The AI Transition: Even Dinosaurs Weren't Stupid Enough To Create Their Own Extinction Event

By Peter Tchir of Academy Securities

A Bridge Too Far? The AI TRANSITioN?

Last weekend we discussed Molotov Cocktails, Volatility, Stability, & Faux Liquidity. In a nutshell, it was about:

• The transition from one steady state to another steady state can be volatile.
  • A rules-based world, dependent on trade, to a ProSec-based world where each country operates more independently.
  • The transition from a pre-AI world to an AI world.
• Faux liquidity – or our assessment that market structure is set up to produce bigger moves than the headlines or news warrant.

We got to discuss many of these things on Bloomberg TV on Friday, where Academy was part of the first half hour. While the focus was on AI, I kept arguing that geopolitics and this transition from one stable system to another stable system was also likely playing a major role in this week’s price action. Of all the things I regret saying, or not saying, I flubbed the final question on Walmart’s multiple. It isn’t something I focus on, and my answer was weak. I wish I’d highlighted that Walmart is the sort of company that should do well – big enough to navigate the changing global trade system and well positioned enough to extract the maximum benefit from AI-related efficiencies.

In any case, we certainly have a lot to follow up on based on this past week’s volatility and rapidly evolving narrative.

A Bridge Too Far?

One heck of a movie, and one of the few that comes to mind where the “good guys” lose. They put up an epic struggle, but don’t achieve their goal.

As you know I am Canadian, so you can choose to take this with a grain of salt, but I believe that this week’s “Truth Social” post about the new bridge, almost completed, fits the “bridge too far” narrative.

• There was a lot of concern about imposing tariffs on countries that had been deemed to be blocking the U.S. “taking” Greenland. Not just from foreign countries, but there also seemed to be some degree of backlash and concern domestically. Not “just” from economists (which were front and center during Liberation Day). Nothing broke, and nothing really changed, but it seemed to set the stage for what happened this week.
• On Sunday night (or early Monday morning) the President posted some complaints about the new bridge being built. The Gordie Howe Bridge. He is legendary both in Canada and Detroit. As we’ve become used to there was a mix of fact and fiction, and some weirdness (like China going to take away the Stanley Cup – which no Canadian team has won since 1993).
• He went down the path of ownership. But it quickly came out that Michigan will have ownership, once the bridge costs are paid for (which were heavily skewed towards being paid by Canada). The argument of “ownership” also looked “flimsy” as people discovered that the Ambassador Bridge (the current connecting bridge) is privately owned by an American company (or family). I’ve used that bridge a lot, and it leaves a lot to be desired. One thing that I think of a lot is how great the new Tappan Zee Bridge is (technically the Mario Cuomo Bridge). It is a beautiful bridge and it has changed traffic patterns for the better. I don’t even know how old the bridge is now, but I still feel a sense of awe (and even pride) when driving across that bridge. I’m not sure the Gordie Howe Bridge is anywhere near as impressive as the new Tappan Zee Bridge, but it certainly has to be an improvement (and additive).
• I’ve left out a myriad of other allegations around this to focus on the pertinent point. Michigan, with the approval (and support) of U.S. Presidents (including President Trump) has engaged in a project that they viewed would help their economy. Out of the blue, that is being challenged?

Now maybe it is pure coincidence, but this week, the House of Representatives voted to stop the tariffs between the U.S. and Canada. There is no way this won’t get stopped with a veto (assuming it gets passed the Senate), but this is the first time during this administration that we saw Republicans go against the President even as they were warned about reprisals such as “being primaried.”

We’ve had some questions about the American Brand. Tourism to the U.S. from abroad is down (not horrific, but down). We have yet to notice a discernible change in consumer tastes abroad, but many of these “bridges too far” have occurred only recently.

While I’m not sure much will come of it, France announced on January 26th that civil servants would have to use Visio by 2027, instead of Zoom.

While we have “goods” trade deficits with many (even most countries), we have “services” surpluses.

We’ve always argued that the total trade balance is most important (goods and services).

• While I don’t see it tracked anywhere, “profitability” of trade is even more relevant and what little evidence there is points to the fact that from most countries, the U.S. imports low margin products and exports higher margin products (or services as the case may be).
• That is NOT inconsistent with ProSec which prioritizes domestic (or trade with close allies) for “things” that are vital for national security in a wholistic way (rather than purely military).

We’ve also argued that tariffs put pressure on the system slowly. It is the cumulative effect of tariffs that matter (especially when the rates themselves seemed subject to change at any moment). As we move into the 10th month of higher tariff revenue (around $30 billion per month) the cumulative effect seems to be appearing (lots of reports this week citing amounts eaten by exporters, versus paid by importers, or passed on to customers).

Now maybe it is pure coincidence, but this week, stories circulated about reducing tariffs on steel and aluminum. There were some denials but this makes sense – as it will take the U.S. time to crank up production and it is “confusing” how to apply this, as both steel and aluminum are a part of so many products.

Markets like some degree of certainty. Even if the certainty is somewhat variable. The market has grown to accept the volatility and the “maximalist negotiating leverage” game. 

But have we crossed a bridge, where that game no longer functions like it has for the previous 6 months or so?

U.S. stocks underperformed most other indices last week, especially when converted to dollars.

I think we have seen enough Molotov Cocktails lobbed domestically and internationally (from all sorts of directions and parties) that this volatility extends and resolves itself in lower valuations, especially domestically, as the U.S. has outperformed by so much for so long.

The AI TRANSITioN?

I was trying to find a font that had more of a computer/sci-fi “vibe”. I wanted to use one of The Far Side’s dinosaur cartoons where a couple of dinosaurs are laughing at a mammal while one looks mildly concerned about some snowflakes that are falling (but we probably needed some actual copyright permission to do that – though I urge you to search The Far Side for dinosaurs).

I guess I was thinking about that because Even the Dinosaurs Weren’t Stupid Enough to Create Their Own Extinction Event. They were not smart, and they did become extinct, but they didn’t do it to themselves.

So, we will use this little picture to symbolize what may have happened last week (and I’m pretty sure we don’t need any copyright permission from Grok).

We have been talking about the little I (or i-shaped) economy. Arguing that maybe it is a k-shaped economy rather than a K-shaped economy. We’ve also been talking about the “working poor” in recent pieces (The Fed, Electricity, & Affordability).

You could almost convince me that it is an h-shaped economy, but that might be too negative.

But for now, I think the K in the K-shaped economy just cracked. Let’s look at this “cracking” of the K in two ways.

The first from “margin compression” and even “margin differential” compression:

• High margin, low physical asset businesses are likely to face margin pressures. I don’t think we are close to the day where AI can create products that remotely compete with the biggest and best software programs – but they could face margin pressures as they head off any potential competition at the pass. The selling may already be overdone, but we could see some margin compression continuing in sectors that don’t have as big of a “moat” as previously thought. Installed base is still a very powerful “moat” and the market may have forgotten that, but margin pressure is likely to be a story that becomes a recurring theme to pressure markets.
• Low margin business, especially those with large “physical” undertakings (property, plant, and equipment, shipping, logistics, etc.) may benefit and see margin expansion. These are the sorts of business that can see margins expand as they get benefits from efficiencies delivered by AI (I should have done a better job on this on Friday’s TV appearance).
• So, the high margin sectors that the market owns heavily could see margins shrink, while the low margin businesses that many investors are underweight in could see margins expand. Both the margin expansion and compression come from the same force – rapidly improving AI. This rotation could have some staying power. Call this the margin differential compression trade. It will adjust what are the appropriate multiples for different companies and different industries.

Weirdly, that might be the more benign way to think about this.

• White collar job losses.
  • The FT published an article where Mustafa Suleyman, the CEO of Microsoft AI, predicted (according to a Grok summary) that most tasks in white-collar professions – such as those performed by lawyers, accountants, project managers, and others working at computers – will be fully automated by AI within the next 12 to 18 months. There seem to be a lot of takes on his words that are even worse than what he said, though what he said doesn’t seem great. Presumably, at least some people on the upward sloping part of the K have white-collar jobs?
    • I did manage to write a T-Report this weekend, rather than giving up, but…
  • If you haven’t seen, or I’m the first person to suggest checking out Something Big Is Happening, I recommend it. It is another, I think I can say, “dire” warning about potential job losses.

We’ve been living in a “no hire, no fire” economy. Anyone who had been proclaiming massive job losses from AI was viewed as a tin foil hat wearing “doomer.”

Most people were explaining that AI would:

• Enhance what people could do, so those who harnessed it would benefit greatly.
• The counterpoint to this, recently, has become that since AI is getting so easy to use, don’t even bother, because by the next generation, we won’t need to have a clue on how to use AI, to use it.
• Create some job losses but create many more jobs. Ironically AI prompter is one of them, but see the above comment.
• Basically, the argument has been that AI, like many other technological advances, would be a big net benefit to humankind (and not a self-made extinction event).

That narrative, like the K, seems to have cracked in the past few weeks.

• Will that change how people spend their money? This narrative has appeared rather “suddenly” and has an “alarmist” ring to it. Maybe, like the initial concerns about DeepSeek, it will fall by the wayside.
  • The risk is that, even before job losses occur, people will change their spending behavior out of fear of those job losses.

I’m not in this camp, but the concern that “Someone’s Efficiency is at the cost of Your Job” was almost palpable this week.

Probably overdone, but if the upward sloping leg of the K has been driving the economy and spending, we might want to be very careful (in our investing and spending).

Yet another reason to be cautious on risk as we make it through this “transition.”

The Fed

I remain convinced that:

• We will have 75 bps of cuts by the end of the September meeting. That there is a far higher chance of one more Powell cut (March or April) than the market is pricing in. The market moved in our direction this week, but plenty of room still to price in what we are positioning for.
• 10-year yields will be sub 4%. 10s closed at 4.05% on Friday.

This has nothing to do with the rest of today’s report, but I didn’t want anyone to think we’ve stopped pounding the table on these trades. Though in some ways it has a lot to do with everything in today’s report if we’re right about the volatility and its disruptive nature.

Two Last Things

• The Supreme Court is likely to rule, at least partially, against the U.S. government on the IEEPA tariffs.
  • Countries that have set up trade deals are unlikely to be impacted as the trade deals themselves should overrule the IEEPA tariffs (to the extent there were any). Though there isn’t a lot of evidence that agreements in principle have turned into formal documents.
  • The admin has many other ways to attack tariffs other than under IEEPA, especially for tariffs in the 15% and lower range.
  • It is likely the admin, on any losses, will make it very difficult to collect money paid on tariffs that were deemed illegal. Do you really want to sue the government or do you just view it as a sunk cost?
  • I don’t think the ruling will have much of an impact, though I’m rethinking that, as the reaction might be different if we really did go “a bridge too far” this week.
• Expect nuclear arms proliferation.
  • Ukraine gave up what nukes it had and it was invaded by Russia (which does have nukes and has muted any military response to their actions).
  • Iran has been attacked before, and the U.S. is positioning forces capable of launching another major attack.
  • North Korea, with a backwards economy, and few friends, is largely left alone (while executing cybercrimes to fund themselves). Would the world tolerate such blatant cyber activity if they didn’t have nukes?
  • France has discussed the possibility of working with other nations about sharing (in some form) either technology or weapons.
  • Nuclear energy will be important to the world for ProSec, and I’d be shocked if nuclear weapons didn’t play an important role in smaller nations figuring out how to ensure their sovereignty. So probably bad for humankind and extinction events, but good for uranium and others in the nuclear fuel business.

Bottom Line

More of the same. We could get some bounces.

• Some markets are at or near being oversold.
• We could get pleasant surprises with Iran or Russia.
• There are likely to be new “pronouncements” from the administration in their efforts to run hot heading into the midterms – and I continue to believe people are not pricing in the Fed as aggressively as they should. I also remain a huge fan of the ProSec™ trade. Not in the least because many of the industries that fit the trade criteria are in the camp of stocks that have been underinvested in and are positioned to do well.

I wasn’t even depressed when I started writing this report. Sorry if this report did nothing to brighten your day, but this is the dark spot my thoughts led me to.

Though I do remain skeptical of the ability for AI to change things so quickly that we are hurt before we can reap the benefits.

There, at least we ended on a positive note, and for those on holiday on Monday, do enjoy! It is difficult to believe it is only the middle of February.

Tyler Durden Sun, 02/15/2026 - 15:10

Pentagon Gaming Out "Sustained, Weeks-Long Military Campaign" Against Iran Which Could Open Pandora's Box

The Pentagon is preparing for a "sustained, weeks-long military campaign" against Iran if President Trump gives the green light, according to fresh reporting in Reuters which cites two US officials.

The scenario under review envisions a far broader conflict than last June's 12-day war, when the US and Israel launched strikes on the Islamic Republic. But some who better remember the recent Iraq and Afghan wars say it won't just be "weeks" - but any major Iran action has the likelihood of becoming a much lengthier and bloodier than envisioned quagmire.

Anadolu Agency via Getty Images

The report comes after Washington and Tehran resumed indirect talks in Oman last week - also as Israel is pressing for Iran to dismantle not only its nuclear program but also its ballistic missile arsenal - the same capability Tehran used to strike back at Tel Aviv in June.

Even as some White House officials have touted the idea of 'limited' strikes on Iran, akin to the swift and easy Venezuela operation which ousted Nicolás Maduro, Pentagon planners are being more realistic in admitting immediate Iranian retaliation would sustain the conflict, making it "more complex".

From the heart of the Reuters article...

The planning under way this time is more complex, the officials said. In a sustained campaign, the U.S. military could hit Iranian state and security facilities, not just nuclear infrastructure, one of the officials said. The official declined to provide specific details.

Experts say the risks to U.S. forces would be far greater in such an operation against Iran, which boasts a formidable arsenal of missiles. Retaliatory Iranian strikes also increase the risk of a regional conflict.

The same official said the United States fully expected Iran to retaliate, leading to back-and-forth strikes and reprisals over time.

Trump of course ran on a campaign to end the forever wars and to not start any new ones, especially in the Middle East, where Washington has had a horrible and blood-stained track record. 'Blowback' also defined the period of the 'global war on terror' - as groups like ISIS arose in the wake of toppling Saddam Hussein and destabilizing places like Libya and Syria.

Whether Trump is pursuing diplomacy or using negotiations as cover for renewed military action remains an open question, and talks based on Oman are expected to continue this coming week.

White House spokesperson Anna Kelly said the president has "all options on the table" and will decide on war based on national security interests, also at a moment Congress is as usual asleep at the wheel, despite a couple of efforts to reign in War Powers which have quickly failed.

