Bill Bonner, "Cash In The Bank"

"At the beginning of June, 2025 our national debt was sitting at $31,467 trillion. Today, it has risen to $39.20 trillion.That means that we have added eight trillion dollars to the national debt in just twelve months. It is the largest single debt in the entire history of our planet, and it will never be paid off."  -   https://www.usdebtclock.org/ 

"Cash In The Bank"

by Bill Bonner

Gualfin, Argentina - "In 2007, just as the financial crisis was taking shape, households faced about the same interest rates as today. But between that crisis and today, total debt has doubled. Yesterday, we were focusing on simple things. For example, as consumer debt, prices and interest rates increase, those who don’t own Nvidia stock gets squeezed. Simple enough. But the feds feel the vise tightening too. Instead of paying interest at below 2% on new debt, with the total debt at $27 trillion as it was in 2020...they’re now paying 5% to borrow, with a debt load $13 trillion heavier. And while much of America’s debt was contracted at low rates, that ‘old’ debt will gradually be replaced by ‘new’ debt at higher rates.

At today’s 5% long-term rate, the after-inflation yield is only 1% or 2% - which is historically low...and almost certainly too low to attract new lenders. In order to give investors a real rate over 3%, the nominal rate on US bonds would have to be around 7%. So, looking a few months into the future...when US debt has been rolled over at the new rates...we will have $40+ trillion in debt and interest payments rising to $2.5 trillion - and beyond.

And returning to the poor folks on the downward stroke of the K-shaped economy, the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget projects that in 10 years the interest cost - per household - on federal borrowing could reach $17,000 per year. That is pretty easy to understand, too. You spend more than you can afford for too long and pretty soon it’s out of your control. Then, lenders - sensing a train wreck - want more interest to protect themselves. And you can’t go on.

Pretty obvious too is what you should do about it. Stop…while you still can. But the feds - both Republican and Democrat - show no signs of being aware that the bridge is out...or, if they are, no willingness to put on the brakes. Why not? That’s where it gets complicated. But to simplify, the money they are spending goes to people who don’t want to see it stop. They have power. They have influence. And they want more. What, you’re not one of them? Too bad.

For most households, the news just gets worse. The latest job numbers are so low, we haven’t seen anything like them since 1969. CNBC: According to the Department of Labor, seasonally adjusted initial claims fell to 189,000 for the week ending April 25, down 26,000 from the previous week’s revised level of 215,000. The four-week moving average also dipped to 207,500. Bloomberg reported that the figure marked the lowest level since 1969. Economists had expected 212,000 claims - meaning the actual number came in far below forecasts.

Yesterday, we mentioned how tariffs and the attack on Iran are pushing up prices. Almost everyone assumes that these problems will soon be behind us. Maybe not. “You ain’t see nuthin’ yet,” argues the Ashland Chronicle: "We are running an economy this week on the country we were in February. The shelves still look mostly normal. The shipping bays still seem mostly full. The cargo still appears mostly on time where it is supposed to appear. None of this is the world we are actually living in. We are spending down the last inventory of the country we used to have and we are spending it down on a clock."

Inventory is mercy. Inventory is the cushion the world leaves you between the moment a thing breaks and the moment you feel it break. The blast wave is real, but the blast wave is also delayed by the length of a supply chain, by the contents of a warehouse, by the days it takes a tanker to cross an ocean. Inventory is a pile of firewood...a well-stocked supply chain for food and medicines...oil reserves...and cash in the bank. But who looks at the woodpile until the temperature drops?"

- https://www.bonnerprivateresearch.com/

o

Jethro Tull, "Locomotive Breath"

"Does Iran Have a Nuke? Well Placed Source Says, 'Yes'”

"Does Iran Have a Nuke? 

Well Placed Source Says, 'Yes'”

by Larry C. Johnson

"Pepe Escobar and I received the following intelligence report last Thursday, which was produced by a knowledgeable source with access. I am not reproducing the entire report, but want to highlight the issue of whether or not Iran now has, or soon will have a nuke. Let me emphasize that I firmly support past US intel community assessments that Iran, until now, had no interest in obtaining a nuke.

However, it appears that the surprise attack on 28 February, which followed the aborted color revolution attempted in late December 2025, played a decisive role in changing Iran’s view on this matter. Here is a portion of what Pepe and I received last Thursday:

"The public narrative surrounding the events of May 25, 2026, has fundamentally misdiagnosed the operational reality. We are witnessing an irreversible shift in the regional power structure, driven by a sequence of highly calibrated escalations that have exposed the limits of American coercive power and the fragility of the post-1991 Gulf security paradigm.

The structural reality is clear: The United States is operating from an eroding basing infrastructure, with a compromised executive, against an adversary that has mastered asymmetric escalation.  Following Trump’s maximalist public response, the Supreme National Security Council deployed its ultimate deterrent. Through Pakistani Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif - currently the only trusted back-channel between Washington and Tehran - Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian communicated a formally structured, three-step strategic ultimatum if US strikes continued:

1. Immediate Withdrawal from the ongoing nuclear peace talks.

2. Total Abandonment of the prospective Nuclear Treaty framework.

3. The Detonation of a Nuclear Device on Iranian soil - executed not as a weapon of war, but as an undeniable demonstration of sovereign capability and ultimate control over the escalation ladder.

Transmitted by Pakistani FM Ishaq Dar to US Secretary of State Marco Rubio, this was not rhetoric; it was a binary geopolitical shock warning. Rubio recognized the gravity, immediately moving to suppress the White House’s escalatory posturing.

Here is my analysis of this information. The Iranian National Security Council met last week in the aftermath of US strikes on Qeshm Island and Bandar Abbas. The Council directed President Pezeshkian to deliver a message to Pakistan’s Prime Minister, Shebas Sharif. Pezeshkian’s message was simple and direct. Prime Minister Sharif then directed his Foreign Minister, Mr. Ishaq Dar, to deliver the message to US Secretary of State Marco Rubio. Let me emphasize that the source of this information was involved in the decision making process that culminated in the warning delivered to Rubio.

