This past weekend, Shakira and Cardi B headlined the Global Citizen Festival in Central Park — proof that if you can’t fix Congress, at least you can bring the party. And Cardi? She brought the Bronx swagger and the baby bump, reminding everyone you can still be “hot” while nine months pregnant.
🇺🇸 Iran executed a man accused of being “one of the most important spies for Israel,” as part of its ongoing wave of hangings.
📺 Tropical Storm Imelda is forming near the Bahamas and expected to bring heavy rain to parts of the U.S. East Coast, especially the Carolinas.
🇺🇳 New York City Mayor Eric Adams has officially ended his re-election bid, surprising many in the political world.
✈️ The Taliban on Sunday freed U.S. citizen Amir Amiry from an Afghan prison after striking a deal with U.S. envoys as part of efforts to normalize relations.
🕊️ President Trump will attend a Pentagon meeting with top military commanders this week.
🎤 Join us for Redacted’s live show today at 4 p.m. Eastern Time right here.
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On Monday, President Trump will sit down with congressional leaders from both parties in a desperate bid to avoid a government shutdown that kicks in at the stroke of midnight Tuesday.
But make no mistake: this meeting isn’t a gesture of goodwill. It’s a damage control session. Behind the scenes, the White House has already ordered federal agencies to craft reduction-in-force plans just in case funding isn’t restored.
Democrats are demanding that any short-term funding deal include extensions of Affordable Care Act tax credits and rollbacks of Medicaid cuts that were in the Big Beautiful Bill. Republicans do not want to budge on that. They passed their bill and they intend to keep it.
Could this be a way for the President to get the government layoffs he wanted in the first place? By allowing the government to inch toward a shutdown, Trump creates a pretext for “structural cuts.”
We'll know by Tuesday because if no agreement is reached, the shut down begins on Wednesday.
Trump Teases “Something Special” in the Middle East
Photo credit: The White House
President Trump said that something "special" is about to happen in the Middle East and that "all are on board" for this "greatness."
He doesn't say peace. He says something great for the "first time ever."
Hopefully it is not a war with Iran. Russian state media reports that Israel is preparing a new strike on Iran. They credit "well-informed sources."
It would not be accurate to say "all are on board" for that.
Global opinion is fractured, U.S. polling shows deep resistance to another Middle East war, and even within Israel, skepticism about a direct confrontation with Iran runs high. Calling it “greatness” won’t change that.
If Trump’s tease points to war, it risks igniting a conflict no one can control and few outside the war rooms actually want. Let's hope that is not it.
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It Was Never About China — U.S. TikTok Grab Tied to Israel’s Propaganda War
Photo Credit: Avi Ohayon
Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu said that the next stage of Israel's war will happen on social media and admitted that the U.S. purchase of TikTok was the most important move in that battle.
"We have to fight with the weapons that apply to the battlefield in which we are engaged and the most important ones are on social media," Netanyahu said to a group of influencers this weekend. "The most important purchase that is going on right now is TikTok. I hope it goes through because it can be consequential. The other one that is most important is X so we have to talk to Elon. Now if we can get those two things, we get a lot."
What does he mean by "get"? Get control of course.
So if you ever bought that the U.S. wanted to control TikTok because of China, you're a chump. It was always to shut down criticism of Israel's war on the Palestinians.
Israel hosted dozens of young influencers over the weekend because support for Israel among young people is at an all-time low. Haaretz reports that the "Foreign Ministry has set a goal of bringing 550 influencer delegations to Israel by the end of 2025 to continue this outreach."
Is it working? Poll numbers say it isn't. Videos like this have been trending, not for being effective, but for being cringe and, dare I say, racist. It is racist to tell other people how jealous they are of all Jews.
So let me get this straight. Ukraine is bragging about getting weapons from Israel and those weapons were gifts from the U.S.
So the U.S. sent missile systems to Israel. Israel used them until they didn't want them any more. The U.S. took those weapons back, refurbished them, and then sent them to Ukraine.
Now Ukraine will use them to strike Russia.
Ukrainian President Zelensky says that he wants more Patriot missiles but the U.S. says that it can't spare them because Israel needs them to start a war with Iran. But we'll send the refurbed ones!
Can we ever stop arming the bad guy and creating new bad guys?
The Patriots in Ukraine will eventually get used up or destroyed in combat with Russia. Zelensky will keep asking for replacements, and Washington will keep juggling stockpiles, stripping one ally to feed another, all while defense contractors pocket fresh contracts for new systems. Israel, meanwhile, demands its own share in anticipation of war with Iran.
The net effect? Two hot wars fed by Washington. Instead of reducing conflict, the constant recycling of weapons ensures more fronts open, more adversaries harden and more civilians die.
This patriot recycling system was developed by the Biden administration but President Trump hasn't stopped it like he promised he would, which is further proof of the uniparty, in case you needed any.
$2.5 billion. That is how much Amazon will pay to settle a Federal Trade Commission (FTC) case alleging the company "misled customers into signing up for its Prime subscription service and made it difficult for them to cancel."
10 days. That is the jail sentence of a man in Switzerland who refused to pay a government fine for saying this on a lawmaker's social media: “If you dig up LGBTQI people after 200 years, you’ll only find men and women based on their skeletons. Everything else is a mental illness promoted through the curriculum.”
What's Trending?
Photo credit: Apple Music
Bad Bunny is trending because it was announced that he will headline the Apple Music Super Bowl Halftime show.
Typhoon Bualoi is trending because it made landfall in Vietnam over the weekend, forcing 23,000 families to evacuate to shelters.
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