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This evening's music features blues guitarist Robert "Junior" Lockwood. Enjoy!

"The Iranian navy, which has been destroyed eight times, closed the Strait of Hormuz again, because the United States for the seventh time won the war that wasn’t a war, so the United States can open the Strait of Hormuz that was open before the not war.

The not war that started to get the uranium that was completely obliterated, so that the Iranians can’t build the nuclear bomb that they weren’t building for the not war that the United States started.

Then the United States which has nuclear weapons threatening to use nuclear weapons to prevent Iran from having nuclear weapons because having nuclear weapons is dangerous.

If the United States saw what the United States is doing in the United States, the United States would invade the United States to liberate the United States from the tyranny of the United States."

-- Mohamad Safa

News and Opinion

World on the Brink in the Hands of a Madman

Donald Trump “indefinitely” extended the ceasefire with Iran on April 21 and over the last 12 days the certifiable man in the White House has vacillated between words of peace and threats of all out war as he stands alone on the brink of a decision that could end the world as we know it for the foreseeable future. Under unrelenting pressure from Israel to restart the war with with Tehran, Trump holds almost unprecedented individual power to unleash a series of events that could bring the world economic system to a crashing halt.

To those armchair warriors who think they are smarter than everyone else and ridicule anyone who thinks the American president sometimes actually runs the show and isn’t always subject to the wiles of the Deep State, consider what economist Jeffrey Sachs has to say about it. Former British MP and TV host George Galloway asked him on Sunday: “If there is a war, it seems to rest on the tortured, fevered speculation and social media ramblings and so on of one individual. How can that be?” Sachs responded:

“Do individuals make a difference? Well, when there are systems, the answer is no, not so much. But we have completely broken all rational systems in the United States. And by that I mean the actual processes of decision are quite exposed right now and they rest with Trump. It’s weird. But it’s not an exaggeration.”

“We’re not talking about an interagency process,” said Sachs. “We’re not talking about intelligence estimates. We’re not talking about a plan. We’re not talking about the president of the United States consulting with congressional leaders. We’re not talking about American public opinion, which runs overwhelmingly against everything that is happening.” He said:

“We’re talking about a few people led by a delusional old man who never was very good at anything but is very bad at this. … So there’s no process. This is a case where an individual can make decisions. Netanyahu is his own case. He’s a very, very dark pathological figure. … This is what we have. We do not have either rational leadership or a rational process in I think either country, the U.S. or Israel. …Actually both countries add a strain of religious zealotry which is also pretty strange.”

So this most consequential decision is up to one, very unstable man. Relaunching the war would invite vowed Iranian retaliation against energy installations throughout the Gulf, plunging the world into an economic dark age. In trying to decide what to do, Trump may very well be calculating whether he will personally make a profit as he acts the part of the quintessential American businessman: profits über alles …

Scott Ritter: IRAN UNLEASHES MISSILES! Trump CAVES, UAE & Israel PANIC!

Iran Says US Bombed Cargo Vessels, Not IRGC Boats, and Killed Five Civilians

Iran’s Tasnim news agency reported that a US attack in the Strait of Hormuz on Monday hit cargo vessels, not boats belonging to Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), contradicting claims from US Central Command.

CENTCOM said that its forces destroyed six Iranian naval boats that attempted to interfere with commercial shipping, and President Trump later put the number of boats that were sunk at seven.

An Iranian military source told Tasnim that after an investigation, Iran found that no IRGC “combat vessels were hit” and that the US targeted two boats that were traveling from Khasab, a port city in Oman, to the coast of Iran, and said the attack killed five civilians.

Trump BLINKS: WAR OVER? Markets SURGE

Rude for Iran to be firing missiles after 37 truth social posts about how they’ve been defeated. It’s like they didn’t even read them.

— Jenni (@hashjenni) May 4, 2026

US-Iran truce teeters on meltdown as stalemate takes toll on each side

The month-old ceasefire between Iran and the US appeared to be in new peril on Tuesday with a fresh barrage of Iranian missiles reported to have targeted the United Arab Emirates as US naval forces pressed ahead with efforts to reopen the strait of Hormuz.