The key phrase - If US Strikes Continued - was delivered to Rubio on Thursday. Based on Iran’s announcement today (Monday) that it was withdrawing from further talks with the US until the Israeli attacks on Lebanon and the Palestinians ends, I believe this intelligence report to be credible.

The ball is now in the hands of Donald Trump and Bibi Netanyahu. If Israel persists in bombing Lebanon - Beirut in particular - then we should expect Iran to announce that it is withdrawing from the NPT. Once free of the NPT obligations, Iran will be free to carry out item 3, i.e., Detonating a Nuclear Device on Iranian Soil. This will be a demonstration intended to warn Israel and the US that further attacks on Iran would carry catastrophic consequences.

Pepe and I received clarification on how Iran has obtained a functioning nuke. The information regarding the construction of this device (or devices) was provided by a third country that does have proven capabilities in this area. Iran’s objective is, with the backing of Pakistan, China and Russia, to raise the risk to Israel of engaging in future attacks on Iran.

The source also provided the following assessment of the consequences of US and Israeli actions on the global security and financial architecture: The secondary effects of this standoff are rewiring the global strategic and financial architecture in real time:

• The Collapse of the Abraham Accords: The political infrastructure sustaining Israeli-Arab normalization is functionally dead. Pakistan has publicly rejected it, Saudi Arabia has frozen all back-channel discussions, and Qatar and Oman are actively preparing a six-to-nine-month timeline for U.S. forces to vacate their military installations.

• The Emerging Security Axis: A new Saudi-Pakistan-Turkey-Egypt security architecture is being constructed, completely detached from U.S. backing. Pakistan has elevated itself from a peripheral player to the indispensable operational pivot, leveraging an Islamic cultural proximity that neither Washington nor Beijing can replicate.

• Systemic Risk to the Global Order: An Iranian nuclear demonstration would obliterate the global non-proliferation framework and hand Beijing an unearned, definitive proof-of-concept regarding the limits of American hegemony.

Donald Trump still has time to de-escalate the situation and avoid catastrophe, but it will require some unpalatable, difficult decisions on his part. First, and most important, cut aid to Israel and compel Netanyahu to end his attack on Lebanon and withdraw Israeli forces from Gaza. I doubt that Trump has the spine to do this, but it is the kind of dramatic step required to persuade the Iranians that Trump is serious about negotiating a genuine settlement. Second, lift the sanctions - at least on Iranian oil - and return frozen Iranian assets. Third, accept that Iran has jurisdiction over those parts of the Strait of Hormuz that sit in Iran’s territory under international law.

I doubt that Trump is willing to entertain these options, which means a high probability that the fighting will reignite. If Israel continues to attack Lebanon - Beirut in particular - Iran has made it quite clear that it will attack Israeli military sites and personnel in northern Israel. Last week’s market euphoria about an impending peace deal has evaporated. Now the Western world must come to grips with the reality that Iran, with the firm backing of China and Russia, is prepared to resist US pressure and threats until the Iranian forces prevail."

- https://larrycjohnson.substack.com/

"Alert! WW3 Is Here, The Decision Has Been Made! Iran Suspends Talks!"

Full screen recommended.

Canadian Prepper, 6/1/26

"Alert! WW3 Is Here, The Decision Has Been Made! 

Iran Suspends Talks!"

Comments here:

- https://www.youtube.com/

"The Total Collapse Of Negotiations With Iran Threatens To Cause Global Economic Devastation"

"The Total Collapse Of Negotiations With Iran 

Threatens To Cause Global Economic Devastation"

by Michael Snyder

"This is a moment in history that we will remember for a long time to come. Even though we were told over and over again that a deal with Iran was almost “finalized”, the truth is that there never was going to be a deal with Iran. It was all smoke and mirrors. The U.S. couldn’t give Iran what it was demanding, and Iran simply refused to give the U.S. what it was demanding. Now negotiations have totally collapsed, and it appears that the war is back on. Needless to say, this is going to be absolutely devastating for the global economy.

The Iranians are absolutely furious that Israeli troops have been advancing deep into Lebanese territory during the ceasefire period, and they are identifying that as the primary reason why they have decided to pull out of talks with the United States… Iran negotiators will stop exchanging messages with the U.S. through intermediaries, and Tehran will move to fully close the Strait of Hormuz, in retaliation for ongoing ceasefire violations, Iran’s state-affiliated news outlet Tasnim said Monday.

The report, in a translated post on the social media site Telegram, homed in on Israel’s military operations in Lebanon against the Iran-backed militia Hezbollah. “No dialogue will take place” until Israel fully withdraws from occupied areas in Lebanon and stops all attacks in both Lebanon and Gaza, per Tasnim.

Israel will stop shooting as long as Hezbollah agrees to stop sending attack drones into northern Israel. But there is no way that we are going to see the IDF completely pull out of Lebanon. If the Iranians are waiting for that to happen, they will be waiting for a really, really long time. The Iranians are alleging that the U.S. naval blockade of the Iranian coastline is also a violation of the ceasefire, and they want that to end too. President Trump has vowed to keep that blockade going until a deal is finally reached, and so the Iranians are not going to get that either.

So it appears that any hope for a deal is completely dead, and the Iranians apparently intend to “completely block the Strait of Hormuz and activate other fronts including the Bab al-Mandeb Strait”… “Also, the resistance front and Iran have resolved to completely block the Strait of Hormuz and activate other fronts including the Bab al-Mandeb Strait, in order to punish the Zionists and their supporters,” the report said. The Bab el-Mandeb Strait is a trade chokepoint that connects the Red Sea to the Gulf of Aden. Since the war began, Saudi Arabia has still been able to export quite a bit of oil by sending it via pipeline to ports on the Red Sea. But if the Bab al-Mandeb Strait is also closed, the Saudis won’t be able to export any oil at all.

