Source: The American Prospect
by David Dayen
“For the past year, it felt like we were a long way from the moment in Congress when Sen. Dick Durbin (D-IL) lamented that big banks ‘own the place’. As the Trump administration took power, a pitched battle emerged between the financial industry and Silicon Valley on a range of issues, and the tech oligarchs, with better connections to MAGA-world and more ability to enrich the Trump organization directly, seemed well positioned to win. The power center seemed to be shifting away from its traditional roots. But Wall Street didn’t become Wall Street by losing its ability to capture the government. A scuttled markup on a bill with major implications for cryptocurrencies shows that reports of the demise of big banks are greatly exaggerated.” (01/19/25)
https://prospect.org/2026/01/19/wall-street-strikes-back-crypto-banks/
Source: Forbes
“The Northern Lights may be seen from as many as 24 U.S. states down to mid-latitudes — such as Oregon, Illinois and Pennsylvania — overnight on Monday, Jan. 19, through Tuesday, Jan. 20, according to a forecast by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Space Weather Prediction Center. … The forecast is for a ‘strong’ G3 or possibly a ‘severe’ G4 geomagnetic storm on NOAA’s five-level Space Weather Scale, as a ‘full halo CME’ — an Earth-directed coronal mass ejection — interacts with Earth’s magnetic field. … The CME, a cloud of charged particles ejected from the sun, left the sun on Sunday, Jan. 18, in the wake of a massive X1.9-class solar flare.” (01/19/26)
https://www.forbes.com/sites/jamiecartereurope/2026/01/19/major-northern-lights-alert-for-22-states-monday-after-solar-flare/
Source: Brookings Institution
“Universities tackled digital inclusion — now they are accelerating AI use.” (01/19/26)
https://shows.acast.com/tech-tank/episodes/universities-tackled-digital-inclusionnow-they-are-accelerat
Source: Quillette
by Aaron Sarin
“China’s over-reaction to a measured remark about Taiwan made by the Japanese prime minister is an attempt to move the Overton Window.” (01/19/26)
https://quillette.com/2026/01/19/stranded-in-history-china-japan-takaichi/
Source: New York Post
by Peter Schweizer
“Ismail Selim Elbarasse, an accountant by training, seemed to be living a quiet life in Annandale, Virginia. But in 2004, when police officers noticed him driving with his wife across the Chesapeake Bay Bridge and filming its critical structural elements, they decided to act, then detained him and notified federal agents. He was already a suspect in a scheme to provide funding to Islamist terrorist groups, and now agents were searching through his home for further evidence of his possible involvement. They discovered far more than a terrorism funding scheme. Buried among the stacks of paperwork in his home was a document written in Arabic titled ‘An Explanatory Memorandum on the General Strategic Goal for the Brotherhood in North America’, written by a US-based Islamist leader from the Muslim Brotherhood. The strategic goals memo specifically addressed the ‘Civilization-Jihadist Process’ for using migration as a weapon of subversion.” (01/19/25)
https://nypost.com/2026/01/19/opinion/how-radical-islamists-and-the-far-left-united-to-fight-america-everywhere-and-all-the-time/
Source: Big Head Press
by Scott Bieser
Cartoon. (01/19/26)
https://www.quantumvibe.com/strip?page=2570
Source: Christian Science Monitor
by Whitney Eulich
“It’s a phone call no editor wants to receive: a late night jolt from a reporter facing trouble. I have worked with journalists in challenging environments – writing on gang violence and public protests, or from rural, hard-to-reach areas of Latin America and the Caribbean. But it took 15 years before I got my first call from a colleague facing an arrest warrant for his work. Nelson Rauda Zablah, our freelance correspondent in El Salvador, has documented his country’s democratic backsliding since President Nayib Bukele took office in 2019. … When I learned that he was facing the risk of arrest, I felt concerned. I informed Monitor management, offered an advance on his next story payment, and urged him to stay in close touch.” (01/16/25)
https://www.csmonitor.com/Commentary/From-the-Editors/2026/0116/When-your-reporter-is-the-news
Source: Al Jazeera [Qatari state media]
“Japan’s Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi has said she will dissolve parliament on Friday and call a general election to seek voter backing for her spending plans and other policies. The snap election announcement on Monday comes just three months into her tenure as the nation’s first female prime minister. … Calling an early election would allow her to capitalise on strong public support to tighten her grip on the governing Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) and shore up her coalition’s fragile majority. The election will test voter appetite for higher spending at a time when the rising cost of living is the public’s top concern.” (01/19/26)
https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2026/1/19/japans-pm-takaichi-will-dissolve-parliament-call-snap-election
Source: Fountainhead Forum
“Kyle Matovcik on how government regulations have made cars more expensive.” (01/18/26)
https://rumble.com/v74i0zq-ff-407-kyle-matovcik-on-how-government-regulations-have-made-cars-more-expe.html
Source: Libertarian Institute
by José Niño
“On January 16, 2026, Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney stood beside Chinese President Xi Jinping to announce what he called a landmark agreement that fundamentally restructured trade relations between the two nations. The deal slashed tariffs on Chinese electric vehicles from 100% to 6.1% while China reduced levies on Canadian canola from 84% to approximately 15%. But the numbers themselves tell only part of the story. This agreement represents something far more consequential: the first major fracture in North American solidarity since World War II, driven not by ideological sympathy for Beijing, but by Washington’s increasingly erratic and aggressive behavior on the world stage.” (01/19/26)
https://libertarianinstitute.org/articles/trumps-economic-belligerence-is-driving-canada-into-chinas-arms
