Venezuela

Labels like "Terrorist" or "Drug Supplier" come in handy when nations want to attack someone. 

The invention of “Venezuela drugs”

Trump - Corruption

The Clintons and Bidens were pikers compared the the Trump clan. 

Trump’s Latest Crypto Play Is His Biggest and Most Corrupt Yet

The entire Trump family just cashed in on another big cryptocurrency payday. This Labor Day, the digital-assets firm World Liberty Financial—which the president’s three sons co-founded just a year ago—launched a public sale of its flagship WLFI tokens, spurring $1 billion worth of trades on popular crypto exchanges like Coinbase, Kraken, and Binance (all of whose founders have ties with the current administration). Collectively, the Trump family already holds billions of World Liberty coins, and the public trading—carried out mostly overseas and involving few retail traders—boosted the value of those tokens. Per the Wall Street Journal, the four male Trumps involved made as much as $5 billion on Monday, in what was “most likely the biggest financial success for the president’s family since the inauguration.” 

Drill Baby Drill

U.S. Oil Patch Sheds Jobs as Producers Face Weaker Prices

Chevron, which bought Hess Corporation for $53 billion, has said it would reduce its workforce by 20% by the end of 2026 as part of wide cost cuts. This includes 800 jobs in the Permian.

ConocoPhillips, which acquired Marathon Oil Corporation last year, plans to slash workforce numbers by up to 25% across functions and geographies to simplify the organization and cut costs.

Various industry associations have also flagged reduced job numbers in the U.S. oil patch, although they remain generally upbeat about the future prospects of the sector.

Yet, the number of oil and gas upstream jobs in Texas and total U.S. oilfield service jobs has dropped in recent months amid lower oil prices and slowing drilling activity.

Data from the Texas Workforce Commission showed upstream oil and natural gas employment fell by 1,400 in July compared to June, the Texas Oil & Gas Association (TXOGA) said in August.

June’s job loss has been revised to 1,500—less severe than the previously estimated 2,700. Despite declines over the past two months, year-to-date growth remains positive at 4,300 upstream jobs, TXOGA noted. 

 

Charlie Kirk

I was brought up to believe that in the US we believed in live and let live. People did their own thing and we all came together in the belief that that freedom was what made America great. 

People like Charlie Kirk, Christian Nationalists and the current administration believe that if you don't believe what they do, you are somehow inferior and need to be brought to submission. 

That is un-American.  

Kirk was not good for America but killing him was not good for America.

As my old economics teacher used to say, "We can do better" 

I think I'll go play with my dog. She likes people. 

 

A few links. 

Cancel Culture 

People being cancelled for talking about him in way that doesn't satisfy our conservative overlords.

Matthew Dowd’s firing begins flood of people facing consequences for their comments on Kirk’s death  

Mouthy Bullies 

A Dangerous Moment 

 Violence is the enemy of democracy. But so is its dishonest exploitation. To defend democracy now means not only mourning the dead but resisting those who would use their deaths to destroy what remains of our republic.

The National Bully 

 ICE is Eating the Soul of America

International Bully

Israel has attacked six countries in the past 72 hours

Trump - The Globe

Trump and Netanyahu are destroying our credibility around the globe. 

'Find some other partners': Qatar reviewing security pact with US after Israeli attack - report

Qatar was reviewing its security partnership with the United States following the Israeli strikes on its capital targeting Hamas leaders, Axios reported on Thursday.

According to the report, Qatari Prime Minister Mohammed bin Abdulrahman bin Jassim Al Thani informed the White House that Doha considers the attack an "act of betrayal" by Washington.

Furthermore, Thani reportedly told Special Envoy Steve Witkoff Qatar would conduct "a deep evaluation of its security partnership" with the US, "and maybe find some other partners," Axios reported, citing a source with direct knowledge.

 

 

 

Trump - The Secret

I'd like someone to ask Trump about those wonderful secrets?

"A pal is a wonderful thing. Happy Birthday - and may every day be another wonderful secret." 

 

Trump - Lies #2

They lie about everything. 

Trump is used to shaking off criticism - but the Epstein story is different

"The president did not write this letter, he did not sign this letter, and that's why the president's external legal team is pursuing litigation against the Wall Street Journal," White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said on Tuesday.  

Whoops!

 

 

Trump - Lies

They lie about everything.

Karoline Leavitt says they contacted Qatar before the terrorist act.

But ... 

Qatar denies White House claim Trump sent warning before Israel’s attack 

However, Qatar refuted the characterisation, with a spokesperson for Qatar’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs saying claims that the government had been “pre-informed of the attack are completely false”.

“The call that was received from an American official came during the sound of the explosions that resulted from the Israeli attack in Doha,” Majed al-Ansari wrote in a statement on X.

Qatar’s Foreign Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani said the call from the US came ten minutes after the attack began, describing the incident as “state terrorism”. 

 

 

 

South of The Border

The growing Israeli foothold in South America: Three new battlegrounds

Argentina has become Tel Aviv’s forward base, Bolivia faces the prospect of reversal, and Chile could soon follow. What happens in these three states will decide whether the occupation state cements a durable presence in Latin America, or whether a resurgent continental resistance closes the door on its ambitions. 

 

Milei's party just lost Argentina's recent election so that could be a setback. The loss seems to be more about economic policy and not Israel-Palestine but Milei is a staunch supported of Israel so that policy could be tempered.

Milei, to his credit, didn't scream "stolen election" or "hoax" unlike his buddy Trump.

Milei conceded that his right-wing party’s crushing 13-point loss to his populist rivals represented “a clear defeat.”

“We suffered a setback, and we must accept it responsibly,” Milei told grim-faced supporters at the party headquarters, his tone reflective, even chastened.

“If we’ve made political mistakes, we’re going to internalize them, we’re going to process them, we’re going to modify our actions,” he said.  

Argentina President Milei suffers crushing defeat in Buenos Aires provincial election

The US took care of Bolivia, seems to have Chile under control at the moment and are working on Venezuela. I'm sure Brazil is in the lawless Trump regime's sights too.

JD Vance: I don’t care if strike on Venezuela drug boat is war crime  

 

Vibes

The Vibes are Broken

I've seen this a lot since COVID-2020. The notion that people must be optimistic about the economy since they are starting new businesses at record pace. 

Roger Lowenstein wrote an op-ed in the Journal about American exceptionalism. He says last year one out of every 24 household registered a new business application. You don’t start a new buisness if you’re worried about the future or hard work.

Look at this chart:

New business applications have exploded since the pandemic while sentiment has dropped to the floor.

Which one should we trust more — people’s feelings or their actions? 

I suspect there are a couple things going on here instead of just "confidence in the economy". 

First, the spike in new businesses right after COVID. This could have been workers who had been laid-off starting businesses of their own just trying to pay the bills. They certainly weren't optimistic at that time. Another likely cause is a lot of LLCs were formed just to scam some of the free COVID money the Trump Administration was throwing around.

My guess is the continued increase after 2021 is due to working people discovering that single person LLCs are a great way to lower your taxes and remove liability from any business. Do the same thing you were doing but inside an LLC and get away with more money and no liability.  

I think these have a much better chance of being true than that people are just so confident in the economy.