Blog

The War Hawks’ Predictions Have Aged Like Milk

When Donald Trump launched the Iran War on February 28, the usual suspects were in full support. From the moment the conflict ignited, many couldn’t help but immediately express admiration for the president, saying that only a brave, noble, and strong leader would’ve had the courage to do what Trump did here. For weeks, we heard that this war was essential, that we would be better off as a result, and that to be unsupportive was to be siding with the IRGC.

As weeks went by, however, it became apparent that the rosy picture that had been painted in the war’s infancy was not based in reality. One month turned into two, and then three, and here we are now about six months later, with none of the war’s stated objectives having been achieved. Because of the historic nature of this defeat, it is important to reflect on how we got here.

Who were the voices cheering the administration on as it led us down this dark path?

Why did they have such hatred for those of us who opposed the war?

Most importantly, who can’t we trust going forward?

Ben Shapiro

Among the war’s top early cheerleaders was Ben Shapiro. From the first moments of the conflict, Shapiro was praising Donald Trump’s decision to launch the war.

“President Trump is the most courageous commander-in-chief in modern American history,” Shapiro excitedly said. “What he just did is the bravest move by a president of the United States of my lifetime, bar none, without a doubt.”

Shapiro also immediately made it his mission to smear the war’s critics. Doing his best play on David Frum’s 2003 article “Unpatriotic Conservatives,” Shapiro began labeling some of the most prominent anti-war voices – including libertarian Dave Smith – “America-haters.” In a March 4 episode of “The Ben Shapiro Show,” Shapiro makes some very bold – and uninformed – predictions for how the war would play out.

Addressing concerns early on in the war about U.S. munition stockpiles, Shapiro urged his audience to ignore the naysayers, and rest assured that “ we do have significant stockpiles.” To build on his narrative, he claimed that the Iranian’s were “running out of missile launchers.” “This is a major problem for them,” he emphasized.

“The status is pretty good,” Shapiro told his podcast listeners, “things are moving pretty well.”

Shapiro’s blind faith in the government narrative was not enough to will the U.S. to victory, however. His uncritical rereading of Trump’s Truth Social post – in which he claims that we have a “virtually unlimited supply” of munitions – may have convinced his audience to get on board with the war, but this trust in the administration eventually crashed against the rocks of reality.

The U.S. does not have “unlimited” munitions. The Iranian’s ability to launch missiles has not been effectively degraded. This war has not gone as the administration intended, and the biggest proof of this is the conflict’s length. The war was originally sold as a weeks-long offensive, but it turned out to be a drastically larger undertaking than the White House anticipated, and one that has engulfed the Trump presidency.

Keep reading

Islam’s Quiet Takeover: How Britain’s Prisons Became Dawa Centers

Nick Timothy MP, Britain’s shadow justice secretary, just put numbers on something that’s been muttered about for years. Ministry of Justice data shows one in five Muslim prisoners in England and Wales is white. That’s nearly four times the rate in the general population. White Muslim inmates went from 2,767 in 2022 to 3,218 by June 2025. Overall, Muslim numbers in prison rose from 14,037 to 16,051 in the same stretch. They’re now about 18 percent of the prison population in a country where Muslims are only 6.5 percent of everyone else.

Timothy says the gap “raises serious questions.” Experts have been warning for a long time about Muslim gangs pushing conversions behind bars. He wants the Labour government to look into it properly. The Ministry of Justice’s answer is the usual line: they don’t tolerate intimidation or faith-based coercion. Okay. That still doesn’t explain the figures.

Not every conversion is forced, of course. Some guys convert for the structure, the food, or just to have people watching their back. Some white Muslims grew up in the faith. Fair enough. It still doesn’t account for the size of the shift.

Jonathan Hall KC, who reviews terrorism legislation, found Muslims running parts of prisons as self-styled “emirs.” They pull in lonely or vulnerable inmates with food, advice, small gifts — and sometimes the threat of violence.

He named Usman Khan, the London Bridge attacker, who spent years inside pushing other prisoners to take Muslim names and dress the part. Colin Bloom’s review picked up the phrase “convert or get hurt,” and Qurans were left on new guys’ beds. Don’t identify as Muslim, and you can lose the protection of the main group on the wing. Ian Acheson, who looked at this for a previous government, said some of it is just practical: you convert because that’s who runs the place.