Last week, I published an article that discussed the fact that global oil inventories have already been dropping at the fastest pace ever recorded. Shutting down the Bab al-Mandeb Strait would dramatically accelerate the depletion of existing supplies. In other words, we are about to enter unprecedented territory.

Once news broke that the Iranians were cutting off negotiations, the price of oil rose by quite a bit on Monday… The price of oil rose sharply on Monday, after Iranian government-aligned media reported that the country was cutting off talks with the United States to end the ongoing war. U.S. crude oil soared as much as 8.5% to nearly $95 per barrel, an increase of almost $8. International Brent crude climbed as much as 7.3% to more than $97 per barrel, a $6 spike. Heating oil, a proxy for jet fuel, also rose 7%, while wholesale gas prices rose 4%.

Of course this is just the beginning. If the crisis in the Middle East is not resolved, the price of oil is going to go absolutely haywire. A few days ago, the CEO of Chevron made some very alarming comments that have received a lot of attention… That is what made Chevron CEO Mike Wirth’s remarks at the Bernstein 42nd Annual Strategic Decisions Conference on May 28, 2026, so striking. He wasn’t hedging. “The buffers and the shock absorbers are being steadily drawn down, and the ability for the market to absorb this imbalance is drastically diminished today versus where we started,” Wirth said, according to Seeking Alpha.

He is exactly correct. We are in a far worse position today than we were when this war began. And Wirth is projecting that the months of June and July could represent a major turning point…Wirth went further: “Over the next few weeks, we’re likely to see those pressures flow through more directly to physical prices, and there’s more upwards pressure that I would expect as we get into June and certainly into July.” That is a specific, directional warning from the CEO of one of the world’s largest energy companies. The Iran war has been grinding through global oil reserves for more than ten weeks. The cushion that absorbed the initial shock is nearly gone. And the data is starting to confirm what Wirth is describing.

All along there was hope that we would be bailed out by a deal between the Iranians and the Trump administration. But now the rug has been pulled out from underneath our feet. Exxon Senior Vice-President Neil Chapman recently warned that once inventory levels start hitting critical levels, we could see the price of oil soar to 150 dollars or 160 dollars a barrel…

There have been others that have warned that the price of oil could soon hit 180 dollars a barrel. It is difficult to project exactly how high the price of oil will go, because we have never faced anything like this before. And the higher the price of oil goes, the worse it is going to be for the global economy.

Of course the collapse of negotiations is also really bad news for our farmers, because now there is no end in sight for the global fertilizer crisis… The effective closure of the strait of Hormuz has throttled global supplies of fertilizer, as well as oil. So far, the effect on consumers has been mostly felt as high prices at the gas pump, but global food supply chains, from seed to grocery shelf, tend to have longer lags. On May 7, John Denton, Secretary General of the International Chamber of Commerce warned during an interview with Forbes TV that the fertilizer shortage could cause deadly food scarcity and price hikes.

In April, a statement by the American Farm Bureau Federation said that around 70% of U.S. farmers report being unable to afford all the fertilizer they need. The AFBF’s Fertilizer Availability Survey of nearly 6,000 farmers and ranchers across the country also found that nearly six in 10 U.S. farmers report worsening finances, because of rising fertilizer and fuel costs during spring planting.

We had one shot at avoiding a horrifying global economic implosion. We desperately needed the Strait of Hormuz to be reopened, and that isn’t going to happen. If you have been waiting for a sign that will make it clear which way things are going to go, you just got it. From this point forward, global events are going to move at a blinding pace. Negotiations have collapsed, Iran has chosen war, and the crisis in the Middle East is about to get really crazy."

- https://theeconomiccollapseblog.com/

"If These Are The Good Times I Sure Hate To See The Bad Times"

Jeremiah Babe, 6/1/26

"If These Are The Good Times 

I Sure Hate To See The Bad Times"

Comments here:

- https://www.youtube.com/

"17 Preppers Warn Something Huge Is Coming To America And They Are Getting Ready"

Full screen recommended.

Epic Economist, 6/1/26

"17 Preppers Warn Something Huge Is 

Coming To America And They Are Getting Ready"

"Seventeen preppers are sharing what they see coming for America, and the warnings cover food shortages, water storage, power outages, medication supply issues, and economic uncertainty. You'll hear straight from people who are already building bug out bins, canning pantries, stocking emergency antibiotics, planting victory gardens, and storing hundreds of gallons of water. If you've been wondering what steps to take for your own household, this compilation pulls real advice from real people preparing right now."

Comments here:

- https://www.youtube.com/

"Come, My Friends..."

“Ulysses”

"There lies the port; the vessel puffs her sail:

There gloom the dark, broad seas. My mariners,

Souls that have toil'd, and wrought, and thought with me -

That ever with a frolic welcome took

The thunder and the sunshine, and opposed

Free hearts, free foreheads - you and I are old;

Old age hath yet his honor and his toil;

Death closes all: but something ere the end,

Some work of noble note, may yet be done,

Not unbecoming men that strove with Gods.

The lights begin to twinkle from the rocks:

The long day wanes: the slow moon climbs: the deep

Moans round with many voices. Come, my friends,

'Tis not too late to seek a newer world.

Push off, and sitting well in order smite

The sounding furrows; for my purpose holds

To sail beyond the sunset, and the baths

Of all the western stars, until I die.

It may be that the gulfs will wash us down:

It may be we shall touch the Happy Isles,

And see the great Achilles, whom we knew.

Tho' much is taken, much abides; and tho'

We are not now that strength which in old days

Moved earth and heaven, that which we are, we are;

One equal temper of heroic hearts,

Made weak by time and fate, but strong in will

To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield."

- Alfred, Lord Tennyson

o

Procol Harum, "A Salty Dog"

Musical Interlude: Eagles, "Seven Bridges Road" (Live)

Eagles, "Seven Bridges Road" (Live)

"A Look to the Heavens"

“What's happening behind those houses? Pictured here are not auroras but nearby light pillars, a nearby phenomenon that can appear as a distant one. 

