Monday, June 1, 2026

Just Waiting

 Pensive,


  There is a lot of  change stacked up, which will impact us suddenly, and everybody is just going on normally until something happens, if I might summarize so succinctly, what I see all around me. Well, gas prices came down this past week,  so summer vacation plans can go ahead and proceed.
  This feels unnatural to me, and maybe a little unnatural to a lot of people, but just behaving habitually is working for now, so ... 
I don't know just what plans our shadowy puppet masters have to present as solutions to the coming crisis, but I presume that they won't "let it go to waste".

Gold & Geopolitics, Daily digest: 2026-06-01
The "ceasefire" stopped pretending: overnight the US struck Iranian radar at Goruk and Qeshm and a telecom tower at Sirik, and Iran answered with a ballistic missile on a US base in Kuwait4 US service members and 3 contractors wounded
​  On top of that, Iran's president handed in his resignation and Konstantinovka's defense collapsed. Markets, naturally, shrugged: the Shiller PE (price: earnings ratio) is within 3.5% of the dot-com record, oil is bid but paper stays capped, and Trump ordered the first physical Fort Knox audit in 70 years.
​  US and Iran now openly trading strikes mid-"ceasefire." CENTCOM confirmed "self-defense strikes" on Iranian radar/drone command sites at Goruk and Qeshm over the weekend, plus a Sirik (Bandar Sirik) telecom tower; IRGC says it then hit the airbase the attack launched from.​..
​..Iran's President Pezeshkian submits his resignation, saying the IRGC has taken over and the government is excluded from decisions. Khamenei's acceptance unclear; Iranian state-aligned voices call the framing "fake news."​   https://no1sdailydigest.substack.com/p/daily-digest-2026-06-01

  Gold & Geopolitics, Daily digest: 2026-05-31
The "deal is done" story inverted overnight: Trump swapped his blockade-lifted claim for "tougher terms" (uranium limits, denuclearization, Hormuz guarantees) while Iran's IRGC declared it now controls all Strait traffic "with full authority" — and shot down a US drone over its own waters early Sunday. 
​  On the ground, Konstantinovka has largely fallen, and Japanese crude reserves just posted the biggest drawdown in the country's history. 
Continuation underneath it all: record tech concentration, the Fort-Knox-reval​uation chorus, and a US consumer running on fumes.​..
​..IRGC declares "full authority" over all Strait of Hormuz traffic — vessels must obtain permission and use designated routes or be "targeted." Khatam al-Anbiya statement via MenchOsint, First Squawk. Iran separately says 20 ships transited in 24h.​.. 
​..Iran's state-TV MOU text has Tehran deciding the route and fees — the opposite of "return to normal." Don Durrett's one-liner captures the gap: "USA: the Strait has to return to normal. Iran: we now control the Strait. Media: they're close to signing."
​  The $300B reparations number drew open mockery — $70B to bomb, $300B to rebuild, with analysts calling Trump "an idiot" for it. Unconfirmed figure, treat as a circulating claim.​..

​..Kuwaiti base: Iranian missile injured 5 US troops, damaged 2 MQ-9 Reapers. CENTCOM called it a "successful interception​"; MenchOsint and Armchair Warlord say a Fateh-110 actually hit, "intercepted" by two Reapers parked on the tarmac. Drop Site notes Kuwait's documented pattern of blaming "falling shards." ​...
​..Physical oil shortages have begun, per Chevron's CEO — rationing and shortened workweeks already in some Asian markets, US distillate at a 23-year low, ~1bn barrels missing..​. Backed by record Japanese crude drawdown and Goldman's "demand destruction" warning.​.
​..Tech now 37% of the S&P 500 — past the 2000 dot-com peak. Hedgeye and Kobeissi, who adds tech equals 91% of US GDP and 41 AI stocks drove 70¢ of every dollar added since ChatGPT.​..
​..S&P 500 just made 9 straight weekly gains, longest since 2023; meme and high-short-interest names having their sharpest run since 2021; hedge-fund gross exposure at the 100th percentile; implied correlation at a record low. Goldman's read: "all greed, no fear."​...
​..Real disposable income -1.1% YoY, biggest drop since Oct 2022; savings rate down to 2.6%, lowest since 2022, on the 12th straight month of spending outpacing income.
​  Home foreclosures soared 26%
in Q1. Don Durrett, flat: "the consumer is broke."​...
​..The Fort-Knox-audit-then-revalue narrative is now near-daily — GoldTelegraph pricing the reserve at $667B, maneco64 framing reval as "the ultimate debt-crisis solution," Don Durrett noting the US "just began filling its SWF."
​  The most concrete datapoint: John Macintosh via SilverSeek — the US flipped from net silver importer (~19Moz/mo) to net exporter (~35Moz/mo), a 54Moz/mo swing, with the only coherent explanation being US-China rare-earth payments settled in gold and silver rather than dollars.​..
..F-15 downed by a Chinese shoulder-launched missile, plus a China-supplied stealth-spotting radar, per NBC via Mario Nawfal — "complicates US-China relations." Unverified, but a notable escalation if true...
​..Pakistan replacing the UAE as Iran's import/transit hub — 2-3hr overland routing, 45-55% lower freight cost, plus LNG/oil moving to China and Pakistan by rail. Sanctions-evasion architecture forming..​.
​  Bessent's "we outright grabbed the wallets" ($1B Iranian crypto) reframed as a feature, not Iran-specific — Kathleen Tyson and Ben Norton argue it's the Tether/USDT teardown that was always coming under the stablecoin plan.​   
https://no1sdailydigest.substack.com/p/daily-digest-2026-05-31

​  Gold & Geopolitics, Daily digest: 2026-05-30
The Iran "deal" went from Axios leak to full pantomime: Trump posted explicit demands on Truth Social, declared the naval blockade lifted, then convened a 2-hour Situation Room meeting that ended with no decision — while Iran rejected every clause within hours
​  Two genuinely new items: Romania's president admitted the Galati drone was a Russian Geran diverted by Ukrainian air defence, and Bessent boasted of "outright grabbing" $1B in Iranian crypto wallets. Everything else is continuation with a sharper edge — oil-shock warnings from Exxon AND Chevron, an S&P blow-off top, and Hezbollah turning Merkavas into scrap.​   https://no1sdailydigest.substack.com/p/daily-digest-2026-05-30

​  Gold & Geopolitics,  Daily digest: 2026-05-29
Russian drone strikes NATO member Romania. A Geran-type drone entered Romanian airspace overnight and hit a 10th-floor apartment in Galati, near the Ukrainian border. Full explosive payload detonated. Two people lightly injured, ~70 evacuated. Romania scrambled F-16s with authorization to engage. Romanian Defense Ministry confirmed the strike.​..
​..Iran-US escalation cycle intensifies despite "ceasefire." US struck near Bandar Abbas; IRGC retaliated against a US airbase in Kuwait; Iran fired warning shots at four vessels attempting to cross Hormuz; Iran shot down a US drone. Vance says Trump is "not yet ready" to endorse the Iran deal, citing distance on uranium enrichment..​.
​..Israel bombs Beirut after month of quiet — 14 dead. IDF struck targets across Lebanon including Beirut, breaking a month-long lull. Evacuation orders now cover 20% of Lebanon, with more than half north of the Litani. Spain called it "completely unacceptable".​..
​..Blue Origin's New Glenn rocket explodes on Florida launchpad. The rocket, intended to launch Amazon Leo network satellites, detonated at Cape Canaveral. Amazon says satellites were not yet loaded. Bezos says all personnel safe, "we'll rebuild". SpaceX remains the only operational competitor.​..
​..Pentagon positioned to attack Cuba, awaiting Trump's go-ahead. Per Politico, the US has spent months positioning troops and weapons. USS Nimitz and Iwo Jima are off Cuba's coast, though analysts note the carrier lacks a full air wing, suggesting posturing over imminent ops.​   
https://no1sdailydigest.substack.com/p/daily-digest-2026-05-29

​  Intercepted Iranian Missile Injures 5 Americans At Kuwaiti Air Base; Tehran Identifies Two Key MOU Sticking Points
Iran is pushing forward legislation formalizing control/management of Hormuz Strait shipping, which flies in the face of Trump warnings & conditions.
​  An Iranian Fateh-110 short-range ballistic missile targeted Kuwait's Ali Al Salem Air Base, a key operational hub for the U.S. Air Force. BBG says missile intercepted, but falling debris struck part of the base, injuring five Americans.
​  Two more American drones reported destroyed or damaged in the Kuwait base attack (DropSite/BBG).
Iran says two big MOU agreement issues remain & are not finalized: Unfreezing of Assets & Sanctions, Nuclear File​   
https://www.zerohedge.com/markets/intercepted-iranian-missile-damages-us-reaper-drones-injures-five-kuwaiti-air-base

