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Humanoid Robot Roundup: Tesla Kicks Off Optimus Pilot Production As Goldman Tours China's Supply Chain

Humanoid Robot Roundup: Tesla Kicks Off Optimus Pilot Production As Goldman Tours China's Supply Chain

At Tesla's annual shareholder meeting in Austin, Texas, on Thursday evening, more than 75% of investors approved Elon Musk's $1 trillion CEO Performance Award. The package is tied to ambitious milestones, including nationwide robotaxi deployment, large-scale production of the Optimus humanoid robot, and market-capitalization thresholds designed to align long-term value creation with Musk's strategic vision to dominate the 2030s by controlling the most advanced technologies.

A limited internal production of Optimus has already begun at Tesla's Fremont, California factory. The goal next year is to ramp up series production with an eventual goal of a million humanoid robots per year.  

"So we're going to launch on the fastest production ramp of any product of any large complex manufactured product ever, starting with building a one million unit production line in Fremont. And that's Line One. And then a 10-million-unit-per-year production line here (at Giga Texas). I don't know where we're going to put the one hundred million unit production line, maybe on Mars. But I think it's going to literally get to one hundred million a year, maybe even a billion a year," Musk told investors at the annual shareholder meeting yesterday

In October, we cited Chinese media that said Tesla placed a $685 million order for linear actuators from Sanhua Intelligent Controls, with deliveries expected to start early next year. 

Tesla is the leader and one of the few U.S. companies that can scale humanoid robot production ahead of the 2030s. 

We shift our attention to China, where rare-earth minerals and high-tech factories are plentiful, and find that a number of robot companies are gearing up for mass production. 

Goldman Sachs analyst Jacqueline Du spoke with a handful of Chinese companies embedded within the humanoid robot supply chain, including Sanhua, Tuopu, Rongtai, Shuanghuan, Minth, Joyson, Zhaowei, Best Precision, and Shuanglin. 

Du found that most of these companies are ramping up series production in China, Thailand, and to a lesser extent, Mexico. 

Here are Du's key takeaways after her meeting with these companies that provide clients with a snapshot of the humanoid robot space in China:

  • Most suppliers are actively planning capacity both in China and overseas (primarily in Thailand, and less in Mexico), to support potential humanoid robot mass production, though no company has yet confirmed sizable orders or definitive production timelines. Current capacity planning ranges from ~100k to 1mn robot equivalent units per year (which looks bullish on industry growth outlook vs GSe of 1.38mn units of global humanoid robot shipment by 2035E). Most firms intend to scale up gradually upon actual order placement and therefore not necessarily indicating an imminent oversupply risk but most supply chain companies have an optimistic forward-looking view on industry outlook;

  • Across the ecosystem, suppliers are broadening their product portfolios, evolving from single components to integrated modules, expanding product categories from actuators to sensors and structural parts, each targeting ambitious market share gains. It is quite evident that all of these companies that are more or less levered to the automobile industry appear eager to expand into robotics components in search of new growth engines and at the same time to better utilize their existing capacities with certain production synergies;

  • Many companies are aggressively showcasing their technical capabilities and scalable production readiness, emphasizing their rapid design-to-product turnaround, agile service as key comparative edge to secure and expand market share in the supply chain. We note mentions of robotics customers such as Tesla Optimus, Agibot, Leju, Xpeng, etc. which could suggest these companies are more likely the earlier ones which rely more on outside suppliers to kick start volume production of robots with timing commonly expected in 2H26E;

  • We remain constructive on long run humanoid robot technology trend but will need to monitor the key robot products performance and concrete end-applications to assess whether a technology inflection point will be near in sight. Key checkpoints afterwards are: 1) Tesla Optimus Gen 3 launch by Feb/Mar 2026; 2) Public disclosure of China/global humanoid robot companies' 2026E order/shipment targets by end-2025/early-2026. We are Buy rated on Sanhua H, Inovance and Shuanghuan; Neutral rated on Sanhua A, Leaderdrive, Best Precision and Moon's Electric under our coverage which are related to the humanoid robot space.

Our coverage has focused on the rise of humanoid and robodogs:

Give it until the 2030s before these bots start entering the average household.

ZeroHedge Pro subscribers can access the full note in the usual spot, including the analyst’s top bullish picks and detailed company breakdowns.

Tyler Durden Sun, 11/09/2025 - 08:45

BASF CEO: EU CO₂ Trading Is A "Destruction Mechanism" For European Industry

BASF CEO: EU CO₂ Trading Is A "Destruction Mechanism" For European Industry

Submitted by Thomas Kolbe

The roadmap is already set: in the coming years, the EU and its member states will make both businesses and consumers pay even more for CO₂ emissions. BASF CEO Markus Kamieth warns of the enormous destructive potential of this policy.

Truth comes on pigeon feet – Friedrich Nietzsche already knew that. And apparently, the same applies to European climate policy: slowly, but inevitably, the reality of the true costs of the green transformation and its impact on Germany’s industrial foundation is emerging.

On October 29, BASF’s CEO Markus Kamieth faced the press during the quarterly results presentation. What he announced was another cold shower for anyone still hoping for a new economic miracle.

Weak Results in a Stable Environment

The world’s largest chemical company reported a 3% decline in revenue in Q3 2025 compared to last year, while EBITDA fell by 5%. BASF is under massive pressure and has already cut 1,400 jobs to meet growing cost pressures.

BASF’s numbers have to be seen against the backdrop of a slowly recovering global economic cycle. Especially the U.S. economy, growing nearly 4%, is driving strong demand. Economies in China and India continue to expand dynamically, particularly in sectors critical to the chemical industry.

While the global economy gains momentum, BASF – like much of Germany’s chemical sector and the broader industry – continues to lose ground.

BASF CEO Markus Kamieth

The company’s main site in Ludwigshafen is hit hardest, leaving its 33,000 employees facing an uncertain future.

Criticism of the Climate Course

Kamieth was unexpectedly outspoken during the presentation. In addition to criticizing EU trade policy and rising energy costs in Germany, he struck at a rarely openly discussed wound: the EU’s climate policy.

Kamieth didn’t mince words, calling the European CO₂ emissions trading system (EU ETS 2) what it is: an attack on Europe’s industrial foundation.

For BASF alone, if the current climate course within CO₂ trading remains unchanged, annual additional costs of around €1 billion will arise from 2027 onward, when exemptions are removed – costs borne exclusively by European industry, while the rest of the world simply does not participate.

Kamieth hit a sore spot. EU industry is being financially squeezed by an ideologized CO₂ policy. Deindustrialization is – whether unspoken or suppressed – the result of Brussels’ policies and their national enforcers, whose only response to their self-inflicted disaster is ever-new subsidies.

Rare Criticism

Criticism of this centrally planned climate disaster for industry is rare. All the more remarkable are the unmistakable words of the BASF CEO – just two weeks after the sharp critique from Evonik CEO Christian Kullmann. Both direct their warnings to the same address: European isolationism in climate policy.

Kullmann also called for a comprehensive reform of CO₂ emissions trading – or even the complete abolition of the system. He openly called it “economic madness.”

Both CEOs understand global competition. And they know: nobody will follow the Brussels line.

Climate Club Increasingly Isolated

The global climate club is becoming increasingly isolated. At COP30 in Brazil, the U.S. exit from the Paris Agreement confirmed that even leading industrial nations no longer follow Europe’s push for CO₂ dominance.

This development exposes cracks in the belief in a solely CO₂-driven climate change – a signal European climate policy cannot conceal.

Both COP30 and the increasingly frequent EU climate summits reveal the lengths to which authorities go to prevent these doubts from taking root in public consciousness.

Too much is at stake: the gigantic CO₂ tax machine, which in the coming years is designed to funnel massive funds primarily to Brussels’ central EU apparatus.

Ironclad Media Curtain

The situation is similar to nuclear power. Behind an ironclad media curtain spun by the political-media complex around this energy source, the German public remains unaware that nuclear power is making a global comeback – aiming to nearly double capacity in the next three decades.

The silence in climate policy has been bought at a high price – through the climate redistribution machine, which increasingly restrains large parts of the economy.

The annual volume of CO₂ trading is set to nearly triple to around €100 billion in the coming years, plus CO₂ taxes and other climate levies that also hit consumers.

Consider, for instance, the flight levies that are literally wiping Germany off the map as a location for air travel.

Enormous Economic Losses

The actual capital misallocation forced by climate policy and lawmakers is difficult to quantify. We are dealing with a tangle of taxes, subsidies, fiscal advantages, hidden support, and price guarantees.

Yet, it is realistic to estimate that around 4–5% of GDP is being burned outside market mechanisms.

With the expansion of the trading system and the massive increase in climate subsidies, Germany will lose €150–200 billion in productive capital annually. It is therefore no exaggeration to call Brussels’ climate policy a poverty engine – one that is systematically draining Europe’s industrial base in global competition.

The EU has established a Climate Social Fund (CSF), initially equipped with around €10 billion per year, to support households and small businesses in the so-called green transformation. This shows Brussels is fully aware of the consequences – making this policy ethically all the more reprehensible.

