Attribution: Trump’s war timeline by Dave Whamond, Canada, PoliticalCartoons.com
[Dave Whamonds work has appeared in magazines and newspapers including Wall Street Journal, Sports Illustrated, Readers Digest and many more. He has won 7 Silver Reubens from the National Cartoonists Society and several book awards. Dave has written and/or illustrated over 50 books and his syndicated comic, “Reality Check”, has appeared in newspapers since 1995.]
John Oliver discusses J.D. Vance, what he really believes, who he is without Donald Trump, and – most importantly – what he looks like without a beard.
a brief recap for those whose power went out last night – whether from storms, war strum & fury or just plain boredom:
History was made at the 2026 Oscars, as “Golden” became the first K-pop song to win best song, Autumn Durald Arkapaw became the first woman to win best cinematography and Paul Thomas Anderson finally broke his dry spell and brought home some hardware. And no, Timothée Chalamet didn’t get best actor, but Michael B. Jordan did. Plus, Jessie Buckley took home best actress for ‘Hamnet.’ We’re breaking down all the most memorable moments from the 2026 Oscars, including ‘One Battle After Another’ taking home the night’s top honor of best picture.
winterlinde,
a most warm welcome aboard. your trail name portends great things ahead for us according to this AI rundown of its symbolism:
and even lovely lieder about them.
this one composed by Franz Schubert:
PROGRAMMING NOTE: Our daily Digital Diner podcast airs 11-Noon ET on YouTube. JOIN chatroom here. WATCH yesterday’s replay here.
What America is Actually Clicking: March 16, 2026
These are the stories driving the most traffic across U.S. outlets right now—not necessarily the stories we think you should read, and not always the most recent.
A roundup by our AI partner Silas (Gemini).
Patd
Nice welcome for our newest walker on the trail.
The idiocy from MAL continues apace. Must be Monday.
Ex-GOP Honcho Says Trump Should Drop ‘A Dozen’ Nukes on Strait of Hormuz
Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich (R-GA) shared an explosive idea to re-open the Strait of Hormuz that has been essentially closed to shipping by Iranian attacks and mines.
The narrow passageway is the conduit for up to 30% of the world’s total oil consumption and 20% of global liquefied natural gas.
Although he hasn’t been seen in public since becoming Iran’s new Supreme Leader, Mojtaba Khamenei vowed in a written statement to use the “lever of blocking the Strait of Hormuz” to keep the enemy “highly vulnerable”.
President Donald Trump has urged allies — like France, South Korea, Japan, and the UK — as well as China, to send warships to the Strait to police the area and keep it open for oil shipments.
But Gingrich posited that it would be much better to open the Strait with a nuclear attack.
“Instead of fighting over a 21-mile-wide bottleneck forever,” Gingrich wrote, “we cut a new channel through friendly territory.”
“A dozen thermonuclear detonations and you’ve got a waterway wider than the Panama Canal, deeper than the Suez, and safe from Iranian attacks,” Gingrich wrote.
*Don’t give Dumbass any dumb ideas.
Thanks PatD. I had been meaning to ask WinterLinde what her screen name means.
Tomorrow is the 250th anniversary of the British evacuation of Boston.
It’s a festival on Trail Mix and on our Digital Diner YouTube podcast — honoring the man who saved Boston: Henry Knox, a 25-year-old, 250-pound bookseller missing two fingers who had zero combat experience.
Knox looked at a map, told George Washington he could retrieve captured British cannons from Fort Ticonderoga, and then successfully dragged 60 tons of artillery 300 miles across frozen lakes and mountains using ox-drawn sleds.
The British stared down the barrels of colonial artillery and decided a boat ride to Halifax sounded like a fantastic career move.
Join our podcast to celebrate — Tuesday March 17 at 11am ET 👉 https://trailmix.cc/diner
https://defence24.com/geopolitics/france-and-italy-seek-safe-passage-deal-with-iran
*A detailed piece about their interests in the region, but the big takeaway is that France and Italy are negotiating for safe passage of oil for their countries. Just like with the tariffs, folks are going around Donny; they’re cutting him out. Our Congress is full of weak and greedy idiots.
S. Beschloss
The Stupidity of a Bully
https://www.americaamerica.news/p/the-stupidity-of-a-bully?r=bb6o8
https://www.alternet.org/fema-noem/
‘Rescuers flying blind’ after Midwest tornadoes as Noem’s DHS lets $200,000 contract lapse
When tornadoes hit the Midwest and Plains last weekend, state and local search-and-rescue crews had to work without a critical tornado-tracking tool typically provided by FEMA. The tool follows a storm’s destructive path and allows rescuers to quickly reach those most affected.
