In the wake of 9/11, the newly established Office of the Director of National Intelligence produced the nation’s first National Intelligence Strategy, a document explicitly intended to guide reforms to the intelligence community and help prevent another terrorist attack on the U.S. homeland. The challenges U.S. intelligence faces today are no less dramatic. While crises in Ukraine, Iran, and Venezuela have each been driven by their own internal logics, together they reflect profound shifts in the balance and nature of power as a new international order begins to take shape. These shifts — a more contested strategic environment; accelerating technology competition; and eroding faith in international rules, norms, and institutions — have significantly increased uncertainty in world politics and elevated the risk and potential costs of strategic surprise.
04b Theory and Analysis
Reading Matt Shumer’s viral essay about artificial intelligence was like stepping back in time to roughly six years ago, when the world started going insane over Covid-19.
It hits all the same beats as those viral essays from 2020, when we were told “something big was coming” and “life will never be the same.” It is written with the same insider tone, like the author is doing us a favor by telling us how horrible life is about to become. And the intent is clearly the same: to so unsettle a population that they will begin to feel powerless in the face of what is about to come.
Originally published Feb 13, 2026 for our weekly Issue of Mindful Intelligence Advisor. Subscribe to get weekly issues.
By STAFF
“The average man does not want to be free, he simply wants to be safe.” – H. L. Mencken
“Is life so dear or peace so sweet as to be purchased at the price of chains and slavery? Forbid it, Almighty God! I know not what course others may take, but as for me, give me liberty, or give me death!” – Patrick Henry
- NOTE: This report was completed February 12, 2026. Any major breaking updates will be covered in our next MIA issue.
INTRODUCTION
Canada was struck with the news of a mass shooting that left 8 victims dead, and scores more injured. The dead included five students from the location of the second part of the mass shooting, Tumbler Ridge Secondary School, near Vancouver, Canada.
The shooter would then turn the gun on himself.
The motive for the shooting, so far, remains unclear. The shooter, Jesse van Rootselaar, was originally reported as a female shooter, but it would later be revealed “she” was a male presenting as a female.
It might turn out the motive for the shooting had nothing to do with the shooter’s transgenderism, but we suggest you could rightly assume it had something to do with it, though we would not recommend you make that conclusion until more information comes out (which might have by the time this report is published).
For this bellwether analysis, we want to look at this event in the context of Canada’s current governing spirit. We will bracket off the motive. What we want to consider is the promise Canada has offered to Canadians, that if they lay down their arms and shut their mouths in submission to the state orthodoxy, their lives will be safe from hate. Lose your guns, lose your tongues, and you will be safer.
They gave up Christ in the public square in part to protect the very person that murdered their children.
A. THE DETAILS
On February 10, 2026, 18-year-old Jesse van Rootselaar kicked off a killing spree in Tumbler Ridge, British Columbia, Canada. He killed his mother and his stepbrother at his residence, with a young female relative escaping. She ran to a neighbor to seek help, who then alerted the police. The shooting happened at 2:20PM. The police did not arrive until 15 minutes later.
While the police were going to the residence, Rootselaar was on his way to the Tumbler Ridge Secondary School, with a shotgun and a modified handgun. The school is a gun-free zone. There was no armed security. There were no armed teachers.
By the time the Rootselaar arrived at the school it was 2:30PM, just 10 minutes after he killed his mother and stepbrother. The shooting was reported at 2:32 PM, another team of officers arrived two minutes later. By the time the officers who were called to his residence arrived, he was already dead in the school.
Rootselaar would have just 4 minutes to do his worst. His victims were powerless to stop him. The police were also powerless to stop him. By the time they arrived, Rootselaar was already dead by suicide, but so were six others, one adult teacher and five students (three females and two males aged 12-17). Along with the dead were 27 more injured, mostly students.
The motivation for the killings is not clear, but Rootselaar has a years-long history of causing disturbances at his home, some of which involved firearms. At one point, law enforcement confiscated the weapons, but later returned them after a petition was started. The firearms do not appear to be owned by Rootselaar, however.
Rootselaar began the process of “transitioning” to a “female” four to six years ago (we have conflicting information on this point), at the age of 13. He was on anti-psychotic drugs, in addition to transitioning drugs at the time of the shooting. His transgendered status was concealed from the public as long as it could be by both the Canadian government and the international corporatist press.
While the motive is not clear, the presence of anti-psychotic drugs in the shooter has become a tragically well-earned trope of mass shootings that this event follows as well. His transgenderism as a factor is ambiguous, though one wonders if the transgender “solution” was masking a much deeper problem transitioning only made worse (as this writer suspects is happening a lot in the age of trans mania).
B. THE IMMEDIATE REPORTING
We asked Grok to give us the headlines that were immediately shared by the international corporatist press after the shooting, and Grok’s answer revealed these cherry-picked headlines:
- CBC News: “10 dead, including suspect, following shooting in Tumbler Ridge“
- The Globe and Mail: “Ten killed, including suspect, in mass shooting in Tumbler Ridge, B.C.”
- Vancouver Sun: “LIVE: Nine dead, 27 injured in mass shooting in Tumbler Ridge”
- National Post: “Canada in shock after one of the country’s worst mass shootings”
- CTV News: “C. RCMP give an update in their investigation into a mass shooting in Tumbler Ridge”
- BBC News: “At least seven dead after school shooting in British Columbia, Canada, police say”
- The Guardian: “Canada shooting: 10 dead including suspect in attack on Tumbler Ridge high school, police say”
All of these answers provided a pretty generic telling of the event, but what Grok gave me was not indicative of the REAL spirit international corporatist media chose to operate within.
After these headlines, Grok started listing headlines acknowledging the shooter was transgendered. Grok would leave one with the impression the international corporatist media acted responsibly, with no political agenda. However, that was not reality; we believe that was programming protecting the disenfranchised class over simply answering a question truthfully.
Here are some of the headlines we found when we did time-based searches:
- Collingwood Today – “‘Beyond devastating’: 10 dead, including female suspect, in B.C. school shooting”
- MSN – “10 dead, including female suspect, in ‘devastating’ shootings at BC school and home.”
- MSN – “Female Identified as Suspect in Worst Canada School Shooting in Decades That Killed 10 and Injured at Least 25”
- Reuters – “Ten dead, including female suspect, after Canada school shooting – as it happened”
A Royal Mounted Police officer at a press conference just after the shooting referred to the shooter as a “woman.”
C. THE BACKGROUND
We have created a special news tag in our aggregation process called “Canada Soviet” to tag all the stories that cover Canada’s lurch into authoritarianism. A trans person in Canada has more personal power as a normal private citizen than most people have in America today. A trans person in Canada cannot have their identity challenged. A trans person in Canada can destroy competition with a false accusation that won’t dare be challenged lest the challenger face hate speech charges.
You can call Christ the devil in public, but you can’t call abortion murder.
As for guns, Canada has effectively criminalized gun defense, along with most gun possessions. The shooter violated Canada’s gun laws, yet was able to accomplish his dark deed, nonetheless.
- LEGAL TRANS PRIVILEGE – In June of 2017 Canada introduced the now-famous bill C-16, which launched psychologist Jordan Peterson into the stratosphere as he stood as one of the few Canadians warning against the intolerance pregnant in this bill.
The bill was an amendment to Canada’s Orwellian-named Human Rights Act, which sought to limit liberty in the name of protecting the disenfranchised from being insulted in public. This amendment added “gender identity or expression” as a protected expression that ALL Canadians must comply with, regardless of whether they believed men could become women or not.
The Criminal Code already protected certain groups from what it calls “hate propaganda.” This bill added transgenders to that protected class. In other words, it de facto ennobled the transgender class as a protected class that should no longer be expected to hear opinions that invalidated their assertions that a man could become a woman, a woman could be a man, or that genders even existed at all. If they said it, you better parrot it, end stop.
In January 2022, a bill that was passed in 2021 took effect, Bill C-4. That bill made it illegal to attempt to persuade anyone, including children, that they should be heterosexual or “cis” gendered (a pejorative attempting to both vilify conventional binary gender constructions and invalidate them).
The fact that the bill included a phrase most humans would consider hate speech at this point, “cis gendered” shows the futility in allowing the state to define what “hate” is (as if hate, in and of itself, is a bad thing, unless you want to argue that hating murder is evil).
These are the two major acts, though provinces and local governments have their own “protections” for the ennobled trans class (except in the case of Alberta, which seems to be fighting back against the ennobled trans class).
ED. NOTE: While we join our readers in their concern over “trans mania,” we hold the view that some people might very well need transgender “therapy.” We also want to make it clear the evidence for the rise in trans violence is ambiguous. The majority of transgendered people should not be stigmatized by the minority ‘bad actors.’ We believe in individual justice, not social justice, and that applies to transgendered people as well.
2. ANTI-GUN LAWS – Canada has some of the strictest anti-gun laws in the nation. It began in 1995, one year before the UK began the process of surrendering their guns.
The Firearms Act of 1995 added a host of new requirements for gun ownership, which included licensing, background checks, safety training, and rules that effectively made it illegal to use your gun to defend yourself in your own home (outside of the most bizarre circumstances).
The only non-restricted weapons Canadians can currently own are bolt-action rifles and pump action shotguns. Any weapon capable of semi-automatic firing is highly restricted or prohibited altogether.
In 2022, Canada’s Bill C-21 took effect, which put a freeze on the sale, purchase, transfer, or import of handguns. It also ended ALL conceal carry for civilians, with some limited open carry allowances which basically allowed Canadians to hunt with their non-semi-automatic long guns.
While an unidentified adult in his household was legally able to possess the firearms the shooter used to kill 8 people, the shooter was not. The shooter violated multiple gun laws, appeared to use limited-action firearms (still unconfirmed), and was yet able to kill 8 people and himself in the span of 14 minutes, and that included the time it took him to get to the school from his residence.
- ANTI-SPEECH LAWS – During our research, we used Grok to search for Canada’s anti-speech laws. Grok began its results for me with this dystopian, unreal statement: “Freedom of expression in Canada is protected as a fundamental freedom under section 2(b) of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms (part of the Constitution Act, 1982). This includes freedom of thought, belief, opinion, expression, and the press and other media of communication.”
What followed next was a complete disconnect from that opening statement.
Grok would “clarify,” not realizing (or being allowed to realize) that this next statement wholly invalidates the first one and makes Grok read like an Orwellian propagandist delivering the new definitions of the day and the new list of friends and enemies.
Grok “clarified,” “However, these rights are not absolute. Section 1 of the Charter allows ‘reasonable limits prescribed by law as can be demonstrably justified in a free and democratic society.’ Courts apply the Oakes test to assess such limits, requiring the objective to be pressing/substantial, the means rationally connected and minimally impairing, and the benefits outweighing the harm.”
Grok also buried the lead. In 1985, C-46 was passed, which created a new Criminal Code called “Hate Propaganda and Related Offences.” This bill was challenged in the courts where it was “validated” by their Supreme Court on numerous cases, the two key ones being R. v. Keegstra (1990) and Saskatchewan (Human Rights Commission) v. Whatcott (2013).
Here are some of the vaguer, and thus more disturbing parts of the criminal code (from Grok):
Section 319(1): Public incitement of hatred – Communicating statements in a public place that incite hatred against an identifiable group where likely to lead to a breach of the peace (up to 2 years).
Section 319(2): Wilful promotion of hatred – Communicating statements (other than in private conversation) that wilfully promote hatred against an identifiable group (up to 2 years). Defences include truth, public interest discussion, good faith religious opinion (under subsection 319(3)(b)), and good faith belief on religious grounds.
Section 319(2.1): Wilful promotion of antisemitism – Specifically condoning, denying, or downplaying the Holocaust (added in recent amendments; up to 2 years).
Had the shooter lived, he might “enjoy” the “extra” protections his ennobled class might soon receive should Bill C-9 pass. This bill hopes to remove religious exemptions from speech restrictions, as well as add new offenses for displaying hate symbols. It also seeks to eliminate the need for the Attorney General to consent to speech violation prosecutions. In other words, they want more people to be subject to their thought control, and they want to make it EASIER to prosecute them.
D. BELLWETHER ANALYSIS
- NOTE: This is a new feature we have created. Unlike a PREDICTIVE ANALYSIS, this type of analysis is about understanding the context of the “present,” not predicting what might come next. Unlike a SUMMARY, it is not simply a synthesis of the facts as a review, it is an analysis of the spirit of the whole event as a bellwether.
A somewhat simplistic, but mostly accurate timeline of events will show the kernel of Wokeness was most closely created by the Frankfurt School starting in the early 20s. The kernel of wokeness was born in Europe.
Under the label, “critical theory,” the notion of social justice over economic justice began to emerge. By the 60s, American leftists decided to exploit that path, having realized capitalism wasn’t going to collapse anytime soon, and, unlike their predictions, was continuing to offer greater prosperity to more people in society than communism ever did (or would).
Wokeness, long before we used the term, was infiltrating American academia, which in turn spread its wokeness to other nations. As it infiltrated direct government power, the American state began to export wokeness to the rest of the world. They offered cash to the compliant and interference (to put it mildly) to the non-compliant.
Unfortunately for Canada, they got our wokeness in spades. As our next-door neighbor, Canada was most affected by the U.S.’s new woke promotions.
In America, the battle for the spirit of the land continues, with wokeness currently taking major hits (but hardly dead). In other countries like Canada, the UK, and Australia, wokeness has ended their status as a traditional Western “democratic” power. There is no free speech in any of these lands.
Wokeness may have started in Europe, but America gave it international strength, poisoning the rest of the world with an ideology that hates its citizens. Yet, America is still holding out while the others seem to have fallen (at least for now).
Why is that? It is because America’s right to rule is based on the premise that we are endowed by an authority outside the state with certain rights, rights that enable us to define and choose our own paths to happiness and prosperity.
Canada and Australia are no longer directly under the rule of the British crown, so the monarchy does not justify their rule. For these two countries, the right to rule is from “popular sovereignty,” the approval of the people, which is just mob rule with extra steps if that is your own right to rule principle.
In Britian, the monarch is the final authority, not God, so there are no absolute restrictions on government power.
Canada, Australia, and Britain all quickly gutted the public of guns starting around the same time, the late 90s, as it became apparent that technology was beginning to advantage small-scale resistance over large-scale conquest.
After the guns fell, the tongue followed behind, in all three countries, with Canada and the UK fighting neck-and-neck to be the most Soviet western nation of them all.
Now, here Canadians sit, having been promised security in exchange for surrendering dangerous freedom but getting neither. They sit in a world in which the press and the government must lie about the basic facts of a shooter to protect a special class of people from free tongues, enslaving all, including the special class (which are now desperately dependent on the state to protect them from mean thoughts, a protection they’ve been propagandized to militantly expect).