In most places on Earth, a lucky viewer can see a Sun-pillar, a column of light appearing to extend up from the Sun caused by flat fluttering ice-crystals reflecting sunlight from the upper atmosphere. Usually these ice crystals evaporate before reaching the ground. During freezing temperatures, however, flat fluttering ice crystals may form near the ground in a form of light snow, sometimes known as a crystal fog. These ice crystals may then reflect ground lights in columns not unlike a Sun-pillar. The featured image was taken in Fort Wainwright near Fairbanks in central Alaska.”

- http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap160208.html.

The Poet: Robinson Jeffers, “Be Angry at the Sun”

“Be Angry at the Sun”

“That public men publish falsehoods

Is nothing new. That America must accept,

Like the historical republics corruption and empire

Has been known for years.

Be angry at the sun for setting

If these things anger you. 

Watch the wheel slope and turn,

They are all bound on the wheel, these people,

Those warriors,

This republic, Europe, Asia.

Observe them gesticulating,

Observe them going down. The gang serves lies,

the passionate Man plays his part; 

the cold passion for truth

Hunts in no pack.

You are not Catullus, you know,

To lampoon these crude sketches of Caesar. You are far

From Dante’s feet, but even farther from his dirty

Political hatreds.

Let boys want pleasure, and men

Struggle for power, and women perhaps for fame,

And the servile to serve a Leader and dupes

to be duped.
Yours is not theirs.”

- Robinson Jeffers, 1941

"I Wish..."

"I wish it need not have happened in my time," said Frodo. "So do I," said Gandalf "and so do all who live to see such times. But that is not for them to decide. All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given us."

- J.R.R. Tolkien, "Lord of the Rings"

"How To Recover When The World Breaks You"

"How To Recover When The World Breaks You"

by Ryan Holiday

"There is a line attributed to Ernest Hemingway - that the first draft of everything is sh*t - which, of all the beautiful things Hemingway has written, applies most powerfully to the ending of "A Farewell to Arms." There are no fewer than 47 alternate endings to the book. Each one is a window into how much he struggled to get it right. The pages, which now sit in the Hemingway Collection at the John F. Kennedy Library in Boston, show Hemingway writing the same passages over and over. Sometimes the wording was nearly identical, sometimes whole sections were cut out. He would, at one moment of desperation, even send pages to his rival, F. Scott Fitzgerald, for notes.

One passage clearly challenged Hemingway more than the others. It comes at the end of the book when Catherine has died after delivering their stillborn son and Frederic is struggling to make sense of the tragedy that has just befallen him. “The world breaks everyone,” he wrote, “and afterward many are strong at the broken places. But those that will not break it kills.”

In different drafts, he would experiment with shorter and longer versions. In the handwritten draft he worked on with F. Scott Fitzgerald, for instance, Hemingway begins instead with “You learn a few things as you go along…” before beginning with his observation about how the world breaks us. In two typed manuscript pages, Hemingway moved the part about what you learn elsewhere and instead added something that would make the final book - “If people bring so much courage to this world the world has to kill them to break them, so of course it kills them.”

My point in showing this part of Hemingway’s process isn’t just to definitively disprove the myth - partly of Hemingway’s own making - that great writing is something that flows intuitively from the brain of a genius (no, great writing is a slow, painstaking process, even for geniuses). My point is to give some perspective on one of Hemingway’s most profound insights, one that he, considering his tragic suicide some 32 years later, struggled to fully integrate into his life.

The world is a cruel and harsh place. One that, for at least 4.5 billion years, is undefeated. From entire species of apex predators to Hercules to Hemingway himself, it has been home to incredibly strong and powerful creatures. And where are they now? Gone. Dust. As the Bible verse, which Hemingway opens another one of his books with (and which inspired its title) goes: “One generation passeth away, and another generation cometh: but the earth abideth forever…The sun also ariseth, and the sun goeth down, and hasteth to the place where he arose…”

The world is undefeated. So really then, for all of us, life is not a matter of “winning” but of surviving as best we can - of breaking and enduring rather than bending the world to our will the way we sometimes suspect we can when we are young and arrogant.

I write about Stoicism, a philosophy of self-discipline and strength. Stoicism promises to help you build an “inner citadel,” a fortress of power and resilience that prepares you for the difficulties of the world. But many people misread this, and assume that Stoicism is a philosophy designed to make you superhuman - to help you eliminate pesky emotions and attachments, and become invincible.

This is wrong. Yes, Stoicism is partly about making it so you don’t break as easily - so you are not so fragile that the slightest change in fortune wrecks you. At the same time, it’s not about filling you with so much courage and hubris that you think you are unbreakable. Only the proud and the stupid think that is even possible. Instead, the Stoic seeks to develop the skills - the true strength - required to deal with a cruel world.

So much of what happens is out of our control: We lose people we love. We are financially ruined by someone we trusted. We put ourselves out there, put every bit of our effort into something, and are crushed when it fails. We are drafted to fight in wars, to bear huge taxes or familial burdens. We are passed over for the thing we wanted so badly. This can knock us down and hurt us. Yes.

Stoicism is there to help you recover when the world breaks you and, in the recovering, to make you stronger at a much, much deeper level. The Stoic heals themselves by focusing on what they can control: Their response. The repairing. The learning of the lessons. Preparing for the future.

This is not an idea exclusive to the West. There is a form of Japanese art called Kintsugi, which dates back to the 15th century. In it, masters repair broken plates and cups and bowls, but instead of simply fixing them back to their original state, they make them better. The broken pieces are not glued together, but instead fused with a special lacquer mixed with gold or silver. The legend is that the art form was created after a broken tea bowl was sent to China for repairs. But the returned bowl was ugly - the same bowl as before, but cracked. Kintsugi was invented as a way to turn the scars of a break into something beautiful.