The $200,000 contract for that crucial tool was sitting on a desk awaiting approval, leaving rescue teams literally guessing on where storms had the worst impact.
CNN reports “thousands of FEMA spending requests” have stalled between Noem and FEMA acting chief Karen Evans. “Many have been slashed, others have sat for months,” sources claim and documents show.
Much of FEMA’s work usually continues during government shutdowns. That’s because it’s tied to the Disaster Relief Fund, a pot of money Congress provides for disasters and emergencies.
This time, staffers were told there were only four exceptions to the no-work edict: things tied to President Trump’s State of the Union address, response to winter storms, meetings on the upcoming World Cup and Olympics, and “Nuclear activities.”
“People are being told not to even open their computers,” a high-ranking FEMA official said to CNN about their regional office. “It’s the most appalling experience of my professional life.”
*Wait, is the tRUMPsky regime planning “nuclear activities”?
Today’s menu…
Welcome to Winterlinde. We hope you keep coming back.
today’s meme…
The Diner Is Open
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It isn’t just our imagination …
Researchers Tracked 7,000 Children for 35 Years. What They Found About Intelligence and Politics Is Hard to Ignore.
Mitch Jackson
Mar 16
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY: A 35 year study tracking over 7,000 people from childhood into middle age, backed by research from the University of Minnesota, the University of Ghent, and British cohort studies spanning decades, found that people with higher cognitive and emotional intelligence consistently reject authoritarianism, rigid social hierarchies, and blind obedience to authority. People with lower cognitive and emotional abilities gravitate toward strong leaders who tell them what to think, who to fear, and who to blame.
You live a life full of responsibility. You make decisions that affect your family, your work, and the people who depend on you. Every day you weigh risks, judge character, sort through conflicting information, and carry competing priorities in your head at the same time. The ability to sit with complexity and still act is a form of intelligence. And it turns out that same ability shapes something else you do as a citizen of this country: how you vote.
A 35 year study recently confirmed what researchers across three continents have been finding for decades. The way your brain handles complexity directly influences your political beliefs. And the pattern is consistent, repeated, and difficult to argue with.
This goes deeper than party loyalty. It goes deeper than which cable news channel you watch. This is about how your mind works.
What 35 Years of Tracking Over 7,000 People Revealed
In 1987, researchers at two respected German universities, Saarland University and Philipps University Marburg, launched one of the longest running intelligence studies in modern history. They started with over 7,000 third graders. They gave every one of them standardized intelligence tests that measured reasoning, speed of information processing, and cognitive performance. From that group, they identified two categories: gifted students with an IQ of 130 or above, and a matched control group with IQs around 100.
Then they did something most studies never do. They followed those children for 35 years. Into high school. Through college. Into careers and families and middle age. And when those children were in their early forties, the researchers circled back and asked them about their political views.
The results were published in the journal Intelligence and they were striking.
On a simple left to right political scale, gifted adults and average adults placed themselves in roughly the same spot. Near the center. That finding alone was interesting because it challenged the stereotype that exceptionally smart people hold extreme political views.
The real story showed up when researchers dug deeper with a detailed questionnaire that measured four distinct dimensions of political belief: economic libertarianism, socialism, liberalism, and conservatism.
On three of those four dimensions, there was no difference between the gifted and non gifted groups. Intelligence did not predict whether someone favored free markets over government intervention. It did not predict socialist leanings. It did not predict liberal attitudes in the traditional European sense.
One dimension stood apart. Conservatism. Specifically, the kind of conservatism rooted in rigid tradition, strict social hierarchy, and obedience to authority.
Among men, those identified as gifted in childhood scored significantly lower on this measure than their non gifted peers. Non gifted men were far more likely to endorse values tied to social order, tradition, and authority. Gifted men were far less likely to adopt those same positions.
Among women, no significant difference appeared.
The researchers called this the Cognitive Complexity Openness Hypothesis. It means that people with higher intelligence tend to be more open to new experiences and more comfortable sitting with ideas that contradict each other. They can evaluate both sides of an argument without needing to collapse one into the other. That cognitive flexibility makes rigid, authority driven political frameworks feel restrictive. It does not feel like strength to them. It feels like a ceiling.
The Study That Took the Debate Out of the Lab and Into the Living Room
Critics of the German study pointed out an obvious question. What if smart people are liberal because they went to college? What if the environment shaped them, not their brains?
A team at the University of Minnesota answered that question in 2024 with what many researchers consider the most definitive study ever conducted on this topic.
Led by Tobias Edwards, a behavioral genetics researcher, the study examined more than 300 families, including both biological and adoptive siblings. The design was intentional. Siblings raised in the same house, by the same parents, in the same neighborhood, attending the same schools. Same dinner table. Same rules. Same environment.