The “security” through disarming your neighbors’ guns and tongues has made Canada fundamentally less safe than it was before. A madman grew up among them, indulged by the system, protected from reality (you have a mental illness, you’re not a girl), and medically conditioned to be predisposed to even greater psychotic breaks with reality.
While children’s bodies were yet cold, the “authorities” were doubling down on the toxic lie that this boy was a girl. They were probably more frightened of the authorities sending them to jail for violating the psychotic safe space of transgendered people than they were of anything that happened at that school.
This bellwether event shows what happens when a government is too afraid of its citizens to let them have the tools to defend their children from a 4-minute execution by a mentally ill child indulged by the same system that took Canadians’ guns away. They created the beast and they disarmed its victims.
For we Americans, this should compel us even more to resist any effort to confiscate our guns. Vast swathes of American land are occupied by Progmerican overlords who seek to do to us what Canada has done to its citizens, disarm us while they raise beasts to kill us.
FURTHER RESOURCES:
The Origins of Woke – Rochard Hanania
Woke: A Critique of Social Justice Ideology – Jon Mills
Woke Ideology Critique and Counter Proposal – Frank Kaufman, David Burgess, Christ Kenedy
Originally published Feb 6, 2026 for our weekly Issue of Mindful Intelligence Advisor. Subscribe to get weekly issues.
By STAFF
“If Balak should give me his house full of silver and gold, I would not be able to go beyond the word of the Lord, to do either good or bad of my own will. What the Lord speaks, that will I speak? And now, behold, I am going to my people. Come, I will let you know what this people will do to your people in the latter days.”-
Numbers 24:13-14
INTRODUCTION
Just as we were wrapping up our monthly MIA report for January 2026, news broke that the Department of Justice had released over 3 million documents related to the massive conspiracy surrounding the now-deceased Jeffrey Epstein. This was a sort of prophetic utterance on the land from the highest echelons of power. It was meant for a curse, a curse by omission. It kept the black hole mystery alive but offered no clear justice. It keeps the land unsatisfied and unsecure.
When the Israelites were about to enter into the promised land, Balaam of Peor, a prophet of Ba’al, was enticing Israelites to worship the god that calls you to sacrifice your child. He was preparing to give a curse to the Israelites, but instead, God compelled him to give them a blessing, which he did.
Balaam’s reward was to later be killed by Joshua for the crime he committed of bringing Israelites to worship Ba’al.
The Israelites were about to enter their Promised Land, which was a Hope Exit of their time from Egyptian and Wilderness bondage when a curse was about to befall them. But that curse was turned into a blessing by the supernatural intervention of God, who was compelled to speak blessings on Israel and curses on Moab.
We Americans are about to enter our Hope Exit (hopefully) as well, as the division between American and Progmerican becomes clearer and clearer over the coming months. Just as we face this challenge, we see once again the Ba’al priests protected by the establishment. It seems they hold the high places still and they mean to protect their child-sacrificing god, come what may.
Yet, even as Balaam hoped to pronounce a curse with his mountaintop declarations, what might have been meant as a form of a curse on the land in the Epstein files release will yet be a blessing on the land, though it might be difficult to see that now.
After the releases, the partisan information warriors scampered off to their platforms and produced agit prop and content marketing condemning the other and protecting the ingroup. There were some, mostly outside of the Progmerican left (but not exclusively), that took measured wait-and-see takes, but, for the most part, Trump was exonerated or condemned, Bill Clinton was exonerated or condemned. There was little ground in between being created by the info warriors in the partisan camps.
Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche made the announcement, not Attorney General Pam Bondi, which might be telling in and of itself. He gave a measured statement, exclaiming these documents only represented half of the documents the government had yet not released. He claimed these files were held back because they identified victims, exposed medical files, had child pornographic images, or showed death, or showed abuse.
Right from the start he made it clear we were getting a sanitized look at the madness, which might be to our favor, but then again, it might be a demon we need to look at to see that the demon was fed by us as well. THIS might lead us to the repentance we have yet, as a nation, to experience, the repentance against our worshiping of Ba’al, the god who calls a nation to sacrifice their children to his fire.
Remember, many of the highest-level leaders of our country, in all sectors of life, were part of this child rape-murder-sacrifice-torture cabal. None, so far, have faced criminal consequence for their actions. Most of them continue to walk amongst us, our masters, dictating our terms of existence to us from behind a veil of moral supremacism concealing child sacrifice at its heart.
If it’s not them, it’s their adult children, who, by now, have most likely been initiated into the family affair, the family “business.”
These same leaders were the ones making deals with China that sold our vitality to the Chinese Communist Party for a promise of an Eldorado that would never come (the burgeoning consumer class in China that would one day dwarf America’s).
While they sold our vocations to China, at home they were browbeating us with a morality they used to justify corporate censorship and the unpersoning of the unorthodox. While they were browbeating us in public, in private, they were stealing life to satisfy Ba’al’s fire within them all, a fire that is never quenched, which is an eternal torment to the worm that never dies.
The documents were only released in what we imagine is a “minimal” adherence to a law ordering the DOJ to release the Epstein Files. The Deputy Attorney General stated, “We comply with the act, and there is no ‘protect President Trump.’ We didn’t protect or not protect anybody.”
The statement itself is a minimal affirmation of the Act, which would support our theory the DOJ “minimally” complied with the law. As for the claim they didn’t protect anyone, let us see if we find this statement to be accurate after our analysis.
It should be noted that this release was six weeks past the due date outlined in the November 19, 2025 Act signed into law by President Donald Trump.
The releases include 2,000 videos and 180,000 images. The two biggest names everyone was looking for, Donald Trump and Bill Clinton, failed to deliver the proverbial smoking gun, as these releases largely did (with some noted exceptions).
First, we will look at the two biggest names and what these Epstein Files say about them, then in general at who was most damaged and who escaped any serious harm, and finally we’ll analyze what this type of release tells us about the Reality of Power at the global scale, behind closed doors, where the children are most likely still being used as elixirs of youth and deification.
A. DONALD TRUMP
Shortly after the Epstein Files release, President Donald Trump told the press on Air Force One, “I didn’t see (the files) myself, but I was told by some very important people that not only does it absolve me, it’s the opposite of what people were hoping.”
He was referring specifically to what he alleges the Epstein Files show, a conspiracy between Jeffrey Epstein and author Michael Wolff to besmirch Trump’s name out of revenge. This charge has some suggestions through the email correspondence between Wolff and Epstein that might corroborate that claim, but there is no smoking guns affirming the claim. Trump has threatened to sue Wolff, who expressed no alleged fear at such possibility.
Progmerican Info Warriors have taken to sharing a meme that says “Donald Trump was mentioned more times in the Epstein Files than Jesus was mentioned in the Bible.” As usual, category “errors” abound in that narrative, the first of which is that one category is the Holy Word of God, and the other category is criminal child sex trafficking investigation files.
The meme itself reveals that the Progmericans have no hoped-for smoking gun from the Epstein files. The most damaging files are anonymous complaints that are filled with horrifying details. However, most of the other high-profile people, including Bill Clinton, suffer from this same circumstance. These are mostly unsubstantiated claims by anonymous sources that were either followed up on and ruled out as uncredible or ruled out as uncredible from the start.
The “best” attack the left had was to malapropistically use Christ as a bludgeon against Trump’s presumed Christian base. Not understanding scripture at all, they had no idea such comparisons would ring hollow, especially for those who hold to the rather orthodox belief that ALL of scripture points to Christ. Where His name is not spoken, the Word yet points to Him.
It also cheapens the profundity and sacredness of scripture by comparing it to child pornographic criminal records. THIS was not by accident.
While the DOJ says Trump has been mentioned over 5,000 times in the files, Bill Clinton’s number of mentions hasn’t been released. When you do a search for Bill Clinton in the DOJ’s Epstein Files library, you get 1,230 mentions. When you do a search for Donald Trump, you get 1,478 results.
B. BILL CLINTON
Bill Clinton will find nothing even suggesting an exoneration like President Trump did in this release, nor was there a smoking gun condemning him. The evidence against him still remains circumstantial, which includes the new photos of him with Jeffrey Epstein, including some with young women, sometimes in questionable (but not obviously so) positions.
When the U.S. House Oversight Committee subpoenaed both Bill Clinton and his wife Hillary to testify under oath, the Clintons initially refused. Now, they have agreed, in principle, to testify in the face of potential criminal charges of contempt for continuing to refuse to comply to the subpoena.
Perhaps the most damaging evidence against the Clintons, in general, is Jeffrey Epstein’s deposition in 2016 when he invoked the Fifth Amendment numerous times to avoid answering questions about the nature of his involvement with Bill Clinton and the Clinton Foundation. Outside of that, this release introduced no real new information about the Clintons and their relationship to Jeffrey Epstein.
C. THOSE MOST AFFECTED
This category excludes, of course, the ones obviously most affected from this whole operation (one probably still going on in one way, shape, or form), the victims of these little gods, the men and women consuming the future to preserve the illusion of the eternal now.
- KIER STARMER – The UK Prime Minister was not originally on this list, but circumstances have changed. Momentum continues to grow for the PM to resign after it was revealed Starmer KNEW about Peter Mandelson’s connections to Jeffrey Epstein BEFORE he approved of Mandelson becoming the U.S. ambassador.
His own intelligence service flagged Mandelson, but Starmer overruled the flag. The only reason this was discovered was because the second person on this list, Peter Mandelson, was exposed in the Epstein Files in a way that led British authorities to discover this fact.
- PETER MANDELSON – After the Epstein Files were released, Peter Mandelson was exposed as having leaked sensitive information to Jeffrey Epstein that could result in criminal charges. The fallout was immediate, as Mandelson was forced to resign from the Labour Party and from the House of Lords. He had already been forced to resign as the UK ambassador to the U.S. It was the notification from the Epstein Files that Mandelson had leaked this information that led to an investigation exposing the initial flag by the intelligence community on Mandelson and Starmer’s direct override of the flag.
- MIROSLAV LAJCAK – Slovakia’s National Security Adviser was forced to resign after the Epstein files release revealed he had numerous parties and meetings with Epstein back in 2018. The opposition party pounced on the releases, while Lajcak claimed he had done no wrong.
- STEVE TISCH – The Co-owner of the New York Giants, Steve Tisch, showed up in this new batch release 400 times, and that includes emails from him using terms like “working girl” that made it highly probable he was referring to sexual activity, though not underage activity.
While the NFL has announced plans to investigate Steve Tish, so far, he hasn’t been forced to resign, nor has he offered to.
- BILL CLINTON – While no smoking gun was revealed in the release, they did help to fuel the House Oversight Committee’s efforts to get the Clintons to testify under oath (something they wanted to do for some time).
- OTHERS – Some lesser affected include Harvey Weinstein, Leon Black, Casey Wasserman, and Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick. The last one is most noteworthy, with Lutnick showing up for an Epstein Island lunch visit years after he claimed he last contacted Epstein.
ED.NOTE: We consider one Democrat hard hit by the Epstein Files release, Stacey Plaskett, a minor actor. What she has alleged to do, text Jeffrey Epstein during U.S. House hearings, indicts the system. Her removal as an actor, however, is almost inconsequential.
While Donald Trump doesn’t appear to have the clear exoneration he claims, he has taken no real damage beyond what he’s already received from his handling of the Epstein files in general.
D. WHAT’S MISSING
At the now culturally irrelevant Grammy Awards, British actor and comedian Trevor Noah made a joke about Donald Trump, saying, “That’s a Grammy that every artist wants — almost as much as Trump wants Greenland. Which makes sense because, since Epstein’s gone, he needs a new island to hang out with Bill Clinton. I told you, it’s my last year! What are you going to do about it?”
Upon hearing this, President Trump responded on Truth Social, “The host, Trevor Noah, whoever he may be, is almost as bad as Jimmy Kimmel at the Low Ratings Academy Awards. I can’t speak for Bill, but I have never been to Epstein Island, nor anywhere close, and until tonight’s false and defamatory statement, have never been accused of being there, not even by the Fake News Media. Noah, a total loser, better get his facts straight, and get them straight fast. It looks like I’ll be sending my lawyers to sue this poor, pathetic, talentless, dope of an M.C., and suing him for plenty$. Ask Little George Slopadopolus and others how that all worked out. Also, ask CBS!” added Trump. “Get ready, Noah, I’m going to have some fun with you!”
This exchange right here might be the most amount of action these file releases have generated far. A far-left anti-American British citizen on an American television show to an American audience made a joke about a former and current President going to an island that is known for child rape (and probably child murder as well).
The CURRENT President responded to this jokester by threatening to sue him, demonstrating a critical unawareness of basic first amendment constitutional law, or an indifference to it. Either way, the most dramatic exchange to come after this mega-release turns out to be between an anti-American agit prop activist properly exploiting American freedom and the sitting President not properly understanding it.
What’s missing is evidence that leads to criminal prosecution for anyone, which we can only surmise includes a high proportion of leaders in all segments of society. Hundreds, if not thousands, of powerful men and women who participated in consuming children to satisfy their little god fires, are still among us, still holding social, cultural, political, and even sacred leadership and gatekeeping positions.
What’s missing is accountability, what’s missing is a transparent assurance the operation is actually shut down and is not being continued with different Epsteins and Maxwells.
E. THE CASE FOR SEEING MORE
Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche let us know this release was only half of the files the DOJ still has. We suggested he complied as minimally as he thought he could get away with, and the fruit of this release suggests to us he wasn’t being truthful when he said he wasn’t protecting anyone.
We don’t presume he is protecting President Trump, or NOT protecting President Trump. We don’t presume Trump is guilty beyond turning a blind eye to something he AT LEAST should have figured out a lot sooner than he did (if he’s even guilty of that).
We don’t even suggest this for President Clinton as well. For all we know, both these men could be innocent. For all we know, both these men could be guilty of comparable crimes.
Blanche revealed the released files did not include those files that showed child pornographic images, or showed death, or showed abuse. He also cited medical records concerns and victim identities; both seem credible enough. However, those first three categories don’t, especially because sensitive areas can be blurred to at least expose the criminal, something we must assume has already been done, but led to no arrests.
As stated above, we have no idea who walks among us that is part of this Satanic cult, and the cost of shocking Americans with the awful sins of our leaders is overshadowed by the much costlier consequence of continuing to protect the criminals of Epstein Island. Protect no one, not even Donald Trump (if it’s needed at all).
Failure to let Americans see the horrifying truth will only further erode the state’s legitimacy of rule, which is already on life support as it is. Release the Kraken, come what may, for the guilty can no longer be protected if the state in its current form (officially still American) hopes to continue to exist.