There’s an official side to this now. Figures linked to Timothy’s data show 140 Muslim prison chaplains against 87 Church of England and 94 Catholic. A wider parliamentary count in 2025 put the Muslim total at 263 out of more than 1,200 faith workers. Employed Muslim chaplains went from almost nothing in the early 2000s to well over a hundred later on. No other non-Christian group has anything close.

Most chaplains just do the job — visits, Friday prayers, classes, checking on people at risk. But for some, dawa (inviting people to Islam) is part of it. One Muslim prison chaplain has written that she “gives Dawah to the captives,” hands out books, and helps inmates take the shahadah, including English women. Once you register as Muslim, you get regular visits, Islamic classes, and Friday prayers from the professional chaplains. For a lot of these men, it’s the first proper teaching they’ve ever had. When the strongest group on the wing is already Muslim, that setup works as a pipeline.

Keep reading

State Department to Communist Activist: You Won’t Be Vacationing In the U.S.

At the inaugural Shield of the Americas Summit this past March, Marco Rubio told the other Latin American and Caribbean countries gathered that if they worked together with us, they’d always have a friend in the United States. Here’s an example of that in action regarding the country that will soon be the newest member of the Shield, Colombia. 

Just to recap, in June, the South American nation elected Abelardo de la Espriella as its next president. He defeated Ivan Cepeda, who was former socialist clown President Gustavo Petro’s handpicked successor. President de la Espriella is conservative and promises to be a hard-liner on crime, and while he’s only been in office a few weeks, he’s already proving to be a great leader, even in the wake of a deadly earthquake.

But like the United States, Colombia has its fair share of leftist loons who can’t accept that they lost an election, and one of them is named Viviana Marín. She’s currently the political secretary of the Communist Youth of Colombia (JUCO), a group connected to the Communist Party of Colombia.  

In June, Marín was filmed calling for people to make Colombia “unlivable for Abelardo.” Sounds like a threat to me. 

“What’s coming, comrades, is street protests, so buy some shoes because you’re going to be wearing them out,” she said. 

She also said, “Tell the right wing, well, yes, we are a plague. And we are a plague that will come out into the streets every day of their lives to tell them: ‘No way, we’re here.'” 

Normally, this wouldn’t be our problem. Every country has people like this, but Marín, it seems, is all about communism until she goes on vacation and enjoys spending her spare time in the United States. After she was filmed saying those things, photos of her in the snow in Chicago and hanging out in Florida went viral. 

Keep reading

Homeland Advanced Recognition Technology: The Largest US Biometric Database You’ve Never Heard Of

After being troubled by delays and budget concerns for nearly a decade, the Homeland Advanced Recognition Technology (HART) program will become the US government’s largest biometric database when it launches in September. The program has also been plagued by privacy concerns raised by the Government Accountability Office (GAO), which has warned that HART has “gaps” in its privacy policies.

HART will be managed by the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and will store and process biometric data such as digital fingerprints, iris scans, and faceprints that have been gathered by DHS and its various sub-agencies. According to DHS, government agencies may seek to access this data for national security reasons, law enforcement, immigration and border management, intelligence gathering, background investigations for national security positions, and certain positions of public trust.

While HART is set to complete “initial operating capability” in September 2026, the system is not scheduled to be fully completed until 2027. The system was originally announced in 2015 as a replacement for the legacy Automated Biometric Identification System (IDENT), which was originally developed in 1994 as a law enforcement system for collecting and processing biometric data from individuals apprehended by border security or immigration officials. In 2013, the DHS’ Office of Biometric Identity Management (OBIM) began plans to replace IDENT with HART. HART was set to become operational in December 2018 but was delayed numerous times due to budget concerns.

Since the initial announcement regarding the transition from IDENT to HART, the GAO and digital rights groups have raised concerns about the government upgrading and centralizing its repository of sensitive personal information of millions of Americas.

In February 2020, DHS published its original HART Privacy Impact Assessment to “assess and mitigate any potential privacy risks.” While the system wasn’t yet active, DHS said they “anticipated potential privacy risks associated with the privacy sensitive system” and “sought to proactively develop appropriate privacy safeguards to be implemented” throughout HART’s development.

