Blog

Trump Working on “Temporary Pass” for Illegals in Certain Industries

A “temporary pass” to allow farmers and hospitality businesses to retain some illegal workers is currently in the works, according to President Donald Trump.

In an interview with Maria Bartiromo of Fox News on Sunday, the President said he was trying to be both “the strongest immigration guy that there’s even been” and also the “strongest farmers [and hotels] guy.”

“What we’re going to do is we’re going to do something for farmers, where we can let the farmer sort of be in charge,” the President explained.

“The farmer knows he’s not going to hire a murderer. But you know, when you go into a farm and he’s had somebody working with him for nine years, doing this kind of work—which is hard work to do, and a lot of people aren’t going to do it—and you end up destroying a farmer because you took all the people away, it’s a problem.”

The President continued: “We’re going to work it so that some kind of a temporary pass where people pay taxes, where the farmer can have a little control, as opposed to you walk in and take everybody away.”

Bartiromo asked the President whether the new move was a response to the “clumsy” execution of his mass-deportation policy, which has meant “people were afraid to go to work.” The President responded that his policy was “unbelievable,” and that it was President Biden’s immigration policies that were clumsy.

President Trump indicated at the beginning of June that he was considering a temporary pass for workers in certain industries, and during a cabinet meeting in April, he said that Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem said there should be a pathway for “certain people” who farmers want to “stay in for a while and work with the farmers and then come back and go through a legal process.”

Meanwhile, Border Czar Tom Homan has said that immigration raids on farms, hotels and restaurants will continue.

Keep reading

Trump Says He Gave Iran Permission to Bomb U.S. Base in Qatar and…Well, Mostly Crickets?

When political scientist Seth Masket shared this story on Bluesky yesterday, I couldn’t believe it was real. The right-wing Washington Times reported that at a press conference at the NATO Summit in the Netherlands on Wednesday, Trump revealed that he had given Iran permission to bomb the U.S.’s Al Udeid Air Base in Qatar in retaliation for the American bombing of their nuclear sites. 

“They said, ‘We’re going to shoot them. Is one o’clock OK?’ I said it’s fine,” Trump said. “And everybody was emptied off the base so they couldn’t get hurt, except for the gunners.”

I poked around for other major coverage of this extraordinary admission, and landed only on a transcript of the press conference. And yes, amid a characteristically meandering monologue, Trump actually said that he let a foreign adversary bomb an American military installation. But this story has pretty much come and gone with virtually no attention and certainly none of the outrage commensurate with what Trump said.

Let’s consider what Trump’s verbal diarrhea here could mean. Suppose he is (for once) telling the truth. Wouldn’t that represent the most shocking dereliction of duty one could imagine for the commander-in-chief? (A high crime or misdemeanor, perhaps?) Is he saying he let Iran get its retaliation out of its system with what he called “a very weak response” to bring an end to hostilities? Perhaps Trump simply was rambling incoherently as he basked in his new “daddy” glow at NATO.

Keep reading

Police unveil ‘revolutionary’ new handheld gadget that captures even slightest bruising on domestic abuse victims for use as evidence

‘Groundbreaking’ new technology will allow police to properly capture bruising on domestic violence victims using a handheld gadget.

Britain’s biggest force is today unveiling the device which will allow frontline officers to gather forensic-grade material that can be used as evidence in court within minutes of first contact.

Project Archway uses cross-polarisation to eliminate glare on the skin and enhance visual contrasts to identify bruises invisible to the naked eye.

Previously, officers often faced challenges in capturing visible evidence of bruising – particularly on darker skin tones and during the early stages of injury.

But the technology, developed in-house by the Metropolitan Police, is closing this gap and the force said it is already improving outcomes for victims.

A 33-use pilot in south London resulted in charges for 45 per cent of the cases.

Keep reading

A Translation Guide To Progressive Slavespeak

I propose that we accompany physical detox with a verbal detox: we need to purge our bloated vocabulary of several concepts that are poisoning our understanding of ourselves and the world.

These concepts have been elaborated by people who would describe themselves as “self-aware,” “progressive,” and “liberated,” but they are actually terms more fit for a society of slaves than a society of free persons. Indeed, these concepts, at least as they are typically employed by “progressives,” could be described, without exaggeration, as a species of slavespeak. By this, I simply mean that they are used disingenuously, to rationalise political oppression and slavery.