We are witnessing increasing centralization of political power in Brussels – justified by the moral imperative of carbon dioxide – a civilizational bow to the climate cult.

* * * 

About the author: Thomas Kolbe, born in 1978 in Neuss/ Germany, is a graduate economist. For over 25 years, he has worked as a journalist and media producer for clients from various industries and business associations. As a publicist, he focuses on economic processes and observes geopolitical events from the perspective of the capital markets. His publications follow a philosophy that focuses on the individual and their right to self-determination.

Tyler Durden Sun, 11/09/2025 - 08:10

Hungary Gets Its Badly Needed Russian Energy Exemption After Warm Trump-Orban Meeting

Hungary Gets Its Badly Needed Russian Energy Exemption After Warm Trump-Orban Meeting

In a hugely significant, though not totally unexpected development, President Trump has exempted Hungary from sanctions over its continued purchases of Russian oil and gas for a period one year, according to a BBC report, citing a White House official.

The news follows Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban's Friday trip to the Washington where he was hosted for a state visit in the Oval Office. After being received very warmly by the US president, Trump conceded "it's very difficult for him [Orban] to get the oil and gas from other areas".

AFP/Getty Images

Hungarian Foreign Minister Péter Szijjártó soon followed with a message on X declaring the US had given Budapest "a full and unlimited exemption from sanctions on oil and gas."

But that's when a White House official told press agencies that it would not be unlimited as Budapest was claiming, but was issued for a one-year period.

Late last month the US Department of the Treasury's Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) imposed its latest sanctions on Russia's largest oil producers, Rosneft and Lukoil - after Trump had for months delayed this move amid hopes of finding a speedy ceasefire in Ukraine - but has expressed frustration and essentially given up on this, it appears.

Hungary's Foreign Ministry had at the time immediately proclaimed in the wake of that US action, "We are working on how to circumvent this sanction." 

Still, Orban and Trump have long seen eye to eye on blasting 'warmongers' in the EU. Trump alluded to this Friday in stating, "He [Orban] understands Putin and knows him very well... I think that Viktor feels we're going to get that war ended in the not-too-distant future."

Orban for his part claimed Hungary is the only US ally in Europe which truly wants lasting peace in Ukraine, and with Russia. "All the other governments prefer to continue the war because many of them think that Ukraine can win on the front line, which is a misunderstanding of the situation," Orban said Friday.

Trump at one point asked him: "So you would say that Ukraine cannot win that war?" To which Orban replied: "You know, a miracle can happen."

Below: Another interesting moment of shared vision on immigration problems...

This new one-year exemption for Budapest comes after during the Biden administration Washington and Brussels for years sought to cut off Europe from Russian oil and gas. This meant Hungary would likely be forced to buy more expensive US-produced liquefied natural gas (LNG) - as much of the rest of Europe has done.

But Orban's consistent position has been that as a logistically-challenged, landlocked country it has little choice but to stick with its traditional dependencies in terms of energy sourcing, and that it can't just immediately diversify without tanking the entire national economy.

Tyler Durden Sun, 11/09/2025 - 07:35

Endgame For Germany's Industrial Power Prices: Green Deal Failure Sparks Subsidy Spiral

Endgame For Germany's Industrial Power Prices: Green Deal Failure Sparks Subsidy Spiral

Submitted by Thomas Kolbe

On Thursday, German Chancellor Friedrich Merz hosted top executives from the German steel industry at a summit in the the Chancellery to discuss solutions to the deepening crisis. Since the peak year of 2018, German steel production has fallen by around 25 percent.

Germany’s economic crisis is accelerating. Sky-high energy costs, relentless competition from China and India, and the EU’s absurd push for “green steel”—a climate-neutral variant no one demands on the world market—are pushing companies either into insolvency or out of the country.

Thursday’s meeting will bring together industry representatives, unions, and policymakers to chart the next steps for a sector facing its most severe turbulence in decades.

This is just the latest in a string of crisis summits orchestrated by the federal government for media effect. Awareness is demonstrated—solutions? Not so much. For Germany’s economy, political “solutions” increasingly mean one standard instrument: more subsidies.

A One-Issue Summit

Aside from the expected push for protective tariffs, the summit can be reduced to a single dispute: the so-called industrial electricity price. While many energy-intensive companies already receive partial relief, it is far from enough to remain internationally competitive.

Industrial electricity prices have hovered around 16–17 ct/kWh for months. German industry still pays up to 70 percent more than U.S. or French competitors, who benefit from nuclear power as their energy base.

This is the cost of the green transition.

And with it come job losses, shrinking value creation, and, for the first time, sharply declining municipal tax revenues.

Unsurprisingly, the federal government is ready to approve this subsidy. We are deep in a spiral of interventionism.

Costs Unclear

Economics Minister Katerina Reiche did not provide a specific budget but indicated that state electricity subsidies for energy-intensive industries—from chemicals to steel to paper—could start on January 1, 2026.

The German Economic Institute (IW) estimates the scaled-back industrial power scheme at around €4 billion per year. Two years ago, a parliamentary expert hearing even mentioned €50 billion. Realistically, the final cost will likely land in the low double-digit billions.

As always, taxpayers will foot the bill—either directly through higher levies or indirectly via debt-financed programs, whose costs are offset by inflation.

In truth, the summit is all about subsidies. Were it not for the European Commission, which—surprisingly—is still blocking the plan, insisting on strict state-aid limits: no more than 50 percent of energy consumption and only for three years. Why the Commission blocks here is unclear. But it is the biggest hurdle for this new multibillion-euro subsidy.

Green Deal Fails

The frequency of summits is telling. Germany’s transition to a climate-neutral economy has already failed. Reality refuses to bend to Brussels’ Green Deal diktat.

Meanwhile, thousands of self-appointed climate ideologues gather at COP30 in Brazil, as criticism of Brussels’ climate and regulatory policies grows loud.

German industry sees laws like the so-called Supply Chain Act—as a gateway to full regulatory control along entire value chains—as a major obstacle. Even agreeing on a seemingly competitive industrial power price cannot hide the Kafkaesque bureaucracy from Berlin and Brussels.

In the past three years alone, German companies had to create 325,000 additional positions—not for production, innovation, or export, but solely to meet ever-growing bureaucratic demands. Absurd. Anti-economic. Destructive.

Harbinger of Failure

Now the state intervenes again in a derailed economy. A subsidized industrial electricity price is an unmistakable sign—indeed, a warning—that Germany’s energy transition has failed.

What industry knows and the political-media climate complex denies: under the state-directed green energy market, competitive production of energy-intensive goods is impossible. With cheap Russian gas cut off and nuclear plants being decommissioned, other countries—especially the U.S.—will seize industrial production, leveraging lower energy costs. Deregulation in the U.S. energy sector under Donald Trump’s administration adds to this shift.

Political ethics would demand a candid debate about decades of wasted subsidies, misallocated resources, and collapsing industrial structures. But that is absent.

No Sustainable Solution in Sight

A subsidized industrial electricity price is just another patch in a quilt of subsidies and exemptions. It admits the failure of the green transition and the impossibility of planning complex economic processes on a drawing board.

Returning to cheap Russian gas as a stopgap to ease energy costs is politically impossible under current EU policy. The solution resembles a shell game: money is taken from one group (via taxes or debt, inflation delayed) and given to another—energy-intensive companies.

Europeans must accept importing overpriced U.S. LNG and continuing to fund a failed green subsidy economy. It is time to relearn the basics of economics.

* * * 

About the author: Thomas Kolbe, born in 1978 in Neuss/ Germany, is a graduate economist. For over 25 years, he has worked as a journalist and media producer for clients from various industries and business associations. As a publicist, he focuses on economic processes and observes geopolitical events from the perspective of the capital markets. His publications follow a philosophy that focuses on the individual and their right to self-determination.

Tyler Durden Sun, 11/09/2025 - 07:00

The Day The Guns Fell Silent On The Western Front

The Day The Guns Fell Silent On The Western Front

Authored by Gerry Bowler via The Epoch Times,

On the stroke of 11 a.m. on the 11th day of the 11th month of 1918, fighting ceased on the Western Front, bringing an end to what contemporaries were calling the Great War—the most destructive conflict in world history up to that point. Rejoicing and relief were the order of the day, at least on the Allied side.

The headlines of the Ottawa Citizen read: “PEACE! World War Ends; Armistice Signed; Kaiser Is Out; Revolution Grows.” In Montreal, Le Devoir reported: “Workers … arrived at their factories with their hearts light, liberated from a great burden. In the animated streets, pedestrians were brandishing newspapers with large smiles, their eyes brimming with fire.” The Winnipeg Free Press reported, “Winnipeg Goes Wild With Joy of Peace.”

Church bells rang across Canada, spontaneous processions broke out, liquor flowed, bands played, and tens of thousands of women and children wondered when their fathers, husbands, and sons would be demobilized and ready to come home.

Among the cities of the defeated Central Powers, the reaction was less jubilant.

In Berlin, the news was, “Berlin Seized By Revolutionists: New Chancellor Begs For Order; Ousted Kaiser Flees To Holland.” The Neue Freie Presse in Vienna read, “The Empire Collapses.”