As for the 'option' of a large-scale attack, Pentagon leadership is still cautious on this, given US assets are still being put in place in the CENTOM region, also as a second carrier - the USS Gerald R. Ford - is still en route from the Caribbean.

"Defensively, we’ve got to make sure, before we do anything [that US defenses are in order," said Gen. Joseph Votel, former head of US Central Command. "So we are prepared for the inevitable response that comes back against US interests or against our partners." The NY Times has also lately described the effort as "putting one’s house in order."

Are US dialogue and peace efforts for real this time? Or another ruse to lull the Iranians into thinking it want suffer surprise attack...

Rubio on Iran:

We're dealing with radical Shia clerics.

We're dealing with people who make geopolitical decisions on the basis of pure theology.

No one's ever been able to do a successful deal with Iran, but we're going to try. pic.twitter.com/Au2sOygybZ

— Clash Report (@clashreport) February 15, 2026

Meanwhile, a note via Peter Tchir's Academy Securities: 

“I do believe that before any kinetic action occurs, there would need to be greater consultation with regional allies. For now, the Arab Gulf countries are more comfortable with the weakened devil they know in Tehran than potential chaos in the region, a disruption in oil prices, and investor jitters, not to mention the probability that any Iranian retaliation is likely to include attacks on their soil.” – Linda Weissgold, Former CIA Deputy Director for Analysis

But again, this notion that a military campaign would just take "weeks" (and not months or even years)... is precisely the lie that was floated about the Iraq and Afghan interventions - both which turned into two decade plus nightmares.

Tyler Durden Sun, 02/15/2026 - 14:35

As Demand Grows, US Nuclear Energy Industry Faces Looming Crunch In Reactor Fuel Supply

Authored by John Haughey via The Epoch Times,

The Department of Energy (DOE) has invested billions in incentivizing domestic production of enriched uranium for the commercial development of advanced nuclear reactors, including $2.7 billion issued last month to three companies to build centrifuges and processing plants necessary to produce fuel for reactor cores.

Yet, a fuel crunch that could hobble President Donald Trump’s “nuclear renaissance” initiatives looms as soon as 2028, several experts warned during the two-day U.S. Nuclear Industry Council’s 13th annual Advanced Reactors Summit in Seattle that concluded Feb. 12. 

“If America wants to lead in advanced reactors, we have to do the nuclear fuel here. Make no mistake about that,” Centrus Energy Senior Vice President Patrick Brown told more than 400 nuclear industry professionals on Feb.12.

“Unfortunately, we’re really building from zero.”

Right now, he said, less than 1 percent of the nuclear fuel that the nation’s 94 commercial reactors annually consume is produced domestically, and that is exclusively dedicated to the Pentagon. The nation’s commercial nuclear energy industry is “completely reliant on foreign imports” of enriched uranium, he said, primarily from Kazakhstan and Canada.

Those imports include up to 5 percent from Russia that won’t be available soon. In response to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022, Congress in 2023 banned U.S. companies from importing Russian uranium. That ban goes into effect on Jan. 1, 2028.

Brown said with the global nuclear fuel market already constrained, domestic industry’s scramble to revive enrichment—a process American companies invented and once dominated—is now a race to have supply available to meet demand as new reactors come online.

Because that demand—spurred by the president’s May 2025 executive orders to license 10 new reactors by 2030 and quadruple commercial nuclear energy output by 2050—is likely to outpace domestic fuel production until the early 2030s, he said a timing shortage will emerge in 2028. 

“That’s when we'll see that the problem is there’s not enough non-Russian supply” of enriched uranium to replace even the relatively small amount it now produces in a tight market where restrictions on one supplier impacts the entire market.

“Fortunately,” Brown said, the industry and the Trump administration recognize there is an approaching gap between burgeoning demand and static supply, and has deemed restoring domestic capacity to enrich uranium a national security priority akin to “a second Manhattan Project.”

The entrance of Urenco's uranium enrichment plant in Gronau, Germany. Urenco USA also operates a commercial enrichment plant in New Mexico and is among the few companies in the United States authorized to do so. Volker Hartmann/DDP/AFP via Getty Images

Industry Must Respond

The nation’s domestic nuclear fuel supply chain got a $2.7 billion boost when the Department of Energy on Jan. 5 issued awards to three domestic companies to enrich low-enriched uranium and high-assay low-enriched uranium.

Securing $900 million awards each to build uranium enrichment plants are California-based General Matter in a former Paducah gaseous diffusion plant in western Kentucky, North Carolina-headquartered Orano Group’s Federal Services operation in Oak Ridge, Tennessee, and Maryland-based Centrus Energy’s uranium enrichment plant in Piketon, Ohio.

Brown said unlike the array of demonstration projects the Department of Energy is sponsoring, such as the Energy Reactor Pilot Program that has 10 companies vying for federal funding if they can demonstrate functionality of their designs by July 4, 2026, enriching uranium is not a new process.

“We’re not here to do science experiments, right?” he said. “We’re here to go big or go home. We’re not going home. The era of demonstration is over. We are moving onto large-scale commercial production.”

Centrus is already licensed to produce low-enriched uranium and high-assay low-enriched uranium in its Ohio plant, he said. Its Technology and Manufacturing Center in Oak Ridge, Tennessee, is the only domestic manufacturer of centrifuges needed for the enrichment process. It’s ready to gradually scale-up production.

“We have the site. We have the facility,” Brown said. “We have the room to expand” at the Piketon plant, which is demonstrating with 18 centrifuges what could be replicated by thousands. “Our technologies are proven and are actively producing [high-assay low-enriched uranium] today,” he said.

The Department of Energy award is designed to induce a long-term “demand signal” for investors and utilities, he said, by assuring them there will be ample domestic supply of enriched uranium available should they incorporate nuclear power into their grid expansion plans.

However, Brown said, the Piketon plant and other projects nationwide are not expected to reach peak production until the early 2030s, meaning there could be more demand than supply until production can catch up.

While the Department of Energy funding is critical in seeding domestic capacity to be self-sufficient in producing nuclear fuels, how swiftly that can be achieved is now up to the industry itself, he said, encouraging operators to begin negotiating “off take” agreements with Centrus and others engaged in uranium enrichment so they can secure their fuel supply and processors can commit to ramping up with confirmed orders.

“This is the chicken-and-the-egg problem that [the Department of Energy] was trying to solve. They said, ‘Build the capacity and the advanced reactor development will come while we’re building it,’” Brown said. “That’s the message. So we need firm contracts to proceed to build further. So let us know. We’re ready.”

Tyler Durden Sun, 02/15/2026 - 14:00

Border Patrol Fired Army Lasers At Party Balloons, Forcing El Paso Air Traffic Shutdown

On Wednesday, after the FAA suddenly shut down airspace over El Paso, Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy announced the unsettling move was prompted by a "cartel drone incursion," and assured Americans that "the threat has been neutralized."

However, that shutdown, which impeded everything from commercial air traffic to medevac helicopter flights, was actually caused by a trigger-happy border Border Patrol unit firing a US Army laser weapon at a party balloon, not far from El Paso International Airport. 

The introduction of the weapon into a border-security role without FAA approval may have violated federal law. The proposal for arming the border patrol with the anti-drone weapon was first presented to Deputy Defense Secretary Steve Feinberg in the spring of 2025, sources tell the New York Times. The goal was the interdiction of drones used to smuggle drugs across the frontier. According to two people, Pentagon staff cautioned that the idea would require approval of the FAA and Transportation Department, but Feinberg said the Pentagon was free to do what it wanted with the weapons. The Pentagon called their account "a total fabrication." 

In a Feb 6 email obtained by the Times, the FAA's chief lawyer warned a DOD official that putting the weapon into the border-enforcement mix without restricting the airspace "a grave risk of fatalities or permanent injuries” to civilians flying overhead. 

CPB officers reportedly fired an AeroVironment LOCUST laser counter-drone weapon on loan from the US Army (AeroVironment photo)

In the predawn hours on Monday, Feb 9, as military service members observed, Customs and Border Protection officers fired the laser weapon at what they assumed was a drone near Fort Bliss, but it was actually a metallic party balloon. Around 5pm that day, a DOD official emailed an FAA lawyer, reiterating the Pentagon's stance that prior FAA approval wasn't needed, and that the laser weapons would continue to be employed on the border, adding that he "looked forward" to a meeting to discuss the topic. 

FAA officials were said to be outraged. Early Tuesday evening, the FAA warned the Pentagon and National Security Council that an FAA-mandated shutdown of airspace near El Paso was imminent. Then came the extraordinary order from FAA administrator Bryan Bedford that airspace above El Paso would be closed for 10 days. The "temporary flight restriction notice" forbid any flights below 18,000 feet in the affected area. An angry El Paso Mayor Renard Johnson said the "unnecessary" airspace shutdown, which lasted a few hours, caused "chaos and confusion," including the diversion of medevac flights to Las Cruces, New Mexico. Bedford rescinded the order on Wednesday.  

The laser weapon was fired a balloon approaching Fort Bliss, which is immediately adjacent to El Paso International Airport

The incident has intensified pre-existing tension between the DOD and the FAA, which goes back to the disastrous January 2025 collision between an American Airlines jet and a US Army Black Hawk helicopter that killed 67 people. At least two near-misses with Army helicopters followed. 

While it's been widely and credibly reported that CPB fired at a party balloon, the administration has yet to officially rescind its claims about a "cartel drone incursion." Meanwhile, the safety question hangs heavy in the air. In October 2024, an official at US Northern Command said safety concerns were, at the time, keeping lasers off the table where drone interdiction was concerned: 

“The biggest thing right now is the impact of the laser when it moves beyond its target. You know, how far is it going? What’s that going to do? How long does the laser need to remain on target before it begins to inflict damage and so on, right?” 

It's far from clear if those questions have since been satisfactorily answered. To the extent they're still being sorted out, maybe that process shouldn't be taking place next to El Paso International Airport. 

Tyler Durden Sun, 02/15/2026 - 13:25

"This Alliance Has To Look Different Because The World Looks Different": Rubio Expands On Historic Speech In Munich

Authored by 'sundance' via The Last Refuge,

Marco Rubio appears for an interview with John Micklethwait of Bloomberg News. The interview was pre-scheduled as a follow up to the rather historic speech in Munich at the security conference. Within the interview {video and transcript below} Rubio expands on the baseline of the speech, the ‘why‘ is the U.S-EU alliance important.

Beginning with the end in mind, Rubio reminds the interviewer that an alliance must first accept the purpose of the assembly. There are common values and common social components to the relationship that sit at the core of the decision to be allies.

We have a shared civilization based on shared values, and within that central component the Trump administration is staring at the Europeans and saying they have lost focus on these values. Europe is diminishing itself; it is fracturing its culture and has lost its sovereign identity. The United States wants to stay partnered with Europe, but we are not going to be a partner anchored to a collective mindset that has lost its identity.

This culturally Marxist status, a gathering of nations infected with political correctness, pontificating wokeness and apologetic self-flagellation, is the core problem the Europeans are not willing to face. President Trump and Marco Rubio are essentially telling the EU to shake it off, quit being woke, get proud of your heritage, institute political systems that give benefit to the population and regain pride in themselves and their identity.

The process begins with national security, but that is not just about military spending.  Their energy industry needs to support economic independence; they cannot outsource component manufacturing; they need to reestablish economic baselines that are not dependent on Russia, China, India or any other risk vector that could be used to manipulate.

Key Quotes:

These quotes capture the core themes of Rubio's remarks: pride in Western civilization, the urgency of a capable alliance, lessons from history, pragmatic diplomacy (including with adversaries), and a push for negotiated resolutions in key conflicts.

On shared Western civilization and the transatlantic alliance

"Ultimately, it’s the fact that we are both heirs to the same civilization. And it’s a great civilization and it’s one we should be proud of. It’s one that’s contributed extraordinarily to the world and it’s one, frankly, upon which America is built, from our language to our system of government to our laws to the food we eat to the name of our cities and towns – all of it deeply linked to this Western civilization and culture that we should be proud of, and it’s worth defending."

"People don’t fight and die for abstract ideas. They are willing to fight and defend who they are and what matters and is important to them."

"When we come off as urgent or even critical about decisions that Europe has failed to make or made, it is because we care. It is because we understand that ultimately, our own fate will be intertwined with what happens with Europe."

On the need for Europe to share the burden and be capable

"We want Europe to survive, we want Europe to prosper, because we’re interconnected in so many different ways and because our alliance is so critical. But it has to be an alliance of allies that are capable and willing to fight for who they are and what’s important."

On the Cold War parallels and lessons for today (vs. China)

"It’s reminding people of what we’ve done together in the past. But it’s also a reminder that at the end of that era, when we won the Cold War, there was this euphoria that led us to make some terrible decisions that have now left us vulnerable – it deindustrialized the West; it left us increasingly dependent on others, including China, for our critical supplies. And that needs to be reversed in order to safeguard us."

"We should never be in a situation where our alliance and our respective countries are vulnerable to extortion or blackmail because someone controls 99 percent of something that’s critical to national life."

On European leaders engaging with China

"Nation-states need to interact with one another. [...] I don’t think visiting Beijing or meeting with the Chinese is – on the contrary, I think it would be irresponsible for great powers not to have relationships and talk through things and, to the extent possible, avoid unnecessary conflict."

On the alliance's evolution and core foundation

"This alliance has to look different because the world looks different. This alliance has to be about different things than it’s been in the past because the challenges of the 21st century are different than the challenges of the 20th."

"The fundamental thing that has to change is we have to remind ourselves of why it is we have an alliance in the first place. [...] This is not just a military arrangement. [...] It is what holds us together in the first place as an alliance is our shared civilizational values, the fact that we are all heirs to a common civilization and one we should be very proud of."

On the Ukraine war

"I think that’s a difficult war to say anyone is winning. The Russians are losing seven to eight thousand soldiers a week – a week. [...] Not wounded – dead."

"In the end, this war will not be solved militarily. It will be – in the end, it will come to a negotiated settlement. We’d like to see that happen as soon as possible."

"I don’t think it’s possible for Russia to even achieve whatever initial objectives they had at the beginning of this war. I think now it’s largely narrowed down to their desire to take 20 percent of Donetsk that they don’t currently possess."

On Cuba and the regime

"Cuba’s fundamental problem is that it has no economy and its economic model is one that has never been tried and has never worked anywhere else in the world."