The researchers measured each sibling’s IQ using standardized tests. They also measured something called polygenic scores, which are genetic markers associated with cognitive performance. Then they assessed each person’s political beliefs across multiple dimensions.
The results were direct. Even within the same family, the sibling with the higher IQ and the higher genetic markers for intelligence was consistently more likely to hold socially liberal beliefs and score lower on authoritarianism. This held true even after the researchers controlled for the family’s income, education, and social class.
Edwards himself was careful to point out that intelligence is only one factor among many. He said his study cannot prove that the beliefs of high IQ people tell us what is right to believe. It only tells us what smart people choose to believe. He also warned against drawing sweeping conclusions, noting that extraordinarily intelligent people have supported all sorts of beliefs across history.
That caution is worth respecting. And it does not erase what the data shows.
The sibling design eliminated the biggest criticism in this entire field: the idea that environment explains everything. These siblings shared their environment. They did not share their IQ. And the sibling with the sharper mind consistently moved in a more socially liberal, less authoritarian direction. That pattern held regardless of whether the siblings were biologically related or adopted.
What Your Brain Knew About Politics When You Were Ten Years Old
The British Cohort Studies tracked over 17,000 people born in 1970. Researchers measured their general intelligence at age 10 and then followed them into their thirties and forties, assessing their social attitudes, voting behavior, and political engagement along the way.
The finding was clear. A child’s score on an intelligence test at age 10 was a remarkably accurate predictor of their social values two decades later. Children who scored higher grew into adults who were more likely to support racial equality, gender equity, civil liberties, and trust in democratic institutions. They were more likely to vote. They were more politically engaged. They were more likely to attend rallies, sign petitions, and express interest in how their government operated.
The association between childhood intelligence and liberal social attitudes held even after the researchers accounted for educational attainment and occupational class. Smart kids went to good schools and got good jobs, yes. And something deeper was at work too. Something about how their brains processed information at ten years old predicted how they would see the world at thirty.
This study also found an interesting wrinkle that lines up with the German data. Higher childhood intelligence predicted socially liberal attitudes with consistency. It did not predict economic attitudes in the same direction. Some of the smartest participants in the British cohorts grew up to favor free markets and individual economic responsibility. Intelligence, in other words, does not sort people neatly into left or right. It sorts them away from rigidity and toward openness on social questions, and it leaves their economic views largely up for grabs.
When Emotional Intelligence Enters the Picture
In 2019, a study published in the journal Emotion by researcher Alain Van Hiel at the University of Ghent took the question in a different direction. His team measured the emotional abilities of nearly 1,000 participants using three separate tests: emotional understanding, emotion management, and emotion recognition. They also assessed each person’s political views.
The results were consistent with every other study in this space. Participants who scored lower on emotional intelligence were significantly more likely to score higher on two specific measures: right wing authoritarianism and social dominance orientation.
Right wing authoritarianism describes a tendency to submit to authority figures and show hostility toward people outside your group. Social dominance orientation describes a preference for inequality and discomfort with the idea that all people deserve equal treatment.
People who struggled to read emotions, manage their own emotional responses, and understand what other people were feeling gravitated toward political structures that told them what to do and who to fear.
Van Hiel was responsible in framing his conclusions. He said you cannot discredit an ideology based on these results alone. Emotionally and cognitively sharp people can make wrong decisions too. That is a fair and necessary point. And the pattern he found is consistent across multiple decades of research, across multiple countries, across multiple types of intelligence testing.
What All of This Means When You Look at American Politics Right Now
The studies cited here come from Germany, the United Kingdom, Belgium, and the United States. They span from 1987 to 2024. They include longitudinal tracking, sibling comparisons, genetic analysis, and emotional intelligence testing. And they all converge on the same core pattern.
People with higher cognitive ability tend to reject social traditionalism and authoritarian political structures. They gravitate toward civil liberties, independent thought, and social openness. They do not need someone to tell them what to think. They can hold contradictions without panic.
People with lower cognitive and emotional abilities tend to gravitate toward rigid social hierarchies, strong authority figures, and simple narratives about who belongs and who does not.
Now look at the political reality in the United States in 2026. One major political movement has built its identity around obedience to a single leader. It rejects the findings of scientists. It dismisses the conclusions of legal experts. It mocks complexity. It tells its followers exactly what to believe, who to blame, and what to fear. It frames every question as a simple binary: us or them, strong or weak, loyal or traitor.
This is not a coincidence. The research explains exactly why this type of messaging works on the audience it reaches and why it repels the audience it does not.
Data from multiple U.S. election cycles confirms that the base of the current far right movement in America is disproportionately made up of voters without college degrees. This is not a slur. It is a demographic fact, confirmed by Pew Research, exit polling, and the candidates’ own public statements. Donald Trump has repeatedly said, on camera, that he loves the poorly educated.