In September 2023, the GAO released their own report detailing what it saw as “gaps” in privacy policies required by the Office of Management and Budget. The GAO said DHS implemented only five of twelve privacy requirements. GAO noted that the 2020 privacy impact assessment was “missing key information,” including on whose data will be stored in the system and the partners with whom the system will share the data.

The GAO report also said the HART program did not have “assurances that partners that provide information to the system will appropriately retain and dispose of personally identifiable information.” GAO concluded by stating that until DHS addressed these “privacy weaknesses,” there is no assurance that the personal data gathered on hundreds of millions of individuals will be “appropriately protected.”

In August 2024, DHS released an updated Privacy Impact Assessment for HART in an attempt to “clarify and address points raised by external oversight bodies.” The assessment provided answers to some of the questions posed by the 2023 GAO report, namely whose information will be stored and with whom it will be shared.

“HART will contain personally identifiable information, including biometric data and associated biographic information, on U.S. citizens, lawful permanent residents, and foreign nationals,” the assessment stated.

The report says biometric data held in HART may be shared with every agency of the DHS, including Customs and Border Protection (CBP), U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), U.S. Secret Service (USSS), and the Transportation Security Administration (TSA), as well as other federal agencies such as the State Department, the Department of Justice (DOJ), and the Department of Defense (DOD). It also states that biometric data may be shared with “elements of the Intelligence Community (IC).”

Keep reading

Hope Florida grand jury finds Medicaid money ‘misused for political purposes’

A state grand jury investigating the Hope Florida scandal found that key members of the DeSantis administration wrongly engaged in a “sophisticated scheme” to divert $10 million of a Medicaid settlement into political activities and the Republican Party of Florida, according to a copy of the grand jury’s report obtained by CBS News Miami.

The report concluded the $10 million in taxpayer money was “plainly used for political purposes” but also said the grand jury could not find enough evidence to charge anyone with a crime because no one would “take responsibility” for deciding to divert the money to Hope Florida “or had any memory” of who made the decision.

It noted that most of those involved were lawyers who “acted on the advice of other lawyers” making it hard to determine who was to blame.

“We recognize that this would be an impediment to criminal prosecution,” the report said. “While we can’t prove who is responsible, we can plainly see that taxpayer money was misused for political purposes and we would like to see changes made to prevent this from happening again.”

Despite a lack of criminal charges, the report pointed fingers at key DeSantis officials who had been at the center of a scandal that centered on Hope Florida, a charity championed by First Lady Casey DeSantis. It became embroiled in controversy last year, once it became public that the charity had served as conduit for the $10 million that landed in political committees but should have paid for medical expenses for needy Floridians.

Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier, who was then Gov. Ron DeSantis’ chief of staff, was “in a position of authority” and at the heart of a scheme that sent money to political committees fighting passage of an amendment to legalize marijuana in 2024, the grand jury found.

“Testimony identified (Uthmeier) as having involvement in directing the money after it went to Hope Florida,” the report said. “Testimony also revealed that Mr. Uthmeier’s Keep Florida Clean, a political action committee, was the prime recipient of the majority of the $10 million taxpayer funds.”

The report also found that U.S. Sen. Ashley Moody, who was attorney general at the time, knew of the scheme and authorized her chief deputy at the time, John Guard, to sign the settlement agreement, CBS News reported. Guard signed the settlement, despite his reservations, and “without conducting his due diligence to ensure the proper appropriation of taxpayer funds,” the report said.

Both Uthmeier and Moody were appointed by DeSantis to their current positions and are running for election to those offices in November. Their Democratic opponents called for their resignation after CBS posted its story.

DeSantis appointed Guard to serve as a judge on the Second Circuit Court of Appeal in January.

The $10 million was part of a $67 million settlement with the Centene Corporation, a Medicaid provider that overcharged the state. The $10 million was peeled off to Hope Florida, then within a matter of days transferred to two nonprofit political organizations that in quick succession gave the money to a political committee chaired by Uthmeier and set up to defeat the marijuana amendment.

The grand jury was convened in October 2025 by Leon County State Attorney Jack Campbell to investigate the circumstances surrounding the distribution of the $10 million, part of a larger $67 million settlement with the Centene Corporation, a Medicaid vendor that had overcharged the state for prescription medicines.

The investigation followed months of news reports about the scheme, after Rep. Alex Andrade held committee hearings questioning state officials and Hope Florida board members about the transfer. The grand jury concluded its work in January, and its report was sealed.