"They would much rather be in charge of the country than allow it to prosper."

"The people of Cuba – and that’s what this regime has not been willing to give them because they’re afraid that if the people of Cuba can provide for themselves, they lose control over them, they lose power over them."

On Iran

"I think it’s pretty clear that Iran will never be allowed to have a nuclear weapon, that that poses a threat not just to the United States, to Europe, to world security, and to the region."

"The President would always prefer to end problems with a deal. He would always prefer that, so we’re going to give it a chance here again and see if it works."

Full Transcript:

QUESTION:  Marco Rubio, Secretary of State, thank you for talking to Bloomberg.  You’ve just made this rather remarkable speech where you talked about the destiny of Europe and America always being intertwined.  You talked about the alliance which has stretched all the way, culturally, from Michelangelo to the Rolling Stones – a first, I suspect, for a secretary of state – but a culture that has bled and died together.  But the very common theme of your speech was the need to share the burden, the need for Europe and America to do things together, which was slightly different from the Vice President last year.  Were you kind of offering a carrot where perhaps he was offering a stick?

SECRETARY RUBIO:  I think it’s the same message.  I think what the Vice President said last year very clearly was that Europe had made a series of decisions internally that were threatening to the alliance and ultimately to themselves, not because we hate Europe or we don’t like Europeans but because – what is it that we fight for, what is it that binds us together?  And ultimately, it’s the fact that we are both heirs to the same civilization.  And it’s a great civilization and it’s one we should be proud of.  It’s one that’s contributed extraordinarily to the world and it’s one, frankly, upon which America is built, from our language to our system of government to our laws to the food we eat to the name of our cities and towns – all of it deeply linked to this Western civilization and culture that we should be proud of, and it’s worth defending.

And ultimately, that’s the point.  The point is that people – people don’t fight and die for abstract ideas.  They are willing to fight and defend who they are and what matters and is important to them.  And that was the foundation he laid last year in his speech – and we add on into this year – to explain to people that when we come off as urgent or even critical about decisions that Europe has failed to make or made, it is because we care.  It is because we understand that ultimately, our own fate will be intertwined with what happens with Europe.  We want Europe to survive, we want Europe to prosper, because we’re interconnected in so many different ways and because our alliance is so critical.  But it has to be an alliance of allies that are capable and willing to fight for who they are and what’s important.

QUESTION:  You see a parallel – you seem to see a parallel between the Cold War, which I think I would argue that the – America beat the Soviet Union because it had a common idea and it had allies on its side.  You’re now in a struggle with China.  As people say, you’ve often been a hawk on that subject.  You’re in a struggle with China.  Do you think you absolutely need Europe to be able to win that?

SECRETARY RUBIO:  Yeah.  I would say two things.  First, the mentions of the Cold War are to remind people of everything we’ve achieved together in the past in times when there was doubt.  I mean, it’s hard to imagine today, but there were those who believed, in the 60s and 70s, even, that at a minimum, we had reached a stalemate, and worse, that perhaps Soviet expansion was inevitable and that we needed to come to accept it.  There were voices that actually argued this.

And so it’s reminding people of what we’ve done together in the past.  But it’s also a reminder that at the end of that era, when we won the Cold War, there was this euphoria that led us to make some terrible decisions that have now left us vulnerable – it deindustrialized the West; it left us increasingly dependent on others, including China, for our critical supplies.  And that needs to be reversed in order to safeguard us.

And so I do think, yes, it would be ideal to have a Western supply chain that is free from extortion from anyone – leave aside China – anybody else.  We should never have to – we should never be in a situation where our alliance and our respective countries are vulnerable to extortion or blackmail because someone controls 99 percent of something that’s critical to national life.  So I think we do have a vested interest in that regard.

Today is different than yesterday, but it has parallels, not in that China’s the new Soviet Union but that in our future, collectively we’ll be stronger if we work on these things together.

QUESTION:  Do you worry from that perspective the fact that, especially in the recent period, various sort of allies – Mark Carney has just been to Beijing, Starmer has just been to Beijing, Merz is about to go there – do you worry that they’re beginning to drift off too much in that direction?

SECRETARY RUBIO:  No.  I think nation-states need to interact with one another.  Just because you’ve – I mean, remember, I serve under a President that’s willing to meet with anybody.

QUESTION:  Yes.

SECRETARY RUBIO:  I mean, to be frank, I’m pretty confident in saying that if the ayatollah said tomorrow he wanted to meet with President Trump, the President would meet him, not because he agrees with the ayatollah but because he thinks that’s the way you solve problems in the world, and he doesn’t view meeting someone as a concession.  Likewise, the President intends to travel to Beijing and has already met once with President Xi.  And in this very forum yesterday, I met with my counterpart, the foreign minister of China.

So we expect nation-states to interact with one another.  In the end, we expect nation-states to act in their national interest.  I don’t think that is – that in no way runs counter to our desire to work together on things that we share in common or threats we face in common.  But I don’t think visiting Beijing or meeting with the Chinese is – on the contrary, I think it would be irresponsible for great powers not to have relationships and talk through things and, to the extent possible, avoid unnecessary conflict.

But there will be areas we’ll never agree on, and those are the areas that I hope we can work together on.

QUESTION:  So you think the Russia that many people have spoken about is illusory, that hasn’t happened yet?

SECRETARY RUBIO:  Well, there’s no – I mean, even as I speak to you now, there are U.S. troops deployed here on this continent on behalf of NATO.  There are still all kinds of cooperation that go on at every level; from intelligence to commercial and economic, the links remain.  I think there is a readjustment that’s happening, because I think we have to understand that we want to reinvigorate – this alliance has to look different because the world looks different.  This alliance has to be about different things than it’s been in the past because the challenges of the 21st century are different than the challenges of the 20th.  The world has changed and the alliance has to change.

But the fundamental thing that has to change is we have to remind ourselves of why it is we have an alliance in the first place.  This is not just a military arrangement.  This is not just some commercial arrangement.  It is what holds us together in the first place as an alliance is our shared civilizational values, the fact that we are all heirs to a common civilization and one we should be very proud of.  And only after we recognize that and make that the core of why it is we’re allies in the first place can we then build out all the mechanics of that alliance.  And then everything else we do together makes more sense.

QUESTION: The place where that’s being most obviously tested at the moment is Ukraine  You see all these numbers from the front where the Ukrainians do seem to be doing better in terms of what’s happening with the Russians.  Do you think Ukraine – or do you think Russia is still winning that war, or where you do you – where do you place it militarily?

SECRETARY RUBIO:  I think that’s a difficult war to say anyone is winning.  The Russians are losing seven to eight thousand soldiers a week – a week.

QUESTION:  Yes —

SECRETARY RUBIO:  Not wounded – dead.  Ukraine has suffered extraordinary damage, including overnight, and again, to its energy infrastructure.  And it will take billions of dollars and years and years to rebuild that country.  So I don’t think anyone can claim to be winning it.  I think that both sides are suffering tremendous damage, and we’d like to see the war come to an end.  It’s a senseless war in our view.  The President believes that very deeply.  He believes the war would have never happened had he been president at the time.

So we’re doing two things.  Obviously we continue – look, we don’t provide arms to Russia; we provide arms to Ukraine.  We don’t sanction Ukraine; we sanction Russia.  But at the same time, we find ourselves in the unique position of serving as probably the only nation on Earth that can bring the two sides to discuss the potential for ending this war on negotiated terms.  And it’s an obligation we haven’t – we won’t walk away from because we think it’s a very unique one to have.

It may not come to fruition, unfortunately.  I hope it does, and I think there are days when I feel more optimistic about it than others.  But we’re going to keep trying because that is – in the end, this war will not be solved militarily.  It will be – in the end, it will come to a negotiated settlement.  We’d like to see that happen as soon as possible.

QUESTION:  Are you worried that if Ukraine loses the war it’s going to be a disaster for the transatlantic relationship?  Because the Americans will say the Europeans didn’t provide enough arms, and Europeans will look and remember the meeting in the White House and Zelenskyy and Trump, and they will blame (inaudible).

SECRETARY RUBIO:  No, but that – that would ignore reality.  Look, Ukraine – first of all, they deserve a lot of credit.  They have fought very bravely.  They have received an extraordinary amount of support from the United States to the tune of billions of dollars that preexist the war.  In fact, Ukraine probably wouldn’t have survived the early days of the war had it not been for American aid that came to them even before the war had started with the Javelin missile that disabled the tank (inaudible).

QUESTION:  I wasn’t saying it was fair.  I was just saying there’s a – you have to deal with perceptions.

SECRETARY RUBIO:  Well, I mean people are saying – no, but I’m not worried about that because I can tell you that I think history will understand it.  But I don’t think the war is going to end in a traditional loss in the way people think.  I don’t think it’s possible for Russia to even achieve whatever initial objectives they had at the beginning of this war.  I think now it’s largely narrowed down to their desire to take 20 percent of Donetsk that they don’t currently possess.

And that’s hard.  It’s a hard concession for Ukraine to make for obvious reasons, both from a tactical standpoint and also from a political one.  And so that’s kind of where this thing has narrowed, and we’ll continue to search for ways to see if there is a solution to that unique problem that’s acceptable to Ukraine and that Russia will also accept.  And it may not work out, but we are going to do everything we can to see if we can find a deal.

Like I said, there are days like last week where you felt we had made some pretty substantial progress.  But ultimately, we have to see a final resolution to this to feel that it’s been worth the work, but we’re going to keep trying.  And our negotiator, Steve Witkoff – now Jared Kushner’s involved – have dedicated a tremendous amount of time to this, and they’ll have meetings again on Tuesday in regards to this.

QUESTION:  What about a country with which you’ve had a long interest: Cuba?  You mentioned it obliquely in the speech talking about the Cuban Missile Crisis.  How long do you think the regime can last without oil?

SECRETARY RUBIO:  Yeah, I think the regime in Cuba is – look, the revolution in Cuba ended a long time ago and – Cuba’s fundamental problem is that it has no economy and its economic model is one that has never been tried and has never worked anywhere else in the world, okay?  It just – it doesn’t have a real economic policy.  It doesn’t have a real economy.

Now, forget – put aside for a moment the fact that it has no freedom of expression, no democracy, no respect for human rights.  The fundamental problem Cuba has it is has no economy, and the people who are in charge of that country, in control of that country, they don’t know how to improve the everyday life of their people without giving up power over sectors that they control.  They want to control everything.  They don’t want the people of Cuba to control anything.

So they don’t know how to get themselves out of this.  And to the extent that they have been offered opportunities to do it, they don’t seem to be able to comprehend it or accept it in any ways.  They would much rather be in charge of the country than allow it to prosper.

QUESTION:  Is there any kind of off-ramp for the regime?  I mean, previous ones – when you negotiated with Venezuela, you said if they agreed with various things it would be possible to continue.

SECRETARY RUBIO:  Sure.  I mean, there is.  I mean, look, I think you have to —

QUESTION:  What could – what could the Cuban regime do to —

SECRETARY RUBIO:  Well, I’m not going to tell you or announce this in an interview here because obviously these things require space and time to do in the right way.  But I will say this, that that is that it is important for the people of Cuba to have more freedom, not just political freedom but economic freedom.  The people of Cuba – and that’s what this regime has not been willing to give them because they’re afraid that if the people of Cuba can provide for themselves, they lose control over them, they lose power over them.

So I think there has to be that opening and it has to happen, and I think now Cuba is faced with such a dire situation.  Remember this is a regime that has survived almost entirely on subsidies – first from the Soviet Union, then from Hugo Chavez, and how for the first time it has no subsidies coming in from anyone, and the model has been laid bare.

And it’s not just – look, multiple countries have gone in and helped, but the problem is that you lose money in Cuba.  They never pay their bills.  They never end up paying.  It never ends up working out.  There were European countries that went to Cuba and made what they thought were investments in certain sectors, only to have them – the contracts canceled and get themselves kicked out because the Cuban regime has no fundamental understanding of what business and industry looks like, and the people are suffering as a result of it.

So I think certainly their willingness to begin to make openings in this regard is one potential way forward.  I would also say – and this has not been really talked about a lot, but the United States has been providing humanitarian assistance directly to the Cuban people via the Catholic Church.  We did it after the hurricane.  We actually just recently announced an increase in the amount we’re willing to give.  And that’s something we’re willing to continue to explore, but obviously that’s not a long-term solution to the problems on the island.

QUESTION:  One last thing: Iran.  You’ve just sent a carrier – a second carrier – there.  Is that – and President Trump has talked about a month to give people time.  Are you running out of patience there?

SECRETARY RUBIO:  Well, I’d say twofold.  Number one is I think it’s pretty clear that Iran will never be allowed to have a nuclear weapon, that that poses a threat not just to the United States, to Europe, to world security, and to the region.  There’s no doubt about it.

The second is we obviously want to have forces in the region because Iran has shown the willingness and the capability to lash and strike out at the United States presence in the region.  We have bases because of our alliances in the region, and Iran has shown in the past that they are willing to attack us and/or threaten our bases.  So we have to have sufficient firepower in the region to ensure that they don’t make a mistake and come after us and trigger something larger.

Beyond that, the President has said that his preference is to reach a deal with Iran.  That’s very hard to do, but he’s going to try.  And that’s what we’re trying to do right now, and Steve Witkoff and Jared have some meetings lined up fairly soon.  We’ll see if we can make any progress.

The President would always prefer to end problems with a deal.  He would always prefer that, so we’re going to give it a chance here again and see if it works.

QUESTION:  Secretary Marco Rubio, thank you very much for talking to Bloomberg.

SECRETARY RUBIO:  Thank you.  Thank you.

Tyler Durden Sun, 02/15/2026 - 12:50

Russia Seized A Dozen Ukrainian Villages In February: 'Expanding Security Zone'

The Kremlin on Sunday issued an important battlefield update with Russian army chief Valery Gerasimov having newly declared that a dozen more eastern villages were seized in February.

"In two weeks of February, despite severe winter conditions, combined forces and military units of the joint task force liberated 12 settlements," Gerasimov said while visiting Russian troops operating inside Ukraine.

Getty Images

Gerasimov described Moscow's forces are advancing toward Sloviansk, the industrial city that has been center of fighting between pro-Kiev and pro-Moscow forces going all the way back to 2014.

According to Gerasimov, Russian troops are now roughly 15 kilometers (nine miles) from the city.

Gerasimov said Russian forces are "expanding a security zone" along border areas in the northeastern Sumy and Kharkiv regions, where Moscow holds limited footholds.