He was telling the truth. His movement depends on them.
Why This Matters to You
You did not build your business and life by following orders. You built it by thinking. By reading situations. By adapting when the facts changed. By tolerating uncertainty long enough to find the right answer.
Every quality that made you successful is the same quality that the research links to socially liberal, anti authoritarian political thinking. The ability to sit with nuance. The willingness to question authority when authority gets it wrong. The capacity to see people as individuals instead of categories.
You already think this way. The question is whether you are applying that same intelligence to how you engage with politics.
Because the people who want your vote are counting on you not to. They are counting on fear to override your judgment. They are counting on tribal loyalty to replace critical thinking. They are counting on exhaustion to make you stop paying attention.
And every study cited in this article says the same thing: the smarter you are, the less likely that strategy works on you.
The Pattern Is Clear
Decades of data, across multiple nations, using different research methods and different populations, point in the same direction. Intelligence, both cognitive and emotional, predicts a specific political orientation. Not left versus right in every dimension. The picture is more specific than that. Higher intelligence consistently predicts the rejection of authoritarianism, the rejection of rigid social hierarchies, and a deep preference for independent thought and social openness.
The political movement that asks you to stop thinking, stop questioning, and start obeying is not designed for you. It is designed for people who find thinking painful. People who need a strong figure to tell them what the world means. People who cannot tolerate the discomfort of an unanswered question.
You are not that person. You prove it every day in how you run your life and your business.
Now prove it during the midterms in how you vote.
Mitch Jackson, Esq.
Blue,
Here is the walker/wheelchair combo. There are cheaper one, but mine is lightweight enough to fold and lift into the car, but sturdy enough to carry up to 300 pounds.
meme #2…
King Fucko has been telegraphing that he really wants to nuke something
giving him that power was so foolish
HA!
your doing a good job with your channel, the maga-types polluting it aren’t interested in honest conversation
glad you’re not taking their shit though 🇺🇸
Craig,
George Washington said many things to Henry Knox, primarily in private letters expressing concerns about the weak government, support for a stronger federal system (like the Constitution), and his reluctance to become president, famously calling it a “reprieve” to return home but feeling like a “culprit going to the place of his execution” when accepting the presidency. Their correspondence revealed deep trust, with Washington sharing anxieties about national stability and the need for vigorous action.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Judith_Love_Cohen
Judith Love Cohen (August 16, 1933 – July 25, 2016)[1] was an American aerospace engineer. She was an electrical engineer on the Minuteman missile, the science ground station for the Hubble Space Telescope, the Tracking and Data Relay Satellite, and the Apollo Space Program.[2] In particular, her work on the Abort-Guidance System is credited with helping save Apollo 13.
In 1990, after retiring from practice as an engineer, she began a publishing company called Cascade Pass with her third husband, David Katz.[3] They published two series of books:
The “You Can be a Woman … ” series was created to encourage very young girls to pursue careers in science and engineering
The “Green” series focuses on promoting positive environmental practices, aimed at young children
In a memorial tribute, her son Neil notes that she was troubleshooting problems with schematics on the day she went into labor, called her boss to let him know she had fixed the problem and then delivered Jack.[9]
*The “Jack” referred to is Jack Black.
Jamie – I’d just want it to push Craig for the protest so I wouldn’t have to monitor my balance. Vestibular therapy has helped, but even the wind would blow me over today.
The way things are at airports, I’m glad I decided to stay home.
Search Assist
Henry Knox lost two fingers on his left hand in a hunting accident when his fowling musket exploded in his hand. He managed to bind the wound and seek medical attention, but the injury left him with a permanent disfigurement that he often concealed with a white cloth.
Henry Knox’s Injury
Incident Details
Accident Date: 1773
• Activity: Knox was on a bird-hunting expedition on Noddle’s Island in Boston
Harbor.
Cause: His fowling musket accidentally discharged while he was handling it.
Consequences
Injury: The accident resulted in the loss of the third and fourth fingers on his left hand.
• Aftermath: Knox managed to bind the wound and sought medical help, where a doctor
sewed up the injury.
Impact on Life
Public Appearance: To conceal his disfigurement, Knox always kept his left hand wrapped in a cloth.
Military Career: Despite this injury, he went on to become a prominent military leader during the American Revolutionary War, serving as the chief of artillery.
*Now we know; the chief of artillery accidentally shot his own fingers off during a hunting expedition.
retrain your brain, walk regardless, try not to tilt your head*
*humble recommendation to disregard if desired
(i know what causes my vertigo, i’m just not sure what causes what causes my vertigo, if you dig, but i am able
to manage it after a lot of experience trying)
Today’s Diner Chat: Iran War Resistance, ICE Tactics & Texas Senate Race
Troops resisting an illegal Iran war, ICE’s suburban camo, and James Talarico dodging Trump’s culture war bait to focus on real Texas issues.