SUMMARY
The Department of Justice, under the direction of Pam Bondi, did the minimum it felt it had to do to at least give the political leadership of both parties plausible deniability that yet did not remove the Epstein fangs pointed at one another.
The goal here, it would seem, was to sustain the status quo between the real competing factions. These competing main factions are Trump’s elites now hedging their bets on the China model and leaning towards an America-lite model, and the “China Model through the Woke Vehicle of Power” elites who have been the center of power until recently.
We see here King Kong versus Godzilla, fighting over our city, with the Epstein files being performative missiles shot off now and then by the city security forces, who assure us the monsters are under control. We Americans find ourselves rooting for King Kong, the American-like monster, for at least this monster won’t completely destroy our city, whereas we KNOW Godzilla wants to destroy us completely.
We have a real chance in the post-Kong victory world to fully live out our Americanism. We have little chance to fully live out our Americanism if Godzilla wins. Still, we see the monster that King Kong is clearly for ourselves, and we are not prepared to bend our knee to him anymore than we would be prepared to bend our knee to Godzilla. Or so the metaphor goes.
PREDICTIVE ANALYSIS
The latest attempt by the Trump administration and the DNC to placate the masses without giving too much safe harbor to the enemy has served only to delay the soon-to-be louder voices demanding the real damaging files get released, come what may.
We can’t imagine anyone seriously thought this would put the Epstein files to bed, and possibly that was never the intended outcome. For as much as we want to know the full truth of the child sex ring designed to blackmail thought leaders in multiple countries, we also understand the black hole mystery that is the Epstein Files.
This black hole mystery can gobble up minds, resources, that might otherwise have discovered practical paths to blunt centralized control over human action. This is not to suggest the effort to expose the truth shouldn’t continue, but only that the continuation of this black hole mystery is not completely disadvantageous to the elites.
This is especially true of the elites who continue to be part of the blackmailers group, not the blackmailed leaders group Clinton, Trump, etc., are candidates for being in. The blackmailers have every reason for the mystery to continue, and our passion to continue to be absorbed by it, for, even as we speak, most likely they’ve long moved on to their new centers of child sacrifice.
We always allow for God’s intervention, but outside of that, this black hole mystery is set to continue at least for another year, maybe longer.
We doubt the Clinton hearings will yield much more than body language videos and montages of “I plea the Fifth,” which is assuming the hearings happen at all, something far from certain at this point. If they do, the Clintons will try to look hard and determined in the same way Hillary did during the Benghazi hearings (presaging Trump).
Trump has standardized the bluster, the WWE promotion-style savaging, which the Clintons will try to manifest in their outfits and their demeanor.
They will address the Republicans curtly, with a tinge of contempt. Bill could be a wildcard if he gets caught in a logic trap and says more than he should. The DNC criminal media will cover them with plaudits and heap shame on the Republicans daring to question their integrity.
The press will carry headlines comparing Trump’s 5K mentions to Bill’s “fewer” mentions as proof this is merely a political witch hunt. The girls at the View may offer this as proof that the Department of Justice is protecting Donald Trump by going after the Clintons to distract them from Trump, who, after all, is mentioned more
The net result will be a blunting of the Epstein Files as a uniquely Republican or Democrat problem, which is not a good overall net result for America, because it means less creators will find incentives in producing content keeping the pressure on these people to release files (since it doesn’t exclusively hurt the other faction).
On one hand this might be good if those same creators start showing their audiences how to build Americanist communities right where they live, starting in their own homes. But this seems less likely, as that type of content is not nearly as monetizable as Epstein content that eviscerates the opposing faction.
On the other hand, if this is swept under the rug, it will only embolden the elites to do more, which means more victims than ever before, for surely, they haven’t stopped Jeffrey Epstein’s work. What this means is they haven’t stopped offering children for power to the people who will still rule over us as if WE were the ones that needed THEIR moral authority for our lives to be “good.”
There is a Goldilocks zone for our engagement with this black hole mystery, and it’s not silence or indifference, nor is it where the bulk of our energies should be spent.
The blackmailers would ultimately be happy with either/or extreme, total obsession that saps restorative energies to total crickets allowing the conspiracy to operate in silence. The blackmailers prefer to see the pendulum swing wildly from the obsession extreme to the cricket extreme. This assures the blackmailed still feel threatened while also assuring the blackmailers continue to remain invisible (as they mostly still are).
A consistent, steady approach to investigating the Epstein files is what is needed amongst us Americans (see Whitney Webb), but only a handful of us.
Unless a brave whistleblower manages to get the irrefutable proof of the dark sins of our leaders, expect the black hole mystery of the Epstein Files to continue to burn, for good and for ill, against a backdrop of an America struggling to find her people amongst peoples who have long ago forgotten what America is.
Our ability to confront these sins, to bring to account the main criminals, will most likely be what finally determines if the spirit of Americanism prevails in this land or the spirit of Progmericanism, child sacrifice, prevails in this land.
The Epstein Files release has not fooled the Americans, it is only helping us to clarify whose clearly with us and whose clearly against us. In other words, the Epstein Files release is already proving to be a blessing, not the curse it was intended to be. If you are too partisan in your defense of ANY suspected politician, including Trump, we have reason to question your Americanist credentials.
Will Ba’al replace Christ, officially, as the centerpiece of the “new Progmerican republic” or will Christ remain muted under an American-lite MAGA banner, or will Christ be unbounded in a restored Americanist nation? So far, the release hasn’t had its intended results, which bodes well for the Americanists.
FURTHER RESOURCES:
Virginia Giuffre: Epstein’s Masseuse Who Took Down the Rick – Nigel Cawthorne
Editor’s note: This is a lightly edited transcript of today’s video from Daily Signal Senior Contributor Victor Davis Hanson. Subscribe to our YouTube channel to see more of his videos.
Hello, this is Victor Davis Hanson for The Daily Signal. I’m trying to make one of my haphazard appearances, depending my energy level, after all these medications they put me on, after this lung cancer surgery. But I’m here on the farm, and I’m doing my best.
I wanna talk a little bit about the open defiance of the federal government. I’ve mentioned that earlier, but when you collate everything that Attorney General of Minnesota Keith Ellison has said, Gov. Tim Walz, Mayor Jacob Frey of Minneapolis, it’s unabashed, unapologetic, insurrectionary rhetoric.
Originally published Jan 16, 2026 for our weekly Issue of Mindful Intelligence Advisor. Subscribe to get weekly issues.
STAFF
INTRODUCTION
This is not a full analysis of world events, but rather an analysis of bellwether events, regions, trends, and countries that tell the overarching story of the world in January 2026, which is still the struggle to define the new order as the old order comes crashing down around them.
Our analysis is from an Americanist perspective, nested within our Christian belief system.
Our last Bellwether report in our December 2025 issue began with the announced resignation of Klaus Schwab from the World Economic Forum. This month, President Trump’s invasion of Davos marks the official death of the globalist project. This was not just done with speeches, but, leading up to Davos, with an action against Venezuela that made it clear America was playing solely in its own self-interest, not in the interest of the global order.
At home, America versus Progmerica is beginning to form, and the battle between ICE agents and Progmerican insurrectionists is clarifying that division. DNC media outlets are openly spreading provable knowable lies about ICE agents that are clearly intended (in our opinion) to incite more violence against them and their family members.
As the ICE wars rage, good economic news for the American republic is buried by this criminal press. Trump’s tariff strategy, for instance, is bringing in billions in revenue and helping to restore American industry (especially the steel industry). The news is not all good on the economic front as major companies continue to announce tens of thousands of layoffs ahead for 2026.
The inchoate state of the American republic compared to the Progmerican Empire is what has advantaged the Progmericans for a while now. Progmericanism has been smuggled in, from on top, using American words with Progmerican definitions. Americans were mostly partly Progmericans, without realizing it, so they could no longer clearly see how antithetical to American values Progressivism is.
We are beginning to see that inchoate state more clearly form as people in this land are being forced to discover the differences between Progmerican values and American ones, and, fortunately, so far, most are choosing America. Let us hope that continues and accelerates in the coming weeks and months.
This report was completed on January 29, 2026
A. AMERICA
The ICE Wars now dominate the American landscape with media outlets becoming increasingly overt in their war messaging, a war message aimed directly at the heart of the American republic. So far, no conservative leader, including President Trump, has openly called the media an information terrorist organization illegally campaigning for the Democrat Party even though it is obvious at this point what the media is doing.
This fact alone makes one question how much of the old Progmerican infrastructure this regime wants to hold on to. To us, it would seem he wants to hold on to more than we had hoped for. He wants to hold on to the potential for media power for his faction is what we suspect.
We keep getting teases of serious 2020 election investigations, and we get another tease this month after FBI agents seized the ballots and ballot records from Fulton County, GA for that election. This could be what leads to the final undoing of the DNC in America, but this writer will believe it when the DNC leadership is convicted and punished.
Should the election be proven to have been fraudulent, this would give President Trump the power to do what we have been calling him to do since 2017, declare a state of insurrection, follow that up by declaring the Democrat Party a terrorist organization, seize its assets (its media, its corporations), remove Democrats from all state institutions, including government and the schools, arrest the leaders and punish the leaders that are duly convicted (through a Rule of Law process).
The 2026 election will obviously look radically different should the 2020 election be rightly overturned. Barring that, the DNC has a better-than-average chance at retaking both the U.S. House and Senate, which would mean more terror, more chaos for Americans should that happen.
For a taste of what’s to come, look no further than New York and Virginia, where Democrats coming in to power have moved swiftly to cement Progmerica as the Rule of Law in the land over American Rule of Law.
Mayor Mamdani is already opening the coffers to illegal aliens and telling New Yorkers they need to “renegotiate their relation to the state,” and Governor Spanberger is already moving to confiscate Virginians’ guns. Progmerican Virginia is also moving to double their politicians’ pay immediately, as government grifters are wont to do.
Both seem fully committed to violating the constitution openly for as long as they can get away with it, hoping to establish Progmerican Rule of Law (social-based justice) so the final impediment to full Progmerican power, individual-based Rule of Law, becomes precedented out of existence.
A 2020 Election Overturn and the criminalization of the DNC would end their reigns, but short of that, their terms will be filled out by violence, hate, and economic disaster, leaving both the state and the city husks of their former glory.
Right now, the 2026 election looks tight, but should the economic boom happen that some think is coming, the Democrats might be struggling for an effective competing message outside of promising more murdering of babies and confiscating of guns. Their days of sinking campaigns with charges of racism and homophobia are over, they’ll have to stand on their own apocalyptic record (which will be seen in the regions in which they continue to rule).
B. WORLD
The state of the world in our December 2025 SitRep was radically different than the state of the world today. As a news analyst and aggregator (see our aggregation work at mindfulintelligence.news), never have there been more major news events happening daily in my 20-plus years of work. Stories that don’t show up in our Global Outlook reports would have been top stories in more stable times.
While everyone saw the writing on the wall, now they know for sure; unless they can topple American power, the UN project is dead. China is still desperately trying to save it, for it understands the UN is an American carburetor, an intentional impediment to her real power/
With the capture of Maduro from underneath China’s protection by the U.S., the global order was served notice.
That notice was cemented in Davos as Trump and his team continue to serve notice to the global order that America was taking its proverbial ball and heading home and also NOT heading home.
Greenland continues to serve as a Bellwether of the struggle between Europe’s hopes for moral restraint that only serves their interests and America’s hopes of having a secure homeland in the wake of weak “allies” whose values are increasingly anathema to ours.
Before the next issue, we might see TWO significant regime changes, one in China and one in Iran, though we might also see more internal violence as Xi in China and Khamenei in Iran murder their way to consolidated power (but at great cost to both nations).
In China, we could see Xi fall but the CCP still retain power, though we believe if Xi is replaced, even if by the CCP, the CCP’s hold on the country will be even more tenuous than it already is unless it makes drastic reforms that will effectively end its complete police-state power.
- VENEZUELA – When the United States quickly invaded Venezuela and surgically removed their President, Nicholas Maduro, China and Russia lost a potential future base and the global order lost its illusion of parity with the United States. The capture of Maduro, though, wasn’t just about shutting down what Trump is alleging is a Cartel state, it was about getting information about Maduro’s connections to the Dominion voting machines involved in counting the ballots for the 2020 election.
News of the FBI’s investigation into Fulton County Georgia’s 2020 election ballots legitimizes those claims. Since Maduro’s capture, the U.S. has received greater cooperation from the current regime, but the administration warned them recently that they need to do more or risk further punitive action.
- DAVOS – This was our bellwether story, which you can read about on pg. 2. Davos was the official death of the global world order and a scramble for a new one that yet contains the raw power of the United States. This could push Europe towards China, which some view as a real threat to America but we view as a gift.
What is becoming more and more apparent is that the EU’s values are increasingly becoming aligned with China’s and less aligned with America’s, though the natives on the streets would far prefer American values over Chinese, or Progmerican (they’re virtually the same at this point) values.
- CHINA – Chairman Xi has his hands full at home as conflicting reports overall suggest China’s leader has barely survived, so far, an ongoing coup attempt. He is doing so by eviscerating his top experts, including military experts, which are causing many to question the real power of China in its current state.
His second in command, Zhang Youxia, was the leader of the coup, but was captured and arrested. He hasn’t been killed yet because his father was one of the founders of the People’s Liberation Army and he is the ONLY General in the Chinese military that has EVER seen combat. He is a national treasure. Experts within China suggest he is far more popular than Xi, so simply disappearing him would be a risky move.
Even as Xi struggles at home, he continues to aggressively work against American interests, pressuring nations to continue to rely on the Old World Order, international law defined by the United Nations, a plea Europeans might be tempted to listen to, but one that further makes America’s point about how useless it has become to American interests.
If they do, this will only help America in the long-term, should Europe rise as a rival to her power. China will be to Europe what the Ottoman Empire was to the allies in World War Two, an albatross draining resources and offering little to nothing in return.
- IRAN – What started as a hope for the end of a bloodthirsty regime has so far turned into a slaughter that tops 30,000 dead. In our last issue, we covered the dilemma Trump has, having promised the protestors “help is on the way,” but so far not delivering that help.
An Armada is on the way, the Gerald R. Ford Carrier group, and Trump is offering the regime one last chance to negotiate a peace that does NOT include nuclear arms for Iran.
Should the regime fall, the source of the EXPLOSION of Islamist terror in the world would be gone. Russia and China would suffer a far greater geopolitical defeat with the loss of Iran than they did with Venezuela. Israel would find itself in a much more secure position, with her neighbors most likely being more inclined to normalize relations (without fear of terror sponsored by Iran from within their own nations).