He added that he would confer with senior officers on "further actions in the Dnipropetrovsk direction," signaling potential expansion of operations beyond currently claimed territories - as quoted in AFP.

As also related in TASS:

Russian troops liberated 12 settlements in the first half of February, bringing over 200 square kilometers under their control, Chief of the General Staff of the Russian Armed Forces, Army General Valery Gerasimov, announced during an inspection of the Battlegroup Center units.

The Kremlin officially claims the Donetsk, Luhansk, Zaporizhzhia, and Kherson regions as Russian territory, but still doesn't exercise full control over them, but its forces are still slowly advancing, regional reports indicate.

In parallel with the grinding ground war, a more intense nightly aerial conflict continues. Ukrainian cities can barely keep the lights on, with many plunged into near permanent darkness, as Russia targets the national power grid.

NEW: Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky reiterated Ukraine’s willingness to compromise ahead of trilateral US-Ukrainian-Russian talks in Geneva, Switzerland on February 17 to 18.

Other Key Takeaways:

Russian officials continue to insist that the issues and terms impeding a… pic.twitter.com/t8xLPA97us

— Institute for the Study of War (@TheStudyofWar) February 14, 2026

But overnight and into the early Sunday hours, Russia's military reported downing over 100 inbound Ukrainian drones within a four hour period. The cross-border attacks have wreaked havoc on Russian oil refineries and export sites, in some cases.

Tyler Durden Sun, 02/15/2026 - 12:15

No Arrests In Nancy Guthrie Case After Major Operation Near Her Home

Authored by Jacki Thrapp via The Epoch Times,

No arrests have been made in the Nancy Guthrie case after a night of heavy police activity two miles from the missing 84-year-old’s home.

Nancy Guthrie, who is the mother of “Today” show co-anchor Savannah Guthrie, was last seen on Jan. 31 after she had dinner with her family.

As the search for Guthrie entered its third week, a large police presence responded to a road near the missing woman’s home in the Tucson, Arizona area on the night of Feb. 13, which included a series of sheriff’s and FBI vehicles as well as SWAT and forensics teams.

The Pima County Sheriff’s Department confirmed the police activity was related to the case, but did not release details about what happened inside the blocked-off scene.

“Law enforcement activity is underway at a residence near E Orange Grove Rd & N First Ave related to the Guthrie case,” the Pima County Sheriff’s Department shared in an X post.

“Because this is a joint investigation, at the request of the FBI, no additional information is currently available.”

The Epoch Times contacted the Pima County Sheriff’s Department and the FBI for more information, but had received no response at the time of publishing.

Around the same time that police activity was taking place in Nancy Guthrie’s neighborhood late Friday night, a separate incident was happening at a Culver’s restaurant, also two miles away from her home.

The FBI and the sheriff’s department tagged and towed a Range Rover SUV from a Culver’s restaurant parking lot, which confirmed the activity was part of the Nancy Guthrie case.

Nancy Guthrie was last seen on Jan. 31 when a relative drove her back home from a family dinner at 9:48 p.m.

The 84-year-old’s doorbell camera was disconnected in the early morning hours of Feb. 1.

The FBI accessed footage from her Nest camera and released video of a suspect, without a time stamp, on Feb. 12.

FBI Phoenix described the suspect in the video as a male, approximately 5 feet, 9 inches to 5 feet, 10 inches tall, with an average build.

A combination of images from a video shows a masked person outside Nancy Guthrie's home in Catalina Foothills, Arizona. FBI via The Epoch Times

The agency identified the suspect’s bag in the video as a black, 25-liter “Ozark Trail Hiker Pack” backpack that was sold at Walmart.

Law enforcement believes Nancy Guthrie was removed against her will.

On Feb. 12, the FBI doubled its reward for a tip leading to an arrest in the case to $100,000.

Multiple ransom notes have been reported by local outlets and TMZ.

Savannah Guthrie previously said that her family “will pay” for the return of her mother, but it’s unclear whether any payment was made to the person who sent the ransom note.

Tyler Durden Sun, 02/15/2026 - 11:40

What Do Monica Lewinsky, Maggie Thatcher, Elvis, Cher, Bill Cosby, & The Pope Have In Common?

In the (alleged) interests of transparency, AG Pam Bondi and Deputy AG Todd Blanche released a statement overnight that included a list of all government officials and politically-exposed persons that appeared in The Epstein Files.

SCOOP: The Department of Justice has sent over a letter to Congress outlining why it made redactions to the Epstein files.

The six-page letter also includes a list of all "government officials and politically exposed persons" in the files. pic.twitter.com/aRCmS2p1Bg

— Aaron Parnas (@AaronParnas) February 15, 2026

The term "politically exposed persons" was not defined in the Act, but consistent with Section 3 of the Act, Department reviewers were directed to notate "all government officials and politically exposed persons named or referenced" in any document, including videos and images, reviewed during this process.

This list includes (as directed by the Act) all persons where (1) they are or were a government official or politically exposed person and (2) their name appears in the files released under the Act at least once. Names appear in the files released under the Act in a wide variety of contexts.

For example, some individuals had extensive direct email contact with Epstein or Maxwell while other individuals are mentioned only in a portion of a document (including press reporting) that on its face is unrelated to the Epstein and Maxwell matters.

So, while we have seen 'lists' before, this is the official DoJ list of potential pedophiles, pizza eaters, or island-partiers (allegedly)...

• Acosta, Alexander
• Adelson, Miriam
• Allen, Woody
• Allred, Gloria
• Assange, Julian
• Audrey, Strauss
• Avakian, Stephanie
• Babino, Vincent
• Baldwin, Alec
• Band, Doug
• Bannon, Steve
• Barak, Ehud
• Barr, William
• Becerra, Xavier
• Belohlavek, Lanna
• Berman, Geoffrey
• Beyonce
• Bezos, Jeff
• Biden, Ashley
• Biden, Hunter
• Biden, Jill
• Biden, Joe
• Birger, Laura
• Bistricer, David
• Bistricer, Marc
• Black, Leon
• Blanche, Todd
• Blinken, Antony
• Boies, David
• Bondi, Pam
• Bongino, Dan
• Bono
• Book, Lauren
• Booker, Cory
• Bowdich, David
• Boyd, Stephen E.
• Bradshaw, Ric
• Branson, Richard
• Brennan, John
• Brockman, John
• Brunel, Jean Luc
• Buckley, Sean
• Bull, Gerald
• Bush Jr., George
• Bush, George W.
• Bush, Jeb
• Byrne, Patrick
• Calk, Stephen
• Capone, Russell
• Carlson, Tucker
• Carper, Tom
• Castro, Fidel
• Cheney, Dick
• Cher
• Chomsky, Noam
• Clayton, Jay
• Clinton, Bill
• Clinton, Chelsea
• Clinton, Hillary
• Clooney, George
• Cobain, Kurt
• Cohen, Michael
• Colleran, Brian
• Collins, Linda
• Comey, James
• Comey, Maureen
• Conway, George
• Copperfield, David
• Cosby, Bill
• De Niro, Robert
• Dershowitz, Alan
• Desantis, Ron
• Diller, Barry
• Donahue, Phil
• Donaleski, Rebekah
• Dupont, Kathleen
• Economou, George
• Egauger, Michael
• Eisenberg, John
• Elizabeth II
• Ellison, Keith
• Emmanuel, Rahm
• Epstein, Jeffrey
• Erben, Germann
• Feinberg, Stephen
• Ferguson, Sarah
• Filip, Mark
• Flynn, Michael
• Foley, Mark
• Fortelni, Marius
• Friedland, Edward
• Frost, Phillip
• Gates, Bill
• Gates, Melinda
• Garland, Merrick
• Geithner, Timothy
• Giuliani, Rudy
• Goldman, Dan
• Graham, Lindsey
• Guinness, Arthur Edward Rory
• Haley, Nikki
• Harrish, Joshua
• Harris, Kamala
• Hatch, Orin
• Hawk, Rony
• Heiss, Howard
• Higgins, Tony
• Ho, Stanley
• Holder, Eric
• Hoffman, Reid
• Horowitz, Andreesen
• Horowitz, Michael
• Hosenball, Mark
• Hoyer, Steny
• Huckabee, Mike
• Huckabee, Sarah
• Hutner, Florence
• Inge Rokke, Kjell
• Iveagh, Clare
• Jackson, Michael
• Jagger, Mick
• Jarecki, Henry
• Jayapal, Pramila
• JayZ
• Jeffries, Hakeem
• Johnson, Hank
• Jones, Alex
• Joplin, Janis
• Kasich, John
• Kendall Rowlands, John
• Kennedy Jr., Robert F.
• Kerry, John
• Khanna, Ro
• Kline, Carl
• Krisher, Barry
• Kudlow, Larry
• Kushner, Jared
• Kyl, Jon
• Lady Victoria Hervey
• Lefkowitz, Jay
• Lefroy, Jeremy
• Leo, Leonard
• Lew, Jack
• Lewinsky, Monica
• Lieu, Ted
• Lofgren, Zoe
• Lonergan, Jessica
• Lorber, Howard
• Lord Robert May
• Lutnick, Howard
• Lynch, Loretta
• Mace, Nancy
• Mandelson, Peter
• Mao, Coreen
• Margolin, James
• Markey, Ed
• Markle, Meghan
• Massie, Thomas
• Maxwell, Ghislaine
• Maxwell, Robert
• May, Theresa
• McCain, John
• McFarland, Nicole
• Meadows, Mark
• Menendez, Robert
• Milano, Alyssa
• Milikowski, Nathan
• Milken, Michael
• Mnuchin, Steve
• Moe, Alison
• Monaco, Lisa
• Monroe, Marilyn
• Mook, William
• Moskowitz, Jared
• Mueller III, Robert s.
• Mulvaney, Mick
• Murdoch, Rupert
• Musk, Elon
• Nadler, Jerry
• Napolitano, Janet
• Nassar, Larry
• Netanyahu, Benjamin
• Newsom, Gavin
• Obama, Barack
• Obama, Michelle
• Ocasio Cortez, Alexandria
• O’Donnell, Rosie
• Oz, Mehmet
• Papapetru, Sophia
• Parker, Daniel
• Patel, Kash
• Paul, Ron
• Pecorino, Joseph
• Pelosi, Nancy
• Pence, Mike
• Pestana, Diego
• Phelan, John
• Plaskett, Stacey
• Plourde, Lee
• Podesta, Tony
• Pomerantz, Lara
• Pompeo, Mike
• Pope John Paul II
• Pope, Susan
• Power, Samantha
• Presley, Elvis
• Presley, Lisa Marie
• Prince Harry, Duke of Sussex
• Price Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor
• Prince Philip
• Princess Diana
• Pritzker, JB
• Pritzker, Thomas
• Quayle, Dan
• Raskin, Jamie
• Ratcliffe, John
• Ratner, Brett
• Readler, Chad
• Reagan, Ronald
• Recarey, Joseph
• Reiter, Michael
• Reno, Janet
• Reynolds, Tom
• Rice, Susan
• Richardson, Bill
• Rod-Larsen, Terje
• Rogers, Matthew
• Rohrbach, Andrew
• Romney, Mitt
• Roos, Nicolas
• Rosen, Jeffrey
• Rosenstein, Rod
• Ross, Diana
• Rossmiller, Alexander
• Roth, John
• Routch, Timothy
• Rove, Karl
• Rowan, Marc
• Rubenstein, Howard
• Rubio, Marco
• Ruemmler, Kathy
• Ryan, Paul
• Salinger, Pierre
• Sasse, Ben
• Scanlon, Mary Gay
• Scarola, John
• Schenberg, Janis
• Schiff, Adam
• Schlaff, Martin
• Schumer, Amy
• Schumer, Chuck
• Schwarzman, Stephen
• Scott, Tim
• Sekulow, Jay
• Senatore, Adrienne
• Sessions, Jeff
• Shamir, Yitzhak
• Shapiro, Ben
• Shappert, Gretchen
• Shea, Timothy
• Siad, Daniel
• Snowden, Edward
• Soros, Alex
• Soros, George
• Spacey, Kevin
• Spitzer, Eliot
• Springsteen, Bruce
• Stabenow, Debbie
• Staley, Jes
• Starmer, Keir
• Starr, Kenneth
• Stoltenberg, Jens
• Stordalen, Gunhild
• Stordalen, Petter
• Straub, Glenn
• Streisand, Barbara
• Sultan Ahmed bin Sulayem
• Summers, Larry
• Swalwell, Eric
• Sweency Jr., William
• Thomas-Jacobs, Carol
• Taylor Green, Marjorie
• Thatcher, Margaret
• Thiel, Peter
• Trump, Donald
• Trump, Ivanka
• Trump, Melania
• Tucker, Chris
• Vance, JD
• Villafana, Marie
• Walker, Richard
• Warsh, Kevin
• Wexner, Abigail
• Wexner, Les
• Williams, Damian
• Wolff, Michael
• Woodward, Stanley
• Wyden, Ron
• Yung, Mark
• Zampolli, Paolo
• Zucker, Jeff
• Zuckerberg, Mark

The list contains hundreds of names, spanning politicians, celebrities, business leaders, historical figures, deceased individuals, and others, but leans somewhat left overall due to the inclusion of numerous Democratic politicians and Hollywood figures, but it includes prominent right-leaning ones (especially business donors). 

• Left-aligned: Approximately 130–150 (strong Democratic politicians, entertainers, and donors dominate this side in the list).

• Right-aligned: Approximately 90–110 (strong Republican politicians, recent big-money conservative donors like Musk/Adelson/Thiel, and conservative figures).

• Unclear/Other: The remainder (many historical, foreign, or non-political figures).

Counts are estimates derived from cross-referencing donations, public endorsements/statements, and party registrations/affiliations. Not every name has donation records or explicit statements, so some placements rely on broader consensus from reliable sources.

Still quite a list...

Tyler Durden Sun, 02/15/2026 - 11:05

The Weak Dollar Narrative

Authored by Lance Roberts via RealInvestmentAdvice.com,

We have spent a lot of time over the last year debunking “narratives,” which are dangerous to investors, as “narratives” create a rationalization for overpaying for assets. Nonetheless, Wall Street loves a simple story and is happy to jump on a trend with momentum, selling products to unwitting consumers. A good example of that lately has been the “weak dollar” narrative, which has pushed investors to chase foreign assets. The negative correlation between a weak dollar and rising international stock exposure appears to be a free return. Unsurprisingly, the story spreads fast because performance charts look clean during a dollar slide.