​   Trump Toughens Terms Of Iran Deal Framework, As Bessent Pinpoints Tehran's 'Big Mistake'
Israeli PM Netanyahu says he has "instructed the Israeli military to expand the maneuver in Lebanon" after the occupation of the strategic Beaufort Castle, which he says marks "a dramatic change" in Israel’s operations.​   https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/trump-tightens-terms-iran-deal-framework-bessent-pinpoints-tehrans-big-mistake

Israel Seizes Crusader Beaufort Castle, Marking Deepest Plunge Into Lebanon In Decades​   https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/israel-seizes-crusader-beaufort-castle-marking-deepest-plunge-lebanon-decades

​  Missiles Rain Down On Northern Israel In Large Hezbollah 'Revenge' Operation​   
Northern Israel has come under heavy attack from Hezbollah on Saturday, after this past week a full-scale war has resumed in southern Lebanon, which even saw the resumption of Israeli airstrikes on Beirut's southern suburbs, much further to the north.
​  Even while Tel Aviv maintains the illusion of a ceasefire with Lebanon (as in, its government and national army), there is no ceasefire with Iran-linked Hezbollah, following weeks of sporadic drones being sent on northern Israel, as well as troop positions of invading IDF forces.​   
https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/missiles-rain-down-northern-israel-large-hezbollah-revenge-operation

​  Hezbollah vs IDF at Ramim outpost: 2x FPV drones deliver 2x RPG anti-tank warheads vs 2x IDF Iron Dome air defence missile firing units at IDF border base on 23 May; two of 15 Iron Dome launchers targeted in this war.   https://x.com/jonelmer/status/2060204095391031600

​  The Strait of Hormuz is within the territorial waters of both Iran and Oman. Bessent Warns Oman On Hormuz Toll Scheme, After Trump Threatened To 'Blow Up' US Ally   https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/bessent-warns-oman-hormuz-tolls-after-trump-threatened-blow-us-ally

  A new global energy and finance system will need to be worked out, as all the destroyed infrastructure is rebuilt.  Oil's Peace Dividend Is Real, But Normalization Is Not A Light Switch   https://www.zerohedge.com/energy/oils-peace-dividend-real-normalization-not-light-switch

Huh?!  Congress Quietly Moves To Intertwine US, Israeli Militaries On Formal Level   https://www.zerohedge.com/military/congress-quietly-moves-intertwine-us-israeli-militaries-formal-level

​  Ukraine killed 21 Russian students and lied about it: What really happened in Starobelsk
Ukrainian diplomats attempted to dismiss the tragedy as “a fake story” as Russian parents mourned their children​   
https://web.archive.org/web/20260530084900/https://www.rt.com/russia/640743-ukraine-lied-starobelsk-recap/

​  They mean military command centers, not the Parliament/Rada: Russian Officials Walk-Back Threats of 'Systematic' Devastation of Kiev 'Decision-Making Centers'?   https://simplicius76.substack.com/p/russian-officials-walk-back-threats

It was electronically hijacked into Romania by Ukraine: NATO Condemns Russia After Drone Smashes Into Romanian Apartments: 'Grave Escalation'   https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/nato-condemns-russia-after-drone-smashes-romanian-apartments-grave-escalation

   Russia Strikes Back: Euroclear appeals immediate enforcement of $256 bln Central Bank ruling
 Euroclear has filed a complaint with the Moscow Arbitration Court against the immediate enforcement of a ruling to recover 18.2 trillion rubles ($256 bln) under a lawsuit by the Central Bank, a source familiar with the proceedings told TASS.

​  According to the source, the complaint against the immediate enforcement of the ruling to recover funds under the Bank of Russia lawsuit was filed this week.   
​  In December 2025, the Bank of Russia filed a lawsuit against Euroclear in the Moscow Arbitration Court for 18.2 trillion rubles ($256 bln), amid the European Union's plans to use frozen Russian assets to finance Ukraine. This amount includes frozen funds, the value of blocked securities, and lost profits.
https://tass.com/economy/2139077

​  Russia, Afghanistan sign military cooperation deal in Moscow
The deal was signed at the International Security Forum, during which Russian officials demanded a US release of Afghanistan’s frozen assets
​  Shoigu urged western countries to release Afghanistan’s frozen assets and take responsibility for the country’s reconstruction during the event.“We are convinced that western countries must unfreeze frozen Afghan assets, fully acknowledge their full responsibility for their 20-year presence in Afghanistan, and assume the entire burden of post-conflict reconstruction of the country,” Shoigu said.
​  One day later, on 28 May, Russia’s Deputy Defense Minister Vasily Osmakov met with Yaqoob in Moscow to discuss regional security and potential bilateral military cooperation.
​  According to the ministry, the two sides addressed security issues in Central and South Asia, as well as the outlook for cooperation between their armed forces, including areas of military collaboration.​   
https://thecradle.co/articles/russia-afghanistan-sign-military-cooperation-deal-in-moscow

​  Manufacturing Consent for Trump’s Invasion of Cuba
The US seriously takes the position that we can impose (strained invocations of) US rules against terrorism and engage in extrajudicial seizures, as in kidnapping. The article below describes how we are now putting a lot of weight on the thin reed of enforcing Batista-era property rights.​   https://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2026/05/manufacturing-consent-for-trumps-invasion-of-cuba.html

​  Richartd Revelstoke, on the power struggle between 4 visions of "capitalism", The Four-Clocks Problem
Building on the fracture of the Transnational Capitalist Class outlined in Chapter 1 and Chapter 2, this chapter examines the four clocks — decades (Davos), election cycles (Imperial Nationalists), product/civilizational arcs (Silicon Valley), and dynasties (State Capitalists) — and why their incompatibility produces a stalemate.
​  Davos plans in decades. Imperial Nationalists plan in election cycles. Silicon Valley plans in product cycles and civilizational arcs. State Capitalists plan in dynasties. These are not stylistic differences. 
​  Each faction’s temporal horizon is its theory of power. Davos believes power flows from coordinating long-horizon institutional commitments. Imperial Nationalists believe power is maintained and exercised by compressed transactional victories. Silicon Valley believes power flows from circumventing institutions altogether. State Capitalists believe power flows from outlasting opponents. Time is not what they disagree about. Time is the medium through which each faction theorizes power itself.​   https://www.themargins.ca/p/the-four-clocks-problem

​  Ellen Brown teases out Musk's "AI Abundance" scheme, which China is already having to deal with. Henry Ford paid his workers enough to buy Fords, but Robots don't get paid when they replace humans.  THE AI REVOLUTION: WHERE CAPITALISM MEETS SOCIALISM - The Abundance Paradigm, Part 2.   https://scheerpost.com/2026/05/26/the-ai-revolution-where-capitalism-meets-socialism-the-abundance-paradigm-part-2/

  The Honest Sorcerer, The AI Takeover Has Arrived...but it looks completely different from what we imagined
The stock and housing market crashes, as markets run out of buyers who still believe “the economy is booming” and it’s worth investing into.
​  The economy shrinks 10-15% to match the new supply-demand balance created by a lack of vital physical inputs on one side, and a lack of purchasing power on the other. Prices, trade flows and production volumes eventually stabilize, but at a permanently lower level. And while growth might eventually return, it will be wholly inadequate to raise economic activity back to its pre-war, pre-AI levels. Historians looking back on 2025 will say: that was the year when we passed peak global economic activity.​   
https://thehonestsorcerer.substack.com/p/the-ai-takeover-has-arrived

"The Real Part Of This Economy Is Not Doing Well": Ed Dowd Warns 'Just Wait 'Til The AI Bubble Bursts'​   https://www.zerohedge.com/economics/real-part-economy-not-doing-well-ed-dowd-warns-just-wait-til-ai-bubble-bursts

Yes, the CEO of Blackrock needs ALL the suckers: WATCH: Larry Fink Demands Access to Americans’ Savings, Pension Funds to Bankroll AI​   https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2026-05-28/watch-larry-fink-demands-access-americans-savings-pension-funds-bankroll-ai#google_vignette

​Meryl Nass MD on the efficiencies of AI-Technocracy: Patrick Wood and I discuss Trump's trip to China and the secret plans for Trump's World Order   https://merylnass.substack.com/p/patrick-wood-and-i-discuss-trumps

Escape Key, on the roots of AI-Technocracy:  Planning in the USSR - Nobody reads 1960s Soviet planning manuals in 2026. They should.   https://escapekey.substack.com/p/planning-in-the-ussr

Patrick Wood, Technocrats Using AI To Disappear Dissent Completely​ - How can we counter this?   https://patrickwood.substack.com/p/technocrats-using-ai-to-disappear

