Welcome to Winter

The days will begin to grow longer, and the news will keep churning. This week we had a Russian General assassinated, a marathon press conference by Putin, Biden and company trying to spread chaos by firing missiles into Russia, Ukraine losing badly on the battlefield, the continued dissolution of Syria, and the on going genocide in Gaza and the west bank. A US government shutdown was avoided with an emergency stop gap funding bill, but Germany's government has fallen and new election slated. Canada may be next. Macron's government in France managed to survive and a new centrist PM was installed. All these stories and more below the fold.

Let's begin with US domestic news...

It's the economy, stupid!
Trump and Musk Sink US Government Spending Bill
US Republicans balked at the proposed package right after its release, slamming it as being too bloated and full of Democratic policy priorities. Tesla and SpaceX owner Elon Musk – pitched by Trump as the head of his new Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), a panel charged with finding ways to slash federal spending – launched an entire campaign against the package on X. “This bill should not pass,” Musk wrote early on Wednesday, repeatedly posting different versions of this call throughout the day and late into the night, making a total of more than 60 updates. He decried the bill as “criminal,” “outrageous,” “unconscionable,” and ultimately “one of the worst bills ever written.” Musk’s tirade sparked a virtual flashmob of disapproving statements regarding the bill, which culminated with condemnation by Donald Trump, who called it full of “Democrat giveaways.”
“Republicans must GET SMART and TOUGH. If Democrats threaten to shut down the government unless we give them everything they want, then CALL THEIR BLUFF,” he said in a joint statement with Vice President-elect JD Vance, posted on his TruthSocial account. Many observers noted that it was unusual for the incoming president and his team to tip the scales on legislation before officially coming into power. CNN and The Washington Post reported late on Wednesday that the bill had been killed, with Musk confirming it in yet another post on X.
“Your elected representatives have heard you, and now the terrible bill is dead. The voice of the people has triumphed!” he wrote, adding in another post that “no bills should be passed Congress until January 20,” when Trump takes office.

I'm not sure if people have truly grasped the power of X.
The House was set to pass a BS spending bill.
After just a few hours of posting on X by Musk & X users, the bill was effectively killed... potentially saving the US taxpayer billions of dollars.

Shutdown Odds Tumble As House Passes Latest GOP Spending Package
With the support of Democrats, the House just passed Speaker Johnson’s latest spending package bill. Lawmakers voted 366 to 34 to approve the proposal, well above the two-thirds threshold needed under special fast-track procedures. One lawmaker voted present. It now heads to the Senate, while the White House said in a statement that President Biden won’t stand in the way. “President Biden supports moving this legislation forward and ensuring that the vital services the government provides for hardworking Americans—from issuing Social Security checks to processing benefits for veterans—can continue as well as to grant assistance for communities that were impacted by devastating hurricanes,” White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said in a statement. Polymarket’s odds of a government shutdown are tumbling.
As the Epoch Times notes further, moments after the House of Representatives passed a new package to keep the federal government funded through March 14, House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) and other congressional lawmakers discussed the process that brought the bill over the finish line. “In bipartisan fashion, with an overwhelming majority of votes, we passed the American Relief Act of 2025,” Johnson said, adding that funding the government through March 2025 was “a big priority for us.” The House Speaker described the package as “America First” legislation that allows his GOP coalition to deliver the nation a “sea change in Washington” after Inauguration Day next month. “President Trump will return to D.C. and to the White House, and we will have Republican control of the Senate and the House,” Johnson said.
...
The package also included requested disaster relief funds after an active hurricane season that included multiple destructive storms in multiple states throughout the southeast. Rep. Buddy Carter (R-Ga.), was relieved that portion was included in the final package. “Thank God we got disaster,” Carter told The Epoch Times. Regarding the debt ceiling consideration, Rep. Tom Emmer (R-Minn.) said that the public would have to wait and see what would “be done early in the next administration.” President-elect Donald Trump suggested he was pleased with the outcome of the vote, Rep. Rich McCormick (R-Ga.) told The Epoch Times.

Not everyone was happy...