Front-page stories across Germany and Austro-Hungary covered food shortages, public protests, and the turmoil that followed the proclamation of peace.

In the ranks of the Canadian Corps on the front lines in Belgium there was naturally jubilation, but that feeling was also mixed with anger—anger that their commander, Lt.-Gen. Sir Arthur Currie, had ordered continued attacks on the German-held city of Mons right up until the last moment, even though he knew an end to the war would soon be declared.

Currie’s decision had particular significance for Pte. George Price of Port Williams, Nova Scotia.

Price and his fellow soldiers of the 28th Battalion were advancing against enemy positions in Ville-sur-Haine on the morning of Nov. 11 when he was shot by a German sniper.

He died two minutes before the armistice, the last Canadian soldier and, indeed, the last British Commonwealth soldier, to perish in the war.

A photo of Canadian soldier Pte. George Price is shown in the Belgian village of Ville-sur-Haine on Aug. 3, 2014, the day before a ceremony to commemorate 100 years since the start of World War I. AP Photo/Virginia Mayo

The 28th Battalion was a Western Canadian outfit, with troops drawn largely from Saskatchewan and Manitoba. It had fought with distinction in many of the great battles on the Western Front, including the Somme, Vimy Ridge, Passchendaele, Hill 70, and the final assault on Mons in 1918.

Price had been working in Moose Jaw for the Canadian Pacific Railway when he was conscripted in 1917; he trained in Regina before being shipped to Europe, arriving with his unit in June 1918. He was wounded in a poison gas attack but rejoined his battalion in time for more fighting at Canal du Nord and Cambrai, before dying on Armistice Day. He is buried in St. Symphorien Military Cemetery in Belgium.

Today, Sir Arthur Currie is remembered as a brilliant military leader, an innovator, an opponent of the “war of attrition,” and an architect of the great Canadian victory at Vimy Ridge.

Immediately after the war, however, he came in for intense criticism.

The nickname “Butcher” was attached to him; some called for his court-martial, and many decried him for needlessly sacrificing lives for what was a symbolic victory.

In 1928, he sued the Port Hope Evening Guide newspaper for accusing him of wasting lives. During the trial, he argued that to cease fighting early would have been disobedience and treason, and that his orders for the last day of the war stressed caution and minimizing casualties. The jury found in his favour but awarded him only a token sum in damages. The trial seems to have broken Currie’s spirit and he died five years later, having never fully recovered his health.

War is cruel, and the worse the conflict and higher the casualty count, the less individual deaths appear to matter.

World War I claimed 20 million lives, a number of dead too vast to imagine - but that figure comprises 20 million individual stories, 20 million tragedies that preceded George Price.

Among those who died in the last minutes of the war were Augustin Trébuchon, a shepherd from Lozère who was the last Frenchman to be killed, a mere 13 minutes before Price died, and Henry Gunther of Baltimore, the last American to die. Gunther was shot in the very last minute of the war, charging a machine gun nest manned by Germans who, knowing of the impending ceasefire, begged him to stop.

Views expressed in this article are opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times or ZeroHedge.

Tyler Durden Sat, 11/08/2025 - 23:20

How Americans Want AI To Support Them

How Americans Want AI To Support Them

Three years after the release of ChatGPT in November 2022, there’s little remaining doubt that artificial intelligence, or AI as it’s usually referred to, will change our lives in many ways.

In some ways, it already has.

For example, people are searching the web differently, often relying on AI summaries instead of scrolling through and clicking on search results. That is, if they even use a search engine anymore and don’t just ask a large language model like ChatGPT instead.

The potential for AI tools to make our everyday lives a little easier here and there is virtually limitless, but what do people actually want AI to help them with?

Statista's Felix Richter reports that, according to a recent survey by Statista Consumer Insights, 3 in 10 Americans want AI to act as a personal assistant to them, which it is already capable of.

How Americans Want AI to Support Them | Statista

You will find more infographics at Statista

Especially tools baked directly into smartphones and thus able to aggregate information from various apps have the potential to be very effective personal assistants that help with scheduling, reminders and communication.

Other forms of AI support that Americans are keen on include automating everyday tasks, helping with work tasks as well as health and wellness tips.

Looking at the list, it’s clear that AI is already capable of doing all of these things.

For many people it’s just a matter of finding the right tool or workflow to take full advantage of AI tools and their countless possible applications.

Tyler Durden Sat, 11/08/2025 - 22:45

The False Temperature Claims That Underpin The COP30 Alarmist Agenda

The False Temperature Claims That Underpin The COP30 Alarmist Agenda

Authored by Chris Morrison via DailySceptic.org,

The next two weeks of COP30 will see three favourite climate scares relentlessly broadcast to promote the fast-fading hard-Left Net Zero fantasy.

They are:

  1. breaching a 1.5°C global ‘threshold’ leading to runaway temperatures;

  2. human-caused tipping points producing unimaginable natural disasters;

  3. and attribution of single-event bad weather to the use of natural hydrocarbons.

The 1.5°C figure is a meaningless number invented by politicians and activists to concentrate Net Zero minds; tipping points are climate model codswallop; and ditto attribution crystal ball-gazing.

None of them are backed up by credible scientific evidence and observation.

Which of course is why political elites have trashed the scientific process of inquiry, banned and cancelled any dissenting discussion and declared the matter ‘settled’.

The foundation scam is temperature. The world is said to be warming dramatically, leading to tipping points and worsening extreme weather. Changes are said to be occurring at unprecedented rates and are caused primarily by humans increasing atmospheric levels of carbon dioxide. In fact the temperature rise is small, about 1°C over 200 years (making allowance for all the fake temperature estimates and urban heat-ravaged measurements) and similar rises are commonplace in both the historical and paleo record. The recent ‘hottest evah’ rises have been seen in the past – sudden changes in temperature are caused by sudden local events such as volcano eruptions. As it happens, the underwater Hunga Tonga volcano released vast quantity of water vapour into the upper atmosphere in 2022, a ‘greenhouse’ warming event that would have been helped along by a recent strong El Niño oscillation. Recent accurate satellite measurements show the overall global temperature has been falling during 2025.

Don’t take my word for all this natural movement. Professor Mark Maslin is a Professor of something termed Earth Systems Science at UCL and one of the authors of a recent tipping point report timed for COP30. This particular computer model-based bilge suggested that warm water corals may already be crossing their “thermal tipping points”, despite the fact that coral has been around for hundreds of millions of years and survives in waters between 24-32°C. This would appear to be the same Mark Maslin who as a humble geography lecturer in 1999 wrote a paper that said possibly most of the large climate changes involving movements of several degrees occurred at most on a timescale of a few centuries, sometimes decades, “and perhaps even a few years”. These days he whines that “Earth is already becoming unliveable”, while climate change politics helps build “a new political and socio-economic system”. In 2018, he was one of a number of eco-activists who signed a letter to the Guardian saying they would no longer “lend their credibility” by debating climate science scepticism.

No wonder people like Maslin – needless to say a BBC regular on all learned climate Armageddon matters – walked away from climate science debate.

Tying CO2 levels to rising temperatures to make Left-wing political capital relies on observations from just a few recent years. Widen the observations out to hundreds and then hundreds of millions of years gives a different picture. Sometimes temperatures rise and fall at the same time as CO2, sometimes not. Sometimes even CO2 levels rise before the following temperatures, more often than not they don’t. The simple explanation that warming gases such as CO2 become ‘saturated’ once they pass certain concentrations, with heating falling off a logarithmic cliff, is a scientific hypothesis or opinion, but it has much to offer when past observational evidence is considered.

Let us consider some of these observations starting with the long term record over 600 million years. The graph below shows wide temperature-CO2 divergence.

Over 600 million years it is difficult to observe any general lockstep connection between temperature and gas. It might, however, be noted that over 600 million years, CO2 has generally been declining in the atmosphere to the near denuded levels seen today. As we have seen over the last 40 years even small rises in CO2 lead to significant planet-wide biomass growth. All that CO2 was good for the dinosaurs who roamed the Earth until 66 million years ago, with levels more than three times higher than today. The little extra has also been good for humans since recent crop yields have soared and helped to alleviate naturally-occurring world famine.

These records of course are very long term and are compiled from proxies with accuracy only to a few thousand years. In the more immediate record we find additional and conclusive proof that CO2 is not the main climate thermostat. Temperatures in medieval times were similar to today, possibly slightly higher in the Roman period and often 3-4°C higher in the Holocene thermal maximum around 8,000 to 5,000 years ago. During these periods, CO2 was remarkably stable around 260 parts per million, a mark that is in fact dangerously low to sustain life on Earth. The notorious Michael-Mann-1,000-year temperature ‘hockey stick’ removed the linking problem by abolishing the medieval warming period and the subsequent little ice age that ran up to around 1800.