​  A researcher spent two years documenting what AI is doing to the way humans think. His conclusion fits in one sentence. 
AI is standardizing human thought. Across societies. Across cultures. Across generations. Simultaneously. At a scale no technology in history has ever achieved. 
​  The paper is called "The Impact of Artificial Intelligence on Human Thought." Published July 2025 on arXiv. Written by independent researcher Rénald Gesnot, categorized under Computers & Society and Human-Computer Interaction. It is not a benchmark paper. It is not a capability paper. 
​  It is something rarer — a systematic analysis of what happens to human cognition, creativity, and intellectual diversity when billions of people outsource their thinking to the same machine.​   https://x.com/iam_elias1/status/2050482315068109139

​"Poverty"? For Real? Not Pandemics?  What Are Americans Most Worried About?   https://www.zerohedge.com/personal-finance/what-are-americans-most-worried-about

  The US has totally bought into this. My wife, a school librarian sees these effects every day.  Norway gave an iPad to every student, and it nearly tanked its education system   https://www.yahoo.com/news/articles/norway-gave-ipad-every-student-180000736.html

​  UK’s Social Media Ban Trudges Ever Onward
The main talking point is that “social media is like cigarettes”. Everyone is saying that, it’s the meme of the day.
​  It’s a sentiment originally taken from a new report submitted to the consultation by the Academy of Medical Royal Colleges.Titled “Growing up in an online world”, it contains this hilarious line in the foreword:
…there is, I think, an overwhelming consensus that excessive screen time can harm children and young people and we need to call this out unflinchingly rather than passively wait for someone else to prove causation”.​..
​..Since all the proposed measures rely on age verification for enforcement, they all achieve the end goal: No more online anonymity, for kids or adults alike.
​  Debating the list is pointless, and making a choice counterproductive. It’s like choosing the colour of your electric chair: It makes no difference to the end result, but your entirely cosmetic choice lends tacit approval of the whole process.
​  We all know where this is going: Age gating everything, everywhere and then – eventually – digital ID.​   
https://off-guardian.org/2026/05/26/its-all-so-tiresome-uks-social-media-ban-trudges-ever-onward/

​  Professor Ugo Bardi continues to worry about modes of mass population reduction: The Age of Drones has Come: the End of Cities as We Know Them?
Never ask for whom the drone is coming, it is coming for thee.​   https://senecaeffect.substack.com/p/how-to-survive-at-the-time-of-drones

Immigrant Hordes Set Paris Ablaze Because Their Soccer Team Won​   https://www.zerohedge.com/political/immigrant-hordes-set-paris-ablaze-because-their-soccer-team-won

​  Le Pen leads every major rival in new French presidential runoff polling
Whether the National Rally's presidential candidate is Le Pen or Bardella, the party is in great shape​   
https://rmx.news/article/le-pen-leads-every-major-rival-in-new-french-presidential-runoff-polling/

​  Masters of "control narrative" took pen names, wrote "Josephus" and hammered-together the (approved) Bible: THE PISO FAMILY OF WRITERS
RULING ROYALTY OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE IN THE EARLIEST CENTURIES​   https://francesleader.substack.com/p/the-piso-family-of-writers

​  Well you can't just let people think it is ok to air that without comment, can you? British Ofcom Investigates Airing of Trump Interview Calling Climate Change a “Hoax”   https://jonathanturley.org/2026/05/29/british-ofcom-investigates-airing-of-trump-interview-calling-climate-change-a-hoax/#more-245298

  Paul Craig Roberts clarifies: Has President Trump Committed High Treason?
The principle right is free speech. It is the First Amendment, because without free speech it is impossible for citizens to hold government accountable for violation of the other protections from, and limits on, government power.
​  Trump’s affinity for Zionist Israel has led him into an act that violates his oath of office and possibly caused him to commit high treason against the United States.
​  Trump has created by executive order what in effect is a Sedition Act for Israel that prohibits United States citizens from using their First Amendment right to criticize Israel for the genocide of Palestine, the rape and torture of Palestinian prisoners, the destruction of Palestinian homes, villages, and olive groves by Israeli settlers who blatantly steal Palestinian land, assassinations of foreign leaders, undue influence over the U.S. legislative and executive branches, state governments, media, finance, and education, and wars of aggression against Middle Eastern countries. 
​  U.S. critics of Israel are not even permitted to complain about the Jewish Anti-defamation League’s slander, libel and defamation of them. For an American to complain of being defamed by Zionists is to risk punishment for anti-semitism.
​  To state it plainly, Trump and his acting attorney general have given priority to protecting Israel, a foreign government, over the First Amendment rights of U.S. citizens. Clearly, this means that Trump and his accommodating acting attorney general are serving a foreign interest by suspending without any right or authority to do so, the First Amendment rights guaranteed to U.S. citizens by the U.S. Constitution.​   
https://paulcraigroberts.org/has-president-trump-committed-high-treason/

​So Martial-law enforced by the IDF in the US next? Congress Quietly Moves To Intertwine US, Israeli Militaries On Formal Level   https://www.zerohedge.com/military/congress-quietly-moves-intertwine-us-israeli-militaries-formal-level

Congress established the Memorial to John F. Kennedy... Trump Blasts "Barack Hussein Obama Judge" After Kennedy Center Renovation Blocked   https://www.zerohedge.com/political/trump-blasts-judge-after-kennedy-center-renovation-blocked

As you've heard, and equal in value to 100 of 1990 $US:  US government prepares to print $250 note featuring Trump's face   https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/clypeyx6nemo

  Attorney John Klar explains that the FDA has to follow the law or the courts will reverse its findings. More ‘Forever Chemicals’ in Drinking Water? 
What Is the EPA Up To?  While the legacy media and some MAHA activists criticize a new approach by the EPA, it’s actually a shrewd and practical move.​   https://www.themahareport.com/p/more-forever-chemicals-in-drinking

​  Alex Krainer​ certainly remembers "Event 201" in October 2019,Pandemics and the march of totalitarianism (part 1 of 2)
The pandemics are pushed by the bankers. This report examines what their ultimate objectives are, and what we can do to defeat them.
​..The whole narrative about the plight of this cruise ship was as though it was crafted in the 19th century – a nearly complete, inexplicable radio silence. Even Jake Rosmarin’s updates after his damsel in distress call on 4 May, became minimal and telegraphic, matching almost word for word the updates issued by the ship’s operator, Oceanwide Expeditions, as though they compared notes to make sure that everybody stayed on the message.
 ​  Another oddity about this cruise was its improbable likeness with another ill-fated voyage. It was the fictitious, simulated voyage of a ship in the so-called, Polaris II exercise, the world’s biggest pandemic preparedness simulation. Polaris II was conducted in April 2026, just as the real MV Hondius was already traversing the Atlantic.
​  The simulation scenario involved a crew of researchers embarking on an expedition to the arctic and getting infected by a pathogen that emerged from the permafrost. In this scenario, the WHO jumped into action to reclaim its own relevance. They declared that mitigating the pandemic made global cooperation with the WHO essential, not optional.​   
https://alexkrainer.substack.com/p/pandemics-and-the-march-of-totalitarianism

Pandemics and the march of totalitarianism (part 2 of 2)​ - The pandemics and totalitarian rule go hand in glove, and their instigators are the bankers.
​  It may not be a coincidence that the COVID 19 pandemic came on the back of a gathering collapse in the banking sector. The Federal Reserve was forced to step into the REPO markets as the lender of last resort in September 2019 to bail out the banking system. This was the first such intervention since the 2008 Global Financial Crisis. When central banks step into the repo markets, that’s a sure sign that the system was on the verge of collapse...
..In 2021 the Fed set up a Standing Repo Facility which was on standby since the pandemic with nearly zero transactions until September of last year when it saw a sharp rise in activity. The Bank of England has been active in British repo markets since the summer of 2024 and the ECB has followed suit. ​  Last November, the ECB issued a stark warning that Euro zone banks must prepare for unprecedented shocks causing severe disruptions with far-reaching consequences for the financial system – their words, not mine.
​  If that is so, you might ask, what would the bankers need pandemics for? Well, there’s a lot you can do behind the smokescreen of emergencies that you couldn’t do in normal conditions, especially if those emergencies suspend the ordinary functioning of society. For example, you could lock people down and impose curfews to keep the risk of disruptive social uprisings under control.
​  You could also grant yourself massive bailout funds under the pretense of saving the economy and you can impose central bank digital currencies and other forms of draconian controls on the population under the guise of fighting the pandemic and keeping everyone safe. Some of those systems of control have already been developed.​..
..The bankers’ fingerprints on such plans can be found in a number of documents produced by the World Economic Forum under their Great Reset agenda. An early version of this plan was articulated in a document titled “Scenarios for the Future of Technology and International Development,” published by the Rockefeller Foundation in 2010.
​  On page 18, titled “Lock Step,” the document described their vision of the future as “A world of top-down government control and more authoritarian leadership, with limited innovation and growing citizen pushback.” The way they planned to usher this New Normal was a “pandemic the world had been anticipating for years…” Sure enough, we did get that “pandemic,” in 2020 along with the world of top-down government control and more authoritarian leadership.​   
https://alexkrainer.substack.com/p/pandemics-and-the-march-of-totalitarianism-1d6