Reuters recently reported that the US dollar hit a four-year low in late January after President Donald Trump said the “value of the dollar” was “great.” Reuters tied the move to rate cut expectations, policy volatility, and concerns about fiscal deficits and central bank independence. However, in reality, President Trump was more correct than not, as Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick confirmed the dollar trading at a more “neutral level,” as shown below.

There are two very important points to take away from the chart above.

1. The dollar has been in a very strong uptrend since the Financial Crisis and remains there.

2. Despite the recent pullback in the dollar, it is trading at its “Neutral Value” and is at the same level it was in 1970. Such certainly does not support the “debasement” or “demise of the US Dollar” narratives.

What is true is that the decline in the value of the dollar, after its strong surge starting in 2021, does make foreign assets more appealing as investors seek a hedge against a weaker dollar. However, while the “purveyors of perpetual doom” claim this is evidence of the end of the US Dollar dominance, the recent decline in the dollar, as shown above, is simply part of its long history of rallies and declines as the dollar adjusts to flows as foreign governments seek to balance their currencies against the US Dollar.

If you take a look at the dollar chart above, you will notice that it trades in a band above and below 100 (the “neutral value.) This is because the US Dollar is measured against a “basket” of foreign currencies. It is crucial to understand that foreign governments manage their currency against the dollar through a “peg” or a managed band to reduce exchange rate swings and support trade. As such, foreign central banks set a target rate versus the dollar and defend that target by buying or selling dollars from foreign exchange reserves. This is why, when the dollar was “above neutral,” foreign central banks like China reduced their holdings of US Treasuries to strengthen the Yuan.

When demand for the local currency rises, the central bank buys dollars and sells local currency to keep the rate from rising. When demand falls, the central bank sells dollars and buys local currency to keep the rate from falling too much. Many countries also align short-term interest rates, capital controls, and bank liquidity rules with the peg, since rate differentials and hot money flows pressure the exchange rate.

There are several very important reasons why all countries need a stable currency relative to the dollar:

1. It helps exporters price goods with less uncertainty,

2. Supports long-term contracts,

3. Limits imported inflation on energy and commodity prices priced in dollars, and

4. Lowers currency risk for foreign investors.

The trade-off is less monetary policy freedom, greater reserve requirements, and a higher risk of sharp adjustments when the peg level no longer aligns with inflation, growth, or external deficits.

However, none of this supports any commentary about the “death of the dollar,” or the failure of fiat currencies in general. What those commentaries do is push portfolio behavior. When the dollar falls, international stock exposure often rises in the allocation model. The risk lies in the assumption that a weak dollar stays in place indefinitely.

Looking at the chart above, it is clear that currency trends reverse when positioning crowds in either direction. A weak-dollar narrative encourages investors to pay less attention to valuation, earnings, and country-level fundamentals, leaving portfolios exposed when the thesis breaks.

A Potential For A Dollar Rally

Currency markets move on expectations more than anything else. Yes, interest rates, economic growth, and inflation can all impact the dollar, but it is more about the “expectations” of those variables for the dollar, trade, etc., that move the price. Therefore, investors need to be on the lookout for factors that could reverse expectations. Currently, several conditions are forming that could begin to reverse those expectations.

First, positioning and technicals matter. From a long-term technical perspective, the U.S. Dollar Index is attempting to stabilize after a 2025 downside move. As shown, using a 3-year price momentum measure, the dollar is as oversold now as it was at previous dollar bottoms. The current move lower is becoming increasingly stretched, reducing the catalyst needed to trigger a sharp reversal.

A weak dollar trend also encourages leverage through unhedged international stock exposure. As shown, investors have piled into global sector funds (excluding technology) over the past year to boost returns. However, the last time we saw that kind of exposure shift was in 2021, just before the counter-trend rally in the dollar that hit returns fast.

Second, relative economic growth still supports the U.S. over international economies. As we noted previously,

“While investors are exceedingly bullish on the stock market, forecasts for 2026 are sobering. Even the IMF, which recently produced its global growth estimates, has the US economy growing at 2% for the next two years, and the Eurozone near 1%.”.

Relative growth drives capital flows, and capital flows drive currencies. Therefore, when U.S. growth beats expectations while other regions disappoint, the weak-dollar theme loses its power.

Lastly, policy messaging still matters. Reuters reported that Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent reaffirmed “a strong dollar policy.” Furthermore, the expected monetary policy under Kevin Warsh, the new Federal Reserve chairman, is also dollar-bullish. While a single statement does not set a multi-month trend, repeated statements and eventual actions will shift short-term psychology toward a stronger dollar view.

Most crucially, a dollar rally does not require booming U.S. growth. A dollar rally only requires growth and rates to look less negative than they’re priced, and the current oversold conditions lower that hurdle.

The International Valuation Risk

Investors often stack a second argument on top of the weak dollar story. International markets look cheaper than the U.S.; therefore, international stock exposure offers better value. The problem lies in relative valuation, when we should really look at each market’s valuation relative to its own history and earnings path. As shown, when you do that, those markets trade at historically high valuations.

MSCI data shows the MSCI EAFE Index (ex-US) forward P/E at 15.3 as of January 30, 2026. The level looks reasonable in isolation; however, the key issue is what investors receive for that multiple. Given that earnings growth rates, margins, and sector mix are vastly weaker than in the U.S., overvaluation will matter in those countries, just as it does in the U.S.

On the U.S. side, FactSet reported S&P 500 analysts project 2026 earnings growth of 14.1 percent and a forward 12-month P/E of 21.5, below 22.0 at the end of the fourth quarter. The U.S. multiple still sits above long-run averages, yet the direction matters, as the U.S. has cheapened at the margin while earnings expectations have remained resilient and profit margins have improved.

International markets also carry concentration risk. A significant portion of EAFE performance is tied to financials, industrials, and exporters, all of which are sensitive to global trade cycles and demand from China. Those forces can change quickly, but when the weak-dollar narrative drives the trade, investors often ignore the macro risk.

A currency-driven bid also inflates valuation abroad. A weak dollar lifts translated returns and encourages inflows, which in turn raise price multiples. However, when the dollar turns higher, international stock exposure faces a double drag as currency hedging reverses. When that translation turns negative, the valuation premium compresses as flows reverse.

While international stock exposure is fine, and there are certainly periods when it performs better than domestic markets, over the last 17 years it has trailed domestic markets by a large margin. Such is because, at the end of the day, it isn’t about dollar weakness; it is about earnings growth, profit margins, and future expectations. Currently, that growth remains in the U.S.

Investment Tactics Dollar Reversal

As shown, the move in Emerging Market Stocks (EEM) has been extremely sharp, making it much more exposed to a deep reversal if the dollar rallies.

Therefore, investors should treat international stock exposure as a tool, not a narrative. The goal, as always, is to maintain diversification but only to the point where you can control risk. Once it becomes a momentum chase, that risk control fails.

• Start with position sizing. Set a strategic range for international stock exposure based on your risk tolerance and drawdown limits. Critically, keep that range stable and don’t allow the recent weakness in the dollar to dictate long-term weights.

• Use rules-based rebalancing. When foreign equities run above target due to a weak dollar surge, trim toward policy weight. When foreign equities lag, add slowly. Rebalancing reduces the damage of an unexpected reversal.

• Add currency awareness. Consider a split allocation between hedged and unhedged developed exposure. Hedged exposure reduces the impact of a dollar rally, while unhedged exposure keeps diversification benefits when the weak dollar resumes. MSCI publishes a 100% hedged EAFE benchmark that helps investors compare results across hedged and unhedged frameworks.

• Focus on earnings quality as fundamentals will always matter in the end. Continue to favor markets and sectors with stable cash flows, strong balance sheets, and pricing power, as those traits matter when currencies swing and financial conditions tighten.

• Avoid valuation shortcuts. Do not rely on “cheaper than the U.S.” Use local history and earnings trends. If international multiples rise while earnings lag, reduce exposure, even if the weak-dollar story remains popular.

• Finally, stress test the portfolio. Model a 5 percent to 10 percent dollar rally and a 10 percent drawdown in foreign equities at the same time. If the model shows unacceptable damage, reduce unhedged international stock exposure before the market enforces the change.

The weak-dollar narrative is just a narrative, and a reversal will arrive again. That is just how markets operate. The question is whether your process will protect you or hurt you when that reversal comes.

Tyler Durden Sun, 02/15/2026 - 10:30

Munich Security Conference A 'Circus' - Iran Says After Exiled Shah's Son Invited

The Munich Security Conference, once regarded as a heavyweight diplomatic forum, has devolved into a spectacle that favors "performance over substance," Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi complained after his country was snubbed.

Organizers barred senior Iranian officials from attending this year's gathering after deadly protests and unrest shook the country last month, threatening the stability of the Islamic Republic. Tehran has lashed out:

"Sad to see the usually serious Munich Security Conference turned into the ‘Munich Circus’ when it comes to Iran," FM Araghchi wrote Saturday in a series of posts on X.

Iran's former crown prince and now self-styled key opposition figure Reza Pahlavi, via AFP.

"The EU appears confused, rooted in an inability to understand what is happening inside Iran… An aimless EU has lost all geopolitical weight in our region," he added.

"Europe’s overall trajectory is dire, to say the least," Araghchi said, branding the bloc "an empty-handed and peripheral" actor irrelevant to serious negotiations - particularly over Iran’s nuclear program.

Instead of inviting Iran - which has permanent representation at the United Nations - the Munich Security Conference invited Reza Pahlavi. He is the exiled son of Iran’s former US-backed shah ousted in the 1979 Islamic Revolution.

Pahlavi has supporters in the West, including among some Iranians in the diaspora, but the reality remains is that he is barely known among the Iranian populace. For the over 90 millions Iranians in the Islamic Republic, he's not in reality a recognizable figure - but his last name is simply connected with history from a half century ago.

As expected Pahlavi used the platform to push for regime change and to appear at a rally. He went so far as to tell Reuters that Washington should bomb Iran rather than negotiate with it.

Tens of thousands of pro-Monarchist Iranians gathered in Munich, Germany, to protest the Iranian regime. pic.twitter.com/ZSOixiM9nD

— Moshe Schwartz (@YWNReporter) February 15, 2026

He claims that he can lead Iran into a "secular democracy" - though ironically his name is connected with the historic monarchy which is remembered by Iranians today for its harsh repression and overseeing a system of extreme poverty for the non-royal masses.

He's long worked with Washington-backed opposition groups, and he has lobbied the White House to officially back him as a legitimate ruler of Tehran, but it remains unclear to the degree he might have the current Trump's administration's ear.

Tyler Durden Sun, 02/15/2026 - 09:55

Fetterman Reveals His Parents Are Trump Supporters, Refuses To Call MAGA Voters 'Nazis'

Authored by Steve Watson via modernity.news,

Pennsylvania Senator John Fetterman has once again set himself apart from the radical elements in his party by admitting that his own parents support President Trump—and using that as a reason to reject the Democrats’ over-the-top attacks on MAGA voters.

In a recent interview with Politico’s Dasha Burns, Fetterman again explained why he won’t join the chorus labeling Trump supporters as threats to democracy, emphasizing personal connections over partisan hysteria.

Burns asked Fetterman directly about Trump’s praise for him as the “most sensible Democrat,” questioning if it’s a “badge of honor or kryptonite for a Democrat in 2026.”

Fetterman responded, “My parents would appreciate it.”

He continued, “I know, and I love a lot of people that vote for Trump. And that’s part of why I refuse to call these people Nazis, or they’re brownshirts, or they’re trying to destroy our democracy.”

Fetterman made it clear he’s not engaging in that rhetoric, stating, “I’m not defending the president, but I will say he hasn’t defied a single court order yet. He hasn’t. And there was the big freak out that he was going to run in 28.”

“And I’m like, no, he’s not going to run. That’s not going to happen. And now, of course he’s not going to run,” the Senator added.

When Burns pressed on his relationship with Trump, Fetterman said, “If I have something to say it’s not going to be, you know, in an insult. It’s not going to be extreme things…when you have members of Congress calling him a piece of shit.”

“And I think it’s crazy, it’s like you just don’t, you know, I’ll always talk and speak, you know, with respect, because I really want to find a way forward.”

This admission underscores Fetterman’s ongoing pushback against his party’s extremes, a stance that has increasingly isolated him from Democratic insiders.

As we previously reported, Democrat extremists are already plotting to primary Fetterman ahead of his 2028 reelection bid, viewing his moderate positions as a betrayal. Despite his popularity in Pennsylvania, including strong support from Republicans, party officials are contemplating challenges because he won’t fully embrace their radical agenda.

Fetterman recently warned Democrats that socialism and far-left ideas are electoral poison, stating that such policies “pushed our party over the cliff” and led to recent losses. He called for “common sense” to prevail, highlighting the party’s shift toward figures like New York City’s socialist mayor Zohran Mamdani as a warning sign.

Fetterman has also urged his colleagues to dial back the constant outrage, telling them to stop turning everything into a “national freak out.” He criticized Democrats for overreacting to issues like the firing of Jimmy Kimmel and risking government shutdowns over partisan squabbles, emphasizing that “people need to just chill a little about a lot of things.”

These repeated calls for moderation have earned Fetterman bipartisan respect, even as they fuel internal Democratic discord. His refusal to demonize Trump voters, rooted in his own family’s views, exposes the growing divide between the party’s base and its leadership’s ideological purity tests.

Republicans stand to benefit from this chaos, as Fetterman’s crossover appeal could complicate Democratic efforts in swing states like Pennsylvania. If pushed too far, he might even consider running independently, further splintering the left.

Fetterman’s approach highlights a rare willingness to prioritize respect and practicality over division, a move that contrasts sharply with the Democrats’ ongoing embrace of extremism. As the party grapples with its identity, his voice serves as a reminder that alienating everyday Americans—including Trump supporters—only weakens their position.

