"Still, Sometimes..."

“The early bird catches the worm. A stitch in time saves nine. He who hesitates is lost. We can’t pretend we haven’t been told. We’ve all heard the proverbs, heard the philosophers, heard our grandparents warning us about wasted time, heard the damn poets urging us to seize the day. Still, sometimes, we have to see for ourselves. We have to make our own mistakes. We have to learn our own lessons. We have to sweep today’s possibility under tomorrow’s rug, until we can’t anymore, until we finally understand for ourselves what Benjamin Franklin meant: That knowing is better than wondering. That waking is better than sleeping. And that even the biggest failure, even the worst, most intractable mistake, beats the hell out of never trying.”

- “Meredith”, “Grey’s Anatomy”

"The Linguistic Kill-Switch: Inside the Modern Propaganda Playbook"

"The Linguistic Kill-Switch: 

Inside the Modern Propaganda Playbook"

by Nick Giambruno

"The next time someone sneers “conspiracy theorist,” “anti-vaxxer,” “climate denier,” “far right,” “hate speech,” “terrorist,” or the ever-popular “racist,” understand what they are really saying: stop thinking. These words are a linguistic kill-switch - engineered to short-circuit thought by triggering a reflexive emotional spasm. If you encounter someone using these words, you can be certain you are not dealing with someone interested in a good faith effort to find the truth.

These terms are precision-guided psychological weapons, fired by unseen hands to herd the public mind. Recall the CIA’s own 1967 memo coining “conspiracy theorist” expressly to silence anyone doubting the magic-bullet fairy tale that supposedly killed JFK. Although they are a poor substitute for an actual argument, these propaganda terms unfortunately work on many people. Call someone one of these words and you no longer need to refute their ideas with facts, logic, or reason. The slur does the work like magic.

Take the granddaddy of all elastic scare-labels: terrorism. One hundred years ago the word barely existed. Today it vaporizes civil liberties on contact. Glenn Greenwald nailed it: the T-word is “simultaneously the single most meaningless and most manipulated word in the American political lexicon.” The only difference between a freedom fighter and a terrorist is who controls the narrative.

Greenwald elaborates: “There is this common paradox which is that the words that are most frequently used and have the greatest impact are often the words that are the most ill-defined. And therefore subject to manipulation, deceit, and propaganda.

So the word 'terrorist' for example is something that pervades countless political discussions of great significance. And we are essentially at the point, literally, where if the government points to somebody and simply utters the word 'terrorist,' and large numbers of citizens… will cheer for whatever it is that is done… No matter how lawless, no matter how little evidence has been presented to justify it, the mere fact that they have been labeled a 'terrorist' is something that will basically cause a majority of people to sanction whatever is done. And yet what is so fascinating about the word 'terrorist' is that it really is a term that has absolutely no fixed meaning, it's simply a term that means whatever the person wielding it wants it to mean.”

Greenwald continues: “Because the word terrorism is so potent and shuts down all debate, the mere application of that label by the government, anonymously and with no evidence… has made huge numbers of people stand up and cheer the most radical power a government can seize, which is the power to target one's own citizens for death, for assassination, in total secrecy and with no due process. And that to me really illustrates the potency of how these propagandistic terms are wielded….

If we're really going to vest virtually unlimited power in the government to do anything it wants to people they call ‘terrorists,’ we ought at least to have a common understanding of what the term means. But there is none. It's just become a malleable, all-justifying term to allow the US government carte blanche to do whatever it wants. ‘Terrorism’ is really more of a hypnotic mantra than an actual word.” In short, say the magic T-word and - poof - your rights, your property, your life evaporate, all without trial, all to thunderous applause.

The Antidote: Using these words is almost like casting a spell - most people who hear them become hypnotized, immediately stop thinking, and turn into easily herded automatons. Fortunately, the counter-spell is simple: demand consistent and logical definitions. Make them spell out exactly what they mean by “terrorist,” or “science denier.” Watch their argument collapse into ad hominem attacks, straw men arguments, appeals to emotion, and crocodile tears. And if that all fails they will play the "racist"card.

That’s the playbook. In short, when sophistry is all they have, facts become kryptonite. The propaganda spell breaks the moment you refuse to flinch at the linguistic kill-switch. The good news is that it's a fragile method of control; people can snap out of their hypnosis. And once they do, they never go back. It's like pulling back the curtain to see the Wizard of Oz and still being intimidated by him... that just doesn't happen.

So never stop asking questions and thinking critically. Don't be intimidated by cowards, intellectual midgets, charlatans, and petty tyrants who use propaganda words to get you to shut up and stop thinking. And when they reach for the next emotionally-charged empty label, smile and say: “Is that all you’ve got?”

- https://internationalman.com/

The Daily "Near You?"

Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. Thanks for stopping by!

