever to happen on drug pricing and on health care. This will have a tremendous impact on health care itself.”

Reuters contributed to this report.

A Russian general was killed early Monday after a bomb detonated beneath his car in southern Moscow, Russian law enforcement officials have announced. The hugely provocative act, which was likely either carried out by Ukrainian operatives or allied Western intelligence (or both) marks the third killing of a high-ranking defense official over the past year.

The slain senior officer has been identified Lieutenant General Fanil Sarvarov, 56, who headed the General Staff’s operational training department. He initially survived the blast but soon after succumbed to his injuries.

Investigators released video showing a severely damaged white Kia Sorento in a residential parking area near apartment blocks in Moscow’s Orekhovo-Borisovo Yuzhnoye district. The doors were shown to be blown out and debris was strewn everywhere.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov later indicated that President Vladimir Putin was informed of Sarvarov’s death immediately.

BBC describes that Sarvarov “previously took part in combat operations during the Ossetian-Ingush conflict and the Chechen wars in the 1990s and early 2000s, and also led operations in Syria between 2015-2016.”

As for the investigation at the scene, The Moscow Times cites officials who say they are “assessing whether Ukrainian intelligence services could be linked to the incident. Ukraine, which has previously acknowledged carrying out similar attacks inside Russia, did not immediately comment.”

This adds to a growing list of high profile assassinations related to the Ukraine war. To review:

—Darya Dugina was killed in a car bombing in 2022 which was likely meant for her father, prominent political thinker and often dubbed “Putin ally” Aleksandr Dugin.

—Gen Igor Kirillov died in December 2024 outside of his residence when a bomb planted in a nearby scooter detonated.

—Gen Yaroslav Moskalik, who served as deputy head of the Main Operations Directorate of the General Staff of the Russian Armed Forces, was killed in a car bomb attack last April. A “homemade” explosive device detonated under his Volkswagen Golf in a residential neighborhood.

Throughout the course of the war there’s been a string of these high profile assassinations on Russian soil involving car and even cafe bombs.

Footage from the scene of Monday’s car bomb attack, which marks the third such covert hit of a top Russian officer in a year:

Russia’s Investigative Committee says a car bomb in Moscow has killed a Russian general https://t.co/kajpAQoa2L pic.twitter.com/XmWXf1H8qq

— Reuters (@Reuters) December 22, 2025

The cafe bombing had happened in April 2023, and killed prominent pro-Kremlin blogger and war correspondent Vladlen Tatarsky. The blast at a St. Petersburg cafe during a close-quarters speaking event wounded some two dozen bystanders, six of them critically.

America’s CIA or Britain’s MI6 has long been suspected of being involved in these targeted killings, or at least assisting in such brazen Ukrainian-linked operations, but ultimately little has been uncovered or proven in terms of a potential Western hidden hand in this ongoing ‘dirty war’.

Authored by Daniel Lacalle,

One year into Donald Trump’s new presidency, the verdict from the data is clear: the apocalyptic consensus forecasts have failed, and the United States stands as the only major developed economy combining strong growth, controlled inflation and fiscal consolidation.

The same analysts and institutions that applauded massive stimulus, monetary excess and regulatory excess under the previous The same analysts and institutions that applauded massive stimulus, monetary excess, and regulatory excess under the previous administration now struggle to explain why the U.S. economy, which they expected to sink into stagflation, is instead outperforming all of its G7 peers. Furthermore, the U.S. peers that followed net-zero, big government and big tax policies are in secular stagnation.

From the “tariff tantrum” to a global surprise

When Trump announced his new wave of tariffs and trade policy, much of the global consensus rushed to predict a disaster. I called it the tariff tantrum. Commentators warned of an inflation surge beyond 2021 levels, 6%–7% Treasury yields, collapsing investment, a recession, and a world turning its back on the United States in favour of supposedly more responsible governments in Europe.​

Twelve months later, none of those predictions materialised. Instead, the U.S. 10-year yield has fallen to 4.1%; the U.S. is the only G7 economy growing robustly, while those nations that doubled down on hyperregulation, aggressive climate‑driven restrictions, high taxes and ever‑bigger government spending are stuck in stagnation despite enjoying a very positive tailwind of low oil and gas prices.