Let’s name them and shame them, one by one:

  1. Misinformation/disinformation: On its face, this means false or misleading information that could be harmful to citizens. But in slavespeak, while it parades under this apparently innocent meaning, it actually means information that some individuals find disagreeable or inconvenient, and therefore want censored or banished from the public square.
  2. Far right: On its face, this means political positions that border on the insane, the pathological, and the irrational, and have violent and oppressive tendencies, with affinities to Nazism, white supremacism, and other dodgy political movements. In slavespeak, “far right” retains these connotations, but the term is applied arbitrarily to any position that disrupts the official narrative of the political Establishment.
  3. Xenophobia: Xenophobia usually means blanket dislike or prejudice against foreigners. But in slavespeak, xenophobia is applied to anyone who affirms the value of national ties or national identity, defends the idea that immigrants should adapt to the their host culture, or dissents from open border policies.
  4. Hate speech: On its face, this means speech that targets particular groups in society with vitriolic language and insults of various sorts, seeking to portray such groups as intrinsically detestable. In slavespeak, hate speech just means any strongly worded discourse that dares to speak critically of any protected cohort of society or its behaviour or opinions. So heated political discourse is treated as insidious hate speech, especially discourse that threatens the reigning ideology.
  5. Tolerance: On its face, this means a disposition to peacefully put up with people, behaviour, or opinions one finds abhorrent or offensive. In slavespeak, tolerance means the uncritical celebration of every conceivable lifestyle under the sun, the anaesthesisation of one’s critical faculties. So verbally expressing disapproval or criticism toward a way of life, which used to be permitted by freedom of expression, is now condemned as intolerance.

Keep reading

Prophecy, not politics, may also shape America’s clash with Iran

When most people contemplate the future of America’s conflict with Iran, they hunt for clues in grainy satellite photos, statements from military analysts and President Trump’s social media posts.

But when scholar Diana Butler Bass considers what could happen next, her thoughts turn toward another group she says is now thinking more about prophecy than politics.

She recalls warnings from her childhood about the rise of an Antichrist, stories about weeping mothers clutching their empty blankets after their babies were suddenly “Raptured” to heaven and paintings of an angry Jesus leading armies of angels to an Armageddon-like, final battle in modern-day Israel.

Those stories terrified and thrilled Bass when she heard them growing up in a White evangelical church in the 1970s. It was a time when the end always seemed near, and books like the bestseller “The Late Great Planet Earth” warned Christians to gird their loins for a period of Great Tribulation and prepare for Jesus’ triumphant return to Jerusalem.

Bass, a prominent, progressive religious author who hosts a popular Substack newsletter called “The Cottage,” no longer believes those stories. Yet when she considers why the US struck three nuclear facilities in Iran this month and what could happen next, she now offers a prophecy of her own: Bombing Iran will reinforce Trump’s status as God’s “Chosen One” and Israel as His chosen nation among many of the President’s White evangelical supporters.

Many of these supporters dismiss the dangers of a larger war, she tells CNN, because such a clash would mean the world is approaching the “end times” — a series of cataclysmic events ushering in the Second Coming of Christ and the rise of Israel as the fulfillment of biblical prophecies.

“There’s almost a kind of spiritual eagerness for a war in the Middle East,” says Bass, describing attitudes among some White evangelicals. “They believe a war is going to set off a series of events that will result in Jesus returning.”

Trump’s decision to bomb Iran has so far been examined almost exclusively through the lens of politics or military strategy. Yet there is a religious dimension to his decision – and what could happen next – that’s been underexplored.

Keep reading

US Approves $510 Million Arms Deal for Israel

The Trump administration has approved a new arms deal for Israel that will provide the country with $510 million worth of Joint Direct Attack Munitions (JDAMS), kits that turn bombs into precision-guided weapons, as the US continues to provide military aid to support the genocidal war in Gaza.

According to the Pentagon’s Defense Security Cooperation Agency (DSCA), the State Department notified Congress of the sale of 3,845 JDAMS for 2,000-pound BLU-109 bombs and 3,280 JDAMS for 500-pound MK 82 bombs. The deal also includes US “government and contractor engineering, logistics, and technical support services; and other related elements of logistics and program support.”

The DSCA said Boeing is the principal contractor for the deal. The notification of the potential deal begins a time period when US lawmakers could potentially block the sale, but there’s little opposition to US military support for Israel within Congress, despite the many war crimes the US is implicated in by providing Israel with weapons.

Fragments of bombs with US-provided JDAM kits have been found at the scene of Israeli airstrikes in Gaza that have massacred many civilians. In 2023, Human Rights Watch said it identified JDAM fragments that were found in two airstrikes on homes in central Gaza that killed 43 civilians, including 19 children, and 14 women.

