Source: New York Times
“Iran’s armed forces struck a container ship that was passing through the Strait of Hormuz on Thursday, according to U.S. and Iranian officials, undermining efforts to restore shipping traffic through the crucial waterway. The attack came hours after Iran, demonstrating its control over the strait, had warned ships that the only route through the vital pathway for oil and natural gas was through its waters. Many ships had been using a route on the southern side of the strait, hugging the Omani coast.
The strike halted traffic through the crucial waterway, contradicting President Trump’s claim that Iran did not control the strait and his assurances that it was open once again to shipping. Oil prices jumped after the attack, with the price of Brent crude, the global benchmark for oil, rising over 2 percent to about $75 a barrel.” (06/25/26)
https://archive.is/4eOLK
Source: Garrison Center
by Thomas L Knapp
“My solution has three parts. Part one: Drain the pool. Part two: Zone the pool ‘commercial.’ Part three: Auction the pool off to a new, private sector, owner. I mean, it’s prime commercial real estate, right? Smack in the middle of a busy tourist area, lots of people walking around all day long with money in their pockets. And have you ever noticed what that tourist area’s called? ‘The National Mall.’ But good luck finding a Nordstrom or Bath & Body Works there. It’s mostly just museums and statues of, or for, dead people.” (06/25/26)
https://thegarrisoncenter.org/archives/20714
Source: JimBovard.com
Video by Jim Bovard. (06/25/26)
https://jimbovard.com/blog/2026/06/25/video-george-s-custer-deserved-the-little-bighorn-massacre/
Source: Yahoo! Finance
“Roughly $10.63 billion in Bitcoin (BTC) and Ethereum (ETH) options expire on Deribit Friday. The settlement drops into a market that keeps sliding lower while traders hunt for a floor. Bitcoin trades near $60,200 after a 2% daily drop, while ether sits around $1,580 after a steeper 4.43% fall. Both rest far below their options max pain levels. Friday’s settlement ranks as the quarter’s largest options event on Deribit. The bulk of expiring value sits in Bitcoin, with notional contracts worth about $9.06 billion against ether’s $1.57 billion. Max pain marks the price where the most options expire worthless.” (06/26/26)
https://finance.yahoo.com/markets/options/articles/10-63-billion-bitcoin-ethereum-082102564.html
Source: Law & Liberty
by Graham McAleer
“In the long history of the world, the nation-state is anomalous. In 1900, only 25 percent of the global population lived in a nation-state; today it is close to 100 percent. Nearly 50 percent of today’s states were founded in the thirty years after WWII. … After Nations tells a great historical story, yet plebian uprisings against oligarchy are one of our oldest political tales. Resentment seems as likely a part of our digital future as emancipation. [Rana] Dasgupta thinks, maybe correctly, that oligarchy can jettison the creaking state.” (06/25/26)
https://lawliberty.org/book-review/what-comes-after-the-nation-state/
Source: The Guardian [UK]
“The US supreme court has found in favor of the former Monsanto company in a ruling that is expected to block thousands of lawsuits filed by people alleging the key ingredient in the weed killer Roundup causes cancer. The decision was made in a 7-2 vote, with Justice Brett Kavanaugh offering the majority opinion and justice Ketanji Brown Jackson writing the dissenting opinion, joined by justice Neil Gorsuch. The case, Monsanto v Durnell, specifically dealt with the question of whether a federal law that gives the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) regulatory authority over pesticides preempts state claims that a company failed to warn users of certain product risks when the EPA itself has not required such warnings.” (06/25/26)
https://www.theguardian.com/business/2026/jun/25/monsanto-supreme-court-pesticide-case
Source: Cobden Centre
by Dr. Richard M Ebeling
“Those in political power always seem to be in a hurry. It is not surprising that their time horizons for ‘action’ never extend more than a few years ahead of them, though for different reasons. If it is a dictatorship, the tyrant in power can never be sure when an assassin’s bullet might cut his life short, or if some of his ‘loyal’ followers may be conspiring to overthrow him …. Little by little, however, some began to make the case that of course liberty is essential and property rights are important, but there are some particular needs or problems for which, surely, there can be an exception. … So why is it the case that in America today (and in most other modern democratic countries), those who hold political office seem so much in a hurry with short-term horizons guiding their actions, in their own way similar to dictatorships?” (06/25/26)
https://www.cobdencentre.org/2026/06/why-those-in-political-power-are-in-a-hurry/
Source: Irish Times [Ireland]
“Ukraine said its drones hit two oil refineries in the Russian city of Ufa, the latest in a wave of strikes on its foe’s energy infrastructure that have led to fuel shortages. The drones operated by the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) struck the Ufaneftekhim and Bashneft Novoil refineries, Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskiy said in a Telegram statement on Thursday. The attacks caused a fire at the two facilities’ primary processing units, SBU said in a separate statement. The plants in question are owned by Rosneft, Russia’s top oil producer and refiner. … Ukraine’s refinery strikes set a record in May, forcing Russia’s oil-processing rates runs to drop to a 20-year low at the start of June. Damage to the plants, including an attack on a facility in Moscow last week, has triggered panic buying of petrol, driving up pump prices and disrupting supplies across many parts of the country.” (06/25/26)
https://www.irishtimes.com/world/europe/2026/06/25/fresh-ukrainian-strikes-on-russian-oil-refineries-trigger-fuel-panic-buying/
Source: Libertarian Institute
by Angela Manaco
“In 399 B.C., Socrates chose to drink hemlock and suffer a painful death rather than submit to the state and live a life devoid of critical examination. He would be horrified to see how close we have come to constructing his nightmare: a society willing to jettison free speech and embrace state-defined ‘safety’ over the messy, painful, and necessary work of questioning why we believe what we believe.” (06/25/26)
https://libertarianinstitute.org/articles/the-high-price-of-free-speech/
Source: Al Jazeera [Qatari state media]
“Rescue teams are racing to find survivors trapped beneath the rubble of collapsed buildings after two major, back-to-back earthquakes hit Venezuela. The country’s health minister says at least 235 people have been killed and 4,300 others wounded, with most casualties recorded in the northern coastal region of La Guaira. … More than 4,300 people are wounded, with hospitals ‘full of patients,’ according to Venezuela’s Health Minister Carlos Alvarado.” (06/25/26)
https://www.aljazeera.com/news/liveblog/2026/6/25/venezuela-earthquakes-live-at-least-188-dead-as-rescue-efforts-intensify