"The Land Of Dreams..."

“Father, O father! what do we here
In this land of unbelief and fear?
The Land of Dreams is better far,
Above the light of the morning star.”
- William Blake, “The Land of Dreams”

"Immortality in Passing"

"Immortality in Passing: Poet Lisel Mueller, Who Lived to 96,

On What Gives Meaning to Our Ephemeral Lives"

by Maria Popova

“When you realize you are mortal you also realize the tremendousness of the future. You fall in love with a Time you will never perceive,” the poet, painter, and philosopher Etel Adnan observed as she beheld impermanence and transcendence at the foot of a mountain. “By the grace of random chance, funneled through nature’s laws,” the poetic physicist Brian Greene wrote in his beautiful meditation on our search for meaning in a cold cosmos, “we are here.” And then we are not.

We die. All of us - atoms to atoms, stardust to stardust, the mountain to the sea - you and I. The dual awareness of our improbable life and our inevitable death is what allows us to animate the interlude with love and beauty, with poems and fairy tales and poems, with general relativity and Nina Simone. It is what puts into perspective just how fleeting and vacant and self-embittering all of our angers and blames and resentments are in the end - what beckons us, instead, to “leave something of sweetness and substance in the mouth of the world.”

That is what the late, great Lisel Mueller (February 8, 1924–February 21, 2020) - one of the most original, deepest-seeing poets of our time - explores with great subtlety and profundity disguised as levity in the poem “Immortality” from her final poetry collection, the Pulitzer-winning masterpiece "Alive Together" (public library).

"Immortality"

"In Sleeping Beauty’s castle

the clock strikes one hundred years

and the girl in the tower returns to the world.

So do the servants in the kitchen,

who don’t even rub their eyes.

The cook’s right hand, lifted

an exact century ago,

completes its downward arc

to the kitchen boy’s left ear;

the boy’s tensed vocal cords

finally let go

the trapped, enduring whimper,

and the fly, arrested mid-plunge

above the strawberry pie,

fulfills its abiding mission

and dives into the sweet, red glaze.

As a child I had a book

with a picture of that scene.

I was too young to notice

how fear persists, and how

the anger that causes fear persists,

that its trajectory can’t be changed

or broken, only interrupted.

My attention was on the fly;

that this slight body

with its transparent wings 

and lifespan of one human day

still craved its particular share

of sweetness, a century later.

- Lisel Mueller

“Immortality” by Lisel Mueller (read by Maria Popova) 

- https://soundcloud.com/brainpicker/lisel-mueller-immortality

(Two centuries earlier, William Blake explored the same eternal subject though the same creature in his short existentialist poem “The Fly.”)

In the front matter of this altogether miraculous book, where an epigraph would ordinarily appear, Mueller offers a short poem that becomes a kind of chorus line for the entire collection, but emerges as an especially harmonizing counterpart to “Immortality” in particular:

Complement these fragments of the wholly transcendent Alive Together with physicist Alan Lightman on our yearning for immortality in a universe governed by decay, Pico Iyer on finding beauty in impermanence, and Marcus Aurelius on mortality as the key to living fully, then revisit Barbara Ras’s bittersweet, buoyant, perspective-calibrating poem “You Can’t Have It All” and Marilyn Nelson’s magnificent ode to how we fill our impermanence with importance, “Faster Than Light.”

- https://www.themarginalian.org/

○

"The Backdoor to Immortality: Marguerite Duras 

on What Makes Life Worth Living in the Face of Death"

“What exists, exists so that it can be lost and become precious,” Lisel Mueller wrote as she weighed what gives meaning to our mortal lives in a stunning poem - one of the hundreds that outlived her as she returned her borrowed stardust to the universe at ninety-six. And yet, by some felicitous deviation from logic - perhaps an adaptive imbecility essential for our mental and emotional survival, one of the touching incongruences that make us human - the moment something becomes precious to us, we quarantine the prospect of its loss in some chamber of the mind we choose not to enter. On some deep level beyond the reach of reason, we come to believe that the people we love are - must be, for the alternative is a fathomless terror - immortal.

And so, when a loved one dies, this deepest part of us grows wild with rage at the universe - a rage skinned of sensemaking, irrational and raw, unsalved by our knowledge that the entropic destiny of everything alive is to die and of everything that exists to eventually not, even the universe itself; unsalved by the the immense cosmic poetry hidden in this fact; unsalved by the luckiness of having lived at all against the staggering cosmic odds otherwise; unsalved by remembering that only because ancient archaebacteria were capable of dying, as was every organism that evolved in their wake, we and the people we love and the people we lose came to exist at all."

- Maria Popova

- https://mailchi.mp/

"They Love Their Chains..."

 

The Poet: Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, "A Psalm Of Life"

"Tell me not, in mournful numbers,

Life is but an empty dream!

