“A family friend, a single mom of two small children, just got denied help from Tennessee’s Families First, a program that is supposed to, among other things, help offset skyrocketing daycare costs for working families. This program is obviously huge because for lower-income people, the cost of daycare can be equal to or even more than what they make working a job. … She relies on her around $16/hour entry-level full-time job to pay rent, utilities, gas, car, vehicle maintenance, clothing, and other expenses (she does get some help for food and healthcare). You would think this person would be a prime candidate for childcare help, especially since she is working full-time and genuinely trying to move up the income ladder and make good decisions after somewhat of a troubled past that includes some minor drug charges.” (12/22/25)
“The highest-ranking Minnesotan in Congress is demanding accountability for anyone who was involved in or aware of the growing social services fraud scandal in the Gopher State. ‘I think as they start to peel this onion back, which just seems to be getting deeper and deeper and broader and broader, whoever was responsible needs to be held accountable,’ House Majority Whip Tom Emmer, the No. 3 House Republican, told Fox News Digital. It comes after U.S. attorneys suggested that Minnesota social services programs could have seen potentially billions of dollars’ worth of fraud and abuse since 2018.” (12/22/25)
“Italy’s antitrust authority fined Apple 98.6 million euros ($116 million) on Monday after determining that operating one of its privacy features restricted App Store competition. Apple said it would appeal the sanction. Apple abused its dominant position with its App Tracking Transparency, ATT, policy, which forces apps to obtain permission before collecting data to target users with personalized ads, the antitrust authority said in a statement. The company rolled out ATT starting in April 2021 as part of an update to the operating system powering the iPhone and iPad. While the feature was designed to tighten up privacy, it faced criticism from Big Tech rivals that it would make it harder for smaller apps to survive without charging consumers. The authority didn’t criticize the policy per se, but the fact that the Apple system requires third-party app makers to ask users for consent twice in order to comply with Europe’s strict privacy rules.” (12/22/25)
“On the night Zohran Mamdani won New York City’s mayoral election, he delivered a rousing victory speech that made explicit the connection between his economic agenda and the national fight against authoritarianism. Calling out President Donald Trump, Mamdani declared, ‘If there is any way to terrify a despot, it is by dismantling the very conditions that allowed him to accumulate power.’ Several weeks later — after that despot had threatened to besiege New York City with immigration raids and strip its federal funding, should Mamdani win—the mayor-elect stood beside Trump during a surreal White House press briefing. When a reporter pressed Mamdani on whether he still considered the president a fascist, the jovial, clearly charmed Trump interjected, ’You can just say yes. … It’s easier than explaining it’. The response was disarmingly nonchalant, coming from the head of an administration that has gone to great lengths to crush opposition to fascism elsewhere.” (12/22/25)
“Reps. Ro Khanna (D-California) and Thomas Massie (R-Kentucky) said Sunday that they will seek to find Attorney General Pam Bondi in contempt of Congress for not releasing more documents related to convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein. … Khanna and Massie wrote legislation that passed Congress nearly unanimously and was signed by President Donald Trump last month requiring the Justice Department to release a trove of Epstein files in its possession within 30 days. … Khanna said in an interview with The Washington Post that he and Massie were pursuing contempt findings because the measure would take effect when it got through the House and would not need to go through the Senate. He said they were likely to give Bondi a 30-day grace period and then start fining her daily until she released all the records.” (12/21/25)
“Few believe the justifications for the ongoing US murder campaign, and now military blockade, off the coast of Venezuela. Even US officials seem halfheartedly committed to their claims about stopping drugs. They now concede that the real goal is overthrowing the Venezuelan government and recovering ‘our oil,’ which was mistakenly buried under Venezuelan soil. If they succeed there, they will surely escalate violence against Cuba and perhaps other noncompliant governments. The larger goal, proclaims the US secretary of defense, is the ‘restoration of our power and prerogatives in this hemisphere.’ That entails reasserting ‘US military dominance in the Western Hemisphere’ and with it the ‘access to key terrain throughout the region’ — that is, markets and resources like our oil. In the meantime, if blowing up boats can also divert attention from domestic scandals, that’s a bonus.” (12/20/25)
“With calm resolve, the United States and the European Union have each made decisions in recent days showing a firm watchfulness against big-power aggression. Neither will receive a Nobel Peace Prize for its actions – Alfred Nobel’s idea of a secure world did not include military deterrence. Yet together, the U.S. and EU have at least helped make war a bit more unthinkable. On Dec. 17, the Trump administration approved the largest-ever U.S. arms sales to Taiwan. Congress is expected to approve the $11.1 billion weapons package, especially after the House Select Committee on China issued a report Thursday calling for ‘unambiguous’ opposition to Beijing’s moves toward an invasion of the self-governing democratic island.” (12/19/25)
“Brace for another government shutdown early in the new year …. The short-term funding bill that Democrats finally allowed to pass last month, ending the record-long shutdown, only runs through Jan. 30. The federal Fiscal Year 2026 started Oct. 1 this year, yet the House and Senate have so far passed only three of the 12 appropriations bills to fund various parts of the government. And they’re not even close on the other nine; they’d need a Christmas miracle to get it done in time. And it’ll be brutally hard to pass yet another stopgap bill, or alternately another ‘omnibus’ to cover everything through next Oct. 1: Too many Republicans are sick of these contraptions, while too few Democrats are willing to give the GOP any help at all.” [editor’s note: The Democrats didn’t have to “allow” the funding bill to pass; the Republicans could have passed it without their help at any time – TLK] (12/20/25)
Source: Caitlin Johnstone, Rogue Journalist
by Caitlin Johnstone
“You are allowed to subvert and undermine Israel’s interests, because Israel is trying to subvert and undermine your rights. You are allowed to interfere in Israel’s affairs, because Israel is interfering in your country’s affairs. As Israel tries to exert more and more influence over western society and pushes western governments to crush our freedom of speech and assembly, we should be doing everything we can to make sure that western society turns against Israel, and that western governments alienate this freakish apartheid state on the world stage. And we should feel perfectly entitled in doing so, because Israel certainly feels comfortable coming after us and our rights. If Israel is going after us, then we get to go after Israel. It’s just basic self-defense at this point.” (12/21/25)
“President Trump is rightfully angry that some of his top choices for U.S. attorneys in Democrat-controlled states are being blocked by Democrats and their leftist allies in the judicial branch. But the recent attacks from some supporters of the president against Sen. Chuck Grassley, Trump’s most effective ally in the Senate, are misplaced. To start, remember who Grassley is. He’s a dignified statesman but also a shrewd legislator, fearless investigator and Senate workhorse. He doesn’t chase the limelight but quietly puts one win after the other on the scoreboard for Trump and his MAGA agenda. This isn’t bluster. Trump appointed three Supreme Court justices, and two were carried squarely on the shoulders of Grassley, who chairs the Senate Judiciary Committee.” (12/19/25)