Neither DeSantis, Uthmeier or Moody were called to testify before the grand jury.

Uthmeier has defended his actions in public, and his office told CBS News on Wednesday said the only crime was releasing the grand jury report. Moody has ducked reporters’ questions about her involvement in the Hope Florida scandal.

DeSantis has characterized the Hope Florida scandal as a “hoax.” During a news conference Wednesday, CBS News reported, he said he wasn’t involved in the settlement agreement, “but was very happy with how everything was done.”

The grand jury report concludes with two recommendations — that the Legislature should pass a law to prevent something like this from occurring again, and pass “clear laws setting requirements” for how nonprofits like the Hope Florida Foundation can use taxapyer funds, making sure those funds are monitored and providing penalties for violating any new laws.

Keep reading

Ayanna Pressley Declares MAGA is the Confederacy Alive and Well 

Rep. Ayanna Pressley of Massachusetts compared President Donald Trump’s MAGA movement to the Confederacy during a Monday campaign appearance in Boston, delivering one of the sharper attacks heard in an already heated Democrat Senate primary.

The accusation turned a routine endorsement event into another display of progressive political theater.

Pressley spoke at Roxbury Community College while campaigning for Sen. Ed Markey of Massachusetts.

Markey is seeking another term but first must defeat Rep. Seth Moulton in the Democrat primary.

“It is bigger than Trump,” Pressley said.

Her message was that removing Trump from the White House would not eliminate the political forces she believes are represented by his supporters.

“Because whenever we do the work of ousting the occupant of the Oval Office, the Confederacy is still alive and well. That’s all MAGA is.”

The sweeping charge placed millions of Trump voters in the same rhetorical bucket as a rebellion formed to tear the nation apart.

Keep reading

Paxton “Child Safety” Plan Puts Legal Speech at Criminal Risk

Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, who is currently running for the US Senate, and pushing online digital ID age verification checks in the name of “online safety,” has announced a data center plan that, among other things, vows to “protect children” by making data center companies criminally liable if the centers they operate “empower AI chatbots that undermine children’s safety.”

Paxton is effectively promising to author legislation that would introduce a novel form of liability, aimed at data centers – the physical and hardware part of the internet’s infrastructure – for the content that is generated by software running on their servers.

This is a clear departure from the principle, enshrined in Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act (CDA), that internet infrastructure is not liable for third-party, user-generated content.

And, while Paxton’s plan speaks of chatbots that “undermine children’s safety” – a broad and vague term that can easily be abused to censor speech – the actual target could be any chatbot, and any speech.

And the liability would be criminal.

Paxton is quoted as saying in a post on X: “My Texas First Data Center Plan will protect our grid, our communities, and our children while ensuring America beats Communist China in the AI race,” he wrote.

Keep reading

Mexican national operating money service charged with laundering cartel drug proceeds

Christopher A. Bravo Marin, 46, was indicted by a federal grand jury last week charging him with conspiring to launder at least $750,000 in drug proceeds on behalf of the Cártel de Jalisco Nueva Generación (CJNG), one of the most prolific and dangerous drug cartels in Mexico, according to U.S. Attorney Daniel Rosen.

Marin, aka Bravo, a Mexican national was arrested Monday by Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) special agents. He appeared before a U.S. magistrate judge in Minneapolis on Aug. 25, 2026.

According to the charges:

From at least February 2023 to at least February 2026, Bravo, an employee of a Minnesota-based money transmitting business, conspired with members of a CJNG drug distribution cell in Minnesota to launder drug proceeds and transfer them to cartel leaders in Mexico through the money transmitter where he worked. Bravo used his position at the money transmitter and his understanding of his employer’s compliance policies and procedures to evade their anti-money laundering controls and conceal the illicit source of the funds he laundered. Cartel members paid Bravo approximately $40-50 for each transfer that he laundered.

To transfer the funds, Bravo allegedly structured the amount of money to be sent to Mexico across multiple transfers, ensuring that each transfer was always right below $1,000—the money transmitter’s threshold for collecting and verifying a customer’s identification document. Bravo created fake names of Hispanic origin to serve as the senders and sent the money to straw beneficiaries in Mexico whose names he received from cartel members.

After processing the transfers, Bravo forged the signature of the senders on each payment confirmation receipt to make the transfer appear legitimate and texted screenshots of the receipts to his co-conspirators so that the funds could be redeemed in Mexico.