​   What are the rights of a US Citizen? U.S. May Finally Allow Hantavirus-Exposed Americans to Leave Government-Mandated Biocontainment Facility — But Only Under 24/7 Surveillance - One locked-up passenger said: “This is not acceptable. We’re not f*cking criminals.”    https://www.thefocalpoints.com/p/us-may-finally-allow-hantavirus-exposed

  Cured by Chinese Acupuncture? NOOOO!!  Study Reports 96% Remission Rate of Alpha-Gal Syndrome with Novel Desensitization Technique
With nearly 500,000 Americans now affected by tick-induced meat allergy, a peer-reviewed study reports almost unbelievable results using Soliman Auricular Allergy Treatment (SAAT).​   https://www.thefocalpoints.com/p/study-reports-96-remission-rate-of

​  BREAKING: Largest Human Cancer Study of Ivermectin + Mebendazole Is Now PEER-REVIEWED and PUBLISHED in a Major Cancer Journal
84.4% of cancer
patients taking ivermectin + mebendazole for 6 months reported either CANCER DISAPPEARANCE, TUMOR REGRESSION, or CANCER STABILIZATION.​   
https://www.thefocalpoints.com/p/breaking-largest-human-cancer-study

​  Meryl Nass MD points out that African countries know the score: Some good news! A summary of the last week's WHA meeting reveals an energetic push by small nations for national health sovereignty, and less WHO governance
Worldwide, public health governance has lost its head of steam, thanks to many of us revealing its real intentions​    https://merylnass.substack.com/p/some-good-news-a-summary-of-the-last

​  Long rumored to be a US military bioweapon that got off the reservation: BREAKING: HHS Secretary Kennedy Announces Major Action to Combat Lyme Disease - The era of ‘gaslighting’ Americans suffering from Lyme disease and other tickborn illnesses is over, Kennedy said Friday   https://www.themahareport.com/p/breaking-hhs-secretary-kennedy-announces

  A Midwestern Doctor explains directive-question-polling: The Secret Poll That Almost Killed Vaccine Reform
A leaked poll exposes the propaganda techniques that were used to derail vaccine reform and also are used against us every single day
​  Since MAHA and RFK came into power, the pharmaceutical industry has disproportionately focused its lobbying on neutralizing vaccine safety reform, with a key tactic being to stall meaningful action until Trump’s term expires so everything can be quietly rolled back.
​  A central tool in this effort was a single poll conducted in late 2025, which concluded that vaccine skepticism is political suicide — results so dire they convinced the White House to shelve vaccine safety as a public issue until after the midterms.
​  However, 25 other polls told a starkly different story: institutional trust has collapsed to historic lows, clear majorities support vaccine safety research and liability reform, and three MAHA-allied polls found that championing vaccine reform made candidates more favorable to voters, not less — while the leading Senate opponent of RFK’s vaccine work just lost his primary with only 24.8% of the vote.
​  The Fabrizio poll achieved its outlier results through a series of deliberately biased design choices not present in earlier versions (which got opposite results).​   
https://www.midwesterndoctor.com/p/the-secret-poll-that-almost-killed

​  Jessica Rose Ph.D. tells the story in documented book-chapter-and-verse [SV40 sequence is carcinogenic]   From Baric's blueprint to SV40 and back again
Synthetic biology, dual-use research, and the illusion of biodefense​   https://jessicar.substack.com/p/from-barics-blueprint-to-sv40-and

​  Well then, it's ok to skip them? BREAKING: Study Finds Pediatric Flu Shots are a COMPLETE FAILURE
Study of an ENTIRE Spanish region (~400,000 people) found NO reduction in flu cases or hospitalizations after mass flu shot rollout to children 6 months to 5 years old.​   https://www.thefocalpoints.com/p/breaking-study-finds-pediatric-flu

​  Not "illegal" to overfill your oil 1/4 quart, clean the mass airflow sensor and throttle body, blow the dirt out of your air filter, or drive-ahead, minimizing use of gas pedal and brake. Useful short video: 17 “Illegal” Tricks That Instantly Make Your Car Run Better   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tkbhuiLUodw

  Kyle Young has done wide ranging research into how food grows, and is grown, with and without chemicals that kill weeds and soil bacteria. Glyphosate is almost a forever-chemical. Pillbugs are ok. Microbes, Glyphosate, Fertilizer, Famine and Pillbugs   https://secularheretic.substack.com/p/microbes-glyphosate-fertilizer-famine

  Climate Physicist Anastassia Makarieva, co-originator of the Biotic Pump Model: Atmosphere as a Steam Engine: New Results - I love my work!
I would like to communicate and share a very special mood I am now in — we have just completed a one-year job, finalized and submitted our paper, “Atmosphere as a Steam Engine.” It sheds so much light on the physics of the biotic pump, on condensation-induced atmospheric dynamics, and ultimately on how plants, by creating vapor, literally make the atmosphere do work. It is an accomplishment, a milestone. I am quietly proud and exceptionally satisfied.​    https://bioticregulation.substack.com/p/atmosphere-as-a-steam-engine-new

​Collecting Precipitation (pictured in morning garden after rain)


Thursday, May 28, 2026

Permanent Oil Crisis

 Fellow Earthlings,


  I've been busy with family and full-contact vegetable gardening, as summer begins, with the el-Nino promise of rain for Texas, already in evidence. I am putting in a new 24 ft. X 34 ft bed in the grass covered,and rooted clay soil of Yoakum, with a couple of hard workdays with lunch breaks on Saturday and again yesterday. The goal is to grow calories, which is what farmers do for us, in this case a spring harvest of Rye, and a fall-solstice harvest of black-eyed peas, managed in a "Regenerative Farming" paradigm, but with myself as grunt-labor, and a corded-electric roto-tiller I bought for initial bed prep, now in progress. We are going to have a boring-party with pot-luck dining and local Shiner beer at the Yoakum homestead on Saturday June 20 if the world doesn't end first.
  I agree with oil-man Art Berman's assessment that the Hormuz Crisis is being made permanent, a politically obscured control-valve on global real economy. Let's keep watching with the thought in mind that this is doing what it is supposed to do, throttling down global oil and natural gas consumption with a little bit of leeway, in an emergency context, which cannot really be changed politically, at least not as far as non-elites are concerned. It is inevitable. We have passed Peak-Oil + Gas-Liquids.

  Surplus Energy Economics, The looming crash - HOW THE PHYSICAL DERAILS THE FINANCIAL
Even if the flow of shipping through the Straits of Hormuz were to resume immediately – and there’s very little likelihood of that – more than enough damage has already been done to ensure that the economy will take a very big hit within a matter of months.
  This blow will initially be physical, not financial, though a severe financial crisis will follow swiftly in its wake.
  This is a physical event because it’s axiomatic – but it can’t, in these circumstances, be reiterated too often – that we cannot expect the banking system to lend energy and other raw materials into existence, or ask central bankers to conjure these resources, ex nihilo, out of the ether...
..“Money, having no intrinsic worth, commands value only in terms of those material products and services for which it can be exchanged”.
Money, then, is claim, and has no value in the absence of substance, and a severe loss of substance is now nailed on within a very short time...
..What this necessarily entails is a materially-triggered wholesale destruction of the excess claims created by the reckless financialisation of the Western economies...
..[Well, this will maximize the shock experienced by people...]  Most Western governments have totally failed. They have made no efforts to contain non-essential energy consumption. They have developed no ideas about how to prioritize vital over less important uses of energy. They have done nothing to prepare for rationing of energy and other necessities.
  Investors, meanwhile, have seen nothing anomalous about markets hitting new highs even as the material economy heads into a train-crash...