(2 min)

Trump’s Economic Plans
Trump will begin his first 100 days with an emphasis on his economic plans. His core economic team is already announced including Russell Vought as Director of the Office of Management and Budget, Jamieson Greer as U.S. Trade Representative, Kevin Hassett as Director of the National Economic Council, Scott Bessent as U.S. Treasury Secretary, and Howard Lutnick as Secretary of Commerce. Hassett and Bessent will form the core of this team with Greer taking the lead on tariffs and Vought taking the lead on budget deficits and fiscal policy. Trump’s economic policy will be built around what are called the Three Arrows. That’s a name adopted by the new Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent. He took the name from the Three Arrows policy of Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, who announced them in 2012. Abe’s arrows were monetary easing, fiscal stimulus and structural reforms to make Japan more competitive. Bessent’s arrows are different, but the basic idea of using government to help grow the economy in productive ways is the same.
Bessent’s plan is also called the “3–3–3” plan for reasons that are made clear below. Bessent’s first arrow is to achieve 3% annual real growth in the U.S. economy.

The US is a war economy...
..the combined revenues of the world’s 100 largest weapons manufacturers in 2023 reached $632 billion.”
“..41 US corporations out of the top 100. They received $317 billion, or 50% of global arms-sales revenues..”

Censorship Industrial Complex

Elon was instrumental in getting the pork filled bill canceled and many lawmakers and elite are concerned about his influence.

The rest of the X post reads...
...people go into absolute vapors every time he talks about censorship or talks about Donald Trump.
This turned on Musk when he bought Twitter and took down the censorship system.
But most importantly, when he released the Twitter Files, because many of us were testifying in Congress, and Democratic members would say, you have no proof that there's any coordination between the government and these companies.
And then, Elon Musk supplied the proof with thousands of emails coming from government officials and offices and over 80 FBI agents targeting individuals and groups for censorship.
They never forgave him for that.
And you have this bizarre situation where you have CEOs that openly support Harris, openly support extremely far-left policies. There's not a peep about them. But there is this Musk Mania, which has overwhelmed the media recently.
They've already done everything they could, short of throwing him into a wood chipper.
They've targeted his revenue, they've targeted his companies, they've targeted his advertisers.
In my book, The Indispensable Right, I talk about Musk, and love him or hate him, he is, without question, the most consequential figure in free speech of our generation.
I think he has done more for free speech than any living person today.
In some ways, he actually stopped the progress of the anti-free speech movement by releasing the Twitter Files. But he's really that immovable object this irresistible force encountered, and they won't forgive him for it.
All their CEOs caved. People like Zuckerberg and others, they caved like a house of cards.
But they finally found someone who couldn't be coerced, couldn't be threatened, couldn't be scared.
And they will not forgive him for that.”
Source: @JonathanTurley, Fox News, October 2024

"Old school journalism is dead. Citizen journalism is the future. It's by the people, for the people. It absolutely fundamental that the people actually get to decide the news and the narrative."
一 Elon Musk

The reelection of President Donald Trump could serve as a historic turning point for free speech in America. President Trump has said he will investigate censorship practices by the federal government, end the rampant disrespect for First Amendment rights on our college campuses, and take on Big Tech’s Orwellian policing of speech on the Internet. If successful, these efforts would make the First Amendment stronger than ever before. Yet President Trump’s opponents will not simply stand by and watch as he dismantles their carefully crafted censorship machine. Controlling who gets to speak and what can be said is essential to the left’s dominance over our institutions. They will not give up such an important source of their power without a fight. To ensure the success of Trump’s free speech agenda, the right must anticipate and prepare for the left’s inevitable attacks.

I'll believe it when I see it. I also heard him say campus pro-Palestinian protests should be shut down. So some speech will be free and some will not be allowed.

Hypocrisy reigns supreme after all...
The West’s Romance With Elections Is Dead
It’s been a bad few months for democracy. Election results offensive to the European Union were annulled in Romania; an attempted coup occurred in Georgia over elections that didn’t go the way the west wanted; the French government, widely hated, teetered over the abyss as president Emmanual Macron tried to ignore the last election; on December 16, Washington’s pet German government fell; lots of funny-business happened in the Moldovan referendum and election, amid widespread disenfranchisement of Moldovan voters living in Russia; elections were long ago cancelled in dictatorial Ukraine; and South Korea hosted an attempted coup. In short, western democracies’ storied enchantment with elections is over. As western populations grow sick and tired of their political class and vote against it, what are elites to do? Annul, cancel, overturn and ignore the elections, that’s what. The problem, for the west, is the voters.
Worth a full read...