Remarkable recent scientific evidence has emerged to suggest that abrupt rises in temperature have been a feature of the global climate going back to the iceless Jurassic period over 150 million years ago. Dramatic temperature changes based on 1,500-year cycles, as the younger Maslin can testify, have been known to have occurred in Greenland and the North Atlantic. But a group of French scientists led by Slah Boulila from the Sorbonne found large temperature hikes going back millions of years across the globe. The scientists noted warming up to 15°C within a few decades, “pointing to abrupt and severe changes in Earth’s past climate”. The 1,500 year cycles are often called Dansgaard-Oeschger (DO) events after the scientists who discovered them. Some scientists have downplayed the initial DO findings and suggested the short term temperatures rises of around 1.5°C were caused by specific northern hemisphere oscillations of ice sheets and surrounding waters.

However, the French scientists note: “The 1,500-year cycle is documented in both hemispheres, in other oceans and in continents.” Their work is said to support the global nature of DO-like events, and in particular that their potential primary cause is independent of ice sheet dynamics. Meanwhile, scientific evidence continues to grow indicating much higher temperatures a few thousand years ago. One recent paper found the plant Ceratopteris had grown 8,000 years ago at 40°N in northern China, suggesting winter temperatures 7.7°C higher than today. Another found types of molluscs surviving in the Arctic Svalbard 9,000 years ago that indicated temperatures were 6°C warmer.

The current Net Zero fantasy rests on catastrophising tiny temperature rises that frankly are not even measured properly, demonising CO2 boosts that are helping Earth return to a more healthy biosphere and atmospheric balance, inventing ‘tipping points’ using junk computer models and insulting the intelligence with untestable tales claiming humans are making the weather worse.

And they call us sceptics the ‘deniers’.

Tyler Durden Sat, 11/08/2025 - 22:10

Judges, Democrat Prosecutor Protect Far-Left Activist Who Doxxed & Stalked Stephen Miller

Judges, Democrat Prosecutor Protect Far-Left Activist Who Doxxed & Stalked Stephen Miller

Two judges and a Democrat prosecutor are protecting a far-left activist who doxxed top Trump adviser Stephen Miller, then showed up to his house - forcing Miller to evacuate his family to a military base. 

The case began on Sept. 11, when the suspect, 66-year-old Barbara Wien, was spotted posting flyers in Miller's Arlington neighborhood which included a photo of Miller with a red circle and a cross through it and read "NO NAZIS IN NOVA," according to court records. The flyers included Miller's home address and a QR code linked to the Instagram account of an activist group - Arlington Neighbors United for Umanity (ANUFH).

Wien also cased Miller's home - making eye contact with his wife Katie Miller, and allegedly making an "I'm watching you" gesture according to a frame grab from a Secret Service surveillance video. This was 24 hours after Charlie Kirk was assassinated - and enough to think Wien had violated Virginia's law against doxxing and a similar federal statute. In response, the FBI sought a warrant for Wein's phone. 

Yet late Wednesday, Magistrate Judge Lindsey Vaala denied the FBI's petition for a warrant to search Wein's phone a move the Justice Department plans to appeal, Axios reports. The agency wants to examine Wein's phone to see if she lied to investigators, or may be part of a larger group that might pose a risk to Miller and his family. 

  • When police seized Wien's phone Oct. 1, she spoke with FBI officials who then alleged that she misled investigators, according to a court filing described to Axios. Based on that, the FBI asked for another search warrant, which Vaala denied.
  • Vaala contributed to the presidential campaigns of Presidents Obama and Biden before her appointment to the bench in 2022. -Axios

After Vaala denied the request, the Millers went to Virginia State Police - which took the case to judge Judith Wheat, who authorized the warrant on Oct. 1 - which state and federal law enforcement officials say reflects how routine the request was (and how absurd Vaala's denial was) - yet Democrat prosecutor Parisa Dehghani-Tafti threw a fit, demanding that the Wheat limit the warrant, which she then did in order to limit the search and the sharing of information with the FBI. 

"A prosecutor is usually on the same team as the investigators trying to make a case. But in this case, it's the opposite. She's been stymying the investigation, it appears," said Richard Cullen, counselor to Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin (R), who was brought into the case along with Virginia's Attorney General Jason Miyares' office (via Axios). 

"In all my years, I've never seen anything like the way this case is being handled," said one investigator involved in the case. 

Of note, Dehghani-Tafti's Facebook page is riddled with anti-Miller postings, and she follows ANUFH - of which Wien is a member. Dehghani-Tafti told Axios that she has "performed my duties with integrity and objectivity, and I continue to do so. I have acted in every way to uphold the rule of law."

"The position of the judge and the justice system in Northern Virginia is, Stephen Miller deserves this, so it shouldn't be investigated," a senior administration official told the outlet. 

Of note, Miller's family isn't the only one that's been evacuated from their house - as several admin officials have been housed on bases amid increasing threats from left-wing political violence. As Axios notes further: 

  • Other high-level Trump administration officials also have been moved to bases, a sign of the GOP leaders' alarm about angry protests, the assassination of Charlie Kirk and the assassination attempts on Donald Trump.
  • "A lot of administration officials feel it's a problem that you have to live in Virginia or D.C. or Maryland. But the criminal justice system will not protect you and your family," a White House official said.

Bukele was right... 

Tyler Durden Sat, 11/08/2025 - 21:35

Brennan, Page, & Strzok Hit Today With Russiagate Grand Jury Subpoenas, Up To 30 More Pending

Brennan, Page, & Strzok Hit Today With Russiagate Grand Jury Subpoenas, Up To 30 More Pending

Authored by 'Sundance' vua TheConservativeTreehouse.com,

Fox News is reporting that three grand jury subpoenas were issued today for John Brennan, Peter Strzok and Lisa Page.

Brennan was the former CIA Director during Russiagate, who created the fraudulent Intelligence Community Assessment.  Strzok was the lead FBI counterintelligence agent in charge of Crossfire Hurricane, and Page was the former DOJ lawyer assigned to FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe.  Strzok and Page worked both the Clinton email investigation and the Trump-Russia investigation.

Fox News also reports that up to 30 grand jury subpoenas are anticipated to be served on former government officials involved in “Spygate” and/or “Russiagate.”

[SEE FOX REPORT HERE]

There has been a tremendous amount of external pressure being applied, and thankfully this year a significant amount of key internal pressure has joined that effort.  For the issues surrounding former CIA Director John Brennan, Fox News is citing a declassified “Annex A” of the Intelligence Community Assessment (ICA) which highlights John Brennan including the Steele Dossier in the ICA at the request of former FBI Director James Comey.

Apparently, according to Fox News, the most significant citation against Brennan is an issue we outlined at CTH five years ago [SEE HERE] when we wrote about Annex-A and the implications therein.  President Trump was still in office in 2020 when Annex-A was released. The good news is that Annex-A found its way into evidence that a prosecutor can present to a grand jury.

The outcome of a grand jury subpoena means the primary Russiagate officials will have to lawyer up, spend money and go plead the 5th amendment, the most likely outcome.

From my frame of reference, the evidence against the targets clearly exists and does not need them to make any admissions or denials. 

However, putting them on record in court individually, possibly compelled to testify or invoke the 5th, would perhaps narrow down their options if they were eventually indicted and face a criminal trial.

EXCLUSIVE: A federal grand jury has subpoenaed former CIA Director John Brennan, former FBI officials Peter Strzok and Lisa Page, among others as part of the Justice Department’s investigation into the origins of the Trump-Russia probe, Fox News Digital has learned.

Sources told Fox News Digital Brennan; Strzok, the FBI’s former deputy assistant director of counterintelligence; and Page, a former FBI lawyer, were served with federal subpoenas on Friday.

Law enforcement sources told Fox News Digital that up to 30 subpoenas will be issued in the coming days relating to the investigation.

The grand jury is out of the Southern District of Florida. U.S. attorney for the Southern District of Florida Jason Reding Quiñones is supervising the probe. Fox News Digital first reported this summer that Brennan was under criminal investigation.

[…] As for the criminal investigation into Brennan, CIA Director John Ratcliffe referred evidence of wrongdoing by Brennan to FBI Director Kash Patel for potential prosecution, DOJ sources told Fox News Digital.

[…] But back in June 2020, Ratcliffe, while serving as director of national intelligence, declassified a footnote of the 2017 ICA, which revealed that the reporting of Trump dossier author Christopher Steele had only “limited corroboration” regarding whether then-President-elect Trump “knowingly worked with Russian officials to bolster his chances of beating” Hillary Clinton and other claims.

[…] The footnote, also known as “Annex A” of the 2017 ICA, exclusively obtained by Fox News Digital in June 2020, spanned less than two pages and detailed reporting by Steele, the former British spy who authored the unverified anti-Trump dossier — a document that helped serve as the basis for controversial Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) warrants obtained against former Trump campaign aide Carter Page. (read more)

I also find it interesting they begin with “Russiagate”, and I wonder if they will find the “Spygate” that preceded it {GO DEEP}.

Then again, I am thankful for the change and recognize Spygate might just be a little too uncomfy for those who seek to retain continuity of government.

Tyler Durden Sat, 11/08/2025 - 21:00

Socialism vs. Americanism

Socialism vs. Americanism

Authored by Jeffrey Tucker via The Epoch Times,

New York’s incoming mayor has been transparent about his socialist thinking, and history has shown that the kind he subscribes to should be cause for concern.