..Western leadership cadres seem to have two overriding priorities. Externally, the aim has been to continue Western (and largely American) hegemony over the rest of the world. At home, there’s been an absolute determination to sustain and widen differentials between a favoured minority and everybody else...
..Having narrowly failed to bring down the banking system in 2008, decision-makers seem to have spent the intervening years assiduously working to build a bigger and better crash. Importantly, financial crises are always the product of ambition triumphing over possibility to a point at which rationality flies out of the window...
..The mechanics of financial crashes are well understood. Easy access to credit is essential if investors are to lose more than they actually possess. Lax regulation helps, as does an ability to trade speculative investments as far away as possible from recognised exchanges.
  Ultimately, though, bubbles are psychological, and occur when a culture of greed so overwhelms prudence and reasoned appraisal that rational behaviour is over-ruled...
..In 1945, few people wanted to return to the “business as usual” of the Wall Street Crash, the Great Depression and the rise of political fanaticism. Keynes had given policymakers new tools for the management of what was then known as “the business cycle”.
  A desire to use the same organizational techniques which had won the war to “win the peace” led to the mixed economy of optimised private and public provision. The architecture of the post-war settlement – Bretton Woods, the World Bank and the IMF – might have been far from perfect, but it was well suited to a world in search of progress rather than regression.
  All of this, though, would have had limited results had it not been for energy transition. The impetus of coal, which had powered the industrial economy since its inception in the symbolic year of 1776, began to flag in the inter-war years, and the arrival of oil – and latterly of natural gas – reinvigorated the economy after 1945...
..Oil remained cheap and abundant when, in October 1973, a falling out between major consumers and leading producers distorted the market and created dislocating rises in crude prices.
  On the principle of ‘never let a good crisis go to waste’, opportunistic politicians succeeded in persuading the public that the traumas of the decade were caused, not by oil crises – as was in fact the case – but by “left-wing” government policies and “over-mighty” organised labour...
..Behind the scenes, though, what was actually happening was that the proportionate cost of energy supply – known here as the Energy Cost of Energy – was rising, because the benefits of reach and scale had been exhausted, and the new driver of costs was depletion.
  Though ECoEs began the 1990s at 3.0%, and reached only 4.2% by the end of the decade, this was a sufficient headwind to create the phenomenon known as “secular stagnation”...
..This necessarily led to the GFC of 2008-09, to which official responses amounted to adding “monetary adventurism” to the failed credit version...
..The psychological effect is known as “moral hazard”. What this means is that anyone who has once been rescued from the consequences of their mistakes or misfortunes becomes persuaded that such a rescue will be repeated if these conditions recur. This, in essence, is a licence to speculate.
  The social consequence of 2008 was that the policies then adopted favoured the owners of assets over everyone else...
..There were two big economic shifts associated with post-GFC policies.
One of these was the abandonment of market capitalism, an ascendancy overthrown, not by its established enemies, but by its erstwhile friends.
  Market capitalism is a system that has two basic requirements. The first is that governments mustn’t interfere with the ability of the markets to conduct price-discovery and to put a price on risk. The other is that investors must earn a sufficient real return on their capital.
  Once both of these precepts were abrogated, the neoliberal market-capitalist ascendancy was replaced by post-capitalist expediency.
  The second economic consequence of the 2008 policy choices has been rampant financialisation. In Surplus Energy Economics terms, what this means is the expansion of the amount of money attached to any given quantity of material economic substance...
..Financialisation preceded the collapse of the Roman, Spanish, Dutch and British empires...
..No ascendancy ever retires gracefully, and the false claims made now on the score of ‘infinite economic growth on a finite planet’ are two in number.
  The first is that we can use monetary tools to reinvigorate a flagging material economy. The claim nature of money makes this wholly illogical.
  The second is that the consequences of material economic finality can be circumvented using “limitless” technological innovation. This is fallacious because, far from being “limitless”, the potential of technology is contained within an envelope of possibility whose boundaries are set by the laws of physics and the characteristics of materials.   
https://surplusenergyeconomics.wordpress.com/2026/05/22/324-the-looming-crash/comment-page-1/#respond

  Alex Krainer advocates making informed choices. Economic growth or prosperity?
Not all economic growth is desirable. Ultimately it's about choices: what future do we want to build? We've no right to abdicate on making those choices because future depends on it.   https://alexkrainer.substack.com/p/economic-growth-or-prosperity

Simplicius, US Admits No Hormuz Plan B as Preparations for Next Wave Begin   https://simplicius76.substack.com/p/us-admits-no-hormuz-plan-b-as-preparations

Iran's Top Negotiating Team In Qatar 'For Talks To End War' - But Cautions Deal Signing 'Not Imminent'   https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/iran-says-us-peace-talks-hit-consensus-many-issues-no-final-deal-yet

US Launches "Self-Defense Strikes" Near Hormuz, Killing Several Iranian Personnel   https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/iran-says-us-peace-talks-hit-consensus-many-issues-no-final-deal-yet

Iran Vows 'Swift, Decisive' Revenge After Overnight US Port Attack, As Sides Seek Deal Allowing Each To 'Sell Their Narrative'   https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/iran-decries-us-ceasefire-violation-after-overnight-port-raid-insists-12bn-fund

  IRGC learns to talk-smack like Trump: White House Rejects 'Complete Fabrication' Of Peace Framework Reports From Iranian Side
IRGC keeping up the rhetoric: warns that Iran would "turn the area from Chabahar to Mahshahr into a graveyard for aggressors" if the ceasefire collapses.
  CENTCOM: "Clearly the Iranians are trying to hedge their bets here and put more pressure on the US."
Iranian president: "The main battleground today is the economic war."   
https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/tehran-pushes-draft-peace-framework-while-sidestepping-uranium-question-pezeshkian

  Gold & Geopolitics, Daily digest: 2026-05-27
"The purpose of a thing is what it does." - Strait of Hormuz: still closed, deal nowhere close - Oil supply crisis deepening beneath manipulated prices
  Chinese oil imports plunging to 10-year low for May while Indian imports surge to highest ever - Beijing effectively buffering the region per Javier Blas
Hormuz reopening timeline pushed to mid-August at earliest per JustDario
  Art Berman: "No Hormuz resolution ever" - flows return to 25-50% in 2027 with "crushing effects that will change the world forever"...
..Iran-US hostilities resume during "peace talks": US conducted overnight strikes on southern Iran and Iranian vessels near Hormuz. IRGC retaliated by shooting down a US MQ-9 Reaper drone and firing at an F-35 and RQ-4 in Iranian airspace. Iran's foreign ministry called it a "flagrant ceasefire violation" and vowed retaliation...
..Israel escalates ground operations in Lebanon beyond Blue Line: IDF began operations past its self-declared "Yellow Line" in southern Lebanon, ordered reserve call-ups. Netanyahu ordered "intensified blows". 70+ Hezbollah targets struck in 24 hours...
..US SPR approaching historic lows: Per @JustDario, current SPR at ~365mb after ~9mb weekly drawdown, roughly 10 days from all-time low (~347mb)...  Luke Gromen calls SPR releases "Nixonian price controls with better marketing"...
..Russia targets bunkers, not embassies, but warning is pro-forma: Russia warns all foreigners to evacuate Kyiv, announces systematic strikes: Russia's MFA ordered evacuation of Kyiv ahead of prolonged missile strikes on decision-making centers. Multiple NATO countries refused to withdraw embassies...
..Semiconductor melt-up accelerates into uncharted territory: Micron surged 19% to hit $1T market cap - was $70B just 12 months ago. SK Hynix passed $1T, Korean market up +100% YTD. SOX up 18% in a week...
..S&P 500 hits new ATH but the internals are rotten - 8 of past 12 record highs on negative breadth - more decliners than advancers
Median S&P stock carries 3% short interest - highest since late 2011 - Goldman's Armbrust: "SPX correlation vs every macro asset has broken down"    
https://no1sdailydigest.substack.com/p/daily-digest-2026-05-27

  Gold & Geopolitics, Daily digest: 2026-05-25
Iran-US deal in Schrödinger's state: simultaneously agreed, rejected, and collapsing. Trump announced deal "largely negotiated" Friday, then Saturday walked it back under Israeli pressure, posting a bomb image on Truth Social. Iran's Tasnim called reports of uranium handover "completely false". White House says no deal today, "could take several more days". Iran's Foreign Ministry confirmed 14-point MOU outline but says signing is not imminent. Both sides have completely different versions of the same memorandum. Oil crashed 4-5% on deal hopes, then Trump reversed tone. Sources say he's "completely backing away" under "extreme internal pressure from Israel and its US domestic allies"...
..S&P 500 futures hit all-time high, consumer sentiment at all-time low. "We've never seen a gap this wide between Wall Street and Main Street"...
..Strait of Hormuz: Day 86 closed. Iran established Persian Gulf Strait Authority demanding $2M/supertanker in yuan or crypto. Traffic at <10% of pre-war volume. Iran's Foreign Ministry says "management of the Strait belongs to coastal countries"...
..Five NATO countries blocked mandatory military aid for Ukraine - UK, France, Italy, Spain, Canada opposed Rutte's 0.25% GDP proposal...
..Oil supply crunch beneath the surface - Near-perfect correlation between oil prices and CPI per Kobeissi. Oil averaged ~$100/barrel for 79 days
  JustDario: Trump "cannot shut exports" of light crude without triggering refinery chaos globally. US SPR being drained at unprecedented rates and exported at lower prices...
..US fiscal/bond stress - 30Y Treasury yield hit 5.197%, highest since 2007 - Interest expense could hit 30% of government revenue by 2036 at 4.70% average 10Y yield
  For first time since 2023, US inflation rising faster than wage growth - real purchasing power declining...
..Hezbollah grinding IDF in South Lebanon - At least 2 Israeli soldiers killed on Saturday, 1 lost legs. 7+ wounded in Haddatha per helmet-cam footage
20+ FPV drones launched at occupation forces in single day - Hezbollah now using thermal imaging FPVs - Will Schryver: "US/Israel effectively naked against these things"...
..AI economics hitting reality - Microsoft reportedly told engineers to stop using Claude Code due to exploding costs. Uber's yearly AI budget destroyed by April...
..AI causing net US loss of 16,000 jobs/month per Goldman Sachs.   
https://no1sdailydigest.substack.com/p/daily-digest-2026-05-25