For the soul is dead that slumbers,

And things are not what they seem.

Life is real! Life is earnest!

And the grave is not its goal;

Dust thou art, to dust returnest,

Was not spoken of the soul.

Not enjoyment, and not sorrow,

Is our destined end or way;

But to act, that each to-morrow

Find us farther than to-day.

Art is long, and Time is fleeting,

And our hearts, though stout and brave,

Still, like muffled drums, are beating

Funeral marches to the grave.

In the world’s broad field of battle,

In the bivouac of Life,

Be not like dumb, driven cattle!

Be a hero in the strife!

Trust no Future, howe’er pleasant!

Let the dead Past bury its dead!

Act,- act in the living Present!

Heart within, and God o’erhead!

Lives of great men all remind us

We can make our lives sublime,

And, departing, leave behind us

Footprints on the sands of time;

Footprints, that perhaps another,

Sailing o’er life’s solemn main,

A forlorn and shipwrecked brother,

Seeing, shall take heart again.

Let us, then, be up and doing,

With a heart for any fate;

Still achieving, still pursuing,

Learn to labor and to wait."

"How It Really Is"

 

Dan, I Allegedly, "Nobody is Coming"

Full screen recommended.

Dan, I Allegedly, 9/10/26

"Nobody is Coming"

"It feels like the rules are changing everywhere - and more and more, you’re on your own. In this video, Dan from iAllegedly takes a hard look at what’s happening with outrageous HOA assessments, rising costs, financial problems, real estate and construction, bank mergers, travel disruptions, and a world where the things we once counted on don’t always work the way we expect. Some homeowners are being hit with enormous repair bills, while others are discovering that the financial safety nets they trusted may not be enough. This is bigger than any one story. It’s about protecting yourself, questioning what you’re being told, understanding where your money is going, and paying attention before a problem becomes an expensive lesson. From homeowner associations and real estate to banks, construction, travel and everyday life, Dan asks the question: Are we really prepared for what comes next? Don’t bury your head in the sand. Question everything, stay informed, and be ready to protect yourself."

Comments here:

- https://www.youtube.com/

"Wendy's Is Closing Restaurants Everywhere And The CEO Just Admitted Why"

Full screen recommended.

Epic Economist, 9/10/26

"Wendy's Is Closing Restaurants Everywhere

 And The CEO Just Admitted Why"

"Wendy's closed more than 300 restaurants this year - about 5% of every location it operates. Its CEO went on record and admitted the company cut food quality to save money. The stock has not risen once in five years. And in one American city, half the Wendy's locations quietly disappeared without an announcement. This is what that collapse looks like from the ground: the people who worked there, the customers who stopped coming back, and the empty buildings left behind. You'll hear from a former employee holding his final paycheck. A woman who pulled into a drive-thru that looked abandoned - and it was still open. A man standing outside a shuttered Wendy's that has been turned into a dumping ground. A realtor explaining what is taking over the old lots. And the numbers behind all of it: the closures, the CEO's admission, and the five-year stock chart that analysts call the mark of death for a fast food brand. Every clip is a real person filming what they saw."

Comments here:

- https://www.youtube.com/

"The $5,000 Bribe: Trump’s Desperate Gamble and the Road to Ruin"

"The $5,000 Bribe: Trump’s Desperate 

Gamble and the Road to Ruin"

by Mike Adams

"Trump's Desperate Gamble: I have spent many years exposing the corruption that festers within centralized power structures, but I have never seen a scheme as transparently insulting as the $5,000 check that the current administration wants to mail to every American household, conditional on whether the GOP maintains control of both the House and Senate in the upcoming midterm elections. This is not an economic stimulus package; it is a bribe, pure and simple. It is a desperate political maneuver designed to buy votes with money that does not exist, printed by a Federal Reserve system that serves the banking cartel rather than the public. As a longtime prepper and advocate for personal liberty, I recognize this for what it truly is: a final, panicked act from an administration that knows its time is running out.

The establishment media will frame this as compassion, but I see it as the death rattle of a political machine that has run out of ideas. Instead of getting the U.S. out of international wars and focusing on rebuilding America's own infrastructure, the Trump administration is offering a check that will be worth far less than what people imagine when inflation rapidly worsen as a result of the currency printing. This is the same playbook used by every failed regime in history: distract the masses with temporary bread and circuses while the real plunder continues behind closed doors.

The Inflation Trap: Why Your $5,000 Will Vanish: Let me explain precisely why this $5,000 will evaporate before it even reaches your mailbox. The money for this scheme does not exist. It must be created out of thin air by the Federal Reserve, which means every dollar printed increases the money supply and devalues the currency already in your pocket. As I have documented extensively, this is not an economic rescue; it is a hidden tax on every American who has saved, invested, or worked an honest job. The price of groceries, fuel, and housing will rise to absorb the newly created currency, leaving the average family no better off than they were before the check arrived. The historical evidence is overwhelming: when governments print money to fund political favors, the result is always the same -- poverty for the masses and wealth for the connected insiders.