The Iranian strike on the UAE was the second in 48 hours, and came shortly after the US defence secretary, Pete Hegseth, insisted the shaky truce that has paused the war in the Middle East was intact, despite the new increase in violence.

On Monday, the US military said it had destroyed six Iranian small boats, as well as cruise missiles and drones, after Donald Trump sent warships to “guide” stranded tankers through the strait in a campaign he called “Project Freedom”.

Hegseth told a press conference on Tuesday the operation to encourage commercial ships to transit the strait was temporary and the truce was not over. “We’re not looking for a fight … Right now the ceasefire certainly holds, but we’re going to be watching very, very closely,” he said.

There was no immediate reaction from Iran, though earlier on Tuesday its parliament speaker, Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, issued a defiant statement accusing the US of breaching the ceasefire. “We know well that the continuation of the current situation is unbearable for the United States, while we have not even begun yet,” Ghalibaf, who is considered one of the most influential senior officials in Tehran, said in a social media post.

Chas Freeman: US-Israel Divorce, End of NATO & Sea Power

Democrats urge Rubio to acknowledge Israel possesses nuclear weapons amid Iran war

House Democrats have asked the secretary of state, Marco Rubio, to publicly announce that Israel possesses nuclear weapons, arguing that Washington must end decades of ambiguity over the issue amid the conflict with Iran. In a letter sent on Monday, 30 Democrats wrote that it was unsustainable for Donald Trump to collaborate with the Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, on a military campaign against Iran – with the stated goal of preventing the country from obtaining a nuclear weapon – without publicly acknowledging the US ally’s possession of the bomb.

“We are, in the fullest sense, fighting this war side by side with a country whose potential nuclear weapons program the United States government officially refuses to acknowledge,” reads the letter, which was led by the Texas Democrat Joaquin Castro. “Congress has a constitutional responsibility to be fully informed about the nuclear balance in the Middle East, the risk of escalation by any party to this conflict, and the administration’s planning and contingencies for such scenarios. We do not believe we have received that information.”

The Democrats objected to the continued reticence by Trump administration officials to discuss the subject openly, noting that when Castro asked Thomas DiNanno, the under secretary of state for arms control and international security, to detail Israel’s nuclear capabilities at a congressional hearing in March, he responded that he could not answer. “We ask that you hold Israel to the same standard of transparency that the United States expects from any other country that may be pursuing or retaining nuclear weapons capability,” the lawmakers told Rubio.

Iran Circumvents Trump's Naval Blockade With Land Bridges

Israeli army chief says West Bank troops ‘killing like we haven’t killed since 1967’

The Israeli army chief in the West Bank has said his troops were “killing like we haven’t killed since 1967”, including fatally shooting Palestinian stone-throwers, according to an Israeli report of his comments. The remarks by Maj Gen Avi Bluth, head of the army’s central command, were made in a recent closed forum but were leaked to Israel’s Haaretz newspaper. Bluth has so far not denied the authenticity of the Haaretz account. The Israel Defense Forces did not respond to a request for comment.

Bluth, who was born in a West Bank settlement and educated in a religious military academy in the occupied territory, spoke bluntly about the discriminatory military justice his soldiers administered. He said they had shot 42 Palestinian stone-throwers on West Bank roads last year, insisting that such acts amounted to terrorism. Bluth said the army did not shoot Jewish settler militants for doing the same thing, noting that on one occasion when a settler throwing stones at motorists had been wounded by army gunfire, there was a public “ruckus”.

Bluth said another way he had loosened legal constraints on Israeli soldiers in the West Bank was to allow the maiming of Palestinians caught trying to cross the separation barrier into Israel in search of work. “At the [separation barrier], it is currently permitted to detain a suspect by shooting him at the knee or below to create ‘barrier awareness’,” Bluth said, adding that it served as a deterrent. “There are a lot of ‘limping monuments’ in Palestinian villages of those who tried to [cross the barrier], so there is a price being paid,” he said.

As with stone-throwers, Bluth justified his rules of engagement on the grounds that each illegal Palestinian worker was a “potential terrorist”. The general also portrayed his actions as part of a “survival of the fittest” struggle. “If someone comes to kill you, kill them first is the norm in the Middle East, so we’re killing like we haven’t killed since 1967,” Bluth said, in reference to the war against Arab states that resulted in the permanent occupation of the West Bank and Gaza. Thousands of Palestinians were killed in the second intifada from 2000 to 2005.