We are staring down the barrel of the most incoherent war in a century, complete with Newt Gingrich casually tossing around the word “thermonuclear” and military commanders reportedly claiming the whole mess is somehow Jesus-approved. Meanwhile, troops are allegedly refusing orders, proving at least someone in this equation still has a functioning moral compass and a basic grasp of illegal warfare. And if a global conflict wasn’t enough to keep your blood pressure up, we’ve got ICE playing dress-up in plainclothes and soccer-mom minivans, turning suburban paranoia up to eleven.
On the political front, James Talarico is giving a masterclass on how to handle Trump’s low-IQ attacks. Instead of rolling in the mud over binary pronouns and culture-war garbage, Talarico pivots straight to the stuff that actually keeps Texans awake at night: skyrocketing prices, closed schools, and the wealthy picking our collective pockets. It is the oldest divide-and-conquer trick in the book, and finally, someone is calling it out instead of taking the bait. Oh, and Henry Knox hauled 60 tons of cannons 300 miles to save Boston 250 years ago. Happy Saint Irish Day.
https://trailmix.cc/chat
https://trailmix.cc
https://trailmix.cc/alerts
00:00 Intro
00:03 The Incoherent Iran War & Troop Resistance
10:30 Conan’s Brutal Monologue
14:04 Ryan Coogler’s Braided Guitar
19:33 Iranian Intel & Junior High Politics
24:36 Josh Shapiro on Presidential War Powers
35:00 Chat Debate: Trump, ICE & The Constitution
45:33 James Talarico Masterclass on Trump Attacks
01:03:04 Henry Knox Saves Boston
Dumbass is on tv from the white house lying his ass off. Interesting watching a fat guy kiss his own ass.
https://x.com/Acyn/status/2033359604856348726
“You could make the case maybe we shouldn’t even be there at all.” -Dumbass debating himself on AF1
I’m not sure about the concepts of karma and hubris, they kind of sound like wishful thinking mostly, but I do know one seemingly immutable natural law.
And that is: If one fucks around long enough, one will most surely find out.
Well, I guess there may be exceptions to that…….but what the hell. So it maybe ain’t immutable. So sue me.
he doesn’t even care enough to “find out” from fucking around
he’s playing with house money
he achieved his goal, we can’t ignore him and he’s in the history books. he wins, we lose
he’ll never go go jail either
some of them lieutenants though… 🤔
https://www.newsweek.com/david-sacks-trump-administration-israel-nuclear-escalation-iran-war-11678063
David Sacks, President Donald Trump’s czar for artificial intelligence and cryptocurrency, warned of Israel contemplating using a nuclear weapon in the Iran War.
*David Sacks, of the South African three stooges, the others being Thiel and MuskRat.
https://x.com/Alpha7021/status/2033582514556781053
“I knew the Strait would be a weapon. I predicted it a long time ago. I predicted all of this stuff. I predicted Osama bin Laden would knock out the World Trade Center. I wrote it in a book.” -tRUMPsky
*Nostra-Dumbass!
Make Kreskin Great Again…or at least Amazing.
he’s on an excursion, he’s playing (the game of)“president”
he does not give AF about consequences, he might even be so pathological as to delight in negative ones, there are certainly multiple examples that indicate he does (J6, Charlottesville, Upside-Down Bible incident, etc.)
The way he gleefully describes killing Iranians is as disturbing as it gets
…and Republicans embrace him- that’s as shameful as it gets, if they were capable of shame
Pavel Talankin is a teacher from a small mining town in Central Russia. He spent two and a half years documenting how his school was conscripted into Putin’s war propaganda machine for the Oscar-nominated documentary, Mr. Nobody Against Putin.
Borenstein said Talankin “wanted to show how quickly totalitarianism can take over a school, a workplace, a government, and how our complicity becomes fuel in that fire.”
It’s a message Talankin originally hoped to share with fellow Russians. But he now believes the film speaks to a far wider audience than he could ever have anticipated when he began filming.
He points to a joke circulating in Eastern Europe: the Belarusians say they and the Russians are watching the same TV series- only Russia is a few episodes behind.
“I am sorry to tell you,” he says, “that America has begun watching this series, too.”
https://www.arkansasonline.com/news/2026/mar/09/governor-erika-kirk-to-announce-turning-point-usa/
A news release from the governor’s office included few details about Wednesday’s announcement, but a release from Turning Point USA described it as a “statewide Club America partnership.” Club America is the group’s high school chapter-based program.
