“These Are Not Good People” – Trump Derangement Is The Stupidest Political Phenomenon Of Our Lifetime Authored by Chris Bray via ‘Tell Me How This Ends’ substack, Trump Derangement is the Stupidest Political Phenomenon of My Lifetime, and Its Idiot Propagators Need to be Shoved Into a Forgotten Corner of the Culture Forever Spare a thought for them, America. Liz Cheney is probably being executed by that firing squad as you read this, and Molly Jong-Fast is undoubtedly already on her way to the camps, and the cities are emptying as the brave survivors sew diamonds into the lining of their coats and set off on foot for political asylum in Canada. What time do we get the first delivery of handmaids, Vladimir? So. The dismal cabal of hysterical adult children that makes up the alleged American cultural “mainstream,” the responsible people you see on television and in the op-ed pages — Anne Applebaum, Tom Nichols, Ruth Ben-Ghiat, Adam Kinzinger, Liz Cheney, Joe Scarborough and his idiot wife, Jonathan Capehart, Max Boot, Jen Rubin, David French, Bill Kristol, Ruth Marcus, Nicolle Wallace, Dana Bash, and on and on, all of them completely interchangeable, one set of asinine talking points with a series of different faces sewn on the front — has spent the last year or ten descending into a urine-soaked psychotic tantrum. They don’t know anything, they don’t understand anything, they don’t say anything of value, they don’t contribute anything, ever, and their voices are ubiquitous. Living in this media environment is like living in a place where the air is made of manure. They have absorbed no lesson. This morning, the media is full of warnings about fascism and white nationalism and VLADIMIR PUTIN!!!!!!!, a wall of empty noise in response to the rejection of a wall of empty noise. Ruth Ben-Ghiat is still the Dumbest Professor in America™, by the way, and just a profoundly indecent human being: The lesson of last night is that Trump “has declared war on the US.” You disgusting braindead pig. The unifying reality about these soulless, mindless, worthless people is that they have no history to them, and that goes double for the history professors. How many times have you heard, for example, that the January 6 insurrection was the worst act of political violence in America since the Civil War, and how many times have you heard any of the people who made that ritual claim deal with any of the obvious examples that disprove the claim — the Colfax Massacre, the Ludlow Massacre, the bombing of the Oklahoma City federal building, the bombing campaigns of the Weatherman and other radical groups in the early 1970s, the wave of political assassinations in the late-1960s, and on and on — in any way? Related, all of their history is LITERALLY ADOLF HITLER, but you have to eventually notice that their constant demands for guardrails on the discourse and rules for social media never deal with any American history, any history of the place they think they’re talking about: the Adams administration and the Sedition Act, the military arrest of Clement Vallandigham for an anti-war speech, the Wilson administration’s arrest of anti-war activists, and so on. People who have no history but Hitler have no history. So in the end, they say things, but they don’t think about the things they say. At all. Their very loud voices aren’t attached to any form of cognition. The Potemkin village of our media-academic-political class barely sustains the facade. It’s nothing. They have nothing, they are nothing, the offer nothing. The New Republic, November 1: Here’s the lede: “Donald Trump doubled down Friday on his disturbing comments about placing Liz Cheney in front of a firing squad.” Chevy Chase, Maryland, Nov. 6 Here’s the part of the story that describes the terrifying threat to murder an opponent with a firing squad: “She’s a war hawk. She kills people. She wanted uh, even in my administration, she was pushing that we go to war with everybody,” Trump said. “And I said that if you ever gave her a rifle, [indistinguishable] if you ever do that, she wouldn’t be doing too well.” “If she had to do it herself, and she had to face the consequences of battle, she wouldn’t be doing it. So it’s easy for her to talk, but she wouldn’t be doing it,” Trump continued. “She’s actually a disgrace.” You see, people are handed rifles when they’re shoved up against the wall to be executed by a firing squad, and being killed by a firing squad is an example of facing the consequences of battle. Makes total sense. These are not good people. They’re stupid, dangerous, empty, and a threat to any form of public knowledge. They deserve to have derision howled in their ugly faces for the rest of their worthless lives. Tyler Durden Wed, 11/06/2024 – 17:40

Hurricane Rafael Revs Up To Cat. 2 As Gulf Oil Rigs In Crosshairs  Hurricane Rafael intensified to a Category 2 storm on Wednesday morning and may reach Cat. 3 strength on the five-step Saffir-Simpson scale by evening. Rafael’s cone of uncertainty shifted further west than previous forecasts (read: here & here), putting offshore oil/gas rigs at increased risk across the Gulf of Mexico.  The National Hurricane Center in the US said Rafael was just southeast of Havana and packing winds around 100 mph, making it a Cat. 2 storm. The storm is expected to strengthen into a Cat. 3 storm, unleashing “life-threatening storm surge, damaging hurricane-force winds, and flash flooding” across west and central Cuba.  “Rafael is likely to remain a hurricane over the southeastern and southern Gulf of Mexico during the next few days,” NHC’s Dan Brown wrote in a forecast.  The current trajectory of the storm puts about 1.55m b/d of oil production at risk, according to Bloomberg calculations of data from the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management and the NHC. More from Bloomberg about potential storm impacts on US Gulf area oil/gas assets: Rafael also threatens to cross leases that produced 1.59b cf/d of gas, 29k b/d of condensate Rafael direction has shifted eastward US oil production could be cut by 3.1 million to 4.9 million barrels if hurricane reaches Category 2 status: Mansfield Energy Oil and gas platforms that are within the cone of the storm include: Once Rafael arrives in the southeastern and southern Gulf of Mexico, computer models do not clearly agree on trajectory.  Global + Hurricane Models GFS Ensembles GEPS Ensembles “It is too soon to determine what, if any, impacts Rafael could bring to portions of the northern Gulf Coast,” NHC noted.  For now, Rafael’s trajectory and intensity should be closely monitored as computer models are still subject to change.  Tyler Durden Wed, 11/06/2024 – 17:20