The “tariff tantrum” never became the structural shock that critics announced, because tariffs—however debatable on other grounds—do not cause inflation because they do not add currency units to the economy; uncontrolled public spending and monetary excess do. ​

Growth, investment and a rare fiscal adjustment.

The performance of the U.S. economy in 2025 is extraordinary not just in relative terms, but on its own merits. Real GDP is growing by around 3.8%, with the Atlanta Fed tracking roughly 3.5% annualised in the third quarter, and private investment is expanding at close to double-digit rates. Crucially, this improvement is happening while federal spending is being cut, not expanded as in other peers: public expenditure has fallen by about 3% over the year instead of disguising poor growth with unproductive federal outlays. ​

All international institutions have had to adjust quickly. The IMF, which initially projected a much weaker performance, now expects U.S. growth of about 2.1% in 2026, and several major research houses have revised their forecasts for 2025 up to around 2.5%, after initially warning of zero or even negative growth. Some economists have publicly acknowledged that the profession misread both the resilience of the U.S. private sector and the real impact of the tariff shock, admitting that from January onwards the consensus The consensus was consistently incorrect about the direction of the economy. ​

The most important factor is that the American expansion is not due to another wave of debt-fuelled political spending but rather to the recovery of the private sector, investment, trade, and productivity. In a world where most developed nations’ governments responded to every problem with more spending, more debt and more regulation, the new U.S. strategy creates a significant difference, and the results are much better. ​

Inflation under control

The most significant deviation from the consensus narrative came from inflation. The Keynesian consensus that saw no inflation risk in 2021 when government spending and money supply were soaring unanimously warned in early 2025 that tariffs would push inflation to new annual highs, even above the peaks seen under the previous administration. Instead, by November the consumer price index stands at about 2.7%, below prior expectations of 3.0% and galaxies away from the 6–7% ruin scenario sold to the public. ​

Core inflation tells the same story. The underlying index, excluding food and energy, is running at around 2.6%, significantly lower than in September and October 2024, when the same commentators enthusiastically defended the Biden‑era mix of giant spending and rapid Fed rate cuts. Over the twelve months to November, the all‑items index has risen 2.7%, after 3.0% in the previous twelve‑month period, and core inflation has increased just 2.6%. There is no sign of a tariff‑induced inflation wave in aggregate prices, only the inertia from the debt and spending binge inherited in 2024.

If anything, the trajectory suggests that as final data come in—particularly for food and energy components—the reported CPI could end up even lower. Independent analysis shows a 2.5% inflation estimate for November.

The lesson is clear: it was never tariffs that drove the global inflation spike, but a combination of uncontrolled fiscal expansion and central banks monetising deficits. The U.S. experience in 2025 proved this point once again. ​

Deficit, debt, and the politics of discipline.

While many advanced economies continue to drift into deeper deficits and higher debt, the U.S. has managed a rare success: combining growth with early signs of fiscal consolidation. The federal deficit has fallen by roughly 22%, from about 2.07 trillion dollars in November 2024 to approximately 1.6 trillion a year later, thanks to a mix of higher tax and trade revenues and spending cuts. Measured as a share of GDP, the deficit has dropped from a disastrous 7.1% inherited from the previous administration to an estimated 5.9%. Considering that almost 97% of the 2025 budget was already spent when the Trump administration took office, due to prior spending decisions and the continuation bills approved in 2024, the deficit reduction is even more commendable. ​

The reduction has been accompanied by a major tax reform. Trump has implemented the largest tax cut in decades, bringing the tax wedge on families below 30%, according to estimates from the Tax Foundation. In most OECD economies, policy has been the opposite: higher taxes on work and capital, justified by short‑term revenue needs but negative for investment and productivity.

On the spending side, the numbers are even more remarkable given the starting point. The new administration inherited a budget almost fully pre‑committed. Continuation bills and prior decisions had already locked in around 97% of federal spending. However, federal outlays still fell by 5.6% in the first quarter of 2025 and 5.3% in the second, with total public spending down 3.1% in the first half of the year. Trump has ordered an 8% cut in federal spending for 2026, signalling that fiscal adjustments are a core policy priority.