Consider what this means for your purchasing power. When the government handed out similar payments in the past, the result was predictable price inflation that erased the nominal gains within months. This is the road to ruin, and it is a road paved with good intentions that lead straight to a government-controlled economy.

The $5,000 bribe is a signal that the political class is terrified, and when the ruling elite begin handing out free money, it is time to prepare for the collapse that follows. I urge every American to convert these digital promises into physical assets -- gold, silver, food, and local infrastructure -- because the storm is already on the horizon.

A Desperate Act From a Failing Administration: This attempted campaign bribe is not a sign of strength; it is an admission of total failure. The current administration has driven real inflation to near-historic highs, enacted catastrophic tariffs and trade wars, and engaged in a foreign policy that threatens to ignite World War III. Now, with approval ratings in the toilet and a growing awareness among the American people that they have been betrayed, they are resorting to cash handouts as a last-ditch attempt to buy loyalty.

This is the same tactic used by the failed socialist regimes in Venezuela, where handouts and price controls led to the complete collapse of the economy. I have interviewed people who escaped that nightmare, and they will tell you that government checks cannot replace freedom. The road to ruin is paved with these very policies.

I believe this bribe will not sway voters who can see through the charade. We remember the lockdowns, the vaccine mandates, and the censorship of anyone who dared to question the official narrative. We notice that 70 percent of online traffic now consists of fake content generated by bots, designed to gaslight us into accepting a reality that does not exist. This $5,000 check is just another bot-generated illusion, manufactured by the same system that brought us to the brink of World War III in the Middle East. The people who are truly free will reject this bribe in November, and they will vote for leaders who understand that liberty is worth more than any government handout.

The Medical Tyranny Connection: Who Really Controls Your Life: To understand why this bribe is being offered, you must look at the broader picture of state-sanctioned violence against the American people. The government that wants to give you $5,000 is the same government that recklessly approved experimental injections that have harmed and killed millions of innocent citizens.

We know from the research that the incidence of adverse reactions is drastically underreported, and the toll of death and disability from these products is catastrophic. This is equivalent to a jumbo jet full of hundreds of passengers crashing and killing every single passenger every single day. Yet their repeated homicide is state-sanctioned by federal agencies and state medical boards, which are universally infiltrated and run by Big Pharma proxy agents who make sure that only toxic, deadly vaccines, pharmaceuticals and chemotherapy are "recognized" as valid medicine.

The $5,000 bribe is designed to make you forget that your health freedom has been stolen, that natural medicine is under attack, and that doctors who heal with nutrition are being persecuted. In my interviews with over 1000 health pioneers, I have documented how the system punishes those who offer natural remedies that actually work. The future of medicine is not in the pharmaceutical laboratory; it is in natural sunlight, clean food, and the powerful healing compounds found in nature.

This is why the establishment fears the truth so much -- because the truth is that they are irrelevant. The check they are offering you is a one-time bribe, but the health freedom you can reclaim is a lifetime treasure that no government can take from you. Let their imprisonment of truth-tellers become a beacon to future generations: either respect the freedoms of others or lose your own freedom for life.

The Road to Ruin: Why Real Freedom Is the Only Answer: In the end, this entire episode -- the bribes, the mandates, the censorship -- is a sign that the centralized control system is failing. Power loves to be worshipped, and it hates to be questioned, but it cannot survive when the people wake up to the truth.

We cannot allow ourselves to be divided by these moneychangers. We must remember that the only true security comes from self-reliance, not from government checks that are tied to our obedience. As I have taught for years, successful people always learn new skills and lessons every single day. It is now time to revisit the lessons of history, to see the pattern of tyranny that repeats itself in every generation, and to prepare for those same patterns to be repeated today.

The road to ruin is paved with good intentions, centralized planning, and unconditional trust in government. The road to freedom is paved with personal responsibility, natural medicine, decentralized power, and a deep love for the truth. I have always believed in the importance of being prepared, and this $5,000 bribe is the ultimate signal that it is time to prepare for the final collapse of this corrupt system. The sun will rise on a new America, an America that is free from the tyranny of the dollar and the dictates of the political class. That America will be built not on bribes, but on the unshakable foundation of liberty -- and I will be there to help build it, one informed citizen at a time. This is the end of establishment monopolies on truth and the beginning of a new era of human flourishing.

Conclusion: Reject the Bribe, Embrace Your Liberty: I am calling on every patriotic American to reject this $5,000 bribe in the name of liberty. Do not allow yourself to be purchased, because a man who can be bought has no honor, and a nation of purchased men is nothing but a colony of wage slaves.