To put it bluntly, we aren’t talking about a polite and fashionable Fabian socialism of the British upper class of 100 years ago, with its practical desire to construct cradle-to-grave welfare states. Rather it’s the one drawn from the older tradition of Karl Marx and his utterly mistaken attempt to trace all social evils to the existence of private capital. This view is ridiculously old-fashioned, kept alive entirely by the fake world of academia that is wholly shielded from any real-world experience in economics.

Part of that, of course, means not looking at the material world through the lens of objective reality and economics. This worldview imagines that the government can simply make all things free, lower and freeze rents, and deliver groceries by simply announcing it to be so, with some help from heavy taxes on the successful.

When the plan does not work, as it never does, in this worldview, leaders would have to resort to authoritarian measures. This is true everywhere it is tried. New York City is an awful state right now, and this path is guaranteed to make matters worse. One supposes we will see another round of exodus from Gotham in the coming months, not just fleeing capital but fleeing people.

It’s not just large enterprises and big corporations that should worry. It’s all businesses in the city. This point of view regards any surplus flowing to capital as an unjust flow from workers to owners; that is, from value creators to value exploiters.

It’s a relatively simple outlook that is rooted in a single error, one that seems plausible at first but collapses on closer look. It traces the very existence of economic value exclusively to the manifestation of physical toil. It’s called the labor theory of value. This is genuinely an empirical proposition.

In this view, the whole output of industrial production was equal to the value of manual labour and should be allotted accordingly. Any money deducted from labor—to pay owners of capital or for raw materials or new inventions or for marketing or to lenders—is robbery from labor. Ironically, in this view, those who do mental work (the intellectuals) are doing nothing. Except that the socialists came up with an escape hatch for that one: the intellectuals are the vanguard of the proletariat and therefore necessary.

Is it really the case that all toil generates economic value that should always and everywhere flow only to workers and never owners? Clearly not. Anyone anywhere is fully capable of doing anything and everything that is not regarded as valuable by anyone. Labor alone does not cause value to come into being; what generates value is the act of valuing.

The labor theory of value, however, has long roots in history, even hinted at in the works of Adam Smith and David Ricardo, points later adopted by socialists to argue for the nationalization of capital.

It was the rise of Marxian theory that provoked great clarity on value theory during the so-called Marginal Revolution of the 1880s. Three theorists—Stanley Jevons, Leon Walras, and Carl Menger—argued persuasively for what came to be known as the subjective theory of value as against the labor theory of value.

Among these works, my favorite is Carl Menger’s “Principles of Economics” (1871). It still makes for a compelling read and a good tutorial on economic basics. On the issue of value, he writes:

“Value is therefore nothing inherent in goods, no property of them, but merely the importance that we first attribute to the satisfaction of our needs, that is, to our lives and well-being, and in consequence carry over to economic goods as the exclusive causes of the satisfaction of our needs. ... It is a judgment economizing men make about the importance of the goods at their disposal for the maintenance of their lives and well-being. Hence value does not exist outside the consciousness of men.”

Once you understand this point, the entire theoretical structure of Marxism and even socialism falls apart. It is the unending process of cooperative exchange, driven by people’s perception of their own needs and nonstop working benefit from satisfying the needs of others, that generates value, which is something imparted by the individual minds.

It is not possible for any politicians, intellectuals, or bureaucrats to replicate this delicate system, much less replace it with a new and wholly externalized vision of what is valuable and what is not. Nor can outsiders slice and dice prices and accounting that results from the market process and say: this is too high, this is too low, and here is a plan to make it right. That kind of planning can only result in wild distortions.

There is a deeper point here that relates to the history of the United States. There is nothing about our history as a nation that has any roots in socialist theory. I cannot think of a single Founding Father who had any interest in pre-Marxian utopian socialist theory. Sure, there were anabaptist sects who held things in common and celebrated community. That’s not the same thing. There were plenty of utopian socialists around from the ancient world to the present but the Founders discussed them not at all.

Indeed, do you know the name of Thomas Jefferson’s favorite economist? It was not Adam Smith. It was the French physiocrat Anne Robert Jacques Turgot, Baron de l'Aulne (1727–1781). He was a champion of low taxes, property rights, small business, trade, and the commercial experience generally. It was he who warned the French monarchy to lower taxes and free prices to forestall revolution, a plea that went unheard.

Jefferson was a close reader of Turgot’s great book “Reflections on the Production and Distribution of Wealth” (1766), which pushed the market theory of value long before Menger. His book is meticulous and deeply empirical, laying out the formation of prices via supply and demand and discussing the origin and uses of money.

In his role as adviser to the court, he condemned industrial monopolies and intervention by the Crown into commercial affairs of small business. He was a brilliant innovator. Jefferson admired him so much that he had a bust of him made to display in the main portico of Monticello.

If there is an American economics, this is it: The celebration of private ownership, small business, low taxes, no industrial monopolies, agronomy, entrepreneurship, community service, independence, self-reliance, hard work, creativity, pride in a job well done, frugality, sound money, savings, long-term commitment, family and faith.

To be sure, America has had its debates over economics in the earliest years. The Jeffersonians battled it out with the Hamiltonians. Jefferson hated debt, taxation, was suspicious of banking empires, and opposed forced industrialism and tariffs. Hamilton liked business finance, industry, large banks and leverage, and favored the protective tariff. These are legitimate American debates, deeply rooted in our history. The idea of a national bank went through several rounds of controversy for over a century until the Federal Reserve Act and the income tax came along.

Even with all these disputes and debates, we have no history at all of Hegelian histrionics of the sort that have emerged on the left and sometimes on the right. Not even our earliest socialists like Eugene Debs were communists. His main passion was for free speech, individual rights, and peace not war. This is the long heritage of the American left from a century ago. Woke theory and mass redistribution and fundamental rejection of economic freedom are not really in our DNA.

It’s urgently necessary that Americans reacquaint themselves with the economic system that made this country great. It is inseparable from freedom and rights. What is moral is also practical from an economic point of view. What grants dignity also grants prosperity. That is the American belief and practice.

Tyler Durden Sat, 11/08/2025 - 19:50

Chinese Astronauts Stranded in Orbit Following Suspected Debris Impact

Chinese Astronauts Stranded in Orbit Following Suspected Debris Impact

Authored by Lily Zhou via The Epoch Times,

China has delayed the planned return of Shenzhou 20’s crew after the spacecraft was possibly hit by debris, the regime’s spaceflight agency said on Wednesday.

The three-person crew was originally set to return to the Dongfeng Landing Site in Inner Mongolia on Wednesday, after their six-month rotation at the Tiangong space station.

They handed over of the operation of the space station on Tuesday to their replacements, who arrived aboard Shenzhou 21 on Nov. 1.

The China Manned Space Agency (CMSA) said Shenzhou 20’s return mission was delayed to ensure the astronauts’s health and safety, as well as the success of the mission.

It did not provide details about where and when Shenzhou 20 was likely hit, but it did say an impact analysis and risk assessment are underway. It did not set a new date for the return mission.

If the return capsule can not be repaired, under protocols established since 2021, there is a backup rocket and spacecraft on standby that can be launched within days to rescue the crew in case of an emergency.

In April, the Shenzhou 19 crew’s return mission was delayed by one day due to weather conditions at the Dongfeng landing site. This is the first time a return mission has been delayed by space debris.

The delay highlights the danger to space travel posed by increasing amounts of space debris. The debris, also called space junk, consists of discarded launch vehicles or vessel parts that float around hundreds of miles above the Earth, risking collisions with countries’ active assets.

According to NASA, there are millions of pieces, or nearly 6,000 tons, of debris in low Earth orbit, most of which is flying seven times faster than a bullet.

The Chinese military tested an anti-satellite missile in 2007 and destroyed weather satellite Fengyun-1C, causing global outcry. NASA said China’s “deliberate destruction” of its own Fengyun-1C and and “the accidental collision of an American and a Russian spacecraft in 2009” increased the amount of large space junk by about 70 percent.

In 2016, Mallory Stewart, then-deputy assistant secretary for emerging security challenges and defense policy at the State Department, called the destruction of Fengyun-1C a “remarkable incident of irresponsible behavior” during a speech at the speech at the Atlantic Council in Washington. She said the Chinese regime had since conducted more such tests, albeit they were not debris-generating.

Beijing complained to the United Nations in 2021 that Tiangong had to perform two emergency avoidance manuevers to avoid fragments produced by Starlink satellites, owned by Elon Musk’s SpaceX, which predominate in the Earth’s lower orbital paths.

Shenzhou 20’s delayed return comes after a similar incident last year, when U.S. astronauts Barry Wilmore and Sunita Williams were stranded in space for months because of a spacecraft malfunction.

The NASA astronauts were initially expected to stay in space for just over a week in June 2024, but the capsule returned to earth without them after it was deemed unfit to return them safely. The pair were retrieved in March this year by a SpaceX Dragon spacecraft.