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Tyler Durden Sun, 02/15/2026 - 09:20

Avert your eyes! My Sunday morning look at incompetency, corruption and policy failures:

• Carl Sagan’s 9 timeless lessons for detecting baloney: Carl Sagan’s baloney detection kit taught us how to separate good science from the work of charlatans. In 2026, that matters more than ever. (Big Think)

• One Generation Runs the Country. The Next Cashed In on Crypto. The Trump sons have made billions in cryptocurrency while their father reshapes the regulatory landscape, but their investors didn’t always fare so well.  Nothing to see here… (Wall Street Journal) see also Binance—Whose Founder Was Pardoned—Now Holds 87% Of Trump’s Stablecoin: Binance holds about 87% of USD1, the stablecoin issued by a Trump family crypto venture—a greater concentration than any other major stablecoin has at a single exchange—underscoring the depth of the financial relationship between Binance, whose founder Trump pardoned in October, and World Liberty Financial, which already has added an estimated $1 billion to President Donald Trump’s net worth. (Forbes)

• Divorce, Hedge-Fund Style: Inside the Breakup at Two Sigma: A rancorous divorce, a feud between billionaires and the future of a trading powerhouse. (Bloomberg)

• Intelligence Dispute Centers on Kushner Reference in Intercepted Communication: A whistle-blower has accused Tulsi Gabbard, the director of national intelligence, of blocking distribution of a report that Jared Kushner’s name came up in an intercepted communication about Iran. (New York Times)

• Immigration Raids in South Texas Are Starting to Hit the Economy: The economic consequences of mass deportation raids are becoming visible in border communities. Businesses are struggling to find workers, farms are going unplanted, and the economic toll of mass deportation is becoming impossible to ignore. Trade groups are raising alarms about aggressive immigration enforcement hurting businesses in the region  (Wall Street Journal) see also A Raid in a Small Town Brings Trump’s Deportations to Deep-Red Idaho: Deportation operations are no longer limited to blue-state cities; deep-red communities are feeling the impact. Even ruby-red communities are feeling the shock of aggressive immigration enforcement when it arrives on their doorstep. Wilder, Idaho, prided itself on comity. Then federal agents stormed a racetrack outside of town in October, and the reverberations are still shaking the community (New York Times)

• The Misleading Chartcrime That Killed the ACA Subsidies: One bad chart made the rounds in Congress and helped justify gutting health insurance subsidies for millions of Americans. GOP leaders cited data from a Trump-aligned think tank to argue the ACA is “unaffordable”. Health economists say the numbers were spun and the full story tells the opposite. (Healthcare Uncovered / Substack)

• Uncle Sam Wants You! … to Eat “Chlorine Chicken”: The great chlorine-poultry panic of 2026 is upon us, and it’s Donald Trump’s fault. (Slate) see also How America Got So Sick: The health of a nation reflects the health of a democracy. Both are in trouble. (The Atlantic) see also Newly revealed emails undermine RFK Jr testimony about 2019 Samoa trip ahead of measles outbreak: Newly revealed emails undermine RFK Jr testimony about 2019 Samoa trip ahead of measles outbreak. Kennedy later said the purpose of his trip had nothing to do with vaccines. US embassy and UN staff at the time said otherwise, emails show. (The Guardian)

• He Cyberstalked Teen Girls for Years—Then They Fought Back: How a hacker shamed and humiliated high school girls in a small New Hampshire town, and how they helped take him down. (Wired)

• Deadlier Than Gettysburg: How the cruelty of the Confederacy’s prison camps gave rise to the rules of war. (The Atlantic)

• US federal contractor hired white supremacist leader for wildfire relief: Ian Michael Elliott of neofascist Patriot Front worked ‘crisis relief missions’ funded by Department of Agriculture. US federal contractor hired white supremacist leader for wildfire relief: A federal contractor brought on the leader of the Patriot Front white supremacist group for wildfire recovery work. (The Guardian)

Be sure to check out our Masters in Business this week with Heather & Doug Bonaparthe, a married couple who work together and wrote a book on the financial challenges couples face: “Money Together: How to find fairness in your relationship and become an unstoppable financial team.” Our discussion sits somewhere in between financial planning and couples therapy, built around real stories that try to help couples find a healthier approach to money.

 

Home price growth slowed to its weakest pace in more than a decade
Percent of Mortgages in Negative Equity are very high in Parts of Florida and Texas

Source: Calculated Risk

 

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The post 10 Sunday Morning Reads appeared first on The Big Picture.

Lavrov Soberly Acknowledged The Challenges Posed By Trump 2.0

Authored by Andrew Korybko,

He calmly acknowledged that it’s now more difficult for Russia to advance its foreign policy goals due to the US’ renewed attempt to dominate the global economy through coercion and force, but he still believes that BRICS will play a pivotal role in furthering the global systemic transition to multipolarity.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov recently gave an interview to TV BRICS about their namesake organization and its role in the global systemic transition.

He began by contextualizing the present moment in history as the interim period between the decline of US-led Western hegemony and the rise of multiple centers of power and influence.

These inverse trends have led to friction because “the West is losing its hegemony but keeps on clinging to the institutions set up to secure that hegemony”.

The US can no longer fairly compete within the ‘rules-based order’ shaped by none other than itself several generations ago so it’s resorting to “blatantly unfair methods” against its rivals, especially Russia.

This includes sanctioning its energy companies, weaponizing sanctions threats against its “major strategic partners” like India (whom Lavrov specified) “to restrict Russia’s trade, investment cooperation, and military-technical ties” with them, and opposing the creation of alternative platforms of any kind.

On that last point, Lavrov clarified that “We are not advocating for the IMF, the World Bank and the WTO to cease their existence” and that “President Putin has said on many occasions that we are not the ones refusing to use the dollar.

The United States under President Joe Biden did everything to make the dollar a weapon against those who are deemed objectionable.”

 BRICS, its proposed economic-financial tools, and other alternative platforms are only meant to complement existing ones and induce reform therein.

Russia’s top diplomat soberly acknowledged that “given the global war unleashed against us and the feverish attempts of the West to ‘punish’ all our partners by demanding that they stop trading with us and cooperating in the military-technical sphere, it is significantly harder to do our job and to provide maximally favourable conditions for internal development than it was, say, 10 or 15 years ago.”

He also mildly criticized Trump 2.0 for essentially continuing “Bidenism” despite its rhetoric to the contrary.

Far from respecting the ‘spirit of Anchorage’, which refers to the verbal agreements reached during that summit for resolving the Ukrainian Conflict and normalizing ties, “new sanctions are imposed, a ‘war’ against tankers in the open sea is being waged”, and more pressure placed on Russian partners like India. Lavrov then accused the US of trying to control the global energy industry in order “to dominate the global economy”, but if it relents, then Russia would be eager to explore mutually beneficial cooperation.

On that note, he concluded the interview by circling back to Russia’s vision of BRICS’ role in the global systemic transition, which he foresees “creating an architecture that will not be subject to the illegal actions of one or another player from the Western flank.”

BRICS will also play a role in Russia’s “Greater Eurasian Partnership”, which Lavrov suggested could lay the basis for a “common ‘canopy’” over the continent, with the innuendo being that Eurasia might one day have its own version of the AU or CELAC.

He didn’t say so, but the context implies that BRICS would then function as an alternative center of global governance for reforming the world order in order to make it more equitable, the goal of which would be advanced by assembling representatives from each continental organization to discuss viable pathways thereto within this ‘mini-UN’.

Through these means, Russia and the rest of the World Majority could continue furthering multipolar trends despite the newfound challenges posed by Trump 2.0.

Tyler Durden Sat, 02/14/2026 - 23:20

Which US States Are Seeing Incomes Rise The Fastest (And Slowest)

Since 2019, U.S. household incomes have surged - rising from $68,700 to $83,730 nationally, a 21.9% increase in just five years.

But where you live matters a lot.

While some states tracked close to the national average, others saw incomes climb at nearly double the pace, driven by booming local industries and major investment.

States like Colorado posted outsized gains, while Georgia’s expanding EV industry brought billions in investment and rising paychecks.

The map, via Visual Capitalist's Dorothy Neufeld, shows which states saw the fastest growth in median household income from 2019 to 2024, using data from the U.S. Census Bureau.

Trends in Median Income by State

Below, we show the change in median household income for all 50 U.S. states and D.C. between 2019 and 2024 using nominal figures (not adjusted for inflation):

Rank State Change in Median Household Income
2019-2024 Median Household Income 2019 Median Household Income 2024 1 Colorado 46.9% $72,500 $106,500 2 Georgia 43.4% $56,630 $81,210 3 Maine 36.3% $66,550 $90,730 4 Montana 36.1% $60,190 $81,920 5 Tennessee 34.0% $56,630 $75,860 6 Rhode Island 31.6% $70,150 $92,290 7 Massachusetts 29.9% $87,710 $113,900 8 Florida 29.6% $58,370 $75,630 9 Iowa 29.4% $66,050 $85,480 10 Missouri 29.4% $60,600 $78,390 11 California 28.8% $78,100 $100,600 12 New Hampshire 28.7% $86,900 $111,800 13 North Dakota 25.8% $70,030 $88,080 14 Mississippi 25.0% $44,790 $55,980 15 Ohio 24.5% $64,660 $80,520 16 South Dakota 24.3% $64,260 $79,850 17 Michigan 23.9% $64,120 $79,460 18 South Carolina 23.8% $62,030 $76,780 19 Idaho 23.7% $65,990 $81,650 20 Utah 23.0% $84,520 $104,000 21 Wisconsin 22.6% $67,350 $82,560 22 New York 20.8% $71,850 $86,830 23 Texas 20.8% $67,440 $81,490 24 Wyoming 20.8% $65,130 $78,680 25 New Mexico 20.8% $53,110 $64,140 26 Oregon 20.5% $74,410 $89,700 27 Virginia 20.2% $81,310 $97,720 28 Kansas 19.9% $73,150 $87,690 29 Arizona 19.9% $70,670 $84,700 30 Arkansas 18.9% $54,540 $64,840 31 Washington 18.3% $82,450 $97,500 32 New Jersey 18.0% $87,730 $103,500 33 Nebraska 17.9% $73,070 $86,140 34 West Virginia 17.6% $53,710 $63,150 35 Louisiana 17.5% $51,710 $60,740 36 Alabama 16.7% $56,200 $65,560 37 Alaska 16.4% $78,390 $91,260 38 Kentucky 16.4% $55,660 $64,790 39 Delaware 15.7% $74,190 $85,860 40 Indiana 15.0% $66,690 $76,710 41 Maryland 14.8% $95,570 $109,700 42 Vermont 14.7% $74,310 $85,260 43 Connecticut 13.7% $87,290 $99,240 44 Nevada 13.7% $70,910 $80,590 45 Pennsylvania 13.4% $70,580 $80,060 46 Minnesota 13.4% $81,430 $92,350 47 Illinois 13.2% $74,400 $84,210 48 District of Columbia 12.6% $93,110 $104,800 49 Hawaii 11.6% $88,010 $98,240 50 Oklahoma 9.9% $59,400 $65,310 51 North Carolina 9.9% $61,160 $67,220

Colorado’s thriving tech industry helped push median income up 46.9%, the fastest rise across states.

With $165,606 in average earnings across the sector in 2023, Colorado ranked sixth-highest nationally. From software to renewable energy, employment growth has expanded by double- or even triple-digit percentages across various roles since 2018.

Georgia ranks in a close second, with median incomes climbing 43.4%. In particular, the EV and aerospace sectors are playing a key role in job creation. Since 2018, the state has seen $27.3 billion in investment across EV, aerospace, and battery manufacturers including Rivian and SK Battery America.

Maine, meanwhile, saw wages rise 36.3%. In 2024, wages across the tech sector saw the steepest jump of 11.4% while those in the construction sector saw strong gains of 8.5%. Other factors, such as its older population and tight labor market, have further boosted wages.

Falling near the middle of the pack were New York and Texas, each with wage gains of 20.8% between 2019 and 2024.

By contrast, North Carolina and Oklahoma saw only 9.9% cumulative wage growth, the weakest performance nationwide. Median household income in both states remains well below the U.S. average and still trails pre-pandemic levels.

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

Tyler Durden Sat, 02/14/2026 - 22:45

The Epstein Egregore

Authored by Mark Jeftovic via BombThrower.com,

The Politics Of Institutionalized Predation.

“I become stronger as you become weaker, I absorb strength as yours flows into me. I become capable of this because I do not experience your pain, I don’t care about your loss, and I feel no regret about using, abusing, and devouring you.”
— Page 63, An Age For Lucifer

Consider the following:

“This book explores a strange new spirituality about to enter into competition with other established religions. My purpose here is to convince you that its emergence is probable, if not inevitable. I begin this exploration with an unproven assumption based on Darwinian evolutionary principles: a new predator will appear on our planet, an evolutionary prototype designed to prey on humans. Another assumption then follows: this predator will evolve gradually and incrementally from humanity, just as we apparently evolved from lower forms to prey on them. A further assumption suggests that these predators have already appeared as evolutionary prototypes, as new humans with advanced methods of survival and new forms of spiritual expression and religious organization designed to support and advance their predation.“
— Robert C Tucker, An Age For Lucifer: Predatory Spirituality & The Quest for Godhood

The book in question was Robert C Tucker’s “An Age For Lucifer: Predatory Spirituality and the Quest For Godhood“. I first wrote about it in a Bombthrower piece: The WEF Isn’t a Cabal, It’s A Cult, and I can’t remember how I came into possession of it in the first place. I remember owning it for years and never reading it, because frankly, it scared me.

At first I thought it was some kind of manual for psychopathy – how to rise above your self-limiting human emotions to attain power and fame (even Godhood?) through the energetic predation of those around you.

But once I found out that its author wasn’t some High Priest of the Left Hand Path, but rather, a former counsellor and director of COMA, the Council On Mind Abuse, based in Canada – it started to take on a different light.

COMA worked with “adult survivors and child victims of ritual abuse“, and Tucker spent much of his adult life interviewing Satanists and Luciferians (yes, there is a distinction, as Tucker would elucidate in this book).

The Winged God Lucifer, with a human child on his knee…

It was an anthropological study, born out of a thought experiment:

What if all the ritualistic abuse we are seeing isn’t random criminality but an expression of an overarching, organizing principle that viewed mere humans as psychic fodder, to be devoured for the benefit of those in the know?

In his talks with Satanists and sociopaths Tucker repeatedly detected a whiff of something, he never put a name to it, but referred to it as “the thing that points beyond itself”.

COMA eventually went bankrupt, being on the receiving end of relentless lawfare from the Church of Scientology. Tucker died of a heart attack in Mexico in 2003.

In my original Bombthrower piece, I picked up the thread on “The Thing That Points Beyond Itself”, positing the very real, not metaphorical, existence of larger, transpersonal entities such as egregores, morphogenic fields, Vadim Zeland’s “Pendulums”, memetics and mass thought forms in general.

The WEF Isn’t A Cabal. It’s a cult

As the world tries to wrap its head around the millions of new and partially unredacted Epstein documents, it becomes very difficult to unsee the dynamics of what has been revealed to be playing out at the highest echelons of institutional power, for decades at least.