We are not subjects; we are free people, and our dignity is worth more than any piece of paper the Federal Reserve can print. The choice before us is stark: accept the road to ruin and live as dependents of a failing state, or embrace the path of freedom and build a nation worthy of our founders. This is the fight of our generation, and it is a fight for our children and their children.

Prepare your home, your body, and your mind for the uncertainties ahead. Stock up on clean food and water, learn natural medicine, and above all, never surrender your sovereign right to think for yourself. They can print all the money they want, but they can never print love, liberty, or truth. These things are the birthright of every American, and no bribe, no threat, and no tyranny can ever take them away. Stand strong, stay free, and never let them silence your voice."

- https://www.naturalnews.com/

o

"Trump Tries $5,000 Bribe to Sway Elections"

"Watch Thousands of Restaurants Shut Down as They Get Too Greedy - Now They’re Paying the Price"

Full screen recommended.

Global Discovery Documentary, 9/10/26

"Watch Thousands of Restaurants Shut Down as 

They Get Too Greedy - Now They’re Paying the Price"

"Why are so many Americans eating out less? This documentary examines restaurant closures, restaurant prices, and the restaurant industry as dining out becomes harder to justify for price-sensitive households. Across restaurants in America, menu prices and food prices continue to shape customer traffic. For American consumers dealing with the cost of living, restaurant Inflation can change consumer spending and intensify concerns about a restaurant crisis. But restaurant closures cannot simply be blamed on greed. The restaurant Industry faces higher labor, food, rent, insurance, energy, and financing expenses. At the same time, higher restaurant prices can make eating out feel less affordable. When customer traffic weakens, restaurant chains and independent operators may face difficult decisions. This analysis explores how restaurants in America can respond through clearer value, smarter menus, efficiency, loyalty programs, and better customer experiences."

Comments here:

- https://www.youtube.com/

"Strait Of Hormuz Gridlock: Oil Surges Past $100 As U.S. Tanker Strikes And Iran Missile Retaliation Trigger Global Panic"

by Michael Snyder

""For decades, foreign policy experts warned about what would happen if someone decided to shut down the Strait of Hormuz. Now we are living that reality. The price of Brent crude just smashed through the $100 barrier after fighting between the U.S. and Iran erupted once again last night. Gasoline and diesel are going to become even more expensive, and that is not good news for our economy at all. But that isn’t the big story. The panic that is starting to spread through global financial markets is not the big story either. The big story is that the war with Iran is dangerously close to spiraling completely and utterly out of control. If that actually happens, we really will be facing an apocalyptic scenario.

As I discussed yesterday, great efforts have been made to keep the price of oil under $100 during this war. Unfortunately, those efforts have failed… Oil prices climbed above $100 a barrel Wednesday for the first time in nearly six weeks as escalating attacks on tankers and energy facilities in the Middle East raised fears of further disruptions to global supplies. Brent crude, the international benchmark for oil prices, rose above $100 a barrel in early trading, while the U.S. benchmark climbed above $95.

When the price of oil rises above $100 a barrel, it acts as a psychological trigger and global investors start to become very nervous. The reason why the price of oil is spiking is because more fighting suddenly flared up last night. The U.S. attacked and destroyed five oil tankers that belonged to Iran…"U.S. military forces destroyed five Iranian crude oil tankers Sept. 8, officials said, the latest in an escalating round of exchanges between the United States and Iran.

The strikes targeted five tankers linked to Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, according to U.S. Central Command, the arm of the military overseeing operations in the Middle East. Central Command shared footage of the strikes showing the aft, or rear, part of the massive non-military vessels.

Central Command footage of the strikes shows missiles hitting the ships and leaving them in flames. Four of the tankers were located in the Gulf of Oman. The other tanker was in the Persian Gulf near Kharg Island, a well-known Iranian oil depot President Donald Trump has repeatedly threatened to attack.

U.S. Central Command has specifically identified all five of the oil tankers for us, and we are being told that they were targeted “because of their role in helping move Iranian oil out of the region”…The tankers U.S. forces targeted were M/T Kaviz, M/T Charminar, M/T Horizon 1 and M/T Riesco, located in the Gulf of Oman, and M/T Derya, located near Kharg Island, military officials said. According to Central Command, the vessels were targeted because of their role in helping move Iranian oil out of the region.

It was inevitable that the Iranians would respond. Shortly after the U.S. attacks, Iran launched missiles at 10 ships… Iran said on Wednesday it had attacked 10 ships near the Strait of Hormuz after the U.S. sank five Iranian oil tankers, in the biggest declared wave of tit-for-tat attacks on shipping by both sides since the start of the six-month-old war. Two of the ships that Iran targeted were U.S. warships, and eight of them were commercial vessels. In addition, Iran also fired a number of missiles at U.S. facilities in Jordan.