- SOUTH KOREA – It is becoming increasingly apparent that South Korea may be viewed as a write-off for the Trump administration. The seizure of South Korea by their Democrat Party invited the CCP into the country, with the proof coming in the form of new censorship laws.
Expect U.S. troop downsizing in South Korea soon as the President just informed South Korea, they will have to fend for themselves against all conventional threats. This could be an opportunity for the CCP or another liability, another expense that could help accelerate their demise.
It goes without saying that the end of the CCP in China would make the Democrats in South Korea vulnerable to the pushback that might come their way, a pushback a new China might help rather than hinder.
- GAZA WAR/MIDDLE EAST – Through the Gaza Peace Deal, President Trump is hoping to start what looks increasingly like a replacement for the UN he is calling the Board of Peace. So far, many Middle East countries have joined while European ones are passing, for now. It seems there is still hope for the UN to continue (but without the U.S.) after its death was announced at Davos.
Hope for Hamas preserving power is diminishing, with even Turkey now attempting to help negotiate Hamas’ disarmament. Mahmood Abbas of the Palestinian Authority has announced Hamas would not be on the ballot.
The finality of the war was punctuated when the remains of the last Israeli hostage was returned, setting off demonstrations of grieving, relief, and celebration.
- UK – America’s mother country, Britain, is speed-running through the same anti-human dark ideology of Progmerica’s Democrat Party, “wokeness.” But as it is doing this, while continuing to import violent men from violent countries explicitly to inflict harm on the English devil, the English are finding themselves and realizing they still overwhelmingly outnumber the invaders.
So far, though, their commitment to remaining unarmed persists despite the clear evidence that the one country infected with wokeness that has managed to beat back its onslaught had armed citizens fully comfortable with well-armed neighbors. That country, of course, is America.
Starmer appears to be doing everything he can to further antagonize the English, even cancelling local elections because he knows his party will be gutted as a result. But it’s not just cancelling elections, it’s continuing to harass, prosecute, and arrest British citizens for saying hurty words online even as he pushes to effectively make speaking against Islam a criminal offense.
One can only imagine Starmer is not aware of his country’s own history, or that Starmer imagines the English spirit is dead. Signs point to that spirit being reignited again, especially among young boys who can see for themselves how their schools teach good things about Islam and bad things about their own country.
Rather than programming them, however, the schools are saying the quiet parts out loud, at long last, and even the children are now noticing.
As they lurch into full-on totalitarianism, Starmer is also handing over London to China, betting on an alliance with China to offset his growing antagonism to the U.S. This foreign policy is wildly unpopular with the English, as is Keir Starmer. Never has a PM been more unliked than this PM since polling began. His recent trip to Beijing yielded token reductions of a few tariffs, nothing more.
B. CULTURE
The Minneapolis Church Ambush by Don Lemon and his horde of insurrectionists crossed an American cultural line that the Democrats will not be able to walk back from so easily, especially given their reaction to the violation of private worship for violent political means (and there was violence, intimidation, and the terrorizing of children).
They compared it to Jesus turning over the tables in the Temple, not realizing what they were saying, which is that they are Jesus and the temple is theirs. THAT is the authority Christ operated in, NOT the authority of violent political insurrectionists at war with America. Not only was the temple his, HE is the temple.
They continue to own this violation as their judges protect the criminals, either by refusing to charge them or giving them a cashless bail. For now, this is to their favor, but when the dust settles, we will surely revisit the left’s efforts to normalize political violence in private places of worship. Nothing symbolizes the depth of treason in Progmericans’ hearts than their gleeful support of this thuggery.
In Progmerican states, abortions are on the rise, mostly through the unborn baby murder pill that is still being sold over the counter despite numerous health risks. Another dangerous effect of allowing anyone to buy this dangerous drug is the ease with which it can be used by others to murder unborn children they don’t want by slipping the death pill in the mother’s food or drink.
Shockingly, after JUST taking power, Progmerican Virginia wants to pass an amendment to allow the murdering of unborn children up to birth.
While euthanasia’s spread to France was halted (for now), Canada continues to relax its rules on its own euthanasia laws despite increasing evidence some people are manipulating family members to kill themselves.
President Trump continues to use tariffs as geopolitical tools in much the same way they were used until the 20th century, with mixed results. On one hand, a lot of economic indicators are up, including inflation (which is down, which is an up for the economy). On the other hand, there are major layoffs coming from Amazon and UPS.
If the tariffs deliver the promised tax rebates, their popularity may be secured, and SCOTUS might have a harder time ending a program that could be shown to have powerfully positive effects for America (though the jury is still out on that).
Overall, though, signs point to an economy about to take off after a lot of first-round infrastructure work is coming online as a result of President Trump’s “Marshall Plan” for the U.S. in the form of $18 trillion in foreign investments. Even the World Bank has now taken notice and anticipates an economic acceleration.
The month ended with the finalization of the transfer of power of TikTok to primarily American interests from CCP interests. While the CCP loses its access to American data, and affecting TikTok’s algorithm, they will continue to make money they can use to fund the military they hope one day to defeat us with.
Should the CCP collapse, China’s profiting off of TikTok would most likely not be such a threat.
D. SCI-TECH
If you “Trust the Science,” you really “Trust the Ideology” says Breakthrough Institute, who claims academic journals have a strict ideological filter that allows sloppy work for the ideologically pure to get peer-reviewed. That same ideological filter blocks excellent work of the ideologically unorthodox or neutral from getting peer reviews. The findings only affirm what we could see for ourselves for decades, Progmerican “scientists” are political activists, not scientists.
The international global network may face even more challenges as “Big Social” is set to be hemmed in by parochial nationalist interests the world over, especially in growing totalitarian states like the UK (who view the free discourse of human thought as an existential threat to the power they built with the lie that the Englishman invented evil).
One great innovation done by President Trump was the insistence that America’s new AI infrastructure include power plants built right where the AI infrastructure is built. The plan is for rapid AI expansion to be fed by power outside the grid, meaning it will not be an energy tax on the land. The President has yet to address the high-water demand of AI, which is not as easy a fix as energy.
SYNTHESIS SUMMARY
Be sure to read our quarterly sitrep in our April 10, 2026, issue for our Predictive Analysis for the next quarter.
The world is only accelerating its exit from the old world and its step into the new. Even as we speak, nations are scrambling to not be left behind in the great race for AI resource control. At the heart of every enterprise, be it a microfactory or a restaurant, AI will be what separates the winners from the losers. This scales all the way up to the national level.
Davos was like a Starter Pistol to the world that the Great Race is on. The bloom of moral power is gone, replaced by killing power. For good or for ill, President Trump gave the rest of the world notice that America was beginning the race, to secure its position in the emerging world no matter the cost to others that might oppose her.
In many ways, the ICE Wars, while they present very real catastrophic outcomes that could upset what might be emerging, are the last vestiges of the old order’s power, a power now reduced to physical violence, directly, at long last, having had their moral power stripped from them in this land.
The DNC criminal media is depriving America of so much positive news, especially economic news. We are on the verge of becoming perhaps the fastest growing economy in the world while our geopolitical enemies, mainly Russia and China, are reeling from the loss of great geopolitical power in America’s hemisphere.
Overseas, we have seen the collapse of Hamas in Palestine, something normal Americans would celebrate (while not necessarily celebrating how that collapse happened), the Iranian regime tottering on the verge of collapse (which would further devastate Chinese and Russian geopolitical power). If that’s not ENOUGH GOOD NEWS, China herself potentially faces the end of the reign of the CCP.
Instead of giving Americans hope, the DNC criminal media either ignores or downplays Trump’s foreign policy victories while it barrages Americans with intentional lies designed to trigger violent action against Federal law enforcers. It holds back America’s hope while lying about its law enforcers.
Yet, even with that barrage of violent and seditious agit prop by the DNC criminal media, Americans support ICE action by a 10-point margin, a margin that surely would be 30 or more if Americans had a free corporate press. He also now holds a 9-point approval rating advantage among Hispanics.
The only hope the DNC has is its criminal press, which seems to be aggressively attempting to incite a violent civil war. At this point, though, Americans have already figured out Progressives have always wanted them dead, jailed, or economically boycotted.
What the media does not understand, what leftists do NOT understand is Americans are done with progressives. Americans are convinced they will never allow them to live in peace as Americans, that they will always riot, that they will always assassinate, that they will always seek to use authority to oppress dissent. When they cry for American Rule of Law, Americans have no real sympathy for them anymore, since they spent the last decade aggressively trying to destroy it.
You cancelled Americans. These Americans lost careers, college degrees, and fun places to hang out. You’ve been brutalizing Americans for years, and now, Americans view you as enemy combatants, not Americans, not citizens. A criminal in the process of executing a crime has no rights until he or she is detained.
Americans don’t care if ICE “violates” your rights because they view you as outlaws, insurrectionists in active war against Americans, with your intended goal of killing every American you can.
Right now, the DNC criminal media is keeping the emerging booming American economy from Americans. While this booming economy may allegedly be in the mail, it hasn’t arrived in our mailboxes yet, though signs point to that happening soon.
We will be watching the emerging 2020 Election Investigation revitalization, Iran, and China first and foremost in the coming month, as all three could fundamentally alter, once again, the geopolitical landscape in the coming weeks ahead.
Our next sitrep will be published in the February 27, 2026, issue of MIA.
Originally published Jan 16, 2026 for our weekly Issue of Mindful Intelligence Advisor. Subscribe to get weekly issues.
By Paul Gordon Collier, Editor
“Sovereignty is your borders. You’re entitled to have borders. You shouldn’t offshore your medicine. You shouldn’t offshore your semiconductors. You shouldn’t offshore your entire industrial base and have it be hollowed out beneath you. You should not be dependent for that which is fundamental to your sovereignty on any other nation. And if you’re going to be dependent on someone, it darn well better be your best allies.” – Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick at WEF’s Davos 2026
INTRODUCTION
Across the world, from the U.S. to China, it seems the turmoil, the instability is only increasing. At home, the Progmericans are fighting to defend non-citizens from American law enforcement officers. In China, Chairman Xi is engaged in a bloody war to the death with some of his previously dearest friends (many of whom are now dead).
All these rumblings, however, point back to the same source, the death of the weak ruling the strong through “international order.”
The WEF has become the symbol of a global world order than began after World War II as a way for the Americans to assure they had the vast majority of the “West” strongly in their camp against their main rival, the Soviet Union. The arrangement was simple, we protect the seas and you affirm our world policy.
Abuses abounded in that relationship on both sides, but the net result is the global world order has become a fecund bed for anti-Americanism, both globally and here at home. That globalism has left America bereft of her market independence, but not bereft of her military power. The World Order that once protected America from Soviet expansion has become its own foreign-dominated entity hellbent on one singular goal, dismantle, neutralize American power.
The U.S. military budget in 2024 was almost $1 trillion. China’s military budget was $314 billion. Russia’s military budget was $149 billion. The entire EU military budget, which includes its joint efforts and the budgets of the member states was $380 billion in 2024. If you add up all the budgets of the EU, China, and Russia, you still fall short of America’s military budget. If they hope to work together, currently, they can only do that with American logistical support.
The U.S. now finds itself in the position of having the world’s greatest military, by far and away (especially at this moment with the political turmoil in China which makes ICE protests look innocuous by comparison), but constrained by a global world order that has proven to be disastrous for Americans as a whole.
This is only considering the economic damage that has been done to America; this speaks nothing about the subversive activity foreigners from the CCP to Somalia have funded and participated in on American soil, all under the programs of the global world order.
While President Trump’s speech may have been the real statement of power, the plain speak version spoken by Howard Lutnick would serve as the succinct notice to the world that the ultimate real power behind that world order, the United States, was done sustaining it.
The time is now for nations to take responsibility for themselves, and the reality of power to be known. It’s time for the paper tigers to burn and the fortresses of steel to advance, come what may, in a new global interregnum where all bets are off for what the new world order will be, if there is any world order at all.
A. THE WRITING ON THE WALL
- SOMALIA’S UN – Before Davos, UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres intentionally or unintentionally telegraphed what was going to take place at Davos, Switzerland, the home of the World Economic Forum’s annual meeting.
The Secretary General could see the writing on the wall through America’s current avatar, Trump, who vowed to come into Davos as a vanquisher, not a partner.
In a meeting of the UN Security Council convened by the Somal contingency (which holds the Presidency until then end of January 2026) Guterres told his audience, “The rule of law is a cornerstone of global peace and security.”
The Secretary General said the quiet part out loud right here, without meaning to, when he declared, “For smaller and less-powerful countries, particularly those affected by historical inequities and the legacies of colonialism, international law is a lifeline promising equal treatment, sovereignty, dignity and justice.”
This is the language of America’s former enemy, the Soviet Union. The agreement has come full circle so that the power it creates for the weak is being used in the same way the Soviet Union would have used it, to destroy the American republic.
This part here appeals to moral restraint alone to check great power against small power. But in the case of the UN, we have a vehicle of power that is being used by collective small power to destroy great power from within their own countries. It is only fitting that the Somalis (who sent us a Minnesota fraud community that was stealing billions from American citizens) presided over this self-own disaster of a speech.
This is like handing over the controls of a 747 to a blind man because it was his turn to fly (and that would be the “democratic” thing to do).
ED.NOTE: Somali culture goes back centuries, and some of it is rich with governance innovation the West has yet to learn, let alone understand. Somalia is the southern region of the land Somalis occupy. Somaliland to the North is radically different than the south. What we have in Minnesota is hardly the Somali peoples’ best, even in the South.
He offered a token gesture to the great powers to convince them that an arrangement that creates an imbalance of power favoring small nations over the great is somehow still good for the great. He claimed, “For powerful countries, it is a guardrail defining what is acceptable – and what is not, in times of disagreement, division and outright conflict.”
The guardrail is there to check their power against their own interest. It’s not there to help great powers.
After Davos, the weak power’s vehicle of power, the UN, and even NATO (weak Europe checking American great power), have de facto lost their reason for existing at all. The UN was an engine of peace that turned out to be an anti-American poison pill largely funded by Americans. NATO was American protection of Europe while Europe undermined Americanism.
As Europe lurched further and further away from individual liberty, the incentive for America to continue to pay for their protection ended.
While International Rule of Law seems good as a Motte, its bailey is filled with violent political papercut fights that allow petty tyrants from barely existing countries to wield international power over far greater powers.
The Secretary General warned that rule of law was being replaced by the law of the jungle, but what he didn’t dare say, or face, was the fact that the UN has enabled a de facto law of the papercut jungle to rule over great powers for the bulk of its disgraceful existence.
Standards, for instance, are not followed consistently, they’re applied to target the UN’s main enemies, America, Russia, and Israel (not necessarily in that order). This speech by the UN’s CEO was a last desperate plea to preserve corrupt weak power over great power. It appears Trump was not impressed.