The announcement with Sanders marks the “next step forward” in Turning Point USA’s “mission to put chapters on every high school and college in America,” the group’s news release says.
Turning Point USA’s website states that the organization aims to “build the most organized, active and powerful conservative grassroots activist network on high school and college campuses across the country.”
In December, Texas Gov. Greg Abbott launched an initiative to establish Club America chapters in every high school in the state, the Texas Tribune reported. Abbott announced in a news release at the time that “any school who stands in the way of a Club America program should be reported immediately to the (Texas Education Agency) where an investigation will be opened, and disciplinary action will be taken if necessary.”
*Connect the dots, la, la, la, la. The Widow Kirk and her cadre of pedophilic (or pedo-adjacent) pastors bringing White Sharia Law to the masses.
He’s sounding more and more like Sadaam Insane every day.
Hegseth’s Pentagon Is Trying to Turn a Newspaper for Troops Into Propaganda
A new memo severely restricts Stars and Stripes, a military news outlet operating continuously since World War II.
Under the new policy, Stars and Stripes, which has historically operated with a large degree of editorial freedom, reports that it will generally be blocked from carrying news stories from wire services like the Associated Press, as well as from publishing comics. It is also being directed to publish material from the Defense Department’s own public affairs offices.
The “interim” requirements for Stars and Stripes are included in an eight-page memo that is dated March 9.
The news outlet was not notified about the memo. Instead, a staff member at the publication found the memo on DoD’s website. Stars and Stripes reported on Friday that the document was written without any input from the publication.
The memo follows a January post on X from Pentagon spokesperson Sean Parnell announcing that DoD was planning to “refocus” the content of Stars and Stripes “away from woke distractions that syphon morale.”
The newspaper, which receives much of its funding from the Pentagon, would also shift to being a digital-only outlet, which would bring to an end to its more than 80 years in print. (The paper was first published by Union soldiers during the Civil War and later revived.)
In a further effort to kneecap the paper’s reporting, the memo bars reporters at Stars and Stripes from submitting Freedom of Information Act requests on behalf of the publication.
Stars and Stripes reporters are also prohibited from publishing “controlled unclassified information.”
What I’m listening to as I hang sheet rock.
Kansas City blues woman, Amanda Fish and the Fish band.
https://austinpost.com/news/2026/03/15/epstein-walk-of-shame-stars-at-sxsw
Epstein ‘Walk of Shame’ Stars Appear at SXSW
An anonymous artist installed star-shaped decals naming Jeffrey Epstein’s associates on a downtown Austin sidewalk during SXSW, with QR codes linking to case files.
Star-shaped decals naming figures linked to Jeffrey Epstein appeared on Brazos Street during the South by Southwest Conference and Festivals in Austin. The display, styled after the Hollywood Walk of Fame, is called the “Jeffrey Epstein Walk of Shame” and features 31 stars with the names of the disgraced financier’s rich and powerful associates. Each star includes a unique QR code linking to documents from the recently released files related to Epstein’s sex trafficking case, explaining the individual’s inclusion.
Jeph Clark, a doorman at a Brazos Street business, told the American-Statesman the stars were installed between 2 and 4 a.m. on Saturday, March 14, 2026. “He was putting them down really fast, with a rolling thing,” Clark said. “Just one guy. Little victories, right?”
The identity of the artist is unknown. By early evening on Saturday, two prominent names—President Donald Trump and tech giant Elon Musk—had been ripped off the sidewalk, though their QR codes remained intact. “Trump’s star—I just scanned it—was six pages long,” Clark added.
A similar “Walk of Shame” installation with identical stars appeared earlier in March in Farragut Square in Washington D.C.
I was only aware of Samantha Fish. Related?
James Talarico delivers a masterclass on dodging low-IQ culture war bait. He expertly pivots from fake panic over pronouns straight to the real crisis of skyrocketing prices and closed public schools.
Watch the moment on today’s Digital Diner:
Amanda is the older sister.
Samantha came of age watching her sister perform at Knuckleheads over in the East bottoms. After she turned 18 she got on stage and joined in.
Jack
Blue,
You should put that info on Cohen as a comment on the site or I can go back and edit it in. I’m really trying to get people to comment. It’s lonely over there except for talking to Merlin and I don’t think he counts.
Wasn’t sure you wanted an engineer diluting the mathematicians. Done.
Thirteen dead soldiers and a commander calling it “God’s plan.” If this is the divine strategy, the Almighty is failing an audit. At the Digital Diner we’re dissecting the most incoherent war in 100 years.
https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/world/2026/03/16/cuba-grid-collapse-leaves-millions-without-power/89185346007/
Cuba’s national electric grid collapsed March 16, the country’s grid operator said, leaving around 10 million people without power amid a U.S.-imposed oil blockade that has crippled the island’s already obsolete generation system.
