Bessent Leads Trade Talks With China In Paris Ahead Of Trump-Xi Summit Ahead of the upcoming Trump-Xi summit, China and US have begun a fresh round of trade talks to set the stage for the main event.  Trade negotiators led by US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, US Trade Representative Jamieson Greer and China’s Vice Premier He Lifeng held talks in Paris on Sunday to map out plans for a leaders’ summit later this […]

Energy Secretary Directs Oil Company To Resume Operations In California, Citing National Security Authored by Jacob Burg via The Epoch Times, Energy Secretary Chris Wright on March 13 directed the Texas-based oil company Sable Offshore Corp. to restore operations in water off southern California. Wright invoked the Defense Production Act to restore the company’s Santa Ynez Unit and Pipeline System near Santa Barbara to address […]

Trump Administration Set To Receive $10 Billion Fee From TikTok U.S. Deal The Trump administration is poised to receive roughly $10 billion in payments from investors involved in the recently completed transaction to take control of TikTok’s U.S. operations, delivering an unusual financial windfall tied to the government’s role in keeping the popular social-media platform active in the United States. ByteDance is the Chinese […]

French Municipal Elections Provide Early Test For Le Pen’s National Rally Ahead Of 2027 Presidential Race Takeaways France held the first round of municipal elections on Sunday in nearly 35,000 municipalities, serving as an initial indicator of political momentum ahead of the 2027 presidential election. Marine Le Pen’s National Rally (RN) is seeking to expand its limited local presence, with ambitions focused on southern cities […]

Companies Are Starting To Enforce AI Use. Is That A Good Or Bad Thing? Via the AIX Files, Years ago, I was working on the editorial side for what was then a hot new media company, and found myself spending more and more time with Johan, the lead programmer, and his team, asking them a lot of annoying questions as it was all so new – certainly to me. I was standing over Johan’s left shoulder, mesmerized by whatever new video […]

Anduril Lands $20 Billion Pentagon Contract For “Modern Battlefield” Hardware Nine days after Axios reported that Palmer Luckey’s Anduril was raising around $4 billion at a $60 billion valuation led by a16z and Thrive Capital, Luckey landed a major enterprise contract with the US Army worth up to $20 billion over 10 years.  Photo: Kyle Grillot/Bloomberg via Getty Images Announced on Friday, the deal features a five-year base […]

Waiting For Markets To Open By Peter Tchir of Academy Securities One thing that has become incredibly consistent during times of financial stress is all of the “green dots” on Bloomberg terminals on Sunday night. This Sunday night is likely to be no different. There are plenty of questions being asked (at a presentation on Thursday at a conference in Vegas, I may have, for the first time, faced too many questions!). There […]

Trump ‘Not Ready’ For Iran Deal; US Urges Citizens To Flee Iraq, Iran Arrests 100s Of ‘Spies’ Summary: Iranian retaliation accelerates, including use of cluster munitions, especially against Israel Gulf countries reported new attacks Sunday morning, a day after Iran called for the evacuation of three major ports in the United Arab Emirates. Iran says it targeted U.S. forces at Saudi base with missiles Israel […]

Tucker Carlson Claims CIA Trying To Frame Him For FARA Violation; Loomer Celebrates In a bombshell Saturday monologue, conservative commentator Tucker Carlson alleged that the CIA has been monitoring his private text messages as part of an effort to frame him for a crime and trigger a criminal referral to the Department of Justice (DOJ).  “The other day I found out that the CIA is preparing some kind of criminal referral against […]

Obama-Appointed Judge Temporarily Blocks DHS From Ending Protected Status For Somali Immigrants Authored by Aldgra Fredly via The Epoch Times, A federal judge on March 13 temporarily blocked the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) from ending temporary protected status (TPS) for Somali nationals in the United States. U.S. District Judge Allison D. Burroughs in Massachusetts (appointed by Barack Obama in 2014) issued the […]

Trump Claims “Many Countries” Will Send Warships As US “Bombing The Hell Out Of Shoreline” To Reopen Hormuz Summary: US strikes on Kharg Island escalate war as Trump claims allies sending warships to Hormuz: Trump said US forces “obliterated” military targets on Kharg Island but warned Iran’s critical oil infrastructure could be the. Iran vows bigger regional retaliation: IRGC warned the UAE that US “hideouts” there are now […]

California Startup Starts Drilling World’s First Underground Nuclear Borehole Authored by Jill McLaughlin via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours), Deep Fission, a California-based nuclear energy startup, started drilling the world’s first underground nuclear borehole March 10 in Kansas, taking a major step forward in building small modular pressurized water reactors one mile below the surface. The drill rig at the Deep Fission site […]