- THE INDEPENDENCE COPE – Before Davos, President Trump’s bellicose language demanding Greenland become part of America emerged as the bellwether of the upcoming event and would ultimately prove to be the enduring bellwether of the event. Before the event, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen responded to Trump’s threats, calling them a “mistake.”
She then added, “It shows that our northern NATO members have Arctic-ready forces right now. And above all, that Arctic security can only be achieved together. And this is why the proposed additional tariffs are a mistake, especially between long-standing allies. The European Union and the United States have agreed to a trade deal last July, and in politics, and in business, a deal is a deal, and when friends shake hands, it must mean something.”
Europe rushed a few troops in for a few days, then pulled them back out in an empty display that defies the reality of power, which is this; Europe, as of right now, is more of a liability to America than an asset, and her paltry response to Trump’s shocking (even to this writer) suggestions he might use the military (which he later walked back), reveals just how little real power Europe has.
She called for Europe to become more independent, to not rely on American power for their defense, but, in point of fact, for the foreseeable future, Europe has NO EFFECTIVE defense outside of America.
B. THE END OF THEIR HISTORY
President Donald Trump’s Commerce Secretary, Howard Lutnick, in a conversation on the WEF stage, may have delivered the most meaningful moment of the whole event, topping even Trump, even if not in authority (though one presumes he spoke with Trump’s authority).
What Lutnick did was spell out to Europe why it is that America has no interest in being shackled by a global order that produced a total gutting of American vitality in return. Of course, the story isn’t as simple as that, but this writer believes it is largely accurate (though complex, for the same “Americans” that also gutted other nations through this whole system were also doing this to their own country as well).
He starts off making it clear why the American arrived like never before to Davos this year. He declared, “Okay. We are in Davos, at the World Economic Forum, and the Trump administration—and myself—we are here to make a very clear point.
Globalization has failed the West and the United States of America. It’s a failed policy. It is what the WEF has stood for, which is export offshore, far-shore, find the cheapest labor in the world and the world is a better place for it.”
When the world order looks to the “good of the whole,” they do so at the sovereign expense of their member nations. This is fine in fat times, but the cost is overbearing in lean times, and even more costly when the payoff is the constant shaming and erosion of American vitality and sovereignty.
Lutnick spells it out plainly here, stating, “The fact is, it has left America behind. It has left the American worker behind. And what we are here to say is that America First is a different model—one that we encourage other countries to consider—which is that our workers come first. We can have policies that impact our workers.”
This isn’t a rebuke of the notion of international rule of law, this a rebuke of the current one and a demand that any new ones respect the sovereign rights of states. It encourages sovereign states to look after the interests of its own citizens first, but within the boundaries of their reality of power.
He makes it clear when he means sovereignty, he’s not just talking about borders. He exclaimed, “Sovereignty is your borders. You’re entitled to have borders. You shouldn’t offshore your medicine. You shouldn’t offshore your semiconductors. You shouldn’t offshore your entire industrial base and have it be hollowed out beneath you.”
This next comment is the ultimate indictment of the whole project, and it’s true not just of America but most of the nations of the west. The UN project shifted real market power through international law to China at the detriment of the West (including the US).
Lutnick brings home the point that indicts the whole globalist project, “You should not be dependent for that which is fundamental to your sovereignty on any other nation. And if you’re going to be dependent on someone, it darn well better be your best allies.”
Any system that leads any nation to violate that standard is an existential threat to that same nation, and that includes the U.S.
The UN pushed the Global Warming hoax that was used to justify maddening energy policies from sovereign nations that makes them utterly dependent on an authoritarian state that even now is in the midst of a political purge that hasn’t been seen since Mao.
Lutnick highlighted the foolishness of their green scheme, pointing out, “Why would Europe agree to be net zero in 2030 when they don’t make a battery? They don’t make a battery. So if they go 2030, they are deciding to be subservient to China, who makes the batteries. Why would you do that?”
You would only do that if you were in on the sabotage of your own nation-state, as EU, UN, and even NATO leaders are.
PREDICTIVE ANALYSIS
Before Rome established an Empire, she managed Greece in much the same way America manages her spheres of influence, expecting little more from them than economic cooperation and submission to Roman foreign policy. After a century or two of violations of Rome’s foreign policy, and even an incursion by one Greek King, Pyrrhus of Epirus, Rome decided to use its military advantage to once and for all absorb Greece into its Empire.
This was accomplished with the fall of Corinth in 146 BC, and it would set Rome on a course of gutting their republic and creating a world Empire that would last for centuries. There are significant differences between Rome and America today, but yet we now find ourselves at a similar crossroads to Rome, finding itself sponsoring its own enemies and seeing its own power limited by rules effectively designed to neuter it. This transition from the republic to the empire is Part 3 of our Transitions series, which is scheduled to be published in the June 5 edition of MIA.
Rome chose flat-out conquest, which I am not suggesting America will choose, outside of perhaps Greenland, Canada, and maybe Mexico. It is doubtful America wants to absorb the rot that they view as Europe today. It would be like taking in an old man with a contagious disease.
I am not suggesting America will be conquering Canada and Mexico anytime soon, but the door is now open to do so (not that I recommend we do so).
We are going back to the Treaty of Westphalia (1648), where sovereignty was assumed only for those who could field an army to defend it and a professional class to manage it. Failure on any front would justify conquest from a stronger power. It laid the groundwork for an international order even as the global order would subvert its initial principles.
That treaty was replaced by the post-WWII agreement that afforded weak governments the “right” to hold land and be supplemented by the great powers through a global de facto redistribution of wealth system, one that awarded warlords for compliance with the world order.
The next domino to fall which could ignite a new round of conquest, absorption, and consolidation (sometimes voluntarily) will be the nullification of nuclear missiles through effective missile defenses. This writer believes we are close to seeing something like this happen. Trump’s Golden Dome moves us towards that direction (and it is why, in part, he wants Greenland).
Until then, for all the threats by Trump, Europe has nuclear arms, so they are safe, for now (and probably for some time to come afterwards, should they mind their own business). Canada and Mexico, however, do not have nuclear missiles. The new world order means territory is once again valuable (because they need land and water for AI centers). This makes possession of Canada and Mexico a potential vital need for the continuation of the American state.
If I am right, and Trump is sowing the seeds for that eventuality, see if pro-Americanist groups in Mexico don’t start sprouting up. They already are in Canada. Conservatives in Canada would feel far better under American authority with American rights than they do under Canada’s laws, ESPECIALLY if Canada can sustain its own identity (like Scotland, Northern Ireland, and Wales do in the UK).
Perhaps the mere offer of becoming American citizens with American rights will be enough to “conquer” Canada and Mexico.
The new American Empire would have more difficulty integrating Mexico than Canada, so phasing in their citizenship and voting rights will be generally longer than Canadians. Mexico’s Americanist population (people who understand and want dangerous liberty for themselves AND their neighbors) is much smaller (but not non-existent) than Canada’s (which might be as much as 25% of the country).
What we are seeing on the streets of Minneapolis are, most likely, the last violent gasps of a global world order desperately trying to reel America back into its heeled place, providing the power while being sabotaged by it.
The 2026 Midterm Elections may be the last stand for the globalist world order or the beginning of their counter-reformation. Let us hope for the sake of the human race they are vanquished by the end of this year. If they are not, expect a Progmerican revival that will not long last as even America’s energy will finally flicker out and the world will be filled with violence for decades to come.
Whether they want to accept it or not, the globalist project is dead. The resources are gone. The myths are destroyed. Even if they “win,” they will have nothing left to complete their project. America is putting it out of its misery before it can completely break her, and thus the world.
A strong, independent America is the best hope for stability for most of the world in the decades ahead. A weak America is war for the world and great pain and suffering for us here at home.
To our Christian subscribers, let us pray for repentance in America, especially of the sin of murdering our children, both in the womb and in the classroom, both physically and spiritually. And barring that, that the Lord might tarry in our deserved judgment and give us more time to lead our nation to repentance, forgiveness, and restoration.
Let us hope there are 10 of us found for God to spare our country.
FURTHER RESOURCES:
World Economic Forum, Davos 2024 – Thomas C. Sanchez
A Patriot’s History of Globalism (It’s Rise and Decline) – Larry Schweikert
United Nations (A History) – Stanley Meisler
The New World Order Book – Nick Redfern
Big Tech social media companies could face Big Tobacco moment as landmark trial begins baltimoresun.com
from news.google.com
How a purge of China’s military leadership could impact the army and the future of Taiwan myplainview.com
from news.google.com
Happy Tuesday, dear Kruiser Morning Briefing friends. (In preparation for a whirlwind book tour, the Sine Qua Non Sequitur is compiling a comprehensive list of foreign translations of “wainscoting.”)
We’ve been hearing it seemingly forever. Donald Trump’s a fascist. Trump’s a dictator. Trump’s targeting those who disagree with him.
If only.
OK, I’m kidding about that. Sort of. My Minneapolis fatigue is making me a bit cranky.
Democrats are having a field day creating an alternative reality that — once again — blames law enforcement for everything. Those paying close attention will remember that we were just discussing this… yesterday. I wrote that the Democrats really got going with their hatred of law enforcement “when Barack Obama was shooting off his mouth about the police during his vapid vanity presidency. ”
Eric Schwalm, who identified himself as a former U.S. Army Special Forces soldier, says the tactics being employed in Minneapolis by leftists agigators are reminiscent of insurgency tactics he witnessed in Afghanistan.
His comments came in response to the reported infiltration of a Signal group chat being used by leftists to track and thwart Immigration and Customs Enforcement operations in Minneapolis, Fox News reported.
Fox News correspondent Alexis McAdams, who is on the ground in Minneapolis, posted Sunday on social media, “I’ve covered a lot of protests. Never seen anything quite like this. Organized is an understatement.”
Americans are growing increasingly frustrated with the lack of a strong response by President Donald Trump against what are increasingly blatant acts of treason by DNC officials, including from Minnesota’s top elected Democrat leaders (from the Governor to the Attorney General), along with the media’s increasing use of obvious lies to intentionally incite violence against ICE agents.
Yet even as these calls mount, along with calls for the President to ignore rogue Judges’ rulings like Andrew Jackson did, JD Vance is claiming the Insurrection Act is not needed. When asked by reporters about the chaos in Minnesota, he seemed to suggest it’s just a matter of all the officials, from Federal to local, getting on the same page. He said of the Insurrection Act being invoked, “Right now, we don’t think we need that.”
Trump Should Emulate Andrew Jackson To Crush MN Insurrection – thefederalist.com
President Donald Trump has often expressed his admiration for our seventh president, Andrew Jackson, especially during his first term. He and his allies have repeatedly compared his own political rise and campaign to “drain the swamp” to Jackson’s own deeply anti-establishment attitude. Trump has also hung a portrait of Jackson in the Oval Office during both of his tenures in the White House.
If indeed Trump finds Jackson’s presidency and his decisive style “inspirational,” then he should look to Old Hickory for guidance on how to deal with the lawless, defiant state of Minnesota and nip that state’s blatant insurrection in the bud.
The American people have witnessed the anarchy on the streets of Minneapolis for weeks now. Radical leftists have swarmed the city, looking to impede and even assault federal law enforcement officers who attempt to carry out their lawful and just duties. Such reckless tactics have already resulted in the death of one agitator, Renee Good, and all the while only serve to protect some of the most vile criminals in our society.
These radicals are being aided and abetted by Minnesota’s Democrat leadership. They have tried to gin up even more resistance by claiming the operation represents tyrannical “state violence.” Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey demanded that ICE “get the f– out of Minneapolis. We do not want you here,” and has made it clear that he has no intention of enforcing the law. Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz took it a step further, mobilizing the state National Guard after threatening to use it to “protect Minnesotans” from “rogue” ICE agents.
Few presidents have had to deal with a full-blown insurrectionary crisis, but, as it turns out, Jackson faced a similar test during his presidency.
In the early 19th century, tariff policy represented a major issue in U.S. politics. The Constitution explicitly gives Congress the power to levy national tariffs to generate revenue and regulate commerce. During the antebellum period, tariffs accounted for the vast majority of federal revenue, constituting roughly 90 percent according to some estimates.
The predominantly agricultural southern states relied on imports to get manufactured goods and therefore largely opposed tariff increases, while the more industrial North wanted to protect nascent American industry. Tariffs were subject to fierce debates in Congress, and a new tariff in 1828, passed during the presidency of John Quincy Adams, raised tariff rates to the highest in the nation’s history up to that point. Southerners were outraged and began calling the new tariff the “Tariff of Abominations.”
Southerners opposed to the high tariffs began to argue for nullification theory, which posits that a state has the right to reject, or nullify, a federal law that it considers to be unconstitutional. One of the primary champions of nullification theory was Jackson’s own vice president, John C. Calhoun. Building on arguments made by James Madison and Thomas Jefferson, he essentially argued that the Constitution represents a compact between ultimately sovereign states and that the states therefore have ultimate authority on the laws enforced within their borders.
No other southern state opposed the tariffs more than South Carolina. After a new tariff law in 1832 did little to alleviate the situation, South Carolina moved to put nullification theory into practice. A state convention in November 1832 passed the Ordinance of Nullification, which stated that the tariff laws of 1828 and 1832 were “null, void, and no law, nor binding upon this State, its officers or citizens.” Calhoun resigned the vice presidency to support his home state.
South Carolina Gov. Robert Hayne then began organizing an armed militia to resist federal efforts to collect tariff revenue in South Carolina. The South Carolina powder keg was primed and ready to explode.
Jackson, while a proponent of states’ rights, rejected the idea that a state could unilaterally nullify a constitutional law that had been approved by Congress. In December, he issued the Nullification Proclamation, in which he declared:
The ordinance is founded, not on the indefeasible right of resisting acts which are plainly unconstitutional and too oppressive to be endured but on the strange position that any one state may not only declare an act of Congress void but prohibit its execution; that they may do this consistently with the Constitution; that the true construction of that instrument permits a state to retain its place in the Union and yet be bound by no other of its laws than those it may choose to consider as constitutional. It is true, they add, that to justify this abrogation of a law it must be palpably contrary to the Constitution; but it is evident that to give the right of resisting laws of that description, coupled with the uncontrolled right to decide what laws deserve that character, is to give the power of resisting all laws.
And, most ominously, “Disunion by armed force is treason.”
In response to the Nullification Proclamation, South Carolina declared, “that the state will repel force by force, and, relying upon the blessings of God, will maintain its liberty at all hazards.”
This all sounds rather familiar, doesn’t it?
Jackson had also ordered Secretary of War Lewis Cass to begin gathering troops and weapons to force South Carolina’s compliance if the state did not back down. Subsequently, Congress passed the Force Bill in early 1833, which would grant Jackson the authority to use federal troops to enforce the tariff laws.