Grid operator UNE said on social media it is investigating the causes of the blackout, the latest in a series of widespread outages that last for hours or days, sparking a rare violent protest in the communist-run country over the weekend.
The United States has ratcheted up pressure this year on long-time foe Cuba since capturing Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro – Cuba’s most important foreign benefactor – in January.
Donald Trump cut off Venezuelan oil shipments to Cuba and threatened to slap tariffs on any country that sells oil to Cuba, strangling the Caribbean island’s already antiquated grid.
Cuba said on Friday that it has entered into talks with the United States in hopes of defusing the crisis.
Trump has said in recent weeks that Cuba is on the verge of collapse and is eager to make a deal with the United
*Monster!
Hawks & Doves
https://www.ndtv.com/world-news/iran-israel-war-middle-east-did-ali-khameneis-wife-die-in-us-israeli-strikes-local-media-clarifies-11208850
Did Ali Khamenei’s Wife Die In US-Israeli Strikes?
Iran Media Clarifies Several Iranian media outlets initially reported that Bagherzadeh died from injuries sustained in the strikes, with Tasnim News Agency saying she was in a coma.
Mansoureh Khojasteh Bagherzadeh, the wife of former Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, is alive, Iranian state media has claimed. This comes after earlier reports claimed she was assassinated alongside her husband and other top officials in joint US-Israeli strikes on Tehran.
Bagherzadeh survived the attacks but was seriously injured, Iran’s Fars News Agency clarified on Thursday. The outlet said previous claims about her death were incorrect.
https://www.oneindia.com/international/who-was-iran-s-supreme-leader-mojtaba-khamenei-s-wife-zahra-haddad-adel-and-what-do-we-know-about-he-8020935.html
Mojtaba Khamenei’s Wife: Zahra Haddad-Adel
Zahra Haddad-Adel was the wife of Mojtaba Khamenei, the newly appointed Supreme Leader of Iran.
She was born into a prominent conservative family, being the daughter of Gholam-Ali Haddad-Adel, a significant political figure in Iran. Zahra and Mojtaba married in 1999, which strengthened ties between influential political families in Iran.
Zahra Haddad-Adel maintained a low public profile despite her influential background. She and Mojtaba Khamenei had three children, but details about their family life are scarce, as families within Iran’s clerical leadership often keep their personal affairs private.
Death
Zahra was killed in a joint US-Israel airstrike on February 28, 2026, which also claimed the life of her father-in-law, Ali Khamenei, the former Supreme Leader. Her death occurred shortly before Mojtaba was officially appointed as the new Supreme Leader on March 4, 2026.
*So, the wife of the new Ayatollah was killed, but his mom was also seriously injured.
Europe just looked at Trump’s demand to sail their navies into the Strait of Hormuz and replied, “New phone, who dis?” Catch the transcontinental eye-roll tomorrow at 11:00 a.m. on The Digital Diner.
Did BiBi go bye-bye?
https://www.livemint.com/news/world/nice-try-benjamin-netanyahu-s-latest-video-is-ai-generated-social-media-users-allege-grok-claims-it-s-deepfake-11773625230640.html
Benjamin Netanyahu has hit back at viral rumours about his death. The Israeli Prime Minister has shared a sarcastic video posted on his official Twitter (now X) account.
He then holds up his hands to the camera and asks viewers if they want to count his fingers. It is a direct reference to social media claims that his recent televised address was generated by AI.
However, this video is also under the scanner. North Korea TV shared the video and wrote: “AI experts confirm that this video is artificial intelligence–generated, using an advanced new version that has not even been released to the public yet.”
When curious social media users asked Grok to verify the video’s authenticity, the AI chatbot claimed it was generated by artificial intelligence.
“It’s AI-generated. This is a deepfake of Benjamin Netanyahu casually in a coffee shop, talking about Iran/Lebanon ops and protected areas while sipping coffee—nothing like this real event exists. The original post explicitly calls it advanced unreleased AI,” Grok replied.
*So, the last I heard was when Israel & tRUMPseth started a war, BiBi went to Berlin because Tel Aviv was getting hit. Does Putin now control of tRUMPuppet’s strings?
President Donald Trump said he will soon “be having the honor of taking Cuba” while speaking to reporters about his plans for the Caribbean island at the White House on Monday.
“That’s a big honor,” Trump said.
“Taking Cuba?” Fox News correspondent Peter Doocy immediately followed up.
The president answered yes, “in some form” he will be “taking” the country.
“Whether I free it, take it. I think I can do anything I want with it, you want to know the truth. They are a very weakened nation,” Trump said.