Goodbye Middle Class: Half Of All American Workers Make Less Than $43,222.81 A Year Authored by Michael Snyder via The Economic Collapse blog, It is that time of the year again.   The Social Security Administration has finally released the final wage statistics for 2023, and they are quite sobering.   According to the report, last year the “median wage” in this country was just $43,222.81.  In other words, half of all American workers made less than $43,222.81, and half of all American workers made more than $43,222.81.  That is terrible news, because the cost of living has been rising much faster than paycheck have.  More people are being squeezed out of the middle class with each passing day, but most Americans don’t even realize that this is happening because the media isn’t really talking about it. Poverty, homelessness and hunger are all growing all around us, and if we stay on the path that we are on the middle class will continue to be systematically eviscerated. Once upon a time, the vast majority of the country could afford to live a middle class lifestyle. But now those days are long gone. A study that was recently released found that it now takes more than $100,000 a year for a typical U.S. household to live “the American Dream” in all 50 states, and in 29 U.S. states it takes more than $150,000 a year… A household would have to spend more than $150,000 a year to live the dream in 29 of the 50 states, according to an analysis published in April by the personal finance site GOBankingRates. According to the report, the optimal American lifestyle would cost $137,842 a year in Ohio, $147,535 in Texas, $159,932 in Florida, $194,067 in New York and $245,723 in California. The state that has the lowest cost of living is Mississippi. Living the American Dream only costs $109,516 a year in that state. Needless to say, someone earning $43,222.81 a year is not going to be able to live the American Dream anywhere in the nation. Even if there are two people earning $43,222.81 a year in the same household, that still isn’t going to get you anywhere close to living the American Dream. When I was growing up, my father worked and my mother stayed home with the kids, and we were still able to live a middle class lifestyle. But now most households cannot afford to live a middle class lifestyle even if both parents are working. After reading that, is there anyone out there that would like to disagree with me about the fact that we have been experiencing a long-term economic decline? What I have been warning about all these years has been slowly but steadily playing out right in front of our eyes. Not too long ago, a Wall Street Journal/NORC poll found that only about one-third of the entire U.S. population actually believes that the American Dream “is still alive”… Only about a third of U.S. adults believe the American dream is still alive, a Wall Street Journal/NORC poll published Wednesday found. A survey of 2,501 people conducted by the Public Religion Research Institute twelve years ago found more than half of respondents believed the American dream “still holds true,” but now only a third feel that way, according to a recent WSJ/NORC poll of 1,502 adults. The study also found an increasingly large gap between people’s economic goals and what they think is actually attainable — a trend that was consistent across gender and party lines, but was especially common amongst younger generations. Nobody out there can deny what is happening. This is our country now, and conditions are getting worse with each passing day. One of the biggest reasons why the American Dream is out of reach for most of the population is because home prices have gone absolutely haywire over the last four years… Twenty-four percent of likely voters who rent their homes said that “the cost of housing” is the most important economic issue they’re considering as they decide their vote, according to a CNN poll conducted by SSRS between September 19 and 22. That’s no surprise: The US is facing a once-in-a-generation housing affordability crisis. In the four years through August 2024, national home prices have risen 45%, according to the S&P CoreLogic Case-Shiller Home Price Index. According to the National Association of Realtors, the median sales price of a home in the US hit a record high this summer and now hovers just below that level. Renting used to be an affordable alternative for many people, but these days close to half of all renters in this country “spend more than 30% of their income on housing”… Nor has renting become any easier than buying. Nearly half of US renters spend more than 30% of their income on housing, qualifying them as “cost-burdened,” according to US Census data from September. In September 2024, the median rent in the U.S. was $2,050 a month. How are you supposed to be able to afford that if you are making just $43,222.81 a year? Increasingly, America is being divided into the “haves” and the “have nots”. If you don’t know which group you belong to, let me clue you in.  If you are not making more than $100,000 a year, you are definitely among the “have nots”. Unfortunately, economic conditions are rapidly getting worse, and we are seeing high profile bankruptcies happen at a pace that we haven’t seen since the global financial crisis.  