The Thing That Points Beyond Itself

An egregore isn’t an analogy or mythical. It’s what a shared belief system becomes when it fuses with incentives and institutions and starts behaving like an organism. It recruits, it feeds, it protects itself. The Epstein network isn’t the egregore. It’s one of its organs.

As the names keep dropping, it’s hard not to get a sense that absolutely anybody who had achieved fame, influence, power or renown was mixed up in an organized cabal of depravity and moral turpitude.

It feels like every TED Talk you ever nodded in agreement to, every Grammy award-winning singer you vibed to, every politician you voted for, and every business leader whose companies you bought shares in, they were all laughing behind your back, because it was a Big Club and you ain’t in it.

The Club is in the global domination game, and its accoutrements include fraud, racketeering, blackmail, and ritualized abuse of women and children.

FedEx: “when you absolutely, positively need a wall-sized mural of infant massacre for a ritual happening Wednesday at 2pm”

But what is weird about The Club is the seeming preponderance of pedophiles and sexual predators. Doesn’t anybody nice ever rise into positions of authority?

The Club has to be impelled by something, be it an incentive structure or dynamic that attracts both sociopaths and easily manipulable bunglers.

But it goes beyond that.

The Falsification of Hanlon’s Razor

Hanlon’s Razor used to be the bedrock of my thinking. It’s a derivation of Occam’s Razor. Loosely stated, it advises us:

“Never ascribe to conspiracy what can be explained by stupidity.”

When you look at the types of people ensconced in government, bureaucracy, and academia, this fits. Nowhere in the private sector could you find such a monotonous array of one-dimensional apparatchiks. Any enterprise run by such institutionalized mediocrity would have zero competitive edge and go bankrupt.

However, what I should also have taken to heart, more than I did, was something James Dale Davidson and Lord Rees-Mogg observed over twenty years ago in their seminal work The Sovereign Individual:

“Too little attention has been paid to the fact that electoral politics lures disordered, Messianic personalities into positions of power.”

My base case used to be that the political class were, by definition, failures and rejects. They washed out of the private sector, then drifted into statecraft out of necessity.

I thought that belief in a vast, overarching conspiracy of powerful elites who controlled everything was Loserthink. It ingrained a sense of helplessness in the believer, which made them ambivalent and docile.

Now I realize that I’m the loser – at least in the eyes of everyone in The Club, because there is now no doubt, except to the willfully ignorant – that The Club exists, and the entire political ruling class, the corporate oligarchs, the TED-class influencers and CNN talking heads and panelist experts, are all in it.

Seeing now that The Club exists, and whatever is behind it pulls the levers of power, narrative, and money itself, doesn’t make me feel helpless after all.

It makes me angry. As it likely does for a lot of people.

But The Club is driven by something, that sits behind it.

Not much Podesta in the Epstein files, but lots, and lots of pizza

What’s Behind the Three-M’s?

In numerous writings I have said that the main affliction facing humanity today was what I privately term the “3M’s of Elite Insularism”, those in the The Club are Malthusian, misanthropic, and Marxists.

But I now suspect those are mere symptoms of how The Thing That Points Beyond Itself presents, and that thing is…

In Gore Vidal’s 1954 novel Messiah, a Death Cult named “Caveism” sweeps the Western world in under 36 months.

A Luciferian Death Cult

Throughout his book, the term Tucker uses to refer to his posited predatory spirituality is Luciferianism, and he said that it

“reinforces and encourages four basic energies — devouring, possession, violence and disguise — which in turn, assist the Luciferian to transform consciousness, animate hidden potential, and ultimately attain godhood.”

Devouring is the core process – it is the act of ingesting various types of energy for oneself, whether it be wealth, property or life energy itself – it’s all fair game to the elites in The Club, because they view it all as theirs by divine right.

“Luciferians believe that core identity can be devoured only when it is broken like an egg or nutshell. Once broken, the victim’s identity yields powerful energies. “

Page 71.

(Serious adrenechrome vibes…)

The elites, The Club, view themselves as a kind of breakaway civilization – but not in the sense that I have been calling The Great Bifurcation for years. My sense of that was a split into separate streams of humanity, a la the Eloi and Morlocks posited in The Time Machine, by that irascible communist H.G. Wells.

But The Club isn’t splitting off from the mass of humanity, they’re using the masses as fuel for stage separation like a booster rocket. Ready to jettison our spent husks as our psychic energy is consumed to propel them into the stars and Godhood itself.

For the rest of us to go along with this, we have to submit to this and want to provide ourselves as energetic fuel to be consumed by our betters.

This involves the promotion of what Tucker calls “Self-Annihilating Traditions” and we see it in various forms of psychic driving and mass influence operations that induce an intellectual and instinctive lethargy at both the individual and mass levels:

“The actual experience of being devoured emotionally, cognitively, or spiritually usually occurs gradually over time. The devouring itself is never obvious to the victim; if it was, then defenses would be mobilized.”

Any suffering the victims do experience is attributed to other causes – I think of them as “institutional scapegoats”.

“Suicidal Empathy” is phrase that has arisen from those skeptical of the value prop of allowing oneself to be psychically, economically and even physically devoured to the benefit of The Club, ostensibly in service to the higher calling of the collective.

We have to be conditioned to desire an end to our own existence as a moral imperative unto itself – hence the relentless climate crisis, mankind-as-a-cancer narrative, the institutionalization of euthanasia, abortion and the incentivizing of medical pseudo-science that induces violent psychosis on a mass scale.

Like the Anti-Life Equation posited in DC Comics New Gods series, most humans have to be conditioned to want to die.

DC Comics: New Gods #6 (1972), written and illustrated by Jack Kirby

…so that the “capstone class”, as I’ve called them in the past, can use us as booster fuel into godhood.

Tucker’s book was tabled as a thought experiment, and that’s where it sat for me, until now.

When you map the model onto the world we actually inhabit the point ceases to be that some new predator-class spirituality might emerge.

It is here now, and the point is that we inhabit a system that is optimized for it.

Class structure, now and future

Somewhere along the line, a prototype evolved inside the species, and learned to prey on its own kind. As I outlined in another (very long) piece, this has likely been going on for a long, long time.

(That piece happened to mention Clinton Foundation insider Ira Magaziner, his role shaping the governance regime of the Internet, and his presence in the Epstein black book; the latest Epstein file dump shows, despite protestations that no relationship existed, that Magaziner and Epstein were indeed in contact beyond the stated claims. Ira is still CEO of the Clinton Health Access Initiative. His son is congressman Seth Magaziner, D-RI).

Back to The Club: over the centuries, they’ve built a social and spiritual architecture that normalizes the predation, and advances it – taking special efforts to co-opt anything that appears that could challenge it. Tucker called it “predatory spirituality.” We have other names. The behaviour is the same.

And where would such a class (The Club) take up residence, if they were real?

They would not live at the margins, nor burrow into the powerless underclass.

The Club would move inexorably toward the apex. They would infiltrate the institutions that confer immunity, walk the corridors of power where favours become law.
They would acquire control of the media organs where spin defines reality, and they would reside above the law, where consequences are for other people, the little people.

Predatory spirituality takes up residence where power emanates, because that is where it can feed without being seen, or at the very least with immunity.

Civil War, SplinterNet and Guillotines
(a.k.a. where we are headed…)

Epstein is not important because he was uniquely depraved. He is important because he is the icon, the symbol that points beyond itself.

The machinations of his network give us a glimpse of the operating system. It’s a case study in how leverage, ritual, and institutional protection intertwine. Once you accept that, the question is no longer “How could this happen?” The question becomes “How long has this been going on?” and “Who or what hasn’t been corrupted by it?”

In the follow-up piece, I’m going to widen the lens. Because when institutional legitimacy breaks down, alternative structures step into the vacuum.

Despite what The Club would want for the rabble, when it comes right down to it, people actually don’t want to be psychically, economically and spiritually devoured for the benefit of an insular, overlord class.

For years I have written the age of centralization and the linear geometry of the Industrial Age was heading toward collapse. It was, and still is, too early to tell what comes next – but whatever it is, owing the emerging architecture of the Network Age, it won’t be a top-down hierarchy, lorded over by (Luciferian) priests of the temple.

Whenever people ask me for a succinct descriptor of what I see coming, my answer was and remains: Snow Crash.

We've already gone full Snow Crash. pic.twitter.com/KJjgRI6snQ

— Mark E. Jeftovic (@jeftovic) February 11, 2026

As the collapse in institutional legitimacy accelerates, non-state groupings will step into the vacuum and provide the functional scaffolding that civil governments are no longer willing, or able to provide.

Sometimes they look like protection rackets. Sometimes they look like special economic zones, franchise sovereignties or city-states.

Sometimes they look like cartels with drones. Sometimes they look like transnational corporations with private intelligence services.

The end result is the same. Fragmentation. Competing authorities. SplinterNets (and consensus reality shattered).

That’s where this leads.

Epilogue

My next piece explores a strange new social construct about to enter into competition with other established sovereignties. My purpose here is to convince you that its emergence is probable, if not inevitable. I begin this exploration with an unproven assumption based on game theory and simple incentives: a new class of irregular sovereigns will appear on our planet, an evolutionary prototype designed to oppose Luciferian predation. Another assumption then follows: these factions will evolve gradually and incrementally from largely compromised nation states, just as we apparently evolved from previous obsolete governance structures. A further assumption suggests that these groups have already appeared as evolutionary prototypes, as guerrillas with advanced methods of resiliency and new forms of communications and asymmetric tactics designed to support and advance their insurgency.

Watch this space.

Get on the Bombthrower mailing list to get the next instalment, follow me on X, we’re also getting ready to relaunch Ready.ca – a boot camp for politically homeless Canadians (and others). 

Tyler Durden Sat, 02/14/2026 - 22:10

Bitcoin Mining & The Electricity Grid: A Quiet Savior

Authored by Joakim Book via The Mises Institute,

With all eyes on the winter storm raging through America last month, a silent hero was working in the background to keep the lights on.

And I don’t primarily mean the emergency workers or the teams of electricians, foresters, and engineers that keep the power lines up and ice-free; these guys operate very much in the foreground, the public well aware of their critical work.

Before and during winter storms, the electricity supply becomes strained and household demand spikes—think space heaters, heat pumps requiring more juice, more lights turned on, and the natural gas system requiring more electricity for ordinary functions.

In Econ101 lingo, the grid is hit with a simultaneous leftward shift in supply and rightward shift in demand, explaining why electricity prices and natural gas prices shot up in recent days.

Most people think of electricity (or “energy” more broadly) as a static resource, at civilization’s disposal and always available at the literal flick of a switch.

That’s true for gasoline in a car tank, liquid and stable when unused.

Electricity, rather, is a constant flow where the push of a button either redirects it from elsewhere or informs the generators or reactors to produce more, or idly spinning back-up turbines to re-engage.

Some countries, like my home Iceland, use aluminum smelters as this electrical grid backstop, a rapacious consumer that could use more or less electricity to run the Hall-Héroult process—dissolving aluminum oxide in molten cryolite—faster or slower.

Some four-fifths of all electricity generated in the (electrically-isolated) island country is used for metal production, filling the gap between renewable production (dispatchable hydro and constant geothermal) and variable demand, always able to give back power to the grid when necessary.

The Texas grid, for instance, doesn’t have a vast aluminum industry backstopping its industry and millions of households.

How, then, does the state and its grid operator ERCOT source the additional gigawatts on a whim, electricity being an on-demand, always-clearing, flow resource?

You might think “more generation,” which to some extent is true: In a natural gas or hydroelectric plant, you turn up the dial; with excess wind turbines running idle, you can order them to re-engage. But in a grid like Texas’s that has outsourced so much of its electricity to nature (solar and wind), you also need other mechanisms for dealing with peak demands or winter storms; it’s too late to start building new generation a week before the storm lands.

While some media outlets have pointed to Texas having “nearly 10 times as much battery capacity on the grid” now compared to the devastating storm five years ago, the missing component is the arrival of Bitcoin miners, able and willing to shut off on short notice; from the grid’s point of view, miners are functionally the same as massive, spread-out batteries.

In the last four years or so, the US’s role in global Bitcoin mining has increased considerably, fueled in part by the China exodus and accommodating policies in, for example, Texas and Tennessee. Federally, too, the current administration has famously (and mostly rhetorically since the statement doesn’t make any sense), said it wants the remaining Bitcoin “to be mined in America.”

Ordinarily, Bitcoin miners run electricity through a barebones computer to generate bitcoin. Most of the industrial-scale ones engage in demand-response programs that—when ordered by the grid (and reimbursed accordingly)—will shut off their machines and thus return the electricity flow back to the grid. This is akin to the grid taking out electricity supply insurance; like a battery, but less duplicative or wasteful. In contrast, backup power like unengaged wind turbines or topped-up battery facilities are expensive, overbuilt, and economically inefficient. By having a sizable number of Bitcoin miners around, you can effectively outsource this backup function to an always-on, always-hungry consumer like Bitcoin miners.

Even though Bitcoin miners only consume a few percentage points of ERCOT’s grid generation, they’re the most flexible percentages—able and willing to give it all back to the grid at a moment’s notice.

“Bitcoin miners provide a flexible load in a way no other industrial use case can,” remarks Ella Hough for Cornell University on the Texas power grid. Riot Platforms—a Texas-based Bitcoin miner—reported curtailment credits of roughly 15 percent of its electricity cost in 2024.

Note that these payments are not subsidies, like so much in the green energy sector, but payments for specific services rendered: think of participating in demand-response programs like an insurance contract. The unique difference for a miner compared to any other user of electricity, AI or other data centers included, is that they’re untroubled by turning off—in fact, most mining facilities schedule specific maintenance or repairs during curtailment times. In exchange for a fee—or technically, a discount on their total electricity bill—their operations can be shut down (and turned on later) without operational loss.

When I explored these topics in an article for The Daily Economy two years ago, I wrote:

The reason that the grid is strained during a cold snap is the same reason power users place a very high value on their electricity use. The supply gets squeezed precisely at the time consumer demand becomes price inelastic, with heating and lighting homes becoming next to infinitely valuable in a pickle.

The hashrate - the amount of computing power operating on the Bitcoin blockchain at any given time - dropped by about a third in recent days, explained largely by the hundreds of etahash (a measure of Bitcoin mining output) of Bitcoin mining capacity participating in such demand-response programs.