“Bluth has now revealed what everyone already knew: the Israel Defense Forces is working hand in hand with the settlers who are carrying out the daily pogroms,” Haaretz commented. “Bluth calls it Israeli terrorism, but not only does he not try to prevent it in the same way that the IDF prevents Palestinian terrorism, but he is actually abetting it.”

Laith Marouf: Hezbollah Launches MASSIVE Air & Ground Assault – Israel’s Buffer Zone Plan Destroyed

Protesters push Portland to investigate firm that appears to supply drone tech to Israel

Anti-war activists in Portland, Oregon, are pushing city authorities to ensure no local resources, tax breaks or investments support a local company that appears to be supplying artificial intelligence software to the Israeli military. The company, Sightline Intelligence, manufactures AI-supported video technology that is used in drones to interpret target movements and make quick decisions based on the perceived threat level. Cargo documents appear to show Sightline has shipped its technology to Elbit Systems, an Israeli arms manufacturer that provides drones to that country’s military and exports to others. The activists argue that such sales violate the UN’s arms agreements.

It is unclear whether Sightline receives any resources or business incentives from the city of Portland, and finding out is the first step activists want local leaders to take. The activists are ultimately hoping their efforts can block the sales altogether. In the face of consistent federal funding and support for Israel’s military operations, the activists argue that slowing the sale of components used by the Israeli military on the local level may be a more effective strategy.

Olivia Katbi, a political organizer in Portland, argued that international law called for an embargo on imports and exports, including any technology, equipment or other parts used in weapons. She said the Sightline video processors fitted that definition, and if the federal government won’t stop their sale, the city should do everything in its power to disrupt the process. “It is showing images of people to kill,” Katbi said. “And that is what these drones do. They kill people.”

Sightline promotional videos show how its AI technology is used to recognize potential targets. Neon triangles hover over military vehicles, boats and people in fields, marking in real time the type of target and how accurate its assessment is. Drones enhanced with Sightline’s aided target recognition software detect, classify and track targets, according to its website.

An analysis of leaked cargo documents by Movement Research Unit, a London-based volunteer research organization, appears to show Sightline’s AI video processing boards and other components shipped to Elbit Systems in Karmiel, Israel, on multiple occasions since 2024. Roughly 85% of drones used by the Israeli military are manufactured by Elbit, and the Israeli army has used Elbit’s armed drones in its daily surveillance and attacks on Gaza, according to 2023 reporting by Al Jazeera.

Trump accuses pope of ‘endangering a lot of Catholics’ with Iran stance

Donald Trump has issued another verbal attack against Pope Leo, accusing the pontiff of “endangering a lot of Catholics” because “he thinks it’s fine for Iran to have a nuclear weapon”. The remarks come two days before Marco Rubio, the US secretary of state, meets Leo at the Vatican in an effort to ease the tensions sparked by Trump’s previous broadside against the Chicago-born pontiff over his condemnation of the US-Israeli war on Iran.

Speaking to Hugh Hewitt, a prominent conservative radio talkshow host on the US-based Salem News network, Trump said the pope “would rather talk about the fact that it’s OK for Iran to have a nuclear weapon, and I don’t think that’s very good”.

“I think he’s endangering a lot of Catholics and a lot of people,” the president added. “But I guess if it’s up to the pope, he thinks it’s just fine for Iran to have a nuclear weapon.”

Leo has never said that Iran should have nuclear weapons, but has repeatedly opposed the war on the country and the subsequent escalation of the conflict in Lebanon and the wider Middle East, calling for ceasefires and dialogue.

The US secretary of state will also endeavour to patch things up with the Italian government after Trump berated its prime minister, Giorgia Meloni, previously one of his closest allies in Europe. She had criticised his remarks against Leo, rebuking her government for not supporting the strikes on Iran and threatening to withdraw US troops from Italy as a result.