You can see in this tea bowl, which dates to the Edo period and is now in the Freer Gallery, how the gold seams take an ordinary bowl and add to it what look like roots, or even blood vessels. This plate, also from the Edo period, was clearly a work of art in its original form. Now it has subtle gold filling on the edges where it was clearly chipped and broken by use. This dark tea bowl, now in the Smithsonian, is accented with what look like intensely real lightning bolts of gold. The bowl below it shows that more than just precious metals can improve a broken dish, as the artist clearly inserted shards of an entirely different bowl to replace the original’s missing pieces.

In Zen culture, impermanence is a constant theme. They would have agreed with Hemingway that the world tries to break the rigid and the strong. We are like cups - the second we are made we are simply waiting to be shattered - by accident, by malice, by stupidity or bad luck. The Zen solution to this perilous situation is to embrace it, to be okay with the shattering, perhaps even to seek it out. The idea of wabi-sabi is precisely that. Coming to terms with our imperfections and weaknesses and finding beauty in that.

So both East and West - Stoicism and Buddhism - arrive at similar insights. We’re fragile, they both realize. But out of this fragility, one of the philosophies realizes there is the opportunity for beauty. Hemingway’s prose rediscovers these insights and fuses them into something both tragic and breathtaking, empowering and humbling. The world will break us. It breaks everyone. It always has and always will.

Yet…The author will struggle with the ending of their book and want to quit. The recognition we sought will not come. The insurance settlement we so desperately needed will be rejected. The presentation we practiced for will begin poorly and be beset by technical difficulties. The friend we cherished will betray us. The haunting scene in "A Farewell to Arms" can happen, a child stillborn and a wife lost in labor - and still tragically happens far too often, even in the developed world.

The question is, as always, what will we do with this? How will we respond? Because that’s all there is. The response. his is not to dismiss the immense difficulty of any of these ordeals. It is rather, to first, be prepared for them - humble and aware that they can happen. Next, it is the question: Will we resist breaking? Or will we accept the will of the universe and seek instead to become stronger where we were broken?

Death or Kintsugi? Fragile or, to use that wonderful phrase from Nassim Taleb, 'Antifragile?' Not unbreakable. Not resistant. Because those that cannot break, cannot learn, and cannot be made stronger for what happened. Those that will not break are the ones who the world kills. Not unbreakable. Instead, unruinable."

- https://ryanholiday.net/when-the-world-breaks-you/

○

Freely download "A Farewell To Arms", by Ernest Hemingway, here:

- https://archive.org/details/in.ernet.dli.2015.209262

o

Full screen recommended.

Native Elder,

"How to Reclaim Your Strength After Life Broke You Down"

"Someone To Believe In It"

"Someone To Believe In It"

by Quora

"On a freezing February morning in 1956, Harry deLeyer arrived too late. The Pennsylvania horse auction was over, and what remained was not opportunity, but condemnation: the last animals had been loaded onto a truck headed for slaughter. He was about to leave when he saw, at the bottom of the truck, a large gray gelding, mangy, thin, marked by years of hard work. A horse no one had wanted. Yet, in his eyes, there was no resignation. There was calm. Kindness. Trust.

Harry asked to let him down. He paid $80. He took him home. His daughter, seeing him, said he looked like a snowman. Thus was born the name: Snowman. At first, there was nothing extraordinary. Snowman was a calm horse, perfect for beginners at the riding school where Harry taught. No particular talent. No hidden promise. So much so that Harry sold him to a neighbor for $160.

Then something happened that no one could have predicted. Snowman returned. He jumped the new owner's fence and showed up at Harry's barn. They brought him back. He returned again. And again. Until Harry realized: that gentle horse was overcoming fences more than five feet high just to come back to him. He bought him back. And began training him.

In less than two years, the horse destined for slaughter entered Madison Square Garden. And won. In 1958 and 1959, he was named Horse of the Year by the American Horse Shows Association, the first in history to win the title twice in a row. The press dubbed him "The Cinderella Horse." He appeared on The Tonight Show with Johnny Carson. Life Magazine dedicated photo shoots to him. Children wrote him letters.

And yet Snowman remained the same: gentle, calm, devoted to the man who had saved his life. He retired in 1969, greeted by a standing ovation at Madison Square Garden as the audience sang "Auld Lang Syne." He died peacefully in 1974, at the age of 26, with Harry at his side. He was inducted into the Show Jumping Hall of Fame in 1992. Harry deLeyer died in 2021, at the age of 93.

Their story continues to resonate because it touches on something profound: the idea that valor isn't always visible, that champions can hide in the most unlikely places, and that all it takes is a different perspective - a perspective willing to see what others ignore - to change a destiny. Snowman isn't just a rescued horse. He's living proof that greatness, sometimes, just waits for someone to believe in it."

https://extremelyinterestingfacts.quora.com

Bill Bonner, "Guardians of Empire"

"Guardians of Empire"

by Bill Bonner

Gualfin, Argentina - "Our problem, and here we speak for the human race, is that we can’t understand things that are complicated and we can’t remember things that are simple. How the Funny Money system works, exactly, we don’t know. It’s too complicated to understand it fully. Few people try. And those that do, generally lose their money, their friends, and their marriages - in that order.

But it’s too easy to forget the basic dynamic of it: as the feds ‘print’ more and more money, each dollar is worth less than the last one. That’s why the patient math of an inflationary bubble dooms late arrivals. And it’s why the boomers are more likely to appreciate the status quo than their children and grandchildren - the geezers got there first.

Last week, we saw that the feds’ spending and their attempts to lower it were both fraudulent. The spending rarely achieves anything close to what was advertised. The latest evidence, the New York Times: "Blowing Up Boats Hasn’t Slowed Cocaine Traffic to U.S., Experts Say." Almost nine months into the operation, epidemiologists, addiction scientists and public health experts say cocaine, by far the top drug smuggled out of South America, is as easy to get in much of the United States as it was before the strikes began.

And efforts to bring some measure of sanity to federal spending are usually fraudulent and fruitless, too. How much did DOGE cut out of US deficits? Not a penny. The result is bipartisan rip-off...in which the empire goes broke while Democrats and Republicans blame each other. Richard Cantillon noticed that the insiders who got John Law’s new money - based on shares in the (mostly mythical) Mississippi Company - did well. They could pass along the money at par value. Then, the supply of ‘money’ increased and the value of it decreased, leaving later recipients holding an empty bag.