Keep reading

TX Gov Signs Law Allowing Texans to Use Gold, Silver as Legal Tender

Texas residents can soon use gold and silver bullion as legal tender in everyday transactions following a bill signed into law by Gov. Greg Abbott (R).

“I signed a law authorizing Texans to use gold & silver as legal tender in day-to-day financial transactions,” the Texas governor declared on X Sunday after signing House Bill 1056.

“It fulfills the promise of Article 1, Section 10 of the U.S. Constitution,” he added.

Article I, Section 10 Clause 1 of the U.S. Constitution states:

No State shall enter into any Treaty, Alliance, or Confederation; grant Letters of Marque and Reprisal; coin Money; emit Bills of Credit; make any Thing but gold and silver Coin a Tender in Payment of Debts; pass any Bill of Attainder, ex post facto Law, or Law impairing the Obligation of Contracts, or grant any Title of Nobility.

The law, which takes partial effect May 1, 2026, and goes into full effect Sept. 1, 2026, authorizes the State Comptroller’s office to establish electronic payment systems “backed by bullion” stored at the Texas Bullion Depository, though it does not require vendors accept the precious metals as payment.

Gold and silver used in transactions must also meet certain requirements, and cannot be minted by governments, but bullion from private minters like Apmex is fine.

Bill author Rep. Mark Dorazio (R-San Antonio) at one point in 2024 said the measure “makes gold and silver functional money in Texas,” adding, “It has to be functional, it has to be practical and it has to be usable.”

Keep reading

Israel Called Its Initial Attack on Iran ‘Red Wedding,’ Referring to a Fictional Massacre that Relied on Deception

According to The Wall Street Journal, Israel codenamed its initial attack on Iran that killed senior military leaders “Red Wedding,” referring to a gruesome massacre from the book series “Game of Thrones,” which was adapted into a TV series on HBO.

In the Red Wedding scene, one family murders the members of the other, including a pregnant woman, during a wedding feast, a surprise attack that relies on betrayal and deception. Israel’s attack also relied on deception as it used the cover of nuclear talks between the US and Iran to catch Tehran off guard.

The Israeli attack was launched on Friday, June 13, two days before the US and Iran were set to hold another round of nuclear negotiations. According to the Journal report, part of the ruse involved Israeli officials leaking stories to the media about a split between President Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu about the possibility of Israel attacking Iran.

Trump and Netanyahu held a phone call on Monday, June 9, the day the Journal report said Israel had decided to launch the attack on June 13. Axios reporter Barak Ravid, a former IDF intelligence officer, reported the day after the call that an Israeli official and a US official told him that Trump expressed to Netanyahu that he believed he could reach a nuclear deal with Iran and opposed military action at that time.

According to the Journal, on the day of the attacks Trump told reporters that the US and Iran were “fairly close to an agreement” and that he didn’t want the Israelis “going in,” and Israeli officials told reporters they would wait to see the results of the next round of US-Iran nuclear talks before attacking.

The Journal report said: “The key to the deception, said a security official familiar with the planning of the operation, was the idea implanted in the minds of the Iranians that Israel wouldn’t strike without US authorization and participation. As long as the US wasn’t mobilizing its forces and was engaged in negotiations, Israel could threaten to attack and even mobilize its troops in plain sight of Iran without giving away the element of surprise.”

Hours before Israel’s bombing campaign started, Trump wrote on Truth Social that he was still committed to a diplomatic solution with Iran. The Journal report said Israeli warplanes were already getting in the air when he made the post.

Keep reading

MIT Invents “Bubble Wrap” That Pulls Fresh Water From The Air…Even In The Driest Places In The World

MIT researchers have invented a new water-harvesting device — a high-tech version of “bubble wrap” — that can pull safe drinking water straight from the air, even in extreme environments like Death Valley, the driest desert in North America, according to LiveScience.

In a study published June 11 in Nature Water, the team described how their innovation could help address global water scarcity. “It works wherever you may find water vapor in the air,” the researchers wrote.

The device is built from hydrogel, a material that can absorb large amounts of water, sandwiched between two glass layers resembling a window. At night, the hydrogel draws moisture from the air. During the day, a special coating on the glass keeps it cool, allowing water to condense and drip into a collection system.

The hydrogel is molded into dome shapes — likened to “a sheet of bubble wrap” — that swell when absorbing moisture. These domes increase surface area, helping the material absorb more water.

LiveScience writes that the system was tested for a week in Death Valley, a region spanning California and Nevada that holds the record as the hottest and driest place in North America.