  West's current aggression stems from decline in influence, fear of competition — Lavrov
Sergey Lavrov also noted that "the financial and economic system led by the West after World War II can no longer function in a way that guarantees continued benefit for Western countries".    
https://tass.com/politics/2134231

  Charles Hugh Smith, Why Is Consumer Sentiment at Record Lows?
Consumer sentiment is at record lows because there is zero visibility on any real-world trends that would be positive for the bottom 90%.
  In previous lows in consumer sentiment, current economic conditions were unfavorable because the economy was in a recession. I’ve indicated the three major recessions of the past 50 years on the chart below: 1973-74 (energy crisis / inflation), 1980-82 (inflation, higher interest rates), and 2008-09 (housing bubble burst, subprime mortgage meltdown triggers Global Financial Crisis).
  The most important difference between then (1973-2009) and now is that average households could still afford to buy a house and have a family and now those are out of reach for a significant percentage of median-income urban households. In previous recessions, consumers suffering the effects of recession had visibility on evidence that once the economy improved, they would still be able to afford to buy a house and raise a family. This visibility wasn’t a top-down narrative bolstered by gamed statistics; it was visible across the entire spectrum of the economy.
  The truth few dare to recognize is there is no credible evidence that housing and having a family will return to being affordable for the majority in the foreseeable future.   
https://charleshughsmith.substack.com/p/why-is-consumer-sentiment-at-record

Gold & Geopolitics has entertaining analysis, "not financial advice" on the NVIDIA stock bubble: Last call on the most valuable company in the world   https://no01.substack.com/p/last-call

  "Smokescreen", whether Netanyahu is alive or an AI-ghost: Larry Johnson calls Trump's claim that he tell Netanyahu what to do a 'smokescreen'
Iran War has been stuck in a stalemate, with both sides taking a hardline stance to end the war   https://trendsinthenews.substack.com/p/larry-johnson-calls-trumps-claim

  "We" pay the bills for "their" genocides: US shoulders most of Israel’s missile defense effort, Pentagon assesses: Report
Washington deployed more than 200 Terminal High Altitude Area Defense interceptors to help defend Israel, nearly half of Pentagon’s entire stockpile   https://www.aa.com.tr/en/us-israel-iran-war/us-shoulders-most-of-israel-s-missile-defense-effort-pentagon-assesses-report/3945188

  AI-Ben-Gvir, just as effective? “Don’t Be Bothered by Their Screams”: Ben-Gvir Proudly Posts Video of Police Dragging Members of the Flotilla Team
A diplomatic firestorm has erupted and what began as another act of humiliation proudly broadcast by Itamar Ben-Gvir quickly spiraled into a rare global diplomatic backlash, with governments across Europe, North America, and beyond publicly condemning Israel’s treatment of Gaza flotilla activists. Britain’s Yvette Cooper said she was “truly appalled,” while Italy’s Giorgia Meloni called the footage “inadmissible.”
  Spain announced plans to ban Ben-Gvir from entering the country and push for wider European sanctions. France, Canada, Australia, Belgium, the Netherlands, Poland, Ireland, Denmark, Sweden, Luxembourg, Cyprus, Qatar, Turkey, South Korea, and top European Union officials all denounced the scenes as degrading, humiliating, illegal, or incompatible with democratic values. Several countries summoned Israeli ambassadors demanding explanations or apologies after footage showed activists zip-tied, dragged, and forced to kneel while Ben-Gvir mocked them online. Even figures inside Israel and allied diplomats distanced themselves from the spectacle, exposing just how politically toxic the images became on the world stage. But for many observers, the outrage also raised a darker question: if world leaders are only now reacting because Western citizens were humiliated on camera, what horrors have Palestinians endured for years outside the spotlight?   
https://scheerpost.com/2026/05/21/itamar-ben-gvir-turns-torture-into-a-public-spectacle-dont-be-bothered-by-their-screams/

Türkiye has called Israel's seizure of Gaza flotilla vessels piracy and banditry.   https://en.topwar.ru/283135-turcija-nazvala-zahvat-izrailem-sudov-flotilii-dlja-gazy-piratstvom-i-banditizmom.html

  Iran Destroyed Nearly $1 Billion Worth of US MQ-9 Reaper Drones
Despite the heavy losses, the chief of the US Air Force dubbed the MQ-9 the 'MVP' of the US-Israeli bombing campaign   
https://news.antiwar.com/2026/05/21/bloomberg-iran-destroyed-nearly-1-billion-worth-of-us-mq-9-reaper-drones/

  Last week: House Republicans Block Vote on Iran War Powers Resolution That Was Expected To Pass
The effort to pass an Iran War Powers Resolution is gaining momentum in both the House and Senate   https://news.antiwar.com/2026/05/21/house-republicans-block-vote-on-iran-war-powers-resolution-that-was-expected-to-pass/

  Or the plan is to just keep milking the Strait and letting a few ships through... US seeks to start new war, force Iran's surrender: chief negotiator
Chief negotiator Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf says the US is using economic pressure and a naval blockade to push Iran toward surrender and acceptance of its demands.   
https://www.trtworld.com/article/dd43a7b6df74

  ‘Over the Border It Was Okay to Be Crazy’: IDF Soldiers Tell About the Army’s Moral Decay in Lebanon
‘The feeling is that the IDF has become like an army of Vikings – they let soldiers loot so they’ll be happy and keep fighting,’ one soldier says.
  “The method was fixed. Every evening, after the sun set, the logistics unit’s convoy would enter. Their mission was to bring us supplies: food, oil, ammunition; whatever was needed.
  “But there was also an unofficial mission: to take out the loot, to unload the spoils at the outpost where the headquarters was, so it would be waiting for the soldiers when they went home.
  “The soldiers in the convoy, of course, weren’t suckers; they would take valuable items themselves. ‘Just choose what you want,’ they’d be told. And there was no shortage of things to loot.   
https://israelpalestinenews.org/over-the-border-it-was-okay-to-be-crazy-idf-soldiers-tell-about-the-armys-moral-decay-in-lebanon/

Israeli strike causes heavy damage to hospital in southern Lebanon - 2 killed in attack near Tebnine Hospital, Lebanese media says   https://www.aa.com.tr/en/middle-east/israeli-strike-causes-heavy-damage-to-hospital-in-southern-lebanon/3945113

  Lebanese accuse Israel of wiping their towns off the map
Lebanese mother-of-two Hala Farah is collecting photos and videos to preserve the memory of her hometown which, like many others along the southern border, has been completely destroyed by Israeli forces.
  Testimony from residents and officials, as well as satellite images and photographs taken by AFP journalists on both sides of the border, show widespread destruction in dozens of Lebanese towns and villages.   
https://www.arabnews.com/node/2644534/middle-east

  US Ambassador to Israel, Mike Huckabee tells Lebanese being bombed to thank Israel for seedless watermelons
The US ambassador to Israel has previously said Israel has the right to take over ‘all' of the Middle East   
https://www.middleeasteye.net/news/us-mike-huckabee-tells-lebanese-thank-israel-seedless-watermelons

Jewish settlers steal dozens of sheep, attack citizens and cars in W. Bank   https://english.palinfo.com/news/2026/05/21/363578/

  UN reports 125,000 skin infection cases in Gaza linked to rats and parasites - UN personnel dealing with 400 cases a day, urge timely delivery of medicines   https://www.aa.com.tr/en/middle-east/un-reports-125-000-skin-infection-cases-in-gaza-linked-to-rats-and-parasites/3944313

Autopsies of Gaza Medics Killed by Israeli Troops Show Some Were Shot in the Head   https://israelpalestinenews.org/autopsies-of-gaza-medics-killed-by-israeli-troops-show-some-were-shot-in-the-head-2/

  Hezbollah Seriously Wounds Commander of Brigade That Killed Hind Rajab — Highest-Ranking IDF Officer Hit Since October 2023 Colonel Meir Biderman, commander of the IDF’s 401st Armored Brigade, was seriously wounded Tuesday after a Hezbollah explosive drone penetrated a fortified building where he was operating between Dibl and Hadatha in south Lebanon, according to reporting from Israeli outlet Maariv cited by journalist Hala Jaber. 
  The drone detonated inside despite protective fortifications, leaving Biderman with serious head injuries. A lieutenant colonel was also wounded. The 401st Armored Brigade is the same unit whose “Vampire Empire” company is accused in a 120-page ICC complaint of deliberately targeting and killing six-year-old Hind Rajab, six members of her family, and two paramedics in Gaza City in January 2024.   https://x.com/DropSiteNews/status/2057213249012048005