Hormuz Chokepoint Claims Next Victim: World’s Largest Aluminum Smelter Cuts Capacity The world’s largest single-site aluminium smelter in the Middle East cut its output by about 20% on Sunday, marking yet another troubling development for the global economy. The disruption in the Strait of Hormuz is no longer just an energy story – it’s now spreading into industrial metals. These second- and third-order effects could soon disrupt […]

Cotton And Stefanik Bill Targets CCP Ties In U.S. Military Trucking Submitted by American Truckers United, Senator Tom Cotton (R-AR) and Rep. Elise Stefanik (R-NY) have introduced the “Trucking Security and CCP Disclosure Act of 2026.” This legislation requires any carrier handling Department of War equipment to certify that neither it nor its subcontractors are owned, controlled by, or maintain significant ties to entities on […]

“New Era” Begins In Venezuela As U.S. Flag Is Raised At Embassy For First Time In Years The United States Embassy in Caracas announced on X early Saturday morning that the U.S. flag was raised for the first time in seven years, stating that “a new era has begun for relations between the United States and Venezuela.” “On the morning of March 14, 2019, the American flag was lowered for the last time at the United States Embassy in […]

Singularity Update: You Have No Idea How Crazy Humanoid Robots Have Gotten Authored by Peter H. Diamandis via Metatrends, I just spent the afternoon at Figure headquarters in San Jose with Brett Adcock and David Blundin, and I’m still processing what I saw. We’re not talking about concept robots. We’re talking about fully autonomous humanoid robots running neural networks end-to-end, doing kitchen work, unloading […]

US Navy Surveillance Plane Made Provocative Flight Over Taiwan Strait, Weeks Before Trump-Xi Summit With the world’s attention hyper-focused on fast-paced events in Iran and the effectively shuttered vital oil transit hub, the Hormuz Strait, some significant things were also happening around Taiwan this past week. The US military confirmed that a P-8A Poseidon anti-submarine patrol aircraft transited the Taiwan Strait on […]

Unhappy Ending: Chinese National Pleads Guilty To Money Laundering Over Prostitution Scheme Authored by Frank Fang via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours), A Chinese national has pleaded guilty to laundering more than $2 million from a prostitution enterprise run through spa businesses in New York’s capital region, the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Northern District of New York announced on March 11. The U.S. Department of Justice […]

War, Oil And Debt: Which Threats To The US Economy Are Legit? Authored by Brandon Smith via Alt-Market.us It’s the magic number, the line that’s not supposed to be crossed; when a nation’s public debt finally exceeds its GDP. Historically speaking, it’s not a sign of doom like many economists suggest. Numerous countries have sustained for decades with a ratio of well over 100% and many other factors have to be considered […]

Over 3 Million Iranians Forcibly Displaced Under US-Israeli Bombardment More than 3 million Iranians have been displaced by the ongoing US-Israeli war against the Islamic Republic, according to the main UN refugee agency. Ayaki Ito, director of the Division of Emergency and Program Support at the UN refugee agency, has described that the US-Israeli attack has already triggered mass internal displacement across Iran. “Between […]

Jet Fuel Prices Soar As War In Iran Ripples Through Global Aviation Authored by Felicity Bradstock via OilPrice.com, Airlines, including Qantas, SAS, and Air New Zealand, have already announced airfare increases. Surging jet fuel prices and disruptions in the Strait of Hormuz are squeezing airline operations. Prolonged conflict could weaken travel demand and deepen pressure on global airline stocks. As the war in Iran spills […]

North Korea Fires 10 Ballistic Missiles, Flexing During US Regional Drills It’s obvious that ‘wars of choice’ never get launched against nuclear-armed powers, and countries like North Korea want to keep it that way, given it is already treated like a ‘rogue’ state by the West. Saturday saw Pyongyang engage in more muscle-flexing, as its military fired about 10 ballistic missiles toward the eastern sea, according to South Korea’s […]

Iran War Exposes America’s Unfixed Supply Chains Authored by David Dayen via The American Prospect, One of the more fascinating sidelights of our war of choice in Iran is how it has reinforced the devastating consequences of our hollowed-out industrial base, consolidated commercial sector, and overreliance on long intermediated supply chains. Arleigh Burke-class guided-missile destroyer USS Frank E. Petersen Jr. (DDG 121) fires a […]

Meta Plans 20% Layoffs To Divert Capital To Data Centers On Friday we noted that Meta has delayed the rollout of its latest AI model because it sucks – and may temporarily license superior models like Gemini to power the company’s AI products.  Now, Meta is reportedly mulling a massive new round of layoffs that could affect more than 20% of its workforce as it accelerates spending on AI data center buildouts. The move comes as […]

Influenza Vaccine Effectiveness Lower In Recent Months, Preliminary Data Show Authored by Zachary Stieber via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours), The effectiveness of vaccines against influenza dropped during the 2025–2026 virus season, officials said on March 12, about two months after the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) stopped recommending flu vaccination for all children. An influenza vaccine in a doctor’s […]