Pepe Escobar : Russia/Iran/China: The New Triangle

Rubio insists US is ‘very fortunate’ as Iran war pushes gas price near $4.50

Marco Rubio has argued the US is in a “very fortunate” position as fuel prices continue to climb nationwide amid disruption sparked by the US-Israel war on Iran. With average US fuel prices now approaching $4.50 a gallon – their highest level in four years – the US secretary of state was asked on Tuesday how long Americans should accept them at such levels.

Other countries were suffering “big time”, Rubio replied. The US was “very fortunate” as a net exporter of oil, which is not as reliant as other countries on oil from the Middle East, he said. “We’ve been insulated to some degree,” Rubio added. “We’re obviously still vulnerable, to some extent, to global prices. But in the end, we’re more insulated than other countries – even though that’s not welcome news to Americans that are paying more at the pump, no doubt about it.

“There are people that we’re predicting would be much higher at this point,” he claimed, “but we’re not taking that for granted.”

Rubio claimed that fuel prices would be even higher – about $8 or $9 a gallon, he projected, without citing evidence – if Iran had a nuclear weapon and decided to close the strait of Hormuz. “A nuclear-armed Iran could do whatever the hell they want with the straits, and there’s nothing anyone would be able to do about it,” he said.

Col. Larry Wilkerson: Why This War Ends the US Dollar

UK chancellor and Scott Bessent argued in person about Iran war, sources say

Rachel Reeves had an angry exchange with her US counterpart, Scott Bessent, in Washington last month over the war in Iran, sources have said, in the latest sign of the deepening tensions between the two countries. The chancellor and the US treasury secretary argued in person during the spring meetings of the International Monetary Fund, according to people briefed on the exchange, confirming a story first reported by the Financial Times.

The row centred on Reeves’s criticisms over the Iran conflict, which she made in public before the meetings began, triggering an angry backlash from some in the Trump administration. Criticisms by Reeves and the prime minister, Keir Starmer, have caused the biggest rift in US-UK relations for decades, with the US president, Donald Trump, threatening to rip up a trade deal and to recognise Argentina’s claims to the Falkland Islands in response.

Reeves told the Mirror on 14 April she felt “very frustrated and angry that the US went into this war without a clear exit plan”, calling the war a “folly”. She then travelled to the US, where she told CNBC the goals of the war had “never been clear”.

“I’m not convinced this conflict has made the world a safer place,” Reeves told a panel organised by the US broadcaster. “It’s not been clear over the last six weeks what exactly the aim of this conflict is.” According to those briefed on her meetings, Bessent upbraided her over the comments during an in-person meeting on 15 April, including invoking the threat of an Iranian nuclear attack on Britain. He is understood to have made comments along the lines of those he made to the BBC a day earlier, when he responded to concerns about the war’s economic fallout by saying: “I wonder what the hit to global GDP would be if a nuclear weapon hit London.” Reeves responded by telling the treasury secretary she was not his employee and did not like his tone.

The war in Iran has created arguably the biggest divide between the US and UK since the Suez crisis of 1956. Having gone to great lengths to keep Trump on side in the early months of his premiership, Starmer has taken an increasingly outspoken position against the president’s foreign policy.

900 Health Facilities Shutting Down or at Risk of Collapse as Trump-GOP Cuts ‘Ripple Across the Country’

An advocacy group tracking the impacts of the unprecedented Medicaid cuts that congressional Republicans and President Donald Trump enacted last year said Monday that at least 900 hospitals, nursing homes, and other healthcare facilities are now shutting down or at risk of closure—a disaster for low-income Americans who lack easy access to care.

Protect Our Care’s Hospital Crisis Watch project has identified healthcare centers that have closed or are at risk of closing, cutting services, and shutting down wards as they grapple with the impacts of the GOP’s 2025 budget law, which included over $1 trillion in total healthcare cuts over the next decade. More than $900 billion of the cuts will come from Medicaid, which pays hospitals and other providers for services delivered to low-income patients.

“Hospital Crisis Watch has now reached 900 pins, 900 communities where access to care is evaporating as Republicans’ healthcare cuts ripple across the country,” said Brad Woodhouse, president of Protect Our Care. “Providers are stretched thin, doing everything they can as resources disappear and the system buckles under the pressure of Republicans cutting more than $1 trillion from health care to fund tax breaks for billionaires and big corporations.”