Putin's Marathon Press Conference
Putin Challenges West To ‘Technological Duel’ With Oreshnik
Russian President Vladimir Putin has challenged the West to put their modern air defense systems up against Moscow’s new hypersonic Oreshnik missile in what would be a “technological duel.” During his annual end-of-year press conference on Thursday, Putin was asked to comment on opinions expressed by some foreign military experts suggesting that the Oreshnik can easily be shot down by Western missile defense systems. “Well, if those Western experts you mentioned believe that, they should suggest to their employers in the West and the US to conduct a technological experiment. For instance, a high-tech duel of the 21st century. Let them identify a target in Kiev, concentrate all their air defense and missile defense systems there, and then we will strike it with an Oreshnik. Let’s see what happens. We are ready for such an experiment. Is the other side ready?” Putin asked.

Russia’s Invincible Oreshnik Has Left West in The Dust – Ex-DoD Analyst
Russia’s Oreshnik medium-range hypersonic ballistic missile grabbed the attention of military observers the world over after it was fired at a major defense-related enterprise in Dnepropetrovsk days after the US and the UK okayed the launch of ATACMS and Storm Shadow missiles at targets deep inside Russia.The West is in denial about Russia’s Oreshnik missile that defense systems are powerless to counter, Michael Maloof, former senior security policy analyst in the Pentagon, told Sputnik.He pointed out that Russia’s multi-warhead, nuclear-capable Oreshnik has left the United States far behind.“The US not only does not have a hypersonic offensive system – it doesn’t even have a defensive system that has any hope of stopping Oreshnik and the new class of missiles that are coming out,” the veteran analyst maintained. While the US scrambles to be in the vanguard of such cutting-edge weapons systems, in effect it tends to “put all the bells and whistles on a system, overprice it and then fall behind,” said Maloof.

Putin’s Q&A and the Forever Wars Riddle (Pepe Escobar)
He spoke for four and a half hours, virtually non-stop, reviewing the results of 2024, mastering all the facts. His Direct Line received over 2 million questions, from Russia and around the world. And he had to crown the performance with a flourish, in an “I did it, my way” vein: “I believe that not only did I simply save [Russia], we moved away from the edge of the abyss.” The record would confirm it, compared to the appalling state of the Russia he inherited when first elected president in March 2000. President Putin’s end of the year Q&A contains enough substance to be unpacked for weeks, if not months. Let’s focus here on our current geopolitical crossroads: the Forever Wars in West Asia and Ukraine, two vectors of the standard imperial drive, now united in an Omni-War. Putin stated that, “we have come to Syria in order to prevent a terrorists’ enclave (…) In general, our goal has been achieved.”

It’s The Biolabs, Stupid: Is This Why Ukraine Murdered A Russian General?
The shocking assassination of Lieutenant General Igor Kirillov, the head of Russia’s Radiological, Chemical, and Biological Protection Forces, reverberates far beyond the streets of Moscow. On December 17, 2024, Kirillov was killed in a brazen bombing, an act the Russian government has denounced as terrorism. While the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) – Kiev’s successor to the Soviet KGB – via ‘anonymous sources’ cited in multiple media outlets, has claimed responsibility, labeling Kirillov a war criminal, the truth about his death is likely far more complex – and far more chilling. Kirillov’s death was not just an attack on a prominent Russian official; it was an attack on the truth. For years, he had been at the forefront of investigating and exposing alleged US-funded biolabs in Ukraine, claiming they were part of a broader Western biological warfare agenda.
His assassination raises a deeply unsettling question: Was this a deliberate effort to silence him and prevent his revelations from coming to light? Kirillov’s work was controversial, but his allegations deserved scrutiny. He repeatedly accused the United States of funding clandestine biological laboratories in Ukraine, purportedly operating under the guise of public health initiatives. According to Russian reports, these labs were involved in the development of pathogens that could potentially target specific populations, a claim Washington and Kiev vehemently denied. Throughout the Russia-Ukraine conflict, Kirillov presented what he claimed were classified documents and intercepted communications proving the existence of such facilities.
He argued that the labs represented a serious threat not only to Russia but to global security.