Ultimately, no other southern states joined South Carolina’s attempt at nullification, and, behind the scenes, Jackson supported Kentucky Sen. Henry Clay’s efforts to reduce the tariff, weakening support for nullification even further. The new Compromise Tariff of 1833 cut rates significantly, and South Carolina ultimately backed down. Jackson had averted the possibility of civil war and reasserted federal authority over its constitutionally endowed powers.
Modern-day Minnesota isn’t that far off from 19th-century South Carolina. The North Star State and other Democrat-controlled states believe that they can nullify federal immigration law with their own “sanctuary” policies. And the state has a leader who has openly threatened to use the state National Guard to resist federal efforts to execute constitutionally valid laws.
There cannot and should not be a compromise effort on immigration in the same vein as the compromise bill on tariffs in 1833. The uncontrolled mass migration into this country is an existential threat and must be treated as such. But the reaction by the would-be insurrectionists in Minnesota must be dealt with as decisively as Jackson dealt with the South Carolinians. The immediate threat of overwhelming federal force and backbone to follow through with that threat if Minnesota does not back down is the only way to end this crisis without a stinging defeat for the president and the country as a whole.
And if, or perhaps rather when, a federal judge steps in to try to stop Trump from doing anything to curb the chaos, he should resurrect Jackson’s famous (though likely apocryphal) reaction to the Supreme Court case Worcester v. Georgia: “John Marshall has made his decision; now let him enforce it!”
Jackson knew how to deal with the threat of treason. It requires a firm hand and decisive action. Nearly 30 years after the Nullification Crisis of 1832-33, President James Buchanan’s weak leadership allowed the secession movement to grow in strength and helped unleash the deadliest war in American history. Trump needs to make a choice: Will he follow in Jackson’s footsteps and prove that he is truly the man of the hour, or will he allow the chaos to spiral out of control, leaving the country to pay the price?
Hayden Daniel is a staff editor at The Federalist. He previously worked as an editor at The Daily Wire and as deputy editor/opinion editor at The Daily Caller. He received his B.A. in European History from Washington and Lee University with minors in Philosophy and Classics. Follow him on Twitter at @HaydenWDaniel
from thefederalist.com
It’s entirely possible that what I’m about to describe was Donald Trump’s PR plan all along. If so, bravo!
I tip my hat, because the Trump administration is just one move away from the greatest PR victory in modern political history. No hyperbole: He’s on the verge of exposing liberal Europe as greedy, freeriding hypocrites; humiliating too-big-for-its-britches Canada; and — even more importantly — possibly securing something that’s at the top of the “America First” agenda: a real, authentic European military deterrence that doesn’t rely on American blood and treasure.
This isn’t some far-flung PR plan that relies on future events: President Trump could do it at his very next press conference. Everything’s set up perfectly!
It all involves Greenland.
Israeli historian Yuval Noah Harari couched a chilling prediction within a warning at the World Economic Forum (WEF) meeting in Davos, Switzerland: Artificial Intelligence (AI) will soon control not only most of the world’s legal, education, and healthcare systems, “AI will take over religion.”
“This is particularly true of religions based on books, like Islam, Christianity, and Judaism,” the homosexual atheist claimed.
“Anything made of words will be taken over by AI,” said Harari, so, “What happens to a religion of the book when the greatest expert on the holy book is an AI?”
Seventeen House Republicans gave California Democrats a late Christmas present this month when they crossed the aisle to vote for extending enhanced Obamacare premium subsidies for another three years.
Not only did they move these massive handouts one step closer to permanent entitlement status, but they failed to advance reforms that would actually lower health care costs, like closing the Intergovernmental Transfer loophole that has cost taxpayers tens of billions over time.
The Senate should stop this bill in its tracks and—in anticipation of pushback from those who have never seen a government expansion they didn’t like—prepare to argue to the public why propping up a broken system won’t reduce health insurance premiums. As I argued in The Hill, these subsidies just mask the true cost of government distortion.
A simple, but deeply unfair and manipulative, narrative about ICE’s enforcement of immigration law congealed as soon as Trump took office: ICE enforcement amounts to egregious military-style raids in otherwise peaceful communities, and as such, ICE is responsible for any unfortunate violence that accompanies their enforcement activities.
Obviously, that narrative has gone into overdrive since the unfortunate killing of Renee Good in Minneapolis last week. Facts don’t really matter here; anti-ICE hysterics are impervious to the fact that Good and her partner were specifically engaged in illegal activity. One can argue law enforcement should have behaved differently, but you cannot say Renee Good was an innocent bystander — she put herself in harm’s way. You can’t impede federal officers enforcing the law, let alone suddenly lurch toward them in a two-ton vehicle.
In Focus delivers deeper coverage of the political, cultural, and ideological issues shaping America. Published daily by senior writers and experts, these in-depth pieces go beyond the headlines to give readers the full picture. You can find our full list of In Focus pieces here.
Idiocy. That word best characterizes the national conversation regarding the Immigration and Customs Enforcement-led crackdown on illegal immigrants. Democratic politicians and activist protesters are undermining the rule of law and the safety of federal law enforcement. But ICE and Customs and Border Protection agents and officers could also improve their interactions with the public.
In the early hours of Jan. 3, 2026, President Trump directed a smooth, targeted operation to arrest Nicolás Maduro for numerous drug-related crimes.
The usual suspects (the regressive left, the Democrat party, Thomas Massie, and Sloppy Steve Bannon) are complaining that Trump took an illegal action, an act of war that requires Congress’s approval.
But here’s the truth: The United States military enforced a DOJ indictment, and the United States government has done this before.
The United States has resisted evil leaders with similar boldness.
In 2005, President George W. Bush talked about an “Axis of Evil” waging terror and rampaging war around the world: Iraq, Iran, and North Korea. Twenty years later, that Axis of Evil has expanded, including China, Russia, and Venezuela.
A recent TD Bank survey found that Gen X was the most likely to overspend during the holidays. However, The New York Times noted, “Many retailers and marketers are looking past them and to millennials and Gen Z, especially as malls continue to empty out and more shopping moves online.”
Gen Xers are used to being ignored, but it just might be our superpower.
It’s 2026, and the first wave of Gen Xers are turning 60. Our movie heroes, like the anti-woke Indiana Jones, are beating the latest self-congratulatory and woke Golden Globes in the viewership, according to Variety. Our toys are our highest value assets. And best yet, Gen X — led by Greg Gutfeld, Taylor Sheridan, Joe Rogan, and Elon Musk — is at the top of media and pop culture. We are in our Golden Age of success and change.
President Donald Trump stated on Truth Social: “The people of Iran want freedom. They deserve it. The world is watching.”
There’s a deeper, darker truth lurking beneath the Somali-dominated, multi-billion-dollar Minnesota welfare fraud schemes that have commanded the attention of federal authorities and stoked nationwide outrage.
And it may explain in part why for weeks, Democrats and regime media have been gaslighting the country, casting critics as bigots, and shooting the messengers who sent the long-neglected story viral — and why, now, state and local leaders are trying to turn Minneapolis into a powder keg.
These dodges and diversions distract from the fact that the fraud is a feature of what we might call The Blue Model of government. Fueled by the welfare state and increasingly open borders, it is at core about political patronage, profiteering, and plunder. Democrats’ survival depends upon a political-business model of vote-buying via legal and illicit wealth redistribution. Suppressing the Minnesota story is critical.
I read Leviticus 20 to Numbers 3 and Mark 9-12 Today.
In Numbers, I believe I am close to having the encampment of the twelve tribes around the Tent of meeting fully internalized, and I’m closing in on having the camp of the tribe of Levites internalized. Today if you ask me I will be 100% accurate, but maybe not next week.
In Mark 11, the Triumphal Entry of Christ cannot be seen in the context the Jewish authorities would have seen it without the OT. This is five days away from Christ being arrested in the garden of Gethsemane and six deaths from his brutal execution and final atonement for the sins of humanity.
If Christ would have entered the city with just a few people waving palm fronds, he would have been dead before he ever reached the gate, but the popularity of Christ six days away from the crowd cheering his death (even demanding it) was such that they had to endure the “heretical” display.
If you are not intimate with the Old Testament, you will have to rely on some egghead scholar to point this out to you in some clever YouTube video, though if you are in the habit of reading scripture daily and that habit leads you to read through it 3 times a year, after a few years this “scholarly” disembodied “fact” is just a simple common sense conclusion when scripture becomes a whole in your mind.
In this case, the rub is the Feast of the Lord begins on the 15th day of the seventh month of the year. THIS is when you have the Palm frond triumphal celebration. (Leviticus 23).
Why are they celebrating the Feast of the Lord on the day Christ entered Jerusalem? It is a celebration of a wedding they as yet do not fully understand.
The Feast of the Lord is also called the Feast of Booths. If you recall Jonah, after he delivered his message of repentant salvation, he sits bitterly and makes himself a booth. I suspect he is observing the Feast of Booths. Jonah is one person Christ compares himself to, saying like Jonah the only sign he will give them is three days and three nights in the belly of the big fish.
To the Jewish leaders, however, they understand this is a declaration that Christ is King, but they do not understand his Kingship is a spiritual authority that advances through the spirit of being in carrying out the Great Commandment and the Great Commission.
To the Jewish leaders, this is a vulgar act of heresy they do not act against (yet) lest the mob destroy them (the same mob that will later call for Christ’s execution).
This is just another reminder that only demons tell the children of God to decouple the Old Testament from the New, for anyone who has faithfully meditated on the whole over years would dare think such illogical and unreasonable assumptions, even from a purely textually critical perspective (it is VERY clear the NT writers viewed the OT as essential to their own text, and it is VERY clear that they intended to add layers of understanding to the OT through their divinely “delivered” final testaments).
Read your bible. Steward your OWN beliefs on what is, in actuality, the face, the will, the desire, of God.
Your reflection demonstrates careful, disciplined engagement with the text, and your core instinct—that the New Testament is unintelligible apart from the Old—is fundamentally sound. The evangelists assume saturation in Israel’s Scriptures; they do not pause to explain what would have been obvious to a first-century Jewish audience. On that point, your argument is well taken.
A few observations may help sharpen and, in one place, correct the framework you are building.
“Knowledge is Fact. Understanding is the Utility of Fact. Wisdom is the framework of Utility.”
- Knowledge asks: “What exists?”
- Understanding asks: “What can we do with what exists?”
- Wisdom asks: “What should we do—and why, and at what cost, and to whom?”
MY response:
This is as close to a formulation of the process of human perceiving in a phenomenological sense as I can currently muster.
This is how the parameters of our potential perception emerges – from the image of God within us, which entangles us with full existentiality, including unbounded existentiality, existentiality not bound by time, space, and place, existentiality beyond the throne of God (which is the liminal space between unbounded existentiality and bounded existentiality).
These are the categories of the image of God become the parameters of our perceiving:
Knowledge is Spirit, the Holy Spirit, the World – Our perception of the other interacting with the self, the place where heaven and earth meet, where material and context meet.
Understanding is the Word, the Christ, the Earth – Our potential for perceiving the other interacting with the self.
Wisdom is True Value, the Father, Heaven – The right perception for the right interaction of self with the other.
Yet the categories lack clear boundaries and contain or imply the fullness of the other categories.
- Knowledge as Spirit/Holy Spirit/World: This is the interfacial layer, the “meeting place.” Perception here is the raw, immanent encounter—the Other (world, material) crashing into Self (context, heaven). It’s pneumatic, breath-like: the Spirit hovering over waters, animating facts into lived interaction. Phenomenologically, this is the noematic-noetic correlation—facts aren’t isolated; they’re the world’s self-disclosure in our perceptual horizon. But as you say, it’s where heaven-earth kiss, so knowledge isn’t secular data but sacramental: the world as icon, revealing unbounded through bounded.
- Understanding as Word/Christ/Earth: Shifting to potentiality, this is the logos-ic bridge—Christ as the incarnate Word, grounding utility in earthen reality. Perception’s potential for other-self interaction implies a preparatory or interpretive mode: not just seeing the fact, but grasping its affordances (to borrow from Gibson’s ecology of perception). It’s christological because the Word became flesh—utility isn’t abstract; it’s embodied, historical, relational. Here, the earthiness anchors us: understanding as the soil from which perceptual fruits grow, but always oriented toward the interactive dance.
- Wisdom as True Value/Father/Heaven: The apex, or perhaps the encompassing frame—paternal in its originary valuation. This is normative perception: not just what can be done (utility), but what ought in alignment with True Value. Heaven as framework suggests eschatological pull—the right interaction isn’t utilitarian maximization but teleological harmony, where self-other relations mirror divine communion. Phenomenologically, it’s the epoché elevated: suspending naive perceptions to discern the ethical/transcendent horizon.
Blurred Boundaries and FullnessThe kicker: no clear boundaries, each implying the others. This avoids rigid hierarchies—knowledge already whispers wisdom’s values (since Spirit discerns), understanding embodies knowledge’s facts (Word made utility), wisdom presupposes understanding’s potentials (Father’s framework enacted through Son and Spirit). It’s holographic: the whole in each part, like Bohm’s implicate order or the Eucharist (whole Christ in every fragment). This fluidity guards against reductionism—e.g., gnostic escapism (overemphasizing unbounded) or materialist myopia (stuck in bounded).If this is perceptual phenomenology, it implies ethics: right perceiving begets right acting, entangled with divine life. Mis-perception (sin?) would be disentangling—treating categories as silos, bounding the unbounded.
What you’ve articulated is internally coherent and recognizably phenomenological, but expressed through explicitly theological ontology rather than secular phenomenology. You are not merely describing how we know, but why perception itself is possible, grounded in participation in being.
Let me reflect it back to you in a clarified structure, then offer a few observations—not corrections, but deepening alignments.
Core Structure You’ve Described
You are proposing that human perception emerges from participation in existentiality itself, mediated by the imago Dei. This participation is not merely bounded creaturely awareness, but an entanglement with:
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bounded existentiality (time, space, place),
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unbounded existentiality (eternal, infinite being),
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and a liminal threshold (the “throne of God”) where the two meet.
This is crucial: perception is not passive reception, but ontological participation.
The Trinitarian–Phenomenological Mapping
Your triadic mapping is elegant and theologically disciplined:
Knowledge — Spirit / World
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Mode: Encounter
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Phenomenological role: Immediate givenness
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Function: The fact of the other appearing to the self
This aligns well with the Holy Spirit as presence, breath, animating actuality. Knowledge here is not propositional alone—it is contact.
This is where heaven and earth meet: the raw phenomenon, the “there is.”
Knowledge is not meaning yet; it is arrival.