Tyler Durden Sat, 11/08/2025 - 18:40

Comey's Daughter Reportedly Sought To Cut Deal With Epstein To Smear Trump

Comey's Daughter Reportedly Sought To Cut Deal With Epstein To Smear Trump

Authored by Ben Sellers via Headline USA,

The former cellmate of Jeffrey Epstein claimed that James Comey’s prosecutor daughter offered the billionaire pedophile a deal to implicate President Donald Trump.

Maurene Comey, who recently resigned as the walls closed in on her notorious FBI father, began serving in 2016 as assistant U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York.

That put her front and center in the investigations of Epstein and his accomplice, Ghislaine Maxwell after Epstein was arrested in July 2019.

While detained in New York’s Metropolitan Correctional Center, Epstein was assigned to a cell with Nicholas Tartaglione, a former police officer who was serving time for kidnapping  and quadruple murder.

Tartaglione was convicted of killing a man he suspected of stealing some $250,000 in drug money, as well as his nephews and a family friend who “were in the wrong place at the wrong time,” prosecutors said, according to the New York Post.

During the month that Epstein was incarcerated before his apparent suicide, Tartaglione claimed in a recent pardon application that his cellmate had the opportunity to save his skin by throwing the sitting president under the bus.

“Prosecutors … told Epstein that if he said President Trump was involved with Esptein’s crimes he would walk free. in a petition to be pardoned,” according to the Post, which said it had obtained a copy of the filing.

“Epstein told me that Maurene Comey said that he didn’t have to prove anything, as long as President Trump’s people could not disprove it,” the pardon application added.

“According to Maurene Comey, the FBI were ‘her people, not his [President Trump’s].’”

Maurene Comey’s father was forced out of his role as FBI director roughly two years prior. However, questions have continued to swirl about the dubious loyalties of officials including then-Attorney General William Barr and then-FBI Director Christopher Wray.

Even so, questions about Tartaglione’s credibility may outweigh the suspicions against the Deep State.

Epstein reported that his cell mate had attempted to attack and kill him during their time together, according to a memorandum from the responding officer.

“He sat up on the bed and began telling me that he [thinks] his bunkine … tried to kill him,” the memo said.

Tartaglione contradicted the report, saying he had, in fact, tried to revive Epstein.

No camera footage was available due to issues with the surveillance system.

Tyler Durden Sat, 11/08/2025 - 17:30

The Shutdown's Fallout Spreads Further

The Shutdown's Fallout Spreads Further

The U.S. government shutdown has entered its 39th day, making it the longest funding gap in U.S. history.

The consequences of the standstill are far-reaching, with food benefits under the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP, having already come to a halt at the weekend. While a judge has ordered the Trump administration to release full funding for November food stamps by the end of today, the administration asked an appeals court to block the ruling. Meanwhile, around 1.4 million federal employees are on unpaid leave or working without pay until funding is restored and 10 percent of flights at 40 major U.S. airports have been cut amid air traffic control safety concerns. Trump has responded to these events by calling for Republicans to abolish the Senate filibuster rule that requires the 60-vote majority for legislation to pass.

As Statista's Anna Fleck details below, a recent wave of surveys by polling company YouGov illustrates how the number of adults who feel they are personally being affected by the shutdown is growing.

The Shutdown's Fallout Spreads Further | Statista

You will find more infographics at Statista

This pattern is true for both Democrats and Republicans, albeit to a greater extent among Democrats.

On October 10, 21 percent of overall U.S. respondents said they were personally affected by the shutdown either somewhat or a great deal. This had risen to 36 percent as of October 31.

Americans are divided on who they think is most responsible for the standstill, with 35 percent blaming Republicans in Congress, 32 percent blaming Democrats in Congress and 28 percent saying the two groups are equally responsible.

Meanwhile, net approval of Trump’s handling of the shutdown has dropped in recent weeks. On the topic of SNAP benefits, around three quarters of U.S. adults said they should be paid during the government shutdown.

Tyler Durden Sat, 11/08/2025 - 16:55

Narco-Terrorism? Identities Of Slain Venezuelan Drug-Smugglers Revealed, & The Truth Is Nuanced

Narco-Terrorism? Identities Of Slain Venezuelan Drug-Smugglers Revealed, & The Truth Is Nuanced

Unverified videos shared on social media Friday and picked up in foreign media outlets reportedly showed a group Venezuelan F-16 fighter jets scrambled and patrolling airspace hours after two US B-52 bombers again flew over the southern Caribbean Sea near Venezuela’s coastline on Thursday.

The US bombers' flight marked the fourth such operation in recent weeks, after early this month there were reports that President Trump may order 'imminent' military action targeting the Maduro government and land-based cartel locations. This is an extremely expensive and unprecedented military build-up in these waters over what may in the end be some fairly low-level and typical drug transit in the region. Watch unverified video featured by RT and others of Venezuela scrambling F-16s in response:

Data from Flightradar24 indicated that the two B-52s flew parallel to Venezuela’s northern coast, circled northeast of Caracas, and then turned back toward the sea and eventually the American mainland.

"Both aircraft are conventionally armed Boeing B‑52H Stratofortress models, according to publicly available flight data on the website Flightradar24," Newsweek reported. "The planes were flying under the call signs TITO41 and TITO42."

"The sorties are the latest in what the Air Force is calling bomber attack demonstrations in the Caribbean region," the report reviews, and tallies: "Last month, three groups of B-52H and B-1B Lancers flew similar publicly visible missions to within tens of miles of Venezuela's coast."

The Associated Press has meanwhile begun interviewing Venezuelan and other eyewitnesses to conclude that at least some of the many dozens of crewmembers killed aboard alleged drug boats by US drones strikes were very low-level criminals who typically worked as fishermen, taxi drivers, or laborers in derelict and impoverished coastal villages.

Analyzing some of the strikes over the last several weeks, the AP writes:

In dozens of interviews in villages on Venezuela’s breathtaking northeastern coast, from which some of the boats departed, residents and relatives said the dead men had indeed been running drugs but were not narco-terrorists or leaders of a cartel or gang.

Most of the nine men were crewing such craft for the first or second time, making at least $500 per trip, residents and relatives said. They were laborers, a fisherman, a motorcycle taxi driver. Two were low-level career criminals. One was a well-known local crime boss who contracted out his smuggling services to traffickers.

That does seem to be outside verification that drug-running boats and organizations have indeed been the targets, but the question of whether these men can in reality be classified as 'narco-terrorists' remains an open one and the AP report paints them as by and large impoverished locals trying to make quick cash.

Over 60 people have been killed and seventeen boats blown up. The AP report paints a humble picture of the 'narco operations': 

The men lived on the Paria Peninsula, in mostly unpainted cinderblock homes that can go weeks without water service and regularly lose power for several hours a day. They awoke to panoramic views of a national park’s tropical forests, the Gulf of Paria’s shallows and the Caribbean’s sparkling sapphire waters. When the time came for their drug runs, they boarded open-hulled fishing skiffs that relied on powerful outboard motors to haul their drugs to nearby Trinidad and other islands.

The Venezuelan government has rejected Pentagon accusations of organized narco-smuggling and has formally complained to the United Nations that these are "extrajudicial executions."

Certainly drug smuggling into the United States must be stopped, and this is conventionally the role of the Coast Guard, DEA, and other federal agencies - however, are Americans ready to support another war over some low level drug running already long common for decades? 

Tyler Durden Sat, 11/08/2025 - 15:45

US To Establish Military Base In Syria's Damascus

US To Establish Military Base In Syria's Damascus

Authored by Dave DeCamp via AntiWar.com,

The US is planning to establish a military base in Damascus, Syria, Reuters has reported, as the Trump administration continues to strongly back the new Syrian government that’s led by former al-Qaeda leader Ahmed al-Sharaa.

The report said that the US will establish a military presence at an airbase on the outskirts of the Syrian capital for the purpose of enabling a security pact that Washington is attempting to broker between Israel and Syria.

Image source: Reuters

The idea would be for the US military to monitor a potential deal that would include the demilitarization of areas to the south of Damascus. Officials compared it to the US monitoring of the ceasefire deal in Lebanon, which Israel has constantly violated, and the ceasefire deal in Gaza, which Israel has also been in breach of.

A Syrian Foreign Ministry official later told Syria’s state news agency SANA that the Reuters report was "untrue" but did not specifically deny that the US would establish a military presence in Damascus.

"The current stage marks a transformation in the US position towards direct engagement with the Syrian central government in Damascus, and towards supporting the country’s unity while rejecting any calls for partition," the official said.

A Syrian defense official told Reuters that the US had flown to the base in military C-130 transport aircraft to ensure the runway was usable, and a security guard at one of the base’s entrances said that American aircraft were landing there as part of "tests".

Previous reports have said that the Trump administration may sign an agreement with the new Syrian government to formalize its military presence in Syria.

The US has been closing bases in northeast Syria but is expected to maintain its presence at the al-Tanf Garrison in the south, which is situated where the borders of Syria, Iraq, and Jordan converge.