  The Trump administration is threatening to revoke visas for the Palestinian delegation to the United Nations unless Palestinian Ambassador Riyad Mansour withdraws his candidacy for vice president of the U.N. General Assembly, according to an internal State Department cable obtained by NPR. 
  The May 19 cable reportedly instructed U.S. diplomats to pressure Palestinian officials to abandon the bid ahead of June 2 elections for one of the assembly’s 21 vice president posts. The cable described Mansour as someone with a “history of accusing Israel of genocide,” and warned his appointment would undermine Trump’s Gaza agenda.   https://x.com/DropSiteNews/status/2057288168248881633

  AIPAC does not reveal employee names, but... U.S.: New Data Highlights AIPAC Ties to the U.S., Israeli Governments
The data demonstrates a revolving door relationship between AIPAC and U.S. and Israeli governmental institutions, with dozens of current and former AIPAC staff having worked for Israeli or U.S. government bodies.   https://israelpalestinenews.org/u-s-new-data-highlights-aipac-ties-to-the-u-s-israeli-governments/

So "Never", as Art Berman predicts? Joe Kent: Trump can’t end war until Israel taken out of the loop   https://israelpalestinenews.org/joe-kent-trump-cant-end-war-until-israel-taken-out-of-the-loop/

  Syrian Girl on X: Must read article by British patriot Mark Collet on how Israel is ruining Britain’s legal system and the implication it will have for nationalists.
• Defendants banned from explaining their motives to juries • Political protest treated like extremism • Terror-style sentencing logic used in non-terror cases   
https://x.com/Partisangirl/status/2057381838625337579

Last week: "Drills Are Intended To Send A Signal": Russia Holds Massive Nuclear Drills On Land, Sea And Air Alongside Belarus   https://www.zerohedge.com/military/drills-are-intended-send-signal-russia-holds-massive-nuclear-drills-land-sea-and-air

  Tass, Russia uses Oreshnik weapon to strike Ukrainian military command posts
That was response to terrorist attacks by the Ukrainian military against civilian facilities located on the territory of the Russian Federation, the Russian Defense Ministry reported   https://tass.com/defense/2135791

Gilbert Doctorow thinks that it the time for Moscow to do decapitation strikes is long overdue. Moscow finally is blasting Kiev: where is the war headed?   https://gilbertdoctorow.substack.com/p/moscow-finally-is-blasting-kiev-where

  Simplicius, Russia Tells Western Diplomats to Flee Kiev, Announces Campaign of Prolonged Systematic Strikes on Capital City
In a turn of events that stunned the commentariat, the Russian MOD has officially announced that Russia will continue striking Kiev in a new ‘systematic’ campaign of hitting military-industrial enterprises and ‘decision-making centers’...
..But, is it possible that perhaps Russia is looking to finally escalate the war in a way that could change the calculus once and for all? It does appear to be oddly ‘coincidental’ that these rumors of a new operation from the north into Kiev happen to coincide with Russia’s own announcement that a new systematic measure of wasting Kiev’s decision-making centers and HQs...
..The simple fact that attacks on the decision-making centers was announced well in advance to give time for those ‘decision-makers’ themselves to take cover is probably revealing in this regard. At the same time, it seems unprecedented for Russia to warn diplomatic missions to evacuate Kiev, which would seem to imply major coming attacks in the very city center around Bankova and the Independence Square where most such diplomatic missions would presumably be clustered.   https://simplicius76.substack.com/p/russia-tells-western-diplomats-to

  Ukraine Donor Fatigue: Half Of Countries Withdraw From Czech Ammunition Initiative
Pavel said that while 18 countries participated last year, only nine are still making financial contributions now. "This initiative has been delivering up to 50 per cent of all large caliber ammunition to the Ukrainians, so in this sense it cannot be replaced easily by anything else."   https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/ukraine-donor-fatigue-half-countries-withdraw-czech-ammunition-initiative

A "threat" of radio-surveillance? Rubio: Cuba is a threat to the US because Russian and Chinese intelligence units are there   https://en.topwar.ru/283133-rubio-kuba-ugroza-dlja-ssha-tak-kak-tam-razvedpodrazdelenija-rossii-i-kitaja.html

  Russia condemns US attempt to 'economically suffocate' Cuba
Foreign Ministry spokeswoman says US claims of Cuba's alleged preparation to attack it 'provoke nothing but a laugh'   
https://www.aa.com.tr/en/americas/russia-condemns-us-attempt-to-economically-suffocate-cuba/3945182

;-( Russian Fuel Tanker Aborts Cuba Delivery After Drifting In Caribbean For A Month   https://www.zerohedge.com/energy/russian-fuel-tanker-gives-trying-supply-cuba-after-lingering-month-caribbean

  Rubio Says Chance of a ‘Peaceful Agreement’ With Cuba Is ‘Not High’
The comments come after the US indicted Cuba's former president, setting up a pretext for war   
https://news.antiwar.com/2026/05/21/rubio-says-chance-of-a-peaceful-agreement-with-cuba-is-not-high/

  Cuba accuses top US diplomat of instigating military aggression
Marco Rubio's lies once again to instigate a military aggression that would provoke the shedding of Cuban and American blood,' says foreign minister   
https://www.aa.com.tr/en/world/cuba-accuses-top-us-diplomat-of-instigating-military-aggression/3945132

  Trump says US wants to 'help' Cuba
President Donald Trump said Thursday the US is seeking to help the Cuban people and denied that the recent arrival of a US aircraft carrier near Cuba was intended to intimidate the government of the island nation.
  Speaking to reporters at the White House, Trump was asked whether the deployment of the carrier this week was meant as a warning to Havana.
“No, not at all,” Trump responded.
  “The Cubans -- look, it’s a failed country. Everybody knows that they don’t have electricity, they don’t have money, they don’t have really anything. They don’t have food, and we’re going to help them along, and we’re going to help them.”
  Trump said his administration’s approach to Cuba would focus on humanitarian concerns as well as strengthening ties with Cuban Americans in the US, particularly in the state of Florida.
  “Number one, I want to help them, I want to on a humanitarian basis, but we have the Cuban American population, much of it living in Miami and Florida, that’s a great group of people ... Trump added that his administration wants “to open it up to Cuban Americans where they can go back and help.”   
https://www.aa.com.tr/en/world/trump-says-us-wants-to-help-cuba/3945040

Revealed: USAID, NED & Open Society Quietly Bankroll Cuba’s “Independent” Media In Push for Regime Change   https://www.mintpressnews.com/revealed-usaid-ned-open-society-quietly-bankroll-cubas-independent-media-in-push-for-regime-change/290942/

  Thanks Mary: Danielle Smith’s Referendum Is Aimed at Carney, Not Alberta
Danielle Smith does not need Alberta to secede from Canada. She only needs to rock Mark Carney’s boat enough to sink his plans.
  On Thursday, May 21, the Alberta premier announced that the question of secession would join the October 19 provincial ballot. Not a vote to secede — a vote on whether the province should begin the legal process toward a future binding vote on secession. “A referendum to have a referendum,” as commentators have noted...

..This wasn’t aimed at the ballot box. It was aimed at Canada’s S&P AAA rating.
To see why, you have to look at what the Davos Man in Ottawa has spent the past six months building — and how it relates to the Capitalist Civil War quietly and sometimes loudly raging in the news every day. Mark Carney is the closest thing the Davos faction has to a head of state... he is transnational capital that parachuted into the prime minister’s office in Ottawa...
..Carney is building a European bunker with Canada, the EU-C, or Europe+1. This is what the Davos faction looks like when it loses. Not collapse — relocation. It abandons the soft power global commons and digs into a smaller territory it can actually hold — a hard power military industrial complex.
  Canada is leading the charge with the institutional crown jewel — a proposed Defence, Security and Resilience Bank (DSRB)— a multinational lender, modelled on the World Bank, pooling sovereign capital from dozens of allied states to raise $135 billion USD to finance the rearmament of the West...
..The bank works only if it can borrow cheaply, and it can only borrow cheaply if Canada can confirm rock-solid economic stability. The whole edifice of Carney’s retreat — the EU rapprochement, the DSRB, the middle-power coalition — runs on Canada’s AAA credit rating and national stability.
  This is the asset Danielle Smith is leveraging...
..Trump does not need to annex Alberta to win. He needs only to make the seas choppy enough to scuttle the ship. Every month of credible secession threat is a month of doubt priced into Canada’s standing, a month the DSRB’s backers spend wondering whether the host country can keep its own federation together. The threat is the weapon...
..Smith does not have to break Canada; she has to make it expensive to defend. The separatists do not have to win the referendum, they just have to ruin Carney’s variable geometry equation by adding some unstable coefficients so the numbers don’t add up to AAA rating...
..So the October ballot is not really a question about whether Alberta stays in Canada. It is a question about whether the Davos faction’s Europe+1 bunker is as defensible as its architect needs it to be. Smith has handed Carney a six-month ultimatum and it is running straight into the summer’s trade summits.
  The Canada Investment Summit In September 14–15, 2026 in Toronto, where Carney will pitch his variable geometry framework to anchor $1 trillion in direct foreign capital... but the reality is that it is Blackrock and Blackstone leading the packstateless asset-manager capital, the purest Davos-faction money there is — with the Gulf State sovereign funds right behind them...
..This is the Davos faction’s curse stated again. It needs buy-in even from money that has no loyalty to it. And every month Danielle Smith keeps a secession threat alive is a month that the calm waters look choppy — which is the whole point. The mercenaries chase stability. Smith’s only job is to make Canada look unstable enough that they keep their checkbooks closed until October.   https://substack.com/home/post/p-198863049