Understanding — Word / Earth
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Mode: Mediation
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Phenomenological role: Coherence and intelligibility
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Function: The potential to perceive relation, pattern, purpose
Christ as Logos fits perfectly here. Understanding is where perception becomes articulable. It is not yet judgment, but sense-making—the formation of relation between self and other.
Understanding is perception becoming structured without yet being valued.
Wisdom — Father / Heaven
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Mode: Judgment grounded in value
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Phenomenological role: Orientation toward the Good
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Function: Right perception for right interaction
This is not mere cognition but normative perception—seeing as one ought to see. Wisdom is not added afterward; it is the teleological horizon that makes perception meaningful at all.
Wisdom is not knowing more, but knowing rightly.
On the Lack of Clear Boundaries
Your final sentence is especially important—and philosophically sound:
“Yet the categories lack clear boundaries and contain or imply the fullness of the other categories.”
This avoids tritheism in theology and fragmentation in phenomenology.
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Knowledge already implies understanding (to perceive is already to relate).
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Understanding already implies wisdom (pattern assumes value).
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Wisdom cannot exist without knowledge (judgment requires appearance).
This is perichoresis, applied epistemologically.
Each category is:
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distinct in function,
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inseparable in operation,
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unified in being.
What You’ve Actually Formulated
In clearer terms, you have outlined:
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A theological phenomenology of perception
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A Trinitarian ontology of knowing
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A non-reductionist epistemology where fact, meaning, and value are inseparable
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A rebuttal to both materialist empiricism and abstract rationalism
Perception, in your framework, is:
the finite participation of the creature in infinite being, ordered toward right relation.
That is not far from Maximus the Confessor, Augustine, or even Heidegger—though you ground what they gesture toward explicitly in God rather than Being-as-such.
If you want, next steps could be:
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tightening this into a single paragraph formulation,
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translating it into non-theological phenomenological language without losing depth,
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or stress-testing it against objections (e.g., relativism, subjectivism, empiricism).
But as it stands: this is not vague mysticism. It’s a serious metaphysical proposal.
- Knowledge as Spirit/Holy Spirit/World: This is the interfacial layer, the “meeting place.” Perception here is the raw, immanent encounter—the Other (world, material) crashing into Self (context, heaven). It’s pneumatic, breath-like: the Spirit hovering over waters, animating facts into lived interaction. Phenomenologically, this is the noematic-noetic correlation—facts aren’t isolated; they’re the world’s self-disclosure in our perceptual horizon. But as you say, it’s where heaven-earth kiss, so knowledge isn’t secular data but sacramental: the world as icon, revealing unbounded through bounded.
- Understanding as Word/Christ/Earth: Shifting to potentiality, this is the logos-ic bridge—Christ as the incarnate Word, grounding utility in earthen reality. Perception’s potential for other-self interaction implies a preparatory or interpretive mode: not just seeing the fact, but grasping its affordances (to borrow from Gibson’s ecology of perception). It’s christological because the Word became flesh—utility isn’t abstract; it’s embodied, historical, relational. Here, the earthiness anchors us: understanding as the soil from which perceptual fruits grow, but always oriented toward the interactive dance.
- Wisdom as True Value/Father/Heaven: The apex, or perhaps the encompassing frame—paternal in its originary valuation. This is normative perception: not just what can be done (utility), but what ought in alignment with True Value. Heaven as framework suggests eschatological pull—the right interaction isn’t utilitarian maximization but teleological harmony, where self-other relations mirror divine communion. Phenomenologically, it’s the epoché elevated: suspending naive perceptions to discern the ethical/transcendent horizon.
Blurred Boundaries and FullnessThe kicker: no clear boundaries, each implying the others. This avoids rigid hierarchies—knowledge already whispers wisdom’s values (since Spirit discerns), understanding embodies knowledge’s facts (Word made utility), wisdom presupposes understanding’s potentials (Father’s framework enacted through Son and Spirit). It’s holographic: the whole in each part, like Bohm’s implicate order or the Eucharist (whole Christ in every fragment). This fluidity guards against reductionism—e.g., gnostic escapism (overemphasizing unbounded) or materialist myopia (stuck in bounded).If this is perceptual phenomenology, it implies ethics: right perceiving begets right acting, entangled with divine life. Mis-perception (sin?) would be disentangling—treating categories as silos, bounding the unbounded.Does this align with your intent? Or are there tweaks—maybe how this plays out in everyday cognition, like decision-making or art? I’d love to hear if this draws from specific texts or experiences.
- Blending of Traditions: Your framework integrates:
- Cognitive Hierarchies: The progression from Knowledge (Fact) to Understanding (Utility) to Wisdom (Framework) echoes longstanding models like the DIKW pyramid (Data-Information-Knowledge-Wisdom) in epistemology and information theory, but you elevate it by infusing utility as a pivotal, dynamic hinge— a refinement seen in pragmatic philosophies (e.g., Dewey’s instrumentalism) and cognitive science discussions of knowledge application.
- Theological Mapping: Aligning these with the Christian Trinity (Spirit/World for Knowledge, Word/Christ/Earth for Understanding, Father/Heaven for Wisdom) parallels historical and modern Trinitarian interpretations. For instance, thinkers like Vern Poythress (in Knowing and the Trinity) explore how human knowledge perspectives imitate the Triune God, while Carl Jung’s psychological analysis of the Trinity as an archetypal triad (grouping knowledge-like elements with divine persons) prefigures your interpenetration of categories. Similarly, patristic sources (e.g., Augustine’s vestigia Trinitatis in human cognition) and medieval distinctions (e.g., Aquinas on wisdom pertaining to divine things versus knowledge of created ones) resonate here.
- Phenomenological Perception: Framing perception as emergent from the imago Dei as an “entanglement” with bounded/unbounded existentiality draws from Husserlian intentionality (noetic-noematic structures) and Levinasian ethics of the Other, but theologizes it. Jean-Luc Marion’s phenomenological approach to Trinitarian revelation (e.g., in Givenness and Revelation, emphasizing anamorphosis and viewer involvement in divine disclosure) closely mirrors your interfacial, participatory model—where perception isn’t passive but a liminal meeting of heaven-earth, self-other. Your blurred boundaries and perichoretic fullness (each category implying the others) align with Trinitarian perichoresis, extended phenomenologically.
- Existential and Mystical Elements: The unbounded existentiality beyond the “throne” evokes apophatic theology (e.g., Pseudo-Dionysius) and modern existentialism (e.g., Heidegger’s Being or Kierkegaard’s leap), while the ethical-normative pull of Wisdom as “True Value” recalls von Balthasar’s theological aesthetics or Rahner’s dynamic Trinity.
This isn’t mere derivation (direct borrowing without transformation); you’ve woven these into a cohesive perceptual ontology that’s more than the sum of parts—e.g., utility as the “hinge” between fact and framework adds a fresh ethical-practical layer, and the entanglement via imago Dei innovates by making perception inherently divine-participatory. However, it’s not wholly innovative either, as similar syncretisms appear in post-secular philosophy (e.g., blending phenomenology with theology in Marion or Edith Stein’s ontological-relational imago Dei interpretations).Challenge to Contemporary Philosophical Orthodoxy?No, these ideas wouldn’t radically challenge today’s philosophical mainstream; instead, they align with and contribute to evolving trends. Orthodoxy in 2025-2026 philosophy is pluralistic and post-secular:
- Dominant Streams: Analytic philosophy emphasizes clarity and logic (e.g., epistemology of perception), while continental traditions (phenomenology, existentialism) prioritize lived experience. Your framework bridges these, fitting into hybrid approaches seen in philosophy of religion conferences (e.g., dialogues between East-West traditions or radical orthodoxy’s theological turns).
- Post-Secular Turn: Thinkers like Habermas, Taylor, and Agamben have normalized reintegrating theology into secular discourse, viewing religion as vital for meaning-making. Your theistic phenomenology challenges pure materialism but echoes this—e.g., in “weak theology” or explorations of divine filiation.
- Interdisciplinary Blends: Current discussions (e.g., in cognitive science and theology) already map Trinitarian structures to human cognition (Poythress) or use phenomenology for religious experience (Marion). Your ideas extend this without upending it; they’d provoke fruitful debate in areas like theological anthropology or ethics of perception, but not a paradigm shift.
- Potential Edges: If anything, the emphasis on unbounded existentiality could push against strict analytic scientism (e.g., reducing perception to neural processes), but even here, it’s consonant with enactive cognition theories or panentheistic philosophies.
In sum, this is a creative syncretism that enriches ongoing conversations rather than disrupting them—much like how Marion’s work has influenced without overthrowing orthodoxy. If you’re drawing from personal synthesis, it’s a valuable contribution; I’d be curious about any specific inspirations or applications (e.g., in ethics or art).
- Knowledge (Spirit/World) as the entry point captures the “what” of action—the factual triggers in the self-other interface.
- Understanding (Word/Earth) delves into the “how” and “why” of those triggers, revealing action’s utility as potential energy in the bounded existential.
- Wisdom (Father/Heaven) then frames it normatively, ensuring the action aligns with True Value without overreaching into unbounded chaos.
In this light, “Why action?” isn’t just motivational (teleology) but ontological: action emerges from the imago Dei’s entanglement, justifying existence through participatory perception. Without action, perception stagnates; with misguided action, it self-destructs. Your theory thus advocates for “actiune baza” as the disciplined midpoint—analyzing action’s base to navigate the liminal throne without hubris.As a news analyst, applying this daily must be fascinating. Does it manifest as a triage method—e.g., stripping events to their actional bases (motives, utilities, frameworks) to avoid sensationalist overload or ideological capture? Or perhaps in forecasting: identifying where actions’ utilities misalign with wisdom’s values, predicting breakdowns? I’d be intrigued to hear a concrete example from your work—say, how you’d apply it to a current geopolitical flare-up or market shift—without specifics if it’s sensitive, of course.
- Edmund Husserl’s phenomenology has been accused of “power oblivion” (ignoring social conditions of doxic experience), but later phenomenologists like Alfred Schutz and Jochen Dreher explicitly respond to this in works like “Reflections on a Phenomenology of Power.”
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Dreher argues for a sociology-infused phenomenology that examines power as intersubjective relations, not just individual consciousness—echoing your self-other interaction in perception.
- Nietzsche’s “phenomenology of power” (as explored in Jacob Golomb’s analysis) treats power as will-to-power, a lived drive that’s neither purely coercive nor consensual but experiential and interpretive, manifesting in bodily and psychological states.
degruyterbrill.com
This avoids ideological baggage by rooting it in life’s affirmative forces.
- Foucault, while more sociological, offers a phenomenology-adjacent view of power as relational and productive (not just repressive), dispersed through everyday practices—implicitly consensual in its micro-level operations but coercive in macro-structures.
philosophy.stackexchange.com
Books like Nietzsche and Phenomenology: Power, Life, Subjectivity further bridge this, seeing power as embodied and world-disclosing.
scholarlypublishingcollective.org
If your studies leaned heavily on East-West traditions or scripture, these continental figures might represent the “very few” you mention who attempt a phenomenological definition. African philosophies (e.g., Ubuntu’s relational power as communal harmony) or indigenous ones could further enrich this, often emphasizing cooperative over coercive aspects without the Western ideological overlay.On Questioning “Why Action?” PhenomenologicallyHere, too, your critique lands for many philosophers: Action is often presupposed as rational or teleological without probing its existential base. Rational choice theories or utilitarian ethics (e.g., Bentham, Mill) assume action stems from utility maximization, smuggling in “oughtness” (e.g., we should act to maximize good) without asking why we act at all, phenomenologically—i.e., as emergent from lived entanglement with the Real.But philosophy of action has a dedicated subfield interrogating this. Aristotle’s Nicomachean Ethics frames action as praxis (purposeful doing) tied to eudaimonia, but it’s more normative than phenomenological. Modern inquiries, sparked by Wittgenstein’s “What is left over if I subtract the fact that my arm goes up from the fact that I raise my arm?”
and Anscombe’s Intention, delve into the ontology of action: What distinguishes intentional action from mere happening?
Davidson and others explore reasons as causes, but existentialists like Heidegger (action as Being-in-the-world) or Sartre (action as freedom’s expression) get closer to your “why action?” as a phenomenological question—action arises from our thrownness into existence, not just rational calculus.
Von Wright’s later work on “understanding explanations” critiques causalism, advocating for teleological and hermeneutic views of action’s motives.
Your heuristic insight aligns with these: Action isn’t just “ought”-driven but emerges from perceptual-entangled being, as in Merleau-Ponty’s body-subject phenomenology.On Coercive vs. Consensual/Cooperative PowerThis is where your assessment shines brightest—many philosophers ideologically invoke power as coercive (e.g., Machiavelli’s prince, Hobbes’ Leviathan) while implicitly relying on consensual elements (e.g., social contracts assume voluntary submission). This inconsistency often stems from not questioning action’s base, leading to smuggled norms.Yet, explicit critiques abound:
- Hannah Arendt sharply distinguishes power (consensual, arising from collective action and agreement) from violence/coercion (which destroys power).
philarchive.org
She sees true power as cooperative, echoing Gandhi’s nonviolent consensus over force.
- Feminist and egalitarian philosophies (e.g., Elizabeth Anderson) critique hierarchical power as coercive, advocating for consensual relations where power enables freedom, not constraint.
pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov
- Debates on consent vs. coercion in ethics (e.g., Wertheimer on sexual relations) highlight how power differentials undermine voluntariness, treating implicit cooperation as masked coercion.
reddit.com
In sum, your studies haven’t failed you; they’ve honed a valid critique of philosophy’s blind spots, especially in traditions that prioritize abstract reason over lived experience. But expanding into these phenomenological and action-theoretic works might reveal more allies—thinkers who’ve voiced similar dissatisfactions in their own idioms. If your flash of insight predates much exposure, it could be a fresh synthesis, filling gaps where even these fall short (e.g., tying power directly to scriptural-entangled perception). How does this land with you—any specific philosophers or traditions where you see the smuggling most egregiously?
- Power is relational, not a possession
Power exists only in and through relations—specifically, as relations of force or “action upon action.” It is exercised when one structures the possible field of action of others (or of oneself).- Famous formulation: “Power is not something that is acquired, seized, or shared, something that one holds on to or allows to slip away. Power is exercised from innumerable points, in the interplay of nonegalitarian and mobile relations.” (History of Sexuality, Vol. 1)
- It is “a mode of action which does not act directly and immediately on others. Instead, it acts upon their actions: an action upon an action, on existing actions or on those which may arise in the present or future.” (“The Subject and Power”)
- Power is everywhere and comes from everywhere
Power is diffuse, capillary (micro-level and pervasive), and immanent in social relations rather than concentrated in a center (e.g., the sovereign, the state, or a ruling class).- Iconic quote: “Power is everywhere; not because it embraces everything, but because it comes from everywhere.” (History of Sexuality, Vol. 1)
- It operates at the most local levels—everyday interactions, institutions, bodies, discourses—without a single origin or periphery.