Despite the harsh conditions, the harvester consistently produced between 57 and 161.5 milliliters of water daily — about a quarter to two-thirds of a cup. In more humid regions, researchers expect even greater yields. According to MIT representatives, this approach outperforms earlier water-from-air technologies and does so without needing electricity.

One major breakthrough was solving a known problem with hydrogel-based water harvesters: lithium salts used to improve absorption often leak into the water, making it unsafe. The new design adds glycerol, which stabilizes the salt and keeps leakage to under 0.06 parts per million — a level the U.S. Geological Survey deems safe for groundwater.

Though a single panel can’t supply an entire household, its small footprint means several can be installed together. The team estimates that eight 3-by-6-foot (1-by-2-meter) panels could provide enough drinking water for a household in areas lacking reliable sources. Compared to the cost of bottled water in the U.S., the system could pay for itself in under a month and remain functional for at least a year.

Keep reading

The UK’s Crackdown On Pro-Palestine Activists Has Reached New Orwellian Levels.

For years, the UK government has attempted to crack down on the activist group “Palestine Action”, due to their disruption of the Israeli arms manufacturing plant Elbit Systems, which manufactures weapons used to slaughter civilians in Gaza.

The UK government has consistently coordinated with officials from Elbit Systems to assure them that it will crack down on pro-Palestine protests.

As the Guardian has reported , because many court cases have led to “Palestine Action” activists being “acquitted for in the past with human rights defenses” UK government officials met with representatives of Elbit Systems to “reassure” them that they would crack down harder on the protests.

As the independent outlet Declassified UK reported, in 2022, “then home secretary Priti Patel met privately with Martin Fausset, the CEO of Elbit Systems UK, to ‘discuss protests and security’, Home Office documents revealed that the purpose of the meeting was to ‘reassure… Fausset that the criminal protest acts against Elbit Systems UK are taken seriously by the Government’”.

As journalist Kit Klarenberg reported, soon after this meeting, a UK court “ruled that human rights defenses could only be relied on in cases of vandalism of public property, not in cases where criminal damage has been caused to private property. Because Elbit is a private company, the Attorney General’s Office used this determination to dramatically increase prosecutions of Palestine Action activists.”

The Guardian also reported that this meeting with Elbit Systems was “attended by a director from the Attorney General’s Office, said to be representing the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS).”

Tim Crosland from the Defend Our Juries group said “These disclosures, despite the extensive redaction, are the smoking gun on what has been obvious for a while: the government has been trying to put a stop to juries acquitting those who expose and resist corporate complicity in violations of international law and mass loss of life. Such political interference is a national scandal that goes right to the top – the corruption of democracy and the rule of law by those with wealth and power”.

The UK federal government has also coordinated with local police in an attempt to crack down on Palestine Action protestors, even giving a direct line of communication between Elbit Systems and UK police.

As Declassified UK reported, after “Palestine Action” activists disrupted an Elbit Systems drone factory in Leicester in 2023, “Britain’s policing minister Chris Philp held a briefing with Leicestershire police’s deputy chief constable regarding the ‘ongoing protests’”.

Notes from the meeting state that there were “Pushes for remand of those arrested and supports proactive action, show of police and clear[ly] expects us to be taking action against those that commit crime. Focus not on peaceful protestors and facilitating that but on the company”.

Another police file showed that Elbit Systems even shares intelligence on protestors with UK police, as Declassified UK reported, “Elbit Systems UK has ‘its own intelligence cell and shares[s] information with the Police across the country on a two weekly basis’, a police file observes.”

Along with Elbit Systems, the Israeli embassy in the UK has pressured the UK government to crack down on Palestine Action protests.

As the Guardian reported in August of 2023, “Israeli embassy officials in London attempted to get the attorney general’s office to intervene in UK court cases relating to the prosecution of protesters”.

The Guardian found that “The papers, obtained through a freedom of information (FoI) request by Palestine Action, indicate that embassy officials pressed for the director general of the attorney general’s office (AGO), Douglas Wilson, to interfere in cases related to protests on UK soil.”

Since the genocide in Gaza began, the UK government has gone further with its crackdown on Palestine Action activists.

In August of 2024, UK police arrested and charged 10 Palestine Action activists for entering an Elbit Systems facility in Filton, Bristol.

Documents have strongly suggested that the Israeli embassy interfered in the investigation into the Filton activists arrested.

As the Guardian reported in early September of 2024, the head of international law at Britain’s Attorney General’s Office, Nicola Smith, sent the contact details of the CPS (Crown Prosecutorial Service) and Britain’s counter terrorism police (SO15) -who investigated the Filton case- to the deputy Israeli ambassador to the UK, Daniela Grudsky Ekstein.

Keep reading