Ukraine Proxy War
Deeply Immoral’ Anglo-Americans Sabotaged Ukraine Peace – Ex-Swiss Envoy
Veteran Swiss diplomat Jean-Daniel Ruch has alleged that the US and UK “immorally” prevented Ukraine and Russia from sealing a truce back in April 2022 in the hope of dealing a blow to Moscow. The former official, who at the time served as Swiss ambassador to Türkiye, was in the country when peace talks were taking place. In Istanbul, Ukraine and Russia preliminarily agreed to a draft truce under which Kiev would have renounced its NATO membership aspirations, declared neutrality, and limited the size of its armed forces in exchange for international security guarantees. However, Ukrainian negotiators abruptly pulled out, with Moscow later claiming that then British Prime Minister Boris Johnson had urged the Ukrainian leadership not to sign any accord and to “just continue fighting.”

NATO and Ukraine military desperation

(14 min)

Western Asia
Gazans are not quitting...
A stunning report from Gaza implies that not only have Netanyahu's Israeli forces failed to destroy Hamas, they may have done the opposite!
Every life in the Gaza Strip has been disrupted, displaced and in too many cases destroyed. 45,000 people killed and well over 100,000 injured. Diplomatic routes to find a solution fail every time, more ceasefire talks are ongoing again, only for Israel to be moving their red lines as they have every time before to see such ceasefire negotiation fail. No hope is what the world offers, no change, no end, it’s little wonder then when asked roughly half of all of Gaza’s children say they want to die, rather than continue to live through absolute hell, a hell which could be stopped if evil men chose to stop it, but they don’t. So in that case, what exactly do the people of Gaza have to live for? If all are doomed to die, how are they choosing to go out in which case? Quietly into the night, or going out fighting? What you do in their shoes?

Trump And Israel Can’t Wait To Start Bombing Iran
Israeli media reports that the IDF now sees airstrikes on Iran as much easier to execute now that its pilots don’t have to worry about Syrian air defenses along the way, while The Wall Street Journal reports that the Trump team is weighing its options for airstrikes on Iran to prevent it from obtaining a nuclear weapon (which there’s no evidence Iran is currently trying to do).
A new article from The Washington Post titled “Syria’s collapse and Israeli attacks leave Iran exposed” reports that “Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has signaled a desire to capitalize on gains against Hamas and Hezbollah and take on Tehran more aggressively under a new U.S. administration.” The article notes that Trump has expressed openness to war with Iran, saying that “anything can happen”.

PEPE ESCOBAR: PUTIN READIES WAR WITH NATO AS RUSSIA STRIKES KIEV, SYRIA IN CHAOS

(1st hour)

US Plans to Sell Off Syria’s Wealth After Assad
In the immediate wake of the Syrian government’s abrupt collapse, much remains uncertain about the country’s future – including whether it can survive as a unitary state or will splinter into smaller states as did Yugoslavia in the early 1990s, a move that ultimately led to a bloody NATO intervention. Moreover, who or what may take power in Damascus remains an open question. For the time being at least, members of ultra-extremist Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) appear highly likely to take key positions in whatever administrative structure sprouts from Bashar Assad’s ouster after a decade-and-a-half of grinding Western-sponsored regime change efforts. As Reuters reported on December 12, HTS is already “stamping its authority on Syria’s state with the same lightning speed that it seized the country, deploying police, installing an interim government and meeting foreign envoys.”
Meanwhile, its bureaucrats – “who until last week were running an Islamist administration in a remote corner of Syria’s northwest” – have moved en masse “into government headquarters in Damascus.” Mohammed Bashir, head of HTS’ “regional government” in extremist-occupied Idlib, has been appointed the country’s “caretaker prime minister.” However, despite the chaos and precariousness of post-Assad Syria, one thing seems assured – the country will be broken open to Western economic exploitation, at long last. Multiple reports show that HTS has informed local and international business leaders that when in office, it will “adopt a free-market model and integrate the country into the global economy, in a major shift from decades of corrupt state control.”

Jeffrey Sachs: The Inevitable War With Iran, and Biden’s Attempts to Sabotage Trump

(2 hours)

The Duran also spoke with Jeff this week...
Syria power vacuum w/ Jeffrey Sachs (1 hour)

I hope you're planning a healthy holiday meal...

..and will spend time with family and friends.
Here's wishing you all a happy holiday season!
The thread is open...