The boomers defenestrated Thomas Massie for the cardinal sin of actually being a ‘conservative.’ They did so to preserve the status quo, not to upset it. Their houses paid for...their Soc. Security checks in the mail...they’ve become the guardians of the rot...the Imperial Guard of a dying empire. But how many more elections will they control? They are disappearing...dropping from the electoral rolls into quilted silk-lined caskets. Meanwhile, the younger generations peer at the corpses with mixed emotions; it was those old SOBs who fouled the economy.

Tom cued us in to what could be an important warning. Walmart has dropped 14% in the last two weeks. And Costco is down 13% since May 19th. These are where people buy stuff. The fall in the stock could be telling us that consumers are buying less stuff. Which wouldn’t be at all surprising.

Grosso modo, the Cantillon Effect...put in motion a long time ago...moves towards its conclusion. And Donald Trump gives it a push. It seems almost impossible, but when Donald Trump was elected in 2016, US government debt was around $20 trillion. Now it’s almost $40 trillion.

And here’s where simplicity comes back into the picture. As debt rises, interest payments are harder to make. Here’s Mishtalk: "Consumer Credit Stress Is Comparable to the Great Recession." Auto delinquencies are at a new record and credit cards are near record high. In nominal dollars Autos, credit card, student loans and other are higher now than in the Great Financial Crisis (GFC). Excluding housing there is about $621 billion in 60-day or longer delinquencies. People are paying their mortgages but struggling mightily everywhere else. Somehow the DOW isn’t helping.

And it’s not likely to get better before it gets worse. Treasury bond yields bottomed in 2020. They’ve been going up since then and are now at levels last seen just before the GFC. But rising interest rates and higher debt levels aren’t the only things bending the bottom leg of the K-shaped economy downward. Morningstar: "Consumer and wholesale prices are rising at the fastest rate in three years due to the Iran war. The surge in gasoline prices tied to the Iran war is set to drive U.S. inflation to a three-year high - and it might get worse before it gets better."

Tariffs are also driving up prices. WarontheRocks: "The reduced quality and shrinkflation effects are self-evident from bags of chips on grocery store shelves to shirts whose materials feel cheaper. The latest Consumer Price Index report indicated prices had risen 3.8 percent year over year for April 2026. If you isolate tariff-hit industries, you can clearly see higher prices due to the goods on shelves having tariffs added months ago. Footwear prices, for example, rose 4.2 percent in April - the fastest in 43 months - driven by tariff costs. Previously, prices were slowly rising as retailers worked through tranches of inventory at various tariff rates, but now footwear prices are rising faster than overall inflation directly because all shoes at retail have the full weight of tariff costs. Higher interest rates. More debt. Higher consumer prices. Simple analysis: not good. But as expected."

- https://www.bonnerprivateresearch.com/

The Daily "Near You?"

Robstown, Texas, USA. Thanks for stopping by!

"Yet Now..."

“Yet now, as he roared across the night sky toward an unknown destiny, he found himself facing that bleak and ultimate question which so few men can answer to their satisfaction. What have I done with my life, he asked himself, that the world will be poorer if I leave it?”

- Arthur C. Clarke, “Glide Path”

"Can't See The Road Ahead, And It's Alright. In Silence, You Meet Your True Self"

Full screen recommended.

Apollo OpenMusic,

"Can't See The Road Ahead, And It's Alright.

 In Silence, You Meet Your True Self"

"The road ahead may still be blurry, but as long as your heart is steadfast, every step you take is a beautiful scenery. This melody today is dedicated to every soul rushing through life, who feels lost once in a while. May you close your eyes, slow down your thoughts, and let go of the noise and anxiety in your mind amid the peaceful rhythm. No need to hurry, no need to fear. At this moment, the world can wait, and time belongs only to you. In this tranquility, rediscover the long-lost peace and sacredness within. If this music brings you a moment of calm, feel free to leave a message and share how you feel right now, and let’s walk together through the power of music."

"I Ain’t Drunk, I’m Just Tired of Life"

Full screen recommended.

Midnight Delta Soul,

"I Ain’t Drunk, I’m Just Tired of Life"

Every scar has a story. Every story sings the blues.

This music speaks to your soul...

Oh, how familiar that is sometimes...

How about you?

"Too Stubborn to Die"

Full screen recommended.

Delta King's Blues, "Too Stubborn to Die"

"And such is Life... Life knocked me down more times than I can count, but I’m too stubborn to stay there.“Too Stubborn to Die” is a gritty, defiant Delta King’s Blues tune about resilience, hard-earned toughness, and the kind of determination that refuses to quit no matter what the years bring. A rough-edged, hard-driving acoustic guitar pounds out a steady groove like boots refusing to leave the fight. The harmonica growls low and fierce, carrying the sound of a soul that’s weathered every storm and kept moving forward. The rhythm stays slow but relentless, built for folks who’ve been through hell and still show up for another sunrise. This is blues with grit in its teeth. For people who got scars, setbacks, and stories - but never learned how to surrender. I may not be as fast as I used to be… but I’m still here, and that counts for something."

Native Elder, "Why Something Feels Wrong With the World"

Full screen recommended.

Native Elder,

"Why Something Feels Wrong With the World"

o

"Let me tell you why you're here. You're here because you know something. What you know you can't explain, but you feel it. You've felt it your entire life, that there's something wrong with the world. You don't know what it is, but it's there, like a splinter in your mind, driving you mad. It is this feeling that has brought you to me. Do you know what I'm talking about? But remember: I didn't say it would be easy. I just said it would be the truth." 

- Morpheus

"How It Really Is"

Good luck!