“Families are driving further for care, parents are scrambling to find services for their kids, and seniors are being left without the support they need,” Woodhouse continued. “Care is getting harder to access, in too many places, disappearing entirely, and communities are left to deal with the consequences.”

The impacts of the Trump-GOP Medicaid cuts have been felt in both urban and rural areas, despite Republicans’ inclusion of a $50 billion Rural Health Transformation Fund that supporters touted as a way to bolster at-risk healthcare facilities. Critics of the fund have warned from the start that it would not be nearly enough to offset the devastation caused by massive Medicaid cuts. (The Trump-GOP law includes an estimated $137 billion in cuts to Medicaid in rural areas.)

“In Nebraska and other states, rural hospitals are facing across-the-board cuts—and the rural health fund Congress created to offset the impact of Medicaid cuts on rural healthcare is falling short,” Adam Searing, an associate professor at the Georgetown University McCourt School of Public Policy’s Center for Children and Families, wrote in a blog post last week.

“What is quickly becoming clear, even at this early stage, is that as a result of the cuts enacted by Congress, healthcare is going to become much harder to access for many people,” wrote Searing. “Rural areas and small towns across the country will be particularly affected.”

The latest assessments of surging healthcare facility cuts and closures across the US came as Nebraska became the first state to implement the punitive work requirements that the 2025 Republican law imposes on some Medicaid recipients. Early estimates indicate that more than 20,000 Nebraskans could lose Medicaid coverage due to the stringent work requirements and the procedural hurdles the new mandates entail.

States must implement the new work requirements by the start of 2027.

“Everyone who is eligible for Medicaid will be at risk of having their health coverage taken away—whether or not the work requirement applies to them, and whether or not they prove their compliance or exemption status if it does—because the administrative burden of implementing the work requirement strains a state’s entire Medicaid system,” Farah Erzouki, a senior policy analyst at the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, warned last week.

“Without sufficient time and guidance,” Erzouki added, “states will be unable to implement these requirements without harming many more eligible people and millions will lose coverage.”

Senate Republicans propose package including $1bn that could go to Trump ballroom

Senate Republicans have released a new immigration enforcement funding package that includes a proposed $1bn that could go to security measures related to the $400m ballroom that is part of Donald Trump’s “East Wing modernization project”.

Senator Chuck Grassley, an Iowa Republican who chairs the Senate judiciary committee, released the funding plan on Monday, as part of a wider bill the Republican party plans to pass along party lines to fund Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and other agencies involved in the Trump administration’s mass deportation efforts.

While the measure does not explicitly mention the president’s proposed new ballroom, it proposes that $1bn be appropriated for “the purposes of security adjustments and upgrades, including within the perimeter fence of the White House Compound to support enhancements by the United States Secret Service relating to the East Wing Modernization Project, including above-ground and below-ground security features”.

“None of the funds made available under this section may be used for non-security elements of the East Wing Modernization Project,” it adds. The “East Wing modernization project” is the name of the Trump administration’s plan to rebuild the East Wing, which was demolished last year to make space for the ballroom.

In a statement accompanying the release of the proposed funding package, Grassley said: “The Senate Judiciary Committee is taking action to help provide certainty for federal law enforcement and safer streets for American families” adding that “we will work to ensure this critical funding gets signed into law without unnecessary delay”.

Sherrod Brown and Jon Husted set for Senate showdown after Ohio primary victories

Democratic senator Sherrod Brown and Republican senator Jon Husted won their party’s nominations in Ohio’s primary elections on Tuesday, according to the Associated Press – teeing them up for what is expected to be a high-profile and expensive Senate race in November’s midterm elections.

Husted ran unopposed, while Brown had a single opponent whom he handily outraised.

The veteran politicians are standing in a special election to be decided in the 3 November midterms that will determine who serves the remainder of the six-year term JD Vance won in 2022, before becoming vice-president last year.

Husted was appointed by Mike DeWine, Ohio’s Republican governor, to take over for Vance, while Brown, a former three-term senator, is seeking to make a comeback after losing his re-election bid in 2024.

Ohio’s Senate seat is one of four that Chuck Schumer, the Senate’s Democratic minority leader, has prioritized in the party’s bid to retake control of the chamber, which appeared to be a long shot after Donald Trump won election two years ago, but seems increasingly attainable as the president’s approval ratings slump.