A well-known American anti-Assad Islamist commentator admits the endgame is US-Israel hegemony and control over Syria:

President Trump will be hosting Sharaa at the White House on Monday, where he is expected to formally join the US-led anti-ISIS coalition. Ahead of the visit, the US is asking the UN to lift sanctions on Sharaa, which were imposed due to his history as an al-Qaeda commander and associate of Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, the founder of ISIS.

Tyler Durden Sat, 11/08/2025 - 15:10

94% Match: New Clues Emerge In Jan. 6 Pipe Bomber Identity

94% Match: New Clues Emerge In Jan. 6 Pipe Bomber Identity

A new forensic analysis into the Jan. 6 pipe-bomb case has concluded that a former US Capitol Police officer's gait is a 94%-98% match to the 'unique stride' of the Jan. 6 pipe-bomb suspect, Blaze Media reports, following an investigation which was confirmed by several intelligence sources. 

According to the investigation, former U.S. Capitol Police officer, Shauni Rae Kerkhoff, is a high-probability match to the unidentified pipe-bomb suspect seen on surveillance video on Jan. 5, 2021. Kerkhoff, who served four and a half years on the Capitol Police force before leaving in mid-2021 for a security position later described by the CIA as “campus security,” was matched through a forensic gait-analysis software tool that compared her stride to the suspect’s.

Software used in the analysis placed the match at 94%, however the forensic analyst who conducted the review estimated the similarity closer to 96%-98%. Several intelligence officials who reviewed the findings concurred, according to the report. 

Interestingly, Kerkhoff’s residence in Alexandria, Va., appeared to be monitored by law enforcement officers last week - as Blaze News’ editor in chief, Christopher Bedford, said he was pulled over by police after stopping to observe the home and later released.

  • Of note - the Blaze report has been disputed by Headline USA and journalist Breanna Morello. so pop over and read their takes. 
FBI Surveillance Near Suspect in 2021

The new analysis has revived scrutiny of the FBI’s handling of the case. Former FBI Special Agent Kyle Seraphin told Blaze News that, in the days immediately after Jan. 6, he and his team conducted surveillance “one door away” from the residence now tied to the suspected individual. He says the team was pulled off the assignment without explanation, and requests to interview a person linked to the suspect’s movements were denied.

Seraphin said he has recounted these details publicly since 2021, and that the Blaze News findings “vindicate” his account.

The FBI tied a SmarTrip Metro card allegedly used by the suspect to an Air Force civilian employee. Agents conducted two days of surveillance but were instructed not to interview him, Seraphin said. The bureau has not addressed the claim publicly.

A Career in Law Enforcement and Security

Kerkhoff, 31, is a former Division 1 athlete from Ohio who played goalkeeper at Temple University and later for the Columbus Eagles Football Club. A significant leg injury in college required surgery and left her with a slight limp - an element noted by the gait analyst who reviewed her movements from Capitol Police security footage.

Former Capitol Police Officer Shauni Kerkhoff (above) playing soccer in Columbus, Ohio. The pipe bomb suspect approaches the Democratic National Committee building on Jan. 5, 2025.

Kerkhoff joined the U.S. Capitol Police in 2018. She served in the Civil Disturbance Unit and was a training officer for crowd-control munitions deployed on Jan. 6. Blaze News also reported this week that surveillance video shows Kerkhoff and other officers firing “less-lethal” rounds that struck multiple individuals above the waist on the Capitol’s West Plaza.

She left the force months after the riot and later worked in security at the CIA.

Suspicion Around the Pipe-Bomb Videos

Blaze News’ analysis relied on surveillance footage of the pipe-bomb suspect that was not the publicly released FBI version. A private researcher who spent more than a year studying the videos told the outlet the bureau-released clip was downsampled, reducing motion clarity. The higher-quality footage used for the gait analysis reportedly shows smoother movement, allowing for more accurate comparison.

The FBI has said the suspect placed pipe bombs outside the Democratic National Committee and near the Republican National Committee between 7:54 p.m. and 8:16 p.m. on Jan. 5, 2021. The devices were discovered the following day shortly after noon—at the same time Capitol Police resources were being stretched by the breach of the Capitol grounds.

The mysterious handling of the bombs drew scrutiny from Congress and the Department of Homeland Security’s inspector general. Surveillance footage later released by Rep. Thomas Massie (R-KY) showed Secret Service agents responding slowly after being told a device was found at the DNC. Agents remained in their vehicle eating lunch for roughly two minutes before investigating and allowed pedestrians and cars to pass near the device.

Read the rest of the report here...

Tyler Durden Sat, 11/08/2025 - 14:35

Are Americans Better Or Worse Off Since January?

Are Americans Better Or Worse Off Since January?

Authored by Victor Davis Hanson via The Epoch Times,

The left wing and media rage hysterically from one Trump psychodrama to the next, while President Donald Trump trolls both on social media.

But all that is verbiage.

What matters is the data and facts of Trump’s first nine months since Jan. 20, 2025, in comparison to either former President Joe Biden’s prior year or the averages of his four years in office.

Take the border. No one knows how many illegal aliens entered—or stayed in—the U.S. during Biden’s four years of open borders. What is clear is that he set a presidential record of well over seven million illegal entrants.

The border under Trump is now tightly closed. Prior to his administration, it was common for 10,000 people to cross illegally in a single day. In just nine months, approximately two million illegal aliens have been deported or self-deported. The rate of border crossings is now the lowest it’s ever been since 1970.

How about energy? For Trump’s first nine months, gas prices have averaged $3.19 versus Biden’s 2024 average of $3.30 a gallon. Over Biden’s four years, gas averaged $3.46 a gallon.

During the Biden years, oil production averaged 12.3 million barrels per day, compared to 13.5 million barrels during Trump’s first nine months. Biden removed 200 million barrels from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve, leaving office with only 394 million barrels in the SPR.

The reserve has already inched upward under Trump’s initial months to 406 million barrels. Releases have been canceled. Purchases of replacement oil have been scheduled.

Regarding the economy, Biden’s four years averaged 2.9 percent GDP growth per annum.

Trump’s GDP rose 3.8 percent in the second quarter, with final estimates for 2025 ranging around 3 percent.

Inflation under Trump so far averages about 3 percent. Under Biden’s tenure, inflation increased by 21.4 percent over four years, or on average about 5.3 percent a year.

How about U.S. deterrence and defense?

Under Biden, the military fell short by approximately 15,000 recruits per year, crashing to a shortfall of 41,000 in 2023.

Following Trump’s election and throughout the first nine months of 2025, all branches of the military met or exceeded their recruitment goals.

The number of NATO nations meeting their promise to spend 2 percent of GDP on defense rose from 23 in 2024 to a likely total of 31 in 2025, with several pledging to spend as much as 5 percent.

Trump left office in 2021 with no major ongoing wars. His first administration had nearly bankrupted Iran, destroyed ISIS, decimated the Russian Wagner group in Syria, and birthed the Abraham Accords.

Under Biden, the Middle East exploded into a four-front war against Israel.

Iran boasted that it was within months of developing nuclear weapons after the Biden administration lifted prior Trump sanctions and courted Tehran to return to the so-called “Iran Deal.”

Over the last decade and a half, Russian leader Vladimir Putin had only kept within his borders during Trump’s first term, invading neighboring countries during the Bush, Obama, and Biden presidencies.

In 2022, Putin attacked Kyiv during Biden’s second year in office—leading to a full-scale Ukrainian-Russian war, incurring the greatest combat losses in Europe since the Second World War.

In August 2021, in one of the greatest military humiliations in U.S. history, Biden ordered the abrupt flight of all U.S. personnel from Kabul, Afghanistan. The skedaddle resulted in utter chaos, the deaths of 13 Marines, and destroyed U.S. deterrence.

Thousands of U.S. contractors and employees were left behind, and the administration abandoned billions of dollars of new weapons and military equipment to the terrorist Taliban.

In contrast, there is now a tentative calm across the Middle East. After Trump’s bombing of Iran’s nuclear facilities, the theocracy is not expected to be able to acquire a nuclear weapon for years.

Iran, Hezbollah, Hamas, and the Houthis are decimated and increasingly impotent.

No wars broke out during Trump’s current year. Tentative Trump-inspired ceasefires helped stop violence between India and Pakistan, Cambodia and Thailand, Egypt and Ethiopia, Serbia and Kosovo, and Armenia and Azerbaijan.

Trump’s tariffs so far have not caused, as critics predicted, a recession or stock collapse. Instead, the stock market has reached all-time highs.

Trillions of dollars in promised foreign investments in the U.S. have set a record. And China, for the first time in 50 years, is facing an American-led global pushback against its exploitative, mercantilist trade policies.

The left is outraged about many of Trump’s executive orders.

But the public largely supports destroying the cartels’ seaborne drug shipments bound for the U.S. Polls show majorities favor banning transgender males from female sports, ending DEI racialist fixations, and enacting long-overdue higher education reforms.

Yet the daily news is about politicians’ f-bombs, government shutdowns, Trump’s social media trolling, and street violence. But the facts tell a different story of national recovery from the self-inflicted disasters of the recent past.