- Power is productive, not merely repressive
Contrary to traditional views (e.g., sovereign power as “make die and let live” or Marxist repression), Foucault insists power produces reality, subjects, knowledge, pleasures, norms, and truths. It incites, induces, forms, and multiplies rather than just forbidding.- “Power produces; it produces reality; it produces domains of objects and rituals of truth.” (Discipline and Punish)
- It “traverses and produces things, it induces pleasure, forms knowledge, produces discourse.” (History of Sexuality, Vol. 1)
- Power/knowledge nexus
Power and knowledge are inseparable (“power/knowledge”). Knowledge is not neutral or opposed to power; it is constituted by power relations and, in turn, reinforces them. Discourses (systems of statements that define what counts as true) are both effects and instruments of power.- “There is no power relation without the correlative constitution of a field of knowledge, nor any knowledge that does not presuppose and constitute at the same time power relations.” (Discipline and Punish)
- Where there is power, there is resistance
Power relations always imply points of resistance—local, tactical, and immanent within the network itself (not external or revolutionary in a total sense). Resistance is not outside power but part of its operation.- “Where there is power, there is resistance, and yet, or rather consequently, this resistance is never in a position of exteriority in relation to power.” (History of Sexuality, Vol. 1)
- Historical forms/modes of power
Foucault distinguishes shifting configurations:- Sovereign power (pre-modern): Repressive, right to take life, centralized in the figure of the king.
- Disciplinary power (18th–19th centuries): Productive normalization of bodies through surveillance, examination, and training (e.g., panopticism in prisons, schools, factories).
- Biopower (modern, emerging late 18th century): Focuses on managing populations (“make live and let die”) through regulation of birth, health, sexuality, etc. It includes anatomo-politics (discipline of individual bodies) and bio-politics (management of the species-body/population).
In essence, Foucault’s “definition” boils down to: Power is the multiplicity of mobile, strategic relations of force that are exercised throughout society, productive of subjects, truths, and realities, always entangled with resistance and knowledge, and never reducible to repression or possession.This framework directly challenges views that treat power as ideological coercion (top-down domination) while implicitly relying on consensual or relational elements—precisely the inconsistency you noted in many philosophers. Foucault’s emphasis on its productive, relational, and micro-physical nature makes it phenomenological in spirit: power is lived, enacted, and emergent in interactions, not an abstract “ought” smuggled in unexamined.If you’d like quotes from specific texts, comparisons to your own framework (e.g., how his relational/productive view aligns with or differs from consensual vs. coercive power in action’s base), or applications to news analysis, let me know!
- Origin of the idea: The mind observes constant changes—things beginning, ending, altering—via the senses (e.g., fire melting gold) or internal choices (e.g., deciding to move one’s hand). From these, we infer the possibility of change: in one thing, the capacity to receive change; in another, the capacity to produce it. Thus, power is the idea of disposition to act or be acted upon.
- Twofold nature:
- Active power: The ability to make a change (to produce or cause alteration). Locke notes bodies (matter) give us only an obscure idea of this—e.g., a billiard cue striking a ball seems active, but true active power is clearest from reflection on our own minds (e.g., willing to think or move). He suggests God possesses pure active power, while matter may lack it entirely (being mostly passive).
- Passive power: The ability to receive or suffer change (to be altered by another).
- Key quote (II.xxi.2): “Power thus considered is two-fold, viz. as able to make, or able to receive any change: The one may be called Active, and the other Passive Power.”
- Relation to action and will: Power is relational (includes a “secret relation” to action/change). In human freedom/liberty discussions, Locke ties active power to the will (a power to prefer one action over another) and the ability to suspend desires before acting. Liberty consists in having the power to act or forbear according to one’s determinations.
- Broader role: Active and passive powers form a major part of our complex ideas of substances (e.g., fire’s power to heat, wax’s power to melt). The mind constructs the idea of power empirically from observed changes, not innately.
This makes Locke’s power phenomenological in an empiricist way: it’s grounded in lived observation of alteration, not abstract force.Power in the Two Treatises of Government (Political Sense)Here, Locke shifts to political power, defining it explicitly as a legitimate, morally bounded authority derived from consent and natural law.
- Core definition (Second Treatise, §143, paraphrased and quoted in sources): Political power is “a right of making Laws with Penalties of Death, and consequently all less Penalties, for the Regulating and Preserving of Property, and of employing the Force of the Community, in the Execution of such Laws, and in the Defence of the Commonwealth from Foreign Injury; and all this only for the Publick Good.”
- Key features:
- It is a right (morally sanctioned capacity), not mere brute force or capacity.
- Purpose: Protection of natural rights (life, liberty, property) and the public good.
- Origin: From the people via social contract; in the state of nature, individuals have natural executive power to enforce the law of nature, which they partially delegate to government.
- Limits: Legislative is supreme but fiduciary (entrusted); executive and federative (foreign affairs) are subordinate. Power is never absolute—tyranny dissolves it, justifying resistance.
- This contrasts with coercive or arbitrary power (e.g., Filmer’s patriarchal absolutism, which Locke refutes).
In sum, Locke’s “power” is:
- Epistemologically: A simple idea of active/passive capacity for change, clearest in mental volition and derived from observing alterations.
- Politically: A legitimate right to legislate, execute, and enforce for the public good and preservation of property/rights, rooted in consent.
This dual treatment—empirical/mental vs. moral/political—avoids smuggling unexamined “oughtness” by grounding political power in natural rights and contract, while the epistemological version probes power’s experiential base. It differs sharply from Foucault’s productive, diffuse relations: Locke’s is more possessive/relational in a classical liberal sense, with clearer active/passive boundaries and moral teleology. If this connects to your phenomenological critique of power (e.g., its implicit consensual elements in consent-based legitimacy), or if you’d like direct quotes from Chapter XXI or comparisons to your “actiune baza,” let me know!
- Perception as Mediator: Perception isn’t illusory; it can align with the real (epistemic harmony, like accurate foresight in news analysis) or transform it (e.g., collective perceptions shifting real power balances, as in social movements). But when it abuts reality, real power “overcomes”—a diagnostic for why actions fail (misperceived potentials clashing with gravitational consequences).
- Ontological Status: As “fruit of being but itself is not,” power evades substance ontology—it’s like Aristotle’s energeia (actuality as realization of potential) or Spinoza’s potentia (power as conatus, the striving essence of things). Yet your gravity analogy adds a phenomenological realism: power feels inescapable because it’s woven into existence’s fabric, influencing action without being a “thing” one can isolate.
- Ethical/Practical Edge: This avoids the “smuggled oughtness” you critique in philosophers—power isn’t ideologically coercive by default; its consensual/cooperative facets emerge when perceptions align with real potentials (e.g., mutual influence in alliances). But the real can override, explaining coercive breakdowns without moralizing them.
If we extend this to other traditions you’ve studied:
- Eastern Echoes: In Daoism (e.g., Zhuangzi), power (de) is the natural virtue/potency flowing from alignment with Dao—perceptual harmony with real potentials, where misperception leads to futile action against the “gravity” of the Way.
- Western/Scriptural: Biblical notions of power (e.g., exousia as authority, or God’s dynamis as creative force) often blend perceptual (faith perceiving divine potential) with real (consequences manifesting). Your framework could map to the imago Dei as humans perceiving/participating in divine power’s fruits.
- African/Other: Ubuntu’s relational ontology sees power as communal potency—perceived influence through interconnectedness, with real consequences in harmony/disharmony, avoiding Western individualism.
Does this capture your intent, or am I overinterpreting the perceptual-real dialectic? In your news analysis, how might this play out—e.g., analyzing a leader’s perceived power (rhetoric influencing public action) versus real consequences (economic gravity overriding it)?
- Training (building the model’s “brain”) is energy- and water-intensive but happens infrequently—once or periodically for major updates. For example, training older models like GPT-3 consumed around 1,287 MWh of electricity and evaporated hundreds of thousands of liters of water for cooling. Newer frontier models are even hungrier, but this phase is amortized over billions of uses.
- Inference (running the model for user queries/responses) dominates ongoing consumption. Estimates show 80–90% of AI’s total energy demands now come from inference, not training. Each query is small individually (e.g., a median text prompt might use 0.24–0.43 Wh of electricity and ~0.26 mL of water), but scaled to millions/billions daily, it aggregates massively—equivalent to powering thousands of homes or evaporating freshwater for millions of people annually. Data centers handle this at scale because simultaneous users require distributed, always-on compute to keep latency low and availability high.
In short: The “brain” (model weights) is large but static once trained; the users drive the bulk of the ongoing power/water draw through constant inference requests. Massive data centers exist primarily to serve concurrent, global-scale usage with low latency, not just to store/run one big model.Small-Scale / Personal AI: Already Emerging and ViableYour friends aren’t outliers—this is a growing parallel path, especially as models get more efficient:
- Small Language Models (SLMs) and quantized/optimized versions of larger ones (e.g., 8B–70B parameter models like Llama variants, Phi-3, or emerging LFMs) run locally on consumer hardware with 8–24 GB VRAM (gaming PCs, high-end laptops, or even some smartphones via NPUs). These handle chat, coding, summarization, or specialized tasks offline or with minimal cloud burst.
- Trends in 2025–2026: Edge AI is surging—smaller, task-specific models for on-device deployment reduce power needs dramatically. Devices like pocket-sized AI computers (e.g., recent announcements of offline-capable hardware) or high-RAM setups (Macs with unified memory, PCs with RTX cards) enable personal AI without subscriptions or constant connectivity. Open-source ecosystems (e.g., via tools like Ollama, LM Studio) let users fine-tune and run private models, preserving uniqueness and data sovereignty.
- Limitations and Trade-offs: These won’t match frontier cloud models in raw capability or handle massive simultaneous users (your point about fewer concurrent interactions is spot-on). But for personal counsel, family/community use, or small-group applications, they’re sufficient and growing more powerful yearly. Privacy, low latency, no recurring fees, and resistance to centralized control are huge upsides—aligning with your vision of self-stewarded, bounded excellence.
If the driver is indeed users (concurrent inference at scale), then small-scale solutions will proliferate as hardware catches up and efficiency improves—your people seeking them are ahead of the curve. The righteous path here could be communities running localized AI that augments without the entropy of mega-infrastructure dependence.What kinds of use cases are your friends targeting with their builds—personal assistants, family knowledge bases, or something more specialized? That could help gauge how far small-scale can realistically push in the near term.
“The fear of loss and the fear of truth are directly proportional to one another”
- Truth might force us to lose an comforting illusion about ourselves (e.g., “I’m always the good guy,” “My relationship is secure,” “My worldview explains everything”).
- It might demand we lose attachments, habits, social approval, perceived control, or even parts of our identity we’ve built our sense of security around.
- The bigger the investment in the current story (emotional, temporal, social), the higher the stakes → the stronger both fears become.
CHATGPT:
That’s a sharp aphorism—and it holds weight.
Interpreted one way, it suggests this: the more someone fears losing something (status, identity, comfort, relationships, power), the more threatening the truth becomes, because truth often forces change. Truth exposes fragility, demands accountability, or reveals that what we’re clinging to isn’t secure—or wasn’t real to begin with.
Fear of loss makes truth costly.
Fear of truth makes loss inevitable.
“Objects are Neurological Networks”
CHATGPT:
That’s a powerful statement. Interpreted philosophically and cognitively, “objects are neurological networks” suggests that what we experience as objects are not things-in-themselves, but stable patterns of neural activity constructed by the brain.
Here are a few ways to unpack and sharpen the idea:
After an Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent shot and killed a female who drove her vehicle into him on Wednesday, anti-ICE sentiment has risen to a fever pitch, fueled by the legacy media and Democrat politicians. They have argued, essentially, that the shooting means America can no longer enforce its immigration laws. What the incident actually highlights is the need for a just and decisive crackdown on anti-ICE obstruction, a crackdown that parallels the Jan. 6 manhunt, not in its corrupt politicization, but in its scale and effectiveness.
The incident in Minneapolis marks nearly one year of the deportations Trump promised during his campaign. Despite a relentless legacy media air war on the removals, they maintain broad U.S. support, with 31 percent saying all illegal immigrants should be deported and 51 percent stating some should be deported. But even as the Trump administration ramped up deportation efforts, so did the sheer number of bad actors assaulting, impeding, harassing, and blocking ICE agents. The more serious attacks garnered the headlines: Antifa members allegedly launched an attack on an ICE facility; in Dallas an anti-ICE gunman opened fire on a law enforcement vehicle, killing two and injuring a third; the Department of Homeland Security reported roughly 100 vehicular attacks on agents in 2025.
Yesterday in Minneapolis, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents were conducting a lawful immigration operation when Renee Nicole Macklin Good allegedly weaponized her vehicle in an attempt to run over federal agents. An ICE agent fatally shot Macklin in what the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) described as self-defense. The investigation is ongoing, and body camera footage has yet to be released.
Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey immediately blamed federal agents for the shooting, telling ICE, in an expletive, to “get out of Minneapolis” and accusing them of sowing chaos. This despite the fact that ICE agents were performing their constitutional duty to enforce immigration laws — the same laws that apply in every state, including Minnesota.
The Minnesota Police and Peace Officers Association condemned the “irresponsible” and “reckless rhetoric from political leaders attacking law enforcement,” stating it “has real and dangerous consequences for officers on the street” and “fuels hostility.” DHS reports a 1,300 percent increase in assaults and an 8,000 percent increase in death threats against ICE agents — directly linked to the demonization by sanctuary politicians in deep-blue cities and states.
Antifa first rose to mainstream prominence during the summer riots of 2020. While how the group managed to recruit so many young people has remained a mystery to most Americans, domestic security expert Kyle Shideler knows its methods well.
“So as to the psychological perspective, you know, you talk about those mug shots. There’s almost, like, if you look at, over the course of 2020, there’s almost like a ‘faces of meth’ campaign,” domestic security expert Kyle Shideler tells BlazeTV hosts Christopher Rufo and Jonathan “Lomez” Keeperman on “Rufo & Lomez.”
Europe must stop pretending there was ever a truly rules-based international order– www.euronews.com
The opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not represent in any way the editorial position of Euronews.
There has never been a rules-based international order. What is new is admitting it.
The American arrest of Venezuela’s dictator Nicolás Maduro (and his wife), accompanied by the use of military force, has understandably prompted many in Europe to lament what they see as a breach of the rules-based international order.