  "Whatever it takes": Morocco launches mass deportations to block Europe migration route
As the EU rolls out its new, stricter migration pact, Morocco intensifies crackdown and interceptions of sub-Saharan Africans at Europe’s behest   
https://www.middleeasteye.net/news/morocco-launches-mass-deportations-block-europe-migration-route

  Escape Key, Closing the Loop
Originally, the individual was the endpoint — five layers flowing one direction. What’s being built closes the loop. Your responses — purchases, movements, biometrics, votes, searches — feed back as data the system uses to adjust...
..The result is one clearing system operating at every scale from global to personal, with the same standards, verification and conditions applied to every actor. A jurisdiction, a sovereign, a corporation, a citizen — each routes through the same logic.
  The institutions keep their names, but the clearing function underneath them integrates...
..The system listens and adjusts. The voter hasn’t chosen a policy in the old sense. Rather, they’ve chosen a way to implement the same policy, yielding a parameter update in a continuous optimisation system. The next election produces new telemetry, and the system updates again. Replace Keir, and you receive the same policy outcome through different rhetoric.
  The institutional theatre’s preserved while the surrounding architecture runs continuously on indicator-driven adjustment. The vote keeps its visible form, but the work it performs has become data-generation. The voter who turns out at the ballot box perhaps feels they’re exercising democratic agency, but in the architecture, all they generate is a signal, which the system reads and adjusts its parameters. The next round of indicator-driven policy proceeds with the new parameters in place.
  This is what democracy becomes when the institutional theatre is preserved and the surrounding architecture is recoded to run on continuous feedback. It’s not abolished. It’s demoted from decision to input...

..But now that the citizen passes through the architecture’s clearing, they no longer count as subjects affecting the system — rather, they now count as objects the system processes. That system reads the citizen continuously. Their responses, including those framed as democratic votes, feed the system that determines what they’re permitted to do next.   https://escapekey.substack.com/p/the-loop-closes

  Tulsi Gabbard Resigns As Director Of National Intelligence
Tulsi Gabbard is stepping down from her role as Director of National Intelligence (DNI) to support her husband, Abraham, as he battles an extremely rare form of bone cancer... Her last day at the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) will be June 30, 2026.   https://www.zerohedge.com/markets/breaking-news-tulsi-gabbard-resigns-director-national-intelligence

Tulsi Gabbard Fired / Resigned A source familiar with the matter said that Gabbard had been forced out by the White House.   https://www.moonofalabama.org/2026/05/tulsi-gabbard-fired-resigned.html

​  How far can she get in June? DNI Gabbard presses to declassify secret but critical court opinion during FISA renewal debate
The court opinion is expected to detail concerns over how federal agencies have managed queries of Section 702 databases and whether internal guardrails designed to prevent abuse were circumvented, according to a senior intelligence official.​  https://justthenews.com/government/federal-agencies/dni-gabbard-pushing-declassify-secret-fisa-opinion-during-section-702

Tulsi Gabbard Teases Major Bombshells Before Leaving Trump Administration​   https://pjmedia.com/matt-margolis/2026/05/24/tulsi-gabbard-teases-major-bombshell-before-leaving-trump-administration-n4953206

​  BREAKING: In Minnesota, Dept. of Justice Charges 15 Suspects with $90 Million Medicaid Fraud
HHS Secretary Kennedy calls Thursday’s charges “the largest autism fraud bust in American history”​   
https://www.themahareport.com/p/breaking-in-minnesota-dept-of-justice

​  John Klar Esq. Is Grass-fed Beef Really Healthier than Grain-Fed Beef – And, if So, Why?
According to a variety of studies, the evidence favors grass-fed beef over its grain–fed competitor​   https://www.themahareport.com/p/is-grass-fed-beef-really-healthier

​  Vigilant Fox:  Across America, farmers are reporting scenes straight out of a nightmare, mysterious boxes of ticks appearing on rural properties while infestations explode at levels many say they’ve never witnessed before.
  Now those reports are colliding with documented Bill Gates-funded research into genetically modified ticks, growing fears over Alpha-Gal Syndrome, and scientific papers openly arguing it could be “morally good” to spread meat allergies through engineered tick populations. 
  Social media is flooding with horrifying footage of animals overwhelmed by massive tick swarms while officials wave the crisis away as “climate change.” 
  Meanwhile, more than 450,000 Americans are already suffering from Alpha-Gal Syndrome after tick bites, a condition with no cure that can trigger severe allergic reactions to red meat.   https://x.com/vigilantfox/status/2056885076793741695?s=43

​  Nicolas Hulscher, MPH STUDY: Tick-Borne Alpha-Gal Syndrome Incidence Skyrocketed 9,800% in the U.S. Since 2013
Tick-induced meat allergy incidence jumped 301% since 2021 alone, demanding an urgent investigation into past and present tick-related research and biowarfare programs.​   
https://www.thefocalpoints.com/p/study-tick-borne-alpha-gal-syndrome

​  2nd Smartest Guy, LYME & LONE STAR BIOWEAPON DISEASES UPDATE: Congressman Tim Burchett Confirms That Bill Gates Is Behind The Massive Increase In Ticks   https://www.2ndsmartestguyintheworld.com/p/lyme-and-lone-star-bioweapon-diseases

Paul Marik MD has more good reasons to drink green tea: EGCG: A Metabolic Weapon Hidden in Green Tea - A Tier 1 anti-cancer drug   https://substack.com/home/post/p-190195093

Paul Marik​ MD, Mebendazole: A Multi-Axis Metabolic Attack on Cancer​ - A Tier 1 anti cancer drug​   https://substack.com/home/post/p-190209237

  Steve Kirsch, As many as 2M Americans were seriously disabled by the COVID vaccine
I asked Claude Opus 4.7 to analyze the data because no public health official wants to know the numbers of COVID vaccine injured. Here are the results of that analysis.​  https://kirschsubstack.com/p/as-many-as-2m-americans-were-seriously

​  HHS to Rebuild Vaccine Advisory Panel as Deadline Nears to Review Next Season’s Flu, RSV Shots
HHS officials on Monday announced plans for the “re-establishment” of the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices
, admitting that an earlier attempt to renew the committee’s charter did not comply with updated federal advisory committee rules. The new notice emphasizes the need for “fairly balanced membership,” “balanced expertise” and broad outreach to identify nominees for the reconstituted committee.​   
https://childrenshealthdefense.org/defender/hhs-rebuild-vaccine-advisory-panel-deadline-nears-review-next-seasons-flu-rsv-shots/

​  Huh? A New Technological Paradigm? What UFO Disclosure Could Mean for Clean Energy, Human Consciousness, and Our Shared Future
Reported UFO/UAP craft are a profound gateway to entirely new technological paradigms. We draw on the most reputable, verifiable, and credible sources to help you make sense of this emerging issue.​..
​..We believe it’s important to notice these attractors and turning points in human consciousness and use them for good. How do we steward this transition? How do we ensure that breakthrough technologies serve life rather than control? And how do we translate these possibilities into shared abundance and wealth on a global level?
​  Still to this day, government narratives claim that no secret ET programs have existed. In our 33-min Speculation Station video, we look at everything from specific UFO technologies that have allegedly been recovered from crashes to how these other-worldly technologies might have helped accelerate the development of some human technologies.​   
https://substack.com/home/post/p-198728707

​Josh Mitteldorf, A Consciousness Field at the Foundation of Reality​ - review of a physics paper by Maria Stromme   https://mitteldorf.substack.com/p/a-consciousness-field-at-the-foundation

Conscious of Reality (rototilling 816 square feet the first time)