Tyler Durden Sat, 11/08/2025 - 14:00

All Ukraine's State Thermal Power Plants Down After 'Largest Ever Attack' By Russia

All Ukraine's State Thermal Power Plants Down After 'Largest Ever Attack' By Russia

Friday night witnessed more heavy Russian airstrikes on Ukrainian cities, which has left a reported eleven people killed and large swathes of Ukraine without power. Moscow said its attacks targeted the country's energy infrastructure.

Ukraine's military confirmed Saturday morning that Russia launched hundreds of drones and missiles from the air, land, and sea, primarily targeting vital energy infrastructure, ahead of a potentially severe winter.

AFP via Getty Images

In total some 500 aerial attacks were detected overnight, including 45 missiles and over 450 drones. Ukraine's military said just nine missiles were intercepted, but air defenses managed to shoot down 406 UAVs.

Gas and power facilities, including thermal energy sites, were damaged, leading to widespread outages across several regions - something which has started to become the norm as Russia escalates these strikes.

An attack on eastern Dnipro region included a building being hit, which killed three people and injured 11 others, with Ukrainian media saying children were among the casualties. This was the result of a drone ripping through a residential building.

"Russian strikes once again targeted people's everyday life. They deprived communities of power, water and heating, destroyed critical infrastructure, and damaged railway networks," Foreign Minister Andriy Sybiha said in the aftermath.

Emergency management crews are working overtime to restore power to the impacted grids, but this has been a growing problem as badly needed parts are hard to constantly replace after years of accumulated damage.

Reports say Kiev has been plunged into darkness, and swathes of the city and region could be without power for some 9-hours or more:

"We are working to eliminate the consequences throughout the country. The focus is on the rapid restoration of heat, light and water," Svyrydenko said.

Ukraine's southern Odesa was also impacted, with outages reported. The southern Black Sea port city has come under growing attacks, though it was mostly sparred from any major direct military action throughout the war. But as things keep escalating that could change.

Kyiv Post has cited authorities who say that all state thermal power plants are now offline:

All thermal power plants (TPP) operated by Ukraine's state-owned energy company Centrenergo are down following "the largest Russian attack" which targeted all of them, the company announced on Nov. 8.

According to the company, the same thermal power plants that had been restored after attacks in 2024 were struck again, with multiple Russian drones targeting them "each minute" overnight on Nov. 8.

In the north, the mayor of Kharkiv has also reported a "noticeable shortage of electricity." The Kremlin has confirmed this has been systematic and intentional so long as Kiev refuse to make significant compromise, including territorial concessions, to end the war.

While President Trump has recently approved some escalatory measures, such as providing Ukraine with intelligence for long-range attacks on Russian territory, the US president has by and large seemed to have washed his hands of involvement in a rapid peace process or any kind of lasting solution for that matter.

Tyler Durden Sat, 11/08/2025 - 13:25

US To Boycott G20 Over South Africa's 'Rights Abuses' Of Afrikaners

US To Boycott G20 Over South Africa's 'Rights Abuses' Of Afrikaners

Authored by Tom Ozimek via The Epoch Times,

President Donald Trump said on Nov. 7 that no federal government officials will attend Group of 20 summit in South Africa on Nov. 22–23, accusing Pretoria of human rights abuses against white Afrikaners and illegal land seizures.

“It is a total disgrace that the G20 will be held in South Africa,” Trump wrote on Truth Social.

“Afrikaners (People who are descended from Dutch settlers, and also French and German immigrants) are being killed and slaughtered, and their land and farms are being illegally confiscated. No U.S. Government Official will attend as long as these Human Rights abuses continue. I look forward to hosting the 2026 G20 in Miami, Florida!”

South Africa’s foreign ministry called Trump’s remarks “regrettable” and said his claims were factually and historically inaccurate.

“The characterization of Afrikaners as an exclusively white group is ahistorical,” the ministry said in a Nov. 8 statement.

“Furthermore, the claim that this community faces persecution is not substantiated by fact.”

The ministry stated that its focus remains on utilizing the G20 platform to promote global cooperation and share South Africa’s post-apartheid lessons in reconciliation.

It noted that its experience in overcoming racial and ethnic divisions makes it “uniquely positioned to champion within the G20 a future of genuine solidarity.”

Broader Dispute Over Policy and Human Rights

Trump’s decision not to send any officials to the G20 builds on his remarks on July 29 that he might skip the summit altogether and “send somebody else” in his place.

“I’ve had a lot of problems with South Africa,” Trump told reporters at the time. “They have some very bad policies.”

The president has repeatedly criticized South Africa’s domestic and foreign policies, including its land expropriation law and its accusations that Israel committed genocide in Gaza—claims Israel has denied.

Since the end of apartheid, South Africa has implemented what it calls affirmative action and Black Economic Empowerment programs to address historical inequalities. However, the government has rejected allegations that it seizes land belonging to white citizens or targets specific racial groups.

Trump’s decision to boycott the G20 deepens tensions that have been growing since he returned to office in January. Just days after his inauguration, South African President Cyril Ramaphosa signed legislation allowing for the seizure of farmland without compensation and its redistribution to marginalized groups. More than 70 percent of the country’s farmland is owned by white farmers.

In February, Trump issued an executive order in response to what he called a genocide of Afrikaners, saying the law followed “countless government policies designed to dismantle equal opportunity in employment, education, and business, and hateful rhetoric and government actions fueling disproportionate violence against racially disfavored landowners.”

The South African government has consistently denied those claims, calling them unfounded and politically motivated.

Diplomatic Strains Ahead of G20 Transfer

South Africa holds the rotating G20 presidency from December 2024 through November 2025, after which the United States will assume the role. Ramaphosa said in May that he expected Trump to attend the summit to ensure a smooth handover of responsibilities.

“I want to hand over the [G20] presidency to President Trump in November,” Ramaphosa said.

“He needs to be there. I don’t want to hand it over to an empty chair. I expect him to be coming to South Africa.”

Earlier this year, Secretary of State Marco Rubio announced a U.S. boycott of a G20 foreign ministers’ meeting in Cape Town. Writing in a post on X on Feb. 5, Rubio criticized South Africa for “expropriating private property” and for using the G20 platform to promote “solidarity, equality, & sustainability.”

“In other words: DEI and climate change,” Rubio wrote, arguing that it was not in America’s interest to waste taxpayer money or “coddle anti-Americanism.”

South Africa’s close relationship with China and its membership in the BRICS bloc—alongside Brazil, Russia, India, and China—have further strained its relations with Washington.

Pretoria has maintained a policy of strategic non-alignment in global affairs but has increasingly aligned its rhetoric with Beijing and Moscow on issues ranging from Israel to trade.

In February 2023, South Africa conducted a 10-day military drill with China and Russia, an exercise that overlapped with the one-year mark of Russia’s war in Ukraine.

The United States is set to host the G20 in 2026.

Tyler Durden Sat, 11/08/2025 - 12:50

Turkey Issues Own Arrest Warrant For Netanyahu, Pushing Israel Relations To Breaking Point

Turkey Issues Own Arrest Warrant For Netanyahu, Pushing Israel Relations To Breaking Point

Despite the US-backed ceasefire in Gaza having held for weeks at this point, Turkey is once again lashing out at Israel, and appears ready to push official relations to breaking point.

Turkey has long supported the International Criminal Court (ICC) warrants against top Israeli officials, but has this week issued warrants of its own, including seeking the arrest of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and 36 others on charges of genocide.

Named alongside Netanyahu are Israeli Defense Minister Yisrael Katz, National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir, Chief of General Staff Eyal Zamir, and Navy Commander David Saar Salama in the Turkish government arrest warrants. Ankara is further seeking to oblige European states to arrest them.

Given years of ratcheting tensions between the two countries, it was extremely unlikely that Israeli leaders would ever travel to Turkey anyway, but this will continue to also cause problems and create pressures for regular Israeli tourists.

Istanbul Bar Association Chair Yasin Şamlı has denounced what he called the "terror structure of Israel" and highlighted the many countries in the region, including Iran and Qatar, who have endured acts of recent aggression from Israel.

In reference to the killing of 5-year-old Hind Rajab, he stated: "This act proves to the world that Israel is committing open genocide. Israel kills children out of fear. There is no innocent person it refrains from targeting. Israel poses a danger to all humanity."

"Today, we have filed a new complaint regarding the killing of Hind Rajab, the bombing of the Turkish-Palestinian Friendship Hospital, and the crimes committed against members of the Global Sumud Fleet," Şamlı continued.

But Turkey has long expressed support to Hamas leadership, as Israel has consistently pointed out. Netanyahu has denounced Ankara time and again for providing safe-haven to Hamas officials in Turkey.

At times, the Turkish government has accused Israel intelligence agency Mossad of conducting covert operations inside Turkey - which seems a likely scenario given the long-established Hamas presence.

Turkey acts in a way similar to Qatar - on the one hand seeking to present itself as a 'neutral' mediator on the Palestinian issue, but simultaneously supporting hardline Islamist groups like Hamas in Gaza, and AQ-linked fighters in Syria.

Tyler Durden Sat, 11/08/2025 - 12:15

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