The Iranians claim that they successfully hit two U.S. Navy destroyers, but U.S. Central Command is strongly denying this…

It does appear that there were direct hits in Jordan, but the Pentagon is telling us that all U.S. personnel “are accounted for”…After a huge Iranian ballistic missile launch on US bases in Jordan overnight, CENTCOM has yet to respond in any major way. The Pentagon has also said all US troops “are accounted for” – but this doesn’t necessarily mean there were no casualties.

Hopefully we will get more clarity about potential casualties in the hours ahead. It is being reported that the Iranians are starting to use “electro-optical missiles” in some instances. Electro-optical missiles achieve high precision by tracking and striking targets using built-in cameras and light sensors. So where did Iran get such technology? Well, there is speculation that the Iranians may be getting help from Russia or China…

The new missiles suggest Tehran may still be receiving assistance from Russia or China to track the location of US warships, experts have warned. In April, intelligence reports found that Chinese and Russian satellites were secretly providing the Islamic Republic with critical imagery to target US military bases.

Russia has long exchanged weapons with Iran and provided drone expertise during the war. In May, the US sanctioned China-based entities for providing satellite imagery to Iran during the war. Two months later, it was revealed that China was sending 400 rocket launchers to Iran in a new deal, underscoring their increased military ties. If it is confirmed that either Russia or China is assisting the Iranians with their missile program, that would be a deeply troubling development.

I think that the Trump administration was hoping that striking Iranian tankers would cause the Iranians to stop attacking commercial vessels, but that isn’t going to happen. In fact, the IRGC is warning that “if the enemy hits two or three of our targets, we will respond firmly with 20 targets”…Iran’s Revolutionary Guard Corps said Wednesday that it will hit 20 targets for every two or three U.S. strikes, while outlining the country’s conditions for ending the war.

“If the enemy wants an end to this situation, it must, while completely stopping the war, refrain from making threats again, the army of the Zionist regime must withdraw from Lebanon, the blockade of Yemen must end, $24 billion of Iran’s frozen assets must be released, and it must refrain from any interference in the country’s nuclear and missile capabilities,” said IRGC spokesman Brig. Gen. Hossein Mohebi, according to pro-regime Iranian outlet Akharin Khabar.

“We even have the capability to hit targets at this distance of 400 kilometers (250 miles), and some time ago, we targeted an American aircraft carrier at a distance of 500 kilometers (310 miles),” Mohebi claimed, adding that Iran has “reached a point where if the enemy hits two or three of our targets, we will respond firmly with 20 targets.”

The Iranians want to make the response to any military action so painful that President Trump will be forced to back off. But that isn’t going to happen either. If both sides just continue to escalate matters, the entire region could erupt in flames. Perhaps that is inevitable.

On Wednesday, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu once again boldly proclaimed that the end of the regime in Iran is very near… Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said victory over Iran is “very close,” declaring on the eve of Rosh Hashanah that bringing down Tehran’s regime remains the country’s “main task.” “The main task is to defeat the terrorist regime in Iran. We are very close to it,” Netanyahu said in a video message posted to X during a visit to Mount Hermon in Syria. “We know that the entire axis will ultimately fall. We are committed to doing this, and we will do it.”

Netanyahu visited the area alongside Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz and IDF Deputy Chief of Staff Maj. Gen. Tamir Yadai, receiving a briefing on Israeli military operations in the region. Netanyahu has said this several times now.

To me, it does not appear that the fall of the Iranian regime is close. So I would love to learn what he knows that I do not. Needless to say, the regime in Tehran will not go peacefully. If what Netanyahu is claiming is accurate, that would seem to indicate that the war in the Middle East is not even close to over. That means that the global energy crunch is going to get a whole lot worse.

Right now, the Chinese are driving up prices for physical oil as they seek to replace the oil that they normally import from Iran… China, the world’s largest oil importer, is bidding up crude prices across Africa, Canada, and Latin American markets as disruptions in the Hormuz chokepoint and limited Iranian supplies intensify competition for alternatives. The scramble is squeezing smaller Chinese refineries that once relied on heavily discounted Iranian barrels, according to a new Bloomberg report.

The renewed Chinese buying marks a major shift from a period when subdued Chinese buying helped restrain crude oil prices. With Iranian exports almost entirely shut off by the US blockade and fighting flaring again, as seen Monday when Saudi Aramco’s Jizan oil facilities were reportedly hit, the race to find replacement supplies around the world is becoming an increasingly expensive task for the Chinese.

Pretty soon, there will be a mad scramble as nations all over the globe attempt to secure sufficient energy supplies. Inventories are getting extremely tight, and we are feeling the pain here in the United States too. The average price of a gallon of gasoline in the U.S. has never been this high so late in the calendar year, and the average price of a gallon of diesel just reached yet another new record high… While gas prices often lag oil prices, they also ticked higher this week after reaching a record Labor Day weekend high. As of Sept. 9, the national average price of a gallon of regular gasoline is $4.22, up from $4.01 last month and from $3.19 this time last year, according to AAA.