Bravo is charged with one count of conspiracy to engage in money laundering, which carries a maximum penalty of 20 years in prison. A federal district judge will determine any sentence after considering the U.S. Sentencing Guidelines and other statutory factors.

Trial attorney Javier Urbina of the Criminal Division’s Money Laundering, Narcotics and Forfeiture Section (MNF) and Assistant United States Attorney Rebecca E. Kline for the District of Minnesota are prosecuting the case.

The U.S. Attorney’s press release explained that MNF’s mission is to take the profit out of crime, eliminate drug cartels, and protect the U.S. financial system. MNF pursues criminal prosecutions and criminal and civil asset recovery actions involving: financial facilitators who launder profits for criminals; financial institutions and their officers and employees whose actions threaten the U.S. financial system and financial institutions; international money launderers who support transnational organized crime; and the top command and control of international drug trafficking organizations.

MNF’s Bank Integrity Unit investigates and prosecutes banks and other financial institutions, including their officers, managers and employees whose actions threaten the integrity of the individual institution or the wider financial system.

“This defendant strengthened a criminal infrastructure by helping transfer hundreds of thousands of dollars in drug proceeds to cartel leaders,” said Rosen. “My office remains committed to taking down drug trafficking organizations that threaten the public safety of the people of Minnesota.”

Bravo was released from custody on an appearance bond after making his initial court appearance.

Keep reading

Ramaswamy torches Dem rival over ‘outrageous’ COVID-19 claim: ‘Spewing lies’

Amy Acton, the Democratic nominee for governor of Ohio, is facing backlash from Republican rival Vivek Ramaswamy after claiming COVID-19 mortality rates had been as high as 50% in the early days of the 2020 pandemic.

Acton highlighted the figure as evidence of her effective leadership as director of the Ohio Department of Health on a podcast appearance in September.

“In those early days, the mortality rate was 50%. I started with that in March. By June, when we reopened, it was because we took swift, decisive action. The mortality rate had gone down to 5%. We learned how to save lives,” Acton said.

Acton’s retelling of the pandemic’s lethality comes as she defends her record as health director and amid an uphill bid to become the next governor of the Buckeye State.

COVID-19’s mortality rate was well below the 50% Acton described, resulting in 275,000 deaths nationwide in 2020, according to the Centers for Disease Control (CDC)

Of patients who contracted the virus, the death rate was just 15.9% when adjusted for age. And when filtered further for when COVID was the cause of death, that figure fell further to 11.3%.

When asked about the figure, Acton’s office said she had been referring to death rates in hospitals.

She also bashed Republican gubernatorial candidate Vivek Ramaswamy, the founder of Roivant Sciences, a biotech pharmaceutical company that helped produce COVID treatments.

“While Dr. Acton was working hand in hand with Governor DeWine to keep Ohioans safe, Vivek Ramaswamy was calling for mandatory COVID-19 testing, making more than $2 billion off of the COVID vaccine and recommending segregating Ohioans based on biomarker status,” Addie Bullock, a spokesperson for Acton’s campaign, said.

Keep reading

REALLY? Gavin Newsom Claims He Didn’t Know About the 5,000 Bottle Wine Cellar in His Own Home

Gavin Newsom is now trying to claim that he did not know about the 5,000 bottle wine cellar in his own multi-million dollar home.

Why does he think people are stupid enough to believe this?

Newsom is in the wine business but we’re supposed to believe he completely ignored this feature in his home? Please.

The New York Post reports:

Gavin Newsom claims he ‘didn’t even know’ about 5,000-bottle wine cellar at his $7.5M home

California Gov. Gavin Newsom and wife Jennifer Siebel Newsom are selling their $7.5 million Sacramento-area residence — yet the governor claims he was barely aware of one of the home’s key amenities.

At a press conference, the winemaker-turned-pol was put on the spot about whether he even filled the home’s massive 5,000-bottle wine cellar.

Newsom is winding down his time in the California capitol as he preps an expected White House run. Outside of Sacramento, the couple purchased a $9 million home in Marin County in 2024.

Photos of the wine cellar show a luxurious, open area with seating and rows of shelves locked behind a glass door. There appear to be books stacked inside the walls along with bottles of wine.

No one is buying it.

Keep reading