Trump Spends Millions OUSTING Disloyal Indiana Republicans

As household bills soar, is it time for a ‘working-class climate agenda?’

Americans do not care about the climate crisis, only economic issues: that’s the message some wonks have put forth in the past year, as the Trump administration has dismantled environmental protections. But the shift away from climate is misguided, an influential group of progressives is arguing. “The climate crisis is a core driver of the cost-of-living crisis and instability we see across the economy,” says a new policy platform from left-leaning thinktank Climate and Community Institute (CCI).

The proposal, “Stop Greed, Build Green”, outlines a framework for what its authors call “green economic populism”. Decarbonization should be understood not as competing with affordability, but as a potential tool for achieving it, says the group, which has written federal bills for Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, a representative, and Bernie Sanders, a senator, and was behind a groundbreaking New York public power law.

It’s a rebuttal to the growing Washington chorus claiming climate policy is politically toxic. “The strength of this approach is that it directly challenges the perception that reducing emissions will make your life harder and more expensive,” said Naomi Klein, prominent leftwing author and founding advisory board member for CCI. The thinktank unveiled its “working-class climate agenda” at a recent New York City launch event, with speakers including Louise Yeung, Zohran Mamdani’s chief climate officer, representatives from the Democratic Socialists of America and Cornell University’s Climate Jobs Institute. A week later, CCI took its message to Washington DC, meeting with lawmakers and hosting a day of panels with former White House officials, congressional staff, scholars, advocates and union leaders.

The advocates backed their proposal with new data: a recent survey by CCI and the progressive polling firm Data for Progress found that 70% of voters, including 65% of Republicans, believe climate action can lower the cost of living. That suggests working people – an audience long targeted by rightwing populists such as Donald Trump – may be receptive to green policies, they say. Other Democrats and progressives are currently linking the cost-of-living crisis to climate. But CCI says it aims to go beyond short-term fixes, promoting economic democracy by confronting corporate power and working with unions and social movements to shape policy.

The approach builds on the Green New Deal, the sweeping framework popularized by the Sunrise Movement and Ocasio-Cortez in 2018, for which CCI served as a policy arm. That movement sought to yoke decarbonization to an extensive expansion of the social safety net, promising jobs, housing and healthcare alongside a rapid energy transition. While the Green New Deal emphasized job creation, the new framework focuses on cutting everyday costs. All working people, he added, are feeling the cost-of-living crisis – especially as the Iran war drives up fuel prices, underscoring that “fossil fuels cause deadly wars and make your life more expensive”. The platform calls for policies including rent and insurance caps to shield residents from taking on the costs of disasters and green upgrades, expanded free public transit and taxes on polluters to fund climate programs. CCI is also working with unions, social movements and advocates to develop proposals and engaging with federal lawmakers, from progressive mainstays to traditional Democrats.

Also of Interest

Here are some articles of interest, some of which defied fair-use abstraction.

Iran War: Iran Targets US Warships, US Reports Small Successful Gulf Transit, Iran Hits UAE; Putin Call for Middle East to Be a WMD-Free Zone, Challenging Israel Nuclear Program; US Renewed Strikes Still Look Imminent

Top US General Says Iran’s Attacks ‘Below the Threshold’ of Restarting Bombing Campaign

Chris Hedges: Israel Seizes Pro-Palestine Activists

Craig Murray: The Morass of Injustice

War On Iran: – “Project Freedom” A One-Off Stunt – Tightening UAE Blockade – China Counters U.S. Sanctions

America Exports Record 6.4 Million Barrels of Crude

A Little Night Music

Robert Jr Lockwood ~ Selfish Ways

Robert Jr Lockwood - Worst Old Feeling

Robert Lockwood – Aw Aw Baby (Sweet Home Chicago)

Robert Jr Lockwood - Lockwood's Boogie

Robert Jr Lockwood & The Aces - Mean Black Spider

Robert Jr Lockwood ~ This Is The Blues

Robert Jr Lockwood & The Aces - Stormy Monday

Robert Jr Lockwood ~ Terraplane Blues

Robert Jr Lockwood - Rambling On My Mind