Debt dynamics are also encouraging. The new administration took office with federal debt around 36.22 trillion dollars and a legacy of 100% of GDP in committed but unfunded liabilities and roughly 1.5 trillion in previously approved obligations. Despite this poisoned inheritance, the debt has stabilised and edged slightly down to about 36.21 trillion, while the debt‑to‑GDP ratio has declined from roughly 122% to 120%, according to the Federal Reserve and independent analysis figures. Even a modest reversal sends a powerful message. ​

Labour market: native workers improve, and government and immigration shrink.

The labour market picture may be the least understood aspect of the U.S. turnaround. November’s employment report shows the best month for native private‑sector employment in absolute, seasonally adjusted terms since 2015, with real wages rising and a clear shift away from public employment and low‑productivity jobs fuelled by uncontrolled immigration. Weekly real wages are up about 0.8% over the year, and workers in middle- and lower-income categories see real gains of roughly 1.4%. Net real wages after taxes are rising at the fastest pace in years.​

The unemployment rate stands at 4.6%, higher than in Canada, the UK, France, Italy and the Eurozone average.

According to household survey data, native employment has increased from around 130.6 million in November 2024 to 133.3 million a year later—an addition of roughly 2.63 million jobs. Over the same period, foreign employment has fallen modestly, by about 21,000, and total public‑sector employment has dropped by 188,000.

This change—more native private-sector jobs and fewer government- and immigration-dependent jobs—is a huge difference compared with Canada, the UK, or most European economies, where employment gains include large public-sector and heavily subsidised job increases. The U.S. experience shows that a combination of deregulation, tax cuts and stricter control of public payrolls can still deliver better jobs and higher real wages for domestic workers. ​

Trade deals have been a success.

The evidence contradicts the notion that tariffs would destroy America’s position in global trade. The previous administration left behind a massive trade deficit—around 79.8 billion dollars in November 2024, seasonally adjusted, according to the Bureau of Economic Analysis. By September 2025, that deficit had fallen to roughly 52.8 billion, a reduction of about one-third compared with a year earlier. ​

The combination of targeted tariffs, renegotiated trade agreements, and a clearer defence of domestic industry has improved trade flows without triggering the inflation explosion that many had predicted.

Other improvements that matter.

The Trump administration has moved strongly on several fronts: banning central bank digital currencies, rolling back “woke” regulatory and freedom-of-speech limits, healthcare reform, and committing to scrap ten regulations for every new one approved. In foreign policy, Washington has pushed for a peace agreement in Gaza, a more realistic path to a solution in Ukraine based on pressure and sanctions on Russia, and stronger support for the return to democracy in countries like Venezuela. ​

The message for conservatives and centrists in Europe and Latin America is strong: If you want growth, jobs, and lower inflation, you cannot simply replicate the bureaucratic, high-tax, high-regulation model that has left much of the developed world stuck in secular stagnation. Trump may not fit the traditional label of a “classical liberal”, but the results of his first year in office show what a truly reformist conservative government can achieve.

For many in the international policy establishment, the uncomfortable reality is that the United States has delivered what others merely promised: stronger growth, controlled inflation, a narrower deficit, a better labour market for domestic workers, and initial stabilisation of debt. This has been achieved not by expanding the state and suppressing price signals, but by cutting taxes, reducing public spending, deregulating and trusting the private sector to respond. ​

Other advanced economies chose a different strategy: more bureaucracy, higher spending, and aggressive climate and social agendas financed with debt and taxes, and now find themselves in stagnation and a private sector recession despite favourable international energy prices reducing import expenses. ​

One year of Trump’s new term does not guarantee future success, and risks remain—from global shocks to central bank missteps—but it already offers an empirical challenge to the Keynesian consensus recommendations. If the U.S. had followed the net zero, big government and high tax policy suggestions of the mainstream consensus, it would now be in a disastrous fiscal and growth position, and inflation would be much higher, as the UK proves.