"Trump Psyop + Strait of Hormuz Black Op = a Planned Civilizational Collapse"

"Trump Psyop + Strait of Hormuz Black Op

= a Planned Civilizational Collapse"

by Martin Jay

SOTN Editor’s Note: "What is really inexplicable is how few Alt Media sites have covered this single most important aspect of the completely contrived and fastidiously staged Iran War. Apparently, it has evolved into such an inscrutable clusterfuck for many analysts that they are unable to perceive the most obvious reality à la Occam’s razor. In other words, the many layers of deceit and levels of deception are now running so broad and so deep that even the best investigative journalists are at a loss.

No one ever foresaw or anticipated that President Trump would morph into such a flip-flopping crazymaker and embarrassingly fickle wackadoodle on an order never witnessed before in human history. Or course, whether he knows it or not, the Zionist script he is forced to read from every friggin day calls for exactly what he delivers during prime time no matter how daffy or dishonest it sounds. Obviously, Trump has been Epsteined like no other politico/businessman since the Zionist movement was inaugurated in 1897.

Key Point: As much as any other headline throughout the highly engineered Iran War, the following one proves that Trump is nothing but an order-taking carnival barker working assiduously for the carnival-owning power elite. As the global economy crashes and burns, ‘Trump tells US negotiators ‘not to rush’ into deal with Iran’.

So, to state it another way, Donald J Trump has totally succumbed to a highly effective combination of Epstein-generated blackmail, bribery and bullying that the Mossad enforcement arm brings to bear whenever he needs to take a patently treasonous presidential initiative. Not only is the hapless Trump completely owned and operated by his Khararian overlords, his Zionist masters have him on the shortest leash of any POTUS ever, although he deceitfully projects a false persona of being his own man - HE AIN’T (never was and never will be). Otherwise, how could such an incisively denigrating headline ever appear on the front page of the most conservative daily in London. As follows: The $24bn cost of Trump’s capitulation on Iran.

What all of this means for Crisis-Actor-in-Chief Trump is that he has found himself between the biggest rock and hardest hard place of any world leader in modern history, with absolutely no way out but total capitulation to both his Khazarian masters and Iranian enemies alike. Which means that the death knell is silently ringing for the American Republic as well as for all other nations substantially connected to the Zio-Anglo-American Axis of military powers.

There are lies, and then there are Trump lies. Trump telling reporters that he is in no hurry at all to get a deal with Iran, though, was a lie on a grand scale, making him look even more ridiculous both in front of the Iranians and key players in the region. For a man not in a hurry, he moves with great haste and panic, calling emergency meetings with J. D. Vance and Marco Rubio practically on a weekly basis - which is always followed by a constant menacing narrative that is fooling absolutely no one.

It is the clueless, lost child in a supermarket style that sets Trump apart in the big, grown-up world of international politics - and it has cost him dearly. Critical to getting him out of the hole he dug for himself by believing the BS of Israel in the first place would have been the bond with allies around the world, diplomacy, and working on the respect built up over decades for the White House. When Trump starts his mega tantrum, of course all of these are dissolved instantly, as it becomes clearer each day just how isolated his administration is. This is what you get when you fire all the real diplomats around the world and replace them with U.S. ambassadors from his own cabal of real estate business cronies - people who have been given the gift of a certain country to be ambassador in so that they can use their position to manipulate the market.

And market manipulation has always been key to everything he does. But in recent days, we saw devastating news that accompanied Trump’s latest level of buffoonery, giving us a glimpse as to why we keep getting social media teaser posts from his people claiming that the deal is very close, only for it to collapse and everyone walks away.

Typical of his erratic, desperate, capricious style, he throws a spanner in the works and announces that GCC countries should sign the Abraham Accords - which gives us an insight into how deluded and detached from reality he is about his own, and America’s, influence in the region. He said that any agreement to end the Iran war should include a requirement for several additional countries, including Saudi Arabia and Pakistan, to join the Abraham Accords, the U.S.-brokered agreements from Trump’s first term aimed at normalizing relations with Israel.

This was an outstandingly stupid declaration that immediately backfired on him when Saudi Arabia and others told him in no uncertain terms that this wasn’t going to happen. But it shows that, as deluded as he is, he believes that when negotiations get closer to an agreement, the U.S. has the brute power to ask for a last-minute sweetener. Perhaps Nixon and Reagan would have pulled this stunt, but the world has changed, and Trump is rapidly becoming a shining symbol of America’s weakness and decline as the whole world watches an empire not so much fade as crash into the abyss. Shifting the goalposts at the last moment is becoming Trump’s main ruse, and the Iranians know it and do the same thing. The result is that a deal is farther away than ever, but this is largely down to the fact that Trump has no negotiating skills whatsoever and simply can’t be trusted. It’s also about him negotiating from a position of weakness, which convinces Iran more and more each day that they don’t even need a deal, as they are quite content with controlling the Straits of Hormuz while watching the petrodollar fall off a cliff.

Regardless of whether a deal can be struck, economists have already seen that the foolish Trump Iran strike has cost the U.S. so much that America will never be the same again. The U.S. benefited so much from having the petrodollar, as it artificially boosted the U.S. economy and kept the dollar stronger to be used as leverage around the world. Trump is not only going into the history books as the idiot who tore up the Obama deal with Iran but actually negotiated the U.S. into a new deal that was ten times worse -  and the whole basis of America’s Middle East role, and the arms sales that accompany it, has gone. 

Watching Trump wriggle and writhe as each day passes, knowing he is looking more and more like the biggest loser ever to sit in the Oval Office, just gives more strength to Iran. And so the comment about him not being in a hurry and not caring about the midterms is one of the biggest lies of all his lies. Everybody - or at least all of America’s traditional allies - is waiting for him to fall on his sword, while the GCC Arabs know they themselves need a peace deal with Iran that will need to be put together and endorsed by Russia and China for it to work. No one trusts America anymore, and no one takes Trump seriously. The more he threatens, the more it is clear he is weak and desperate. The more he demands last-minute sweeteners, the more obvious it is that he has no clue about negotiating anything. And the more he lies, the stronger Iran becomes. Watching Trump negotiate with the Iranians is like watching a retired circus clown fall off his one-wheeled bike while the crowd jeers him on for his pathetic efforts. As Xi told him in Beijing, “America is a declining power” - but the speed of this descent is alarming, as a U.S. president struggles to fake a war he’s lost hands down.