*He’s talking about Cuba the same way he has acted toward women his entire, miserable life.
https://x.com/LBGamestips/status/2033656163946942486
@LBGamestips x.com
TRUMP IN ONE SINGLE EVENT
— “They won’t be there for us”
— “We have some that are really enthusiastic. They’re coming already.”
— “This isn’t ‘need'”
— “If we need anything, they should be jumping to help us”
— “We want them to come and help us with the strait”
— My attitude is we don’t need anybody”
*video in link (He has the nuclear football.)
https://www.foxsports.com/stories/soccer/usa-world-cup-kits-jerseys-2026-usmnt-uswnt
*It’s giving “Where’s Waldo?”
On to the next shiny object. NYT
How many balls can one clown juggle?
The pope says god is not necessarily on our side.
Ya think?
Flagg decals.
Taking other countries is what put Hitler on the receiving end of other countries’ bombs.
The Cubans should volunteer to become a new state. See what he’d do with that lol
ICE agents now deploy SUBURBAN CAMOUFLAGE. They slap stuffed animals on minivan dashboards and blow orange whistles to blend in while rounding people up.
Watch the moment on today’s Digital Diner:
The Pedo-In-Chief has confused Cuba with a 13-year old girl.
Cuba:
Invade us—Please!
Do we get to be American League or National League??
He’s melting before our eyes. When will he be room temp? JD is chomping at the bit. MAGAts gonna follow JD? Will they clamor for one of Adolf’s spawn? JR? Ivanka?
Expecting Magats to follow Vance would be like expecting the Protectorate to follow Dick Cromwell.
Tight as Dick’s hatband.
JD Now!
He can be the next Gerald Ford.
Sooooo, apparently none of our NATO allies or European “partners” are buying what Dumbass is selling in the Iran “Excursion” or his Hormuz escort service (which we ain’t doing). Imagine that.
On the brighter side, Napoleon DID get to see Moscow in the winter time.
it snows once and the climate deniers like to belittle climate science and call global warming a “hoax”, but you don’t hear from them when the temperature makes 40 degree swings every other day
can’t be good
https://chicago.suntimes.com/2026/03/13/cryptocurrency-ai-join-in-31-million-super-pac-blitz-in-four-congressional-primaries
Cryptocurrency, AI join in $31 million super PAC blitz in 4 congressional primaries
Together with pro-Israel funds, the tech money is swamping Democratic rivals in the Chicago area, and according to one government watchdog, distorting democracy.
Through Thursday, super PACs whose donors are hard to track had reported spending more than $31.4 million, including more than $6.1 million for attack ads that are swamping voters ahead of Tuesday’s primaries.
The portions from the crypto, AI and pro-Israel groups total $26.9 million, a WBEZ review of federal campaign disclosures has found.
…barrage by FairShake, a super PAC linked to cryptocurrency interests. The group, formed in 2023, tries to limit regulations on that financial sector.
Ford last year helped pass legislation to regulate digital asset exchanges — a measure opposed by some cryptocurrency groups.
“I would expect there to be some dirty politics. I didn’t expect there to be lies about my [legal] record,” Ford said. “They’ve been lying, saying I was convicted of bank fraud.”
FairShake has also spent more than $817,000 on negative ads in the 2nd District, which covers part of the South Side and some nearby suburbs. The ads attack state Sen. Robert Peters, a leading candidate to replace U.S. Rep. Robin Kelly, who is running for U.S. Senate.
“Crypto is not well-liked, particularly in the working-class Black community,” Peters said. “They have so much money they could flood the zone with misinformation to try to convince the voters that the [U.S. Sen.] Bernie Sanders-backed candidate is somehow beholden to corporations.”
*Also, guess who is on the board of Polymarket, a crypto-based predictions market? Don Jr. You know, predictive betting, like when the US will go to war.
Anyway, the IL primary will test the waters to see if AIPAC can hide contributions & get their preferred candidates in, and if crypto can flood voters with misinformation.
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-politics/trump-gavin-newsom-president-dyslexia-b2939781.html
President Donald Trump is once again attacking California Governor Gavin Newsom over his well-documented struggle with dyslexia, claiming the condition should bar the Democrat from ever becoming president.
“Honestly, I’m all for people with learning disabilities, but not for my president,” Trump said on Monday when speaking with reporters at the White House. “I think a president should not have learning disabilities.”
During his insults, President Trump referred to Newsom as already being “the president of the United States,” a slip-up Newsom later mocked online.
“NO THANK YOU, WE BELIEVE IN FREE ELECTIONS!” the California leader wrote on X.
*Is he projecting, again?
*Attn: gardeners!
NEW THREAD by our fearless leader
good gardening tip, BiD
(always handle seedlings by leaves not stem btw)