The jumps come days after average U.S. diesel prices reached record highs. On Sept. 9, diesel continued to set records, jumping to an all-time high of $5.92 per gallon, according to Patrick De Haan, head of petroleum analysis at GasBuddy.

Gas prices have surged 42% since the start of the war on Feb. 28, prompting pain at the pump for some American consumers. The University of Michigan’s measure of consumer sentiment and The Conference Board’s measure of consumer confidence fell in August, as survey respondents cited high gas prices. If prices continue to rise, it will have a dramatic impact on economic activity.

Meanwhile, global investors will get really spooked if the price of oil stays above $100 a barrel for an extended period of time. But there is no easy way out now. Even if the U.S. were to completely pull out of the Middle East, it would be just a matter of time before Iran and Israel started going at it again. Decades of tension in the Middle East have been building up to this moment. Now a terrifying war is playing out right in front of our eyes, and there is no end in sight."

- https://theeconomiccollapseblog.com/

o

"The Diesel Crisis Has Arrived"

"The Diesel Crisis Is Here: What the Gaslighters Won’t Tell You"

"Alert! US Runs Drills On Nuclear Site; 10 Tankers Hit! Yemen Collapse!"

Full screen recommended.

Canadian Prepper, 9/9/26

"Alert! US Runs Drills On Nuclear Site; 

10 Tankers Hit! Yemen Collapse!"

Comments here:

- https://www.youtube.com/

"Cotton Town"

Full screen recommended.

Myrasor,

"Cotton Town: A Gentle Song About Home, 

Memory, And Slowing Down"

"In a small town where time moves softly and golden light touches every stone, old Bram sits by his door, just as he always has. Here, grandmothers weave clouds from threads of gold and white, a quiet man sells silence for a moment of rest, and work feels like a slow, simple song. Cotton Town is a story about the place that makes us whole - and the home we long to return to through wind and rain. A quiet, dreamlike ballad about home, belonging, and the beauty of slow living. Original AI-assisted music and visuals. Turn up the volume, breathe out, and let Cotton Town hold you for a while."

"Why Stay?"

Full screen recommended.

Nathaniel MoonFall, "Why Stay?"

"Why Stay" is a soulful Delta Blues song about the moment you finally question why you kept holding on to something that had already changed. Sometimes the hardest thing isn’t leaving. It’s admitting you should have left a long time ago. A slow, raw and emotional blues song about regret, hesitation, loneliness, and finding the strength to finally walk away. If this song speaks to something you’ve lived through, leave a comment and tell me what line hit you the hardest."

"Why Time Is Going Faster Now and How to Slow It Down"

Full screen recommended.

Native American Elder,

"Why Time Is Going Faster Now

 and How to Slow It Down"

"He Discovered That 'Brain Rot' is Real & Social Media Is Causing It"

Full screen recommended.

Redacted, 9/9/26

"He Discovered That 'Brain Rot' is Real &

 Social Media Is Causing It"

Comments here:

- https://www.youtube.com/

Musical Interlude: Runrig, "Running to the Light"

Full screen recommended.

Runrig, "Running to the Light"

"A Look to the Heavens"

"What created this unusual planetary nebula? NGC 7027 is one of the smallest, brightest, and most unusually shaped planetary nebulas known. Given its expansion rate, NGC 7027 first started expanding, as visible from Earth, about 600 years ago. For much of its history, the planetary nebula has been expelling shells, as seen in blue in the featured image. In modern times, though, for reasons unknown, it began ejecting gas and dust (seen in red) in specific directions that created a new pattern that seems to have four corners. These shells and patterns have been mapped in impressive detail by recent images from the Wide Field Camera 3 onboard the Hubble Space Telescope.

What lies at the nebula's center is unknown, with one hypothesis holding it to be a close binary star system where one star sheds gas onto an erratic disk orbiting the other star. NGC 7027, about 3,000 light years away, was first discovered in 1878 and can be seen with a standard backyard telescope toward the constellation of the Swan (Cygnus).”

- https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap200630.html

Chet Raymo, “The Sea Grows Old In It”

“The Sea Grows Old In It”

by Chet Raymo

“The poet, like the electric [lightning] rod, must reach from a point nearer to the sky than all surrounding objects down to the earth, and down to the dark wet soil, or neither is of use. The poet must not only converse with pure thought, but he must demonstrate it almost to the senses. His words must be pictures, his verses must be spheres and cubes, to be seen, and smelled and handled.” 