- https://strategic-culture.su/news/

"U.S. Empire Dies in the Strait of Hormuz"

"U.S. Empire Dies in the Strait of Hormuz"

by State Of The Nation

"No other relevant proverb or ancient saying or words of wisdom captures better the current state of international affairs where it concerns the Iran War than the one posted above. It ought to be readily apparent to every analyst by now that both Trump and Netanyahu have created their own Gordian Knot; and one that cannot be resolved with the “slicing through of Alexander the Great’s sword”. Which is exactly what both of those war criminals and genocidal maniacs would like to do as we have seen by their juvenile (read: irrational) reactions to their respective predicaments.

But what’s of paramount importance to correctly understand is that it took two certified mad men, as in 2 utterly insane bad actors, to tie such a contorted and thorny and gnarled knot in the first place.

What’s the crucial point? The entire Iran War fiasco could not have been planned out to be a bigger catastrophe for the U.S. Empire and greater disaster for the Zionist state of Israel as it has thus far become. Even worse are the multifarious and calamitous outcomes now being experienced and witnessed worldwide.

In other words, whenever a military disaster of such epic proportions takes place, especially when the ensuing consequences to the entire world community of nations are so dire and far-reaching, two extremely significant conclusions can be drawn.

First, that the dark side of the military adventure was set up as an exceedingly dangerous trap for those two leaders who got themselves entrapped. Both were driven mad by the drugs of power and money, hubris and arrogance, religious zealotry and self-delusion, etc. Which is exactly how: “Whom the gods would destroy, they first make mad”.

Not only are those drugs routinely employed by the gods, so are the Big Pharma drugs utilized to further soften up the deranged leader(s) over many years to the point that they can no longer think straight, or even keep their eyes open long enough to make rational decisions. See: BEWARE! THE POTUS IS A STONE-COLD DRUG ADDICT

Secondly, there is always the much higher divine plan unfolding through each and every daffy move and daft maneuver that those two Zionist clucks foolishly made and continue to make. In other words, it appears that the end of American Empire has been divinely ordained, and a very complicated yet perfect plot was put into motion to make sure that empire collapsed on a divine timeline.

No, the Zio-Anglo-American Axis has not yet suffered an obvious collapse but the apocalyptic omen was seen by the whole world nearly 25 years ago when the iconic Twin Towers located in the Empire State of New York fell into their own footprints and the very heart of the U.S. Military Industrial Complex - the Pentagon - was penetrated by a cruise missile fired by the U.S. Navy.

The critical point for the wise among US to consider is that nothing - NOTHING - ever transpires on planet Earth except by the will of Almighty God. But how exactly has divine intervention ensured the final end of the U.S. Empire of Lies? Easy peasy - simply render obsolete the once ubiquitous presence of the US naval power.

How easy was that for Iran to do? As follows: “Iran possess the largest arsenal of hypersonic ballistic missiles as well as the most advanced and sophisticated drone weaponry on the planet. That large nation has vast underground caverns and gargantuan mountainside tunnels full of powerful missiles and lethal drones ready to be rapidly deployed across the Middle East today. The world has never seen anything like it; and the world has yet to see even the most powerful Iranian weapons in action.” (Source: ARCANA IMPERII: The Secret NWO Plan Reveals Itself Via The Iran War)

Which really means that every single aircraft carrier, guided-missile destroyers, amphibious warfare ship, littoral combat ship, cruiser and frigate launched by the US Navy is nothing but a sitting duck henceforth. The U.S. control of the world’s oceans is over.

In point of fact, Tehran has consistently exercised unheard of restraint with regard to not sinking a whole flotilla of American warships within range of their missiles and drones. Clearly, the sage Persian leadership does not want to give the Trump regime a “Pearl Harbor moment” by which to push the American people into a war fever mode against Iran.

KEY POINT: The Twelve-Day War in June of 2025 provided all the evidence needed to both the Trump regime and Netanyahu junta regarding the self-evident futility of invading Iran. Both the CIA/U.S military and Mossad/IDF were fully aware that any attempt to conquer Iran would be met with widespread devastation throughout Israel as well as the complete destruction of U.S. military bases throughout the Middle East (as the world recently witnessed). And yet those war cabinets proceeded with their transparently suicidal attack plans anyway. Only a very serious case of collective insanity would produce such a calamitous outcome for themselves and the world-at-large.

- https://stateofthenation.info/

"Chevron, Exxon & Shell Warn Fuel Shortages Are Coming"

Full screen recommended.

Dan, I Allegedly, 6/1/26

"Chevron, Exxon & Shell 

Warn Fuel Shortages Are Coming"

"Chevron, Exxon, and Shell are all warning about potential gasoline shortages and supply disruptions. In this video, I break down what the CEOs of these oil giants are saying, why refinery closures and global shipping concerns could impact fuel supplies, and what it could mean for gas prices, food costs, trucking, and the overall economy. If these industry leaders are right, Americans could soon face higher prices at the pump and rising costs across nearly every sector. We also discuss California refinery closures, the impact of the Strait of Hormuz, inventory concerns, and why many experts believe energy markets remain vulnerable. Plus, an update on Caesars Palace, fast-food bankruptcies, and what these stories reveal about the broader economic landscape. Share your thoughts below and let me know if you're already seeing higher prices in your area."

Comments here:

- https://www.youtube.com/

o

Full screen recommended.

World Affairs In Context, 6/1/26

"Oil Shortages - Global Oil System Is 

Collapsing as Hormuz Closure Drains Stockpiles"

Comments here:

- https://www.youtube.com/

o

“'Approaching Unheard Of Inventory Levels”: 

Exxon, Chevron Issue Apocalyptic Warning About What Happens Next To Oil"