Seeing the hashrate estimator on my home-miner device show hashrate around 650 EH/s rather than 1,150 EH/s a few days before was stunning and illustrative: Every bit of electricity that previously powered the Bitcoin network was instead redirected to power space heaters and light and urgently needed additional machinery in storm-affected areas.

Wins all around: The remaining miners on the Bitcoin network temporarily earn higher rewards from less competition (though blocks came in somewhat slower), the miners receive lucrative curtailment credits, and consumers have more electricity at their disposal.

It is the ultimate electricity consumer of last resort, in ordinary times grateful for every watt assigned to it, yet happy to immediately surrender it when there’s more valuable usage elsewhere—functionally being outbid by millions of households in need of extra power. Bitcoin miners are the opposite, happy to absorb any and all excess, stranded, overbuilt energy—and then give it all back when the grid needs it the most.

Magic internet money Bitcoin may be, but its positive spill-over effects on electricity grids around the world might be even more important than the asset itself. Stress-tests like the storm that engulfed most of the eastern and southern US in January show the power of that institutional backup.

Tyler Durden Sat, 02/14/2026 - 21:00

Eat The Rich: California Democrats Trigger Reverse Gold Rush With Wealth Tax

Authored by Jonathan Turley,

This month, the anniversary of the California Gold Rush came and passed with little mention … for good reason. When James W. Marshall found gold at Sutter’s Mill, millions traveled great distances to seek their fortune in the “Golden State.”

Now, 178 years later, California has engineered an inverse Gold Rush, virtually chasing wealth from the state. Rather than covered wagons going West, there is a line of U-Hauls going anywhere other than California.

From boondoggle projects to reparations, California politicians continue to rack up new spending projects despite a soaring deficit and shrinking tax base.

Rather than exercise a modicum of fiscal restraint, Democrats are pushing through a tax that takes five percent of the wealth of any billionaires left in the state.

I have long criticized the tax as perfectly moronic for a state with the highest tax burden and one of the highest flight rates of top taxpayers.

In my new book, “Rage and the Republic: The Unfinished Story of the American Revolution,” I discuss the reversal of fortunes in California and other blue states as politicians unleash new “eat the rich” campaigns before the midterm elections.

The problem, of course, is that billionaires are mobile, as is their wealth. Liberals expect billionaires to stay put in a type of voluntary canned hunt.  They are not. Billionaires are joining the growing exodus from the state, taking their companies, investments, and jobs with them.

The latest billionaire to be chased off may be Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg, who is reportedly heading for Florida.

The growing departures have triggered outrage among many on the left, who are in disbelief that billionaires will just not stand still to be fleeced.

Former New York Magazine editor Kara Swisher captured that rage in a recent posting, declaring “you made…all your money in California, you ungrateful piece of s***, you could figure out a way to pay more taxes, and we deserve the taxes from you, given you made your wealth here . . . so why don’t we just do shock and awe at this point, because you don’t seem to be availing yourself to thinking that you owe your state something more.”

By some estimates, California has already cost over a trillion dollars in lost investments and business. That is no small achievement.

Here’s a mind teaser: How can you burn a trillion dollars (which would create a stack some 67,866 miles high) without taking years and destroying the environment?

California politicians have a solution: Have people take it out of the state in a reverse gold rush.

In addition to saying that they want to grab 5 percent of the wealth of these billionaires, California Democrats are planning to base wealth calculations on the voting shares of corporate executives. Often, particularly with start-ups, entrepreneurs have greater voting shares than actual ownership. However, they will be taxed as if voting shares amounted to actual wealth.

In other words, California is moving to nuke the entrepreneurs who created the Silicon Valley boom.

Emmanuel Saez, the U.C. Berkeley economist who helped design the tax, insists that they may not want to stay, but they will still be tapped. They are planning to trap the wealthy fleeing the state retroactively: “The tax is based on residence as of Jan. 1, 2026, sharply limiting their ability to flee the state to avoid paying. Despite billionaires’ threats to leave, I think extremely few will have been able to change residence by Jan. 1, given the complexity of doing so.”

The effort to retroactively impose such a tax is legally controversial and will face years of challenges. In my view, this is unconstitutional, but admittedly it is a murky area.

Regardless of the outcome, a wealth tax will affect a wide range of other wealthy taxpayers. If Democrats can get a retroactive wealth tax to be upheld, it is doubtful that they will stop with billionaires. Why should other top taxpayers stick around to find out where the next cull will fall in the tax brackets?

Recently, Gavin Newsom boasted, “California isn’t just keeping pace with the world — we’re setting the pace.” That is undeniably true if the measure is the record number of U-Hauls fleeing the state — more than any other state. Indeed, the only thing harder to find than a wealthy taxpayer in California appears to be a U-Haul.

According to U-Haul’s data, the state is again leading blue states in the exodus. The Washington Post noted recently that “California came in last. Massachusetts, New York, Illinois, and New Jersey rounded out the bottom five. Of the bottom 10, seven voted blue in the last election.” Conversely, “nine of the top 10 growth states voted red in the last presidential election,” with Texas again leading the growth states.

The Post put it succinctly, “People want to live in pro-growth, low-tax states, while the biggest losers tend to be places with big governments and high taxes.”

The problem is that, while the economics are horrific, the politics remain irresistible.

Democratic Rep. Ro Khanna, who represents part of Silicon Valley, recently mocked billionaires rushing to escape the state. Laughing at his own constituents, Khanna quipped, “I will miss them very much.”

You will not be alone as California becomes known as the La Brea Tar Pit of taxation.

They are on the verge of converting the state motto from “Eureka” to “Welcome to Hotel California, you can check out any time you like, but you can never leave.”

Jonathan Turley is a law professor and the best-selling author of “Rage and the Republic: The Unfinished Story of the American Revolution.”

Tyler Durden Sat, 02/14/2026 - 20:15

Trump Promises Voter ID "Whether Congress Approves Or Not"

The SAVE America Act squeaked through the House this week by five votes.

The final tally was 218-213, with Rep. Henry Cuellar of Texas standing as the lone Democrat to cross party lines. 

On Friday, Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine) gave Republicans their 50th vote late Friday afternoon, telling Maine Wire the revised bill strikes an appropriate balance between election security and voter access. 

“The law is clear that in this country only American citizens are eligible to vote in federal elections. In addition, having people provide an ID at the polls, just as they have to do before boarding an airplane, checking into a hotel, or buying an alcoholic beverage, is a simple reform that will improve the security of our federal elections and will help give people more confidence in the results,” she told Maine Wire.

“Requiring voters to produce passports or birth certificates on Election Day — as opposed to just a state-issued ID — would have placed an unnecessary burden on the voters. That provision is no longer in the bill, and dropping this requirement was key to getting my support.”

With Will Collins on board, Republicans have enough support to pass the bill even without additional backing, with Vice President JD Vance ready to break any tie.

Unfortunately, 50 votes only get the GOP so far. The legislation still lacks the 60 votes needed to overcome a Democratic filibuster, and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer has made clear the bill is "dead on arrival.” 

And Collins herself opposes scrapping the filibuster to ram the measure through.

“I oppose eliminating the legislative filibuster,” Collins said.

“The filibuster is an important protection for the rights of the minority party, that requires Senators to work together in the best interest of the country. Removing that protection would, for example, allow a future Congress controlled by Democrats to pass provisions on anything they want — DC Statehood, open borders, or packing the Supreme Court — with just a simple majority of Senators.”

President Trump, however, is promising that requiring a photo ID to vote will get done with or without Congress.

In a post on Truth Social, he accused Democrats of opposing Voter ID and citizenship verification because “they want to continue to cheat in Elections.”

He said this “was not what our Founders desired” and promised to present an “irrefutable” legal argument on the issue soon. \

Trump vowed that “There will be Voter I.D. for the Midterm Elections, whether approved by Congress or not,” and stated that Americans demand “Citizenship, and No Mail-In Ballots, with exceptions for Military, Disability, Illness, or Travel.”

Trump also slammed Democrats as “horrible, disingenuous CHEATERS” for opposing Voter I.D., claiming they “boldly laugh in the backrooms” while opposing it.

He called the lack of Voter I.D. “even crazier, and more ridiculous, than Men playing in Women’s Sports, Open Borders, or Transgender for Everyone.”

Trump urged Republicans to make it “a CAN’T MISS FOR RE-ELECTION IN THE MIDTERMS, AND BEYOND,” noting that “Even Democrat Voters agree, 85%, that there should be Voter I.D.”

He called Democratic leaders “Crooked Losers like Schumer and Jeffries,” who label it “racist,” and promised to present legal arguments for action via an Executive Order.

Trump warned that if Democrats regain power, they will “PACK THE COURT with a total of 21 Supreme Court Justices” and warned the country “will never be the same if they allow these demented and evil people to knowingly, and happily, destroy it.”

Trump previously signed an executive order attempting to impose proof-of-citizenship requirements on federal voter registration forms.

That effort crashed into multiple legal challenges and has been systematically dismantled by the courts.

Tyler Durden Sat, 02/14/2026 - 19:15

Indian Scrapyards Welcome Growing Number Of Dark Fleet Tankers

By Tsvetana Paraskova of OilPrice.com

At least three vessels sanctioned by the United States have arrived in recent weeks at the demolition hub of Alang on India’s west coast, following a record 15 dark fleet tankers sent to these scrapyards last year, as the business rebounds despite concerns about dealing with sanctioned ships.  

The Woodchip, built in 1993 and sanctioned by the U.S. in 2021 under one of its previous names, is the third tanker to have arrived at Alang in less than a month, Bloomberg reported on Friday, citing vessel-tracking data, agent reports, and sources with knowledge of the deals.  

The Woodchip Suezmax ship. Source: MarineTraffic

The arrivals reflect changes to the shape of the fleet that ferries sanctioned or sensitive crude around the world, as more aged vessels begin to edge toward retirement at a time of plentiful supply, and US officials embrace Venezuelan crude - ultimately reducing the number needed to serve a trade previously off-limits. According to shipbroker Braemar Plc, some 128 dark tankers once served Caracas exports.

The total number of the U.S.-sanctioned tankers that have arrived at India’s Alang so far this year already accounts for 20% of the 15 vessels of the dark fleet welcomed in 2025, according to Bloomberg’s analysis.  

The Woodchip was seen sailing slowly in mid January from the Gulf of Oman eastwards, before arriving at India’s Alang late last week.Source: Bloomberg

Dark fleet tankers are much older than legit vessels and could pose environmental threats if left to service sanctioned oil deliveries for too long. 

The increase in tracked arrivals at India’s scrapyards signals that some of the oldest ships of the global shadow fleet are now finally being retired. 

Moreover, the U.S. intervention in Venezuela and the now legit Venezuelan oil sales under U.S. control have reduced the number of vessels needed to haul sanctioned oil. 

The U.S. took control of Venezuela’s oil sales in early January and authorized two of the world’s biggest independent traders, Vitol and Trafigura, to market the crude to buyers in the U.S., Europe, India, and China.  

Before the U.S. ousting of Nicolas Maduro, about 128 tankers of the dark fleet served the oil exports of Venezuela, per data from shipbroker Braemar Plc cited by Bloomberg.  

Previously, most Venezuelan exports were going to China, as they were under U.S. sanctions, and used sanctioned vessels to deliver crude mostly to the independent refiners, the so-called teapots, in the province of Shandong. 

Tyler Durden Sat, 02/14/2026 - 18:40

"Billion Dollar Movie In One Prompt": AI Disruption Crosshairs Hone In On Hollywood Studios

AI-driven equity disruption was everywhere this past week, spreading like wildfire beyond software into insurance, commercial real estate, financials, shipping, wealth management, and likely many more industries in the coming trading sessions.

One industry in the crosshairs of AI disruption is Hollywood. Some of the publicly traded studios include The Walt Disney Company, Warner Bros. Discovery, Paramount Global, Sony Group Corporation, Netflix, Lionsgate, and others.

On Friday, Axios reported that the Walt Disney Company sent a cease-and-desist letter to ByteDance, alleging that the Chinese tech firm has been infringing on its films to develop Seedance 2.0 without compensation.

Disney's outside attorney, David Singer, wrote a letter to ByteDance global general counsel John Rogovin, accusing the AI company of "pre-packaging its Seedance service with a pirated library of Disney's copyrighted characters from Star Wars, Marvel, and other Disney franchises, as if Disney's coveted intellectual property were free public domain clip art."

"Over Disney's well-publicized objections, ByteDance is hijacking Disney's characters by reproducing, distributing, and creating derivative works featuring those characters. ByteDance's virtual smash-and-grab of Disney's IP is willful, pervasive, and totally unacceptable," Singer said.

He added, "We believe this is just the tip of the iceberg, which is shocking considering Seedance has only been available for a few days."

It’s not just ByteDance’s Seedance 2.0 that has spooked Hollywood studios.

A growing wave of video-generation models suggests that Hollywood’s moat is crumbling, and its control of the media game is nearing its end.

AI VIDEO WARS JUST GOT REAL

Seedance 2.0
Kling 3.0
Sora 2
Veo 3.1

Compared in single-prompt romance scene.

Who's winning 2026 filmmaking?

pic.twitter.com/hrh8nNbG1U

— 0xMarioNawfal (@RoundtableSpace) February 10, 2026

"Authorities should use every legal tool at their disposal to stop this wholesale theft," the Human Artistry Campaign - a coalition that includes dozens of creative groups such as SAG-AFTRA and the Directors Guild of America - said in a statement on Friday.

Seedance 2.0 model ...

Seedance 2.0

Prompt: Sum up the AI discourse in a meme - make sure it’s retarded and gets 50 likes. pic.twitter.com/09yPdo3Tjy

— Charles Curran (@charliebcurran) February 14, 2026

Absolutely insane.

Seedance 2 is able to recreate full scenes from Breaking Bad.

We are officially cooked.https://t.co/1mrmjLXI3e pic.twitter.com/CggLHH8R6Q

— Mark Gadala-Maria (@markgadala) February 11, 2026

Seedance 2 is already making full cinematic short films.

Time is running out on Hollywood...pic.twitter.com/VjTdnsCeHd

— Mark Gadala-Maria (@markgadala) February 12, 2026

Billion dollar movie in just one prompt

Seriously, what the hell is going on with Seedance 2.0 pic.twitter.com/yTBlThLhBv

— Random AI (@Random_AI000) February 11, 2026

Hollywood is living on borrowed time. The next big AI disruption trade could be studios.

Tyler Durden Sat, 02/14/2026 - 18:05