– Ralph Waldo Emerson

“Ah, Mr. Emerson. This seems about as good a description of poetry as one is likely to find. I love the image. Not a hand reaching up to grasp the hand of Zeus, the hurler of bolts, but merely a pointed rod that reaches higher than any surrounding objects. A pen-point, scratching the firmament. Not a conductor reaching down to the earth, but deeper, into the wet inkpot of the soul.

Not lofty thoughts, airy philosophies, gnostic arcana. Rather, ideas that come wrapped in the stuff of the senses. Ideas that must be unwrapped the way you’d peel an orange, or pry open an oyster, or stir up from the bottom of a bowl of soup. The electric fire of the heavens captured and stored in the Leyden jar of physical self.

Take, for example, Marianne Moore’s “The Fish”, a poem that has been endlessly analyzed without ever giving up its secrets. Anyone who stands on that rocky shore with the poet, looking into the wave-washed chasm - the sea as fluid as breath, as hard as a chisel- takes away a lesson as profound as any one might learn in school, perhaps without being able to articulate exactly what the lesson is. The experience is simply there, to be seen, smelled, handled, in the weave and wave of animal bodies, in the intricate rhyme and syllabication of the poem. Truth- crow-blue, ink-bespattered, hatcheted, defiant.

I’d go further. I’d say that Emerson’s description of poetry can be equally applied to science, or to any human attempt to attract the spark of Zeus. One must lift one’s rod beyond the scratch and tumble of the everyday, while keeping its foot buried in the dark wet soil of lived experience.”

- http://blog.sciencemusings.com/

•

“The Fish”

“Wade through black jade.

Of the crow-blue mussel-shells, one keeps

adjusting the ash-heaps;

opening and shutting itself like an injured fan.

The barnacles which encrust the side of the wave,

cannot hide there for the submerged shafts of the sun,

split like spun glass,

move themselves with spotlight swiftness into the crevices -

in and out, illuminating

The turquoise sea of bodies.

The water drives a wedge of iron through the iron edge of the cliff;

whereupon the stars, pink rice-grains, ink-

bespattered jelly fish, crabs like green lilies,

and submarine toadstools, slide each on the other.

All external marks of abuse are present on this defiant edifice -

all the physical features of accident -

lack of cornice, dynamite grooves, burns, and hatchet strokes,

these things stand out on it;

the chasm-side is dead.

Repeated evidence has proved that it can live

on what can not revive its youth.

The sea grows old in it."

- Marianne Moore

The Poet: Mary Oliver, "One"

"One"

"The mosquito is so small

it takes almost nothing to ruin it.

Each leaf, the same.

And the black ant, hurrying.

So many lives, so many fortunes!

Every morning, I walk softly and with forward glances

down to the ponds and through the pinewoods.

Mushrooms, even, have but a brief hour

before the slug creeps to the feast,

before the pine needles hustle down

under the bundles of harsh, beneficent rain.

How many, how many, how many

make up a world!

And then I think of that old idea: the singular

and the eternal.

One cup, in which everything is swirled

back to the color of the sea and sky.

Imagine it!

A shining cup, surely!

In the moment in which there is no wind

over your shoulder,

you stare down into it,

and there you are,

your own darling face, your own eyes.

And then the wind, not thinking of you, just passes by,

touching the ant, the mosquito, the leaf,

and you know what else!

How blue is the sea, how blue is the sky,

how blue and tiny and redeemable everything is, even you,

even your eyes, even your imagination."

~ Mary Oliver

"When I Am Old"

"When I Am Old"

Author Unknown

"When I am old… I will wear soft gray sweatshirts… and a bandana over my silver hair… and I will spend my social security checks on my dogs. I will sit in my house on my well-worn chair and listen to my dogs breathing. I will sneak out in the middle of a warm summer night and take my dogs for a run, if my old bones will allow… When people come to call, I will smile and nod as I show them my dogs… and talk of them and about them…the ones so beloved of the past and the ones so beloved of today… I will still work hard cleaning after them, mopping and feeding them and whispering their names in a soft loving way. I will wear the gleaming sweat on my throat, like a jewel, and I will be an embarrassment to all… especially my family… who have not yet found the peace in being free to have dogs as your best friends… These friends who always wait, at any hour, for your footfall… and eagerly jump to their feet out of a sound sleep, to greet you as if you are a God, with warm eyes full of adoring love and hope that you will always stay,

I’ll hug their big strong necks… I’ll kiss their dear sweet heads… and whisper in their very special company… I look in the mirror… and see I am getting old… this is the kind of person I am… and have always been. Loving dogs is easy, they are part of me. Please accept me for who I am. My dogs appreciate my presence in their lives… they love my presence in their lives… When I am old this will be important to me… you will understand when you are old, if you have dogs to love too."

- https://www.theburningplatform.com/

Full screen recommended.

Alan Parsons Project, "Old And Wise"