For example, one of the largest crafting chains in the U.S. just filed for bankruptcy… Joann — the craft store chain formerly known as Jo-Ann Fabrics — has filed for bankruptcy amid ongoing financial troubles. But DIYers need not worry just yet: The company’s more than 800 stores nationwide will remain open and its website will stay active as the Hudson, Ohio-based company restructures its finances. As hordes of businesses fail all over the nation, our historic commercial real estate crisis just continues to intensify. If you doubt this, just check out these numbers… The delinquency rate of office mortgages backing commercial mortgage-backed securities (CMBS) spiked to 9.4% in October, up a full percentage point from September, and the highest since the worst months of the meltdown that followed the Financial Crisis. The delinquency rate has doubled since June 2023 (4.5%), according to data by Trepp, which tracks and analyzes CMBS. I don’t even have to tell many of you what those numbers mean. We are headed for a historic meltdown, and it is going to absolutely devastate small to mid-size banks from coast to coast. Meanwhile, most Americans are just barely scraping by from month to month as our standard of living steadily deteriorates. We are in far more trouble than most people realize, and the months ahead are going to be extremely challenging. *  *  * Michael’s new book entitled “Why” is available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon.com, and you can subscribe to his Substack newsletter at michaeltsnyder.substack.com. Tyler Durden Wed, 11/06/2024 – 17:00

Middle East At War: How Are Regional Leaders Reacting To Trump’s Victory? The Middle East remains on edge, and Israel is still at war on multiple fronts – in Gaza, and in Lebanon, and with the Houthis in the Red Sea region and Yemen. Iran is still threatening to retaliate against Israel, and Iraqi paramilitaries supported from Tehran are reportedly readying for battle. Israeli airstrikes on Syria have been ongoing for days. US assets from warships to long-range bombers are also parked in the region, ready for anything. The region could explode into bigger escalation at any moment, and tit-for-tat big attacks between Hezbollah and Israel’s military will likely persist through January, when Trump steps into the oval office. Hezbollah’s attacks on northern Israel have not relented, and neither have massive Israeli strikes on Beirut and eastern and southern Lebanon. In his victory speech, Trump acknowledged the regional hot wars playing out in various parts of the globe, two of which have involved US participation by proxy. “They said ‘He will start a war,’ I’m not going to start a war. I’m going to stop wars,” Trump said. Via Reuters Below are the reactions of various Middle East leaders to the Trump victory… Israel To the surprise of no one, Israel is overjoyed that Donald Trump will be the next president of the United States. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was actually the very first world leader to issue a hearty congratulations to Trump.  “Congratulations on history’s greatest comeback!” he said in an English-language statement. “Your historic return to the White House offers a new beginning for America and a powerful recommitment to the great alliance between Israel and America. This is a huge victory!” he said. Netanyahu’s hardline and hawkish National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir simply wrote on social meda “Yesssss”. Yesssss 💪🏻🇮🇱🇺🇸 https://t.co/kPqkYI3PDP — איתמר בן גביר (@itamarbengvir) November 6, 2024 Turkey “I congratulate my friend Donald Trump, who won the presidential election in the US after a great struggle and was re-elected as the President,” said Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan via X. “In this new period that will begin with the elections of the American people, I hope that Turkiye-US relations will strengthen, that regional and global crises and wars, especially the Palestinian issue and the Russia-Ukraine war, will come to an end; I believe that more efforts will be made for a more just world,” Erdogan added.  He declared his hope that “the elections will be beneficial for our friendly and allied people in the US and for all of humanity.” Iran Iranian government spokesperson, Fatemeh Mohajerani, said “US elections are not really our business. Our policies are steady and don’t change based on individuals. We made the necessary predictions before, and there will not be a change in people’s livelihoods,” in reference to US sanctions on Iran. Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) Deputy Commander in Chief Ali Fadavi on Wednesday repeated that Tehran is ready for a confrontation with Israel. Hamas Senior Hamas official Sami Abu Zuhri said “We urge Trump to learn from [US President Joe] Biden’s mistakes” and said that the new president will be “tested” on his statements about being able to end the war in Gaza. He also pointed out past statements of Trump and/or his campaign officials about US support to Israel not being endless. Interestingly Trump had received record Arab-American support in swing states like Michigan, amid anger at the Biden-Harris administration for its blank check support to Israel even as tens of thousands of Palestinian civilians die. “Our position regarding the new US administration will depend on its stances and practical actions towards our Palestinian people, their legitimate rights, and their just cause,” the group, designated by the US as a terror organization, additionally said. “The elected US President is urged to heed the voices that have risen from within American society itself for more than a year since the Zionist aggression on Gaza, rejecting occupation and genocide, and objecting to support and bias toward [Israel].” It’ll be interesting to watch the immediate foreign policy shifts following the Trump victory. Especially in the Middle East. Remember, the Abraham Accords were signed under President Trump in 2020. Israel/Saudi Arabia normalization is likely under the new administration. — Trey Yingst (@TreyYingst) November 6, 2024 Palestinian Authority Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas congratulated Trump and expressed hope for regional peace and stability based on the future declaration of a Palestinian state and equal right and freedoms. “We will remain steadfast in our commitment to peace, and we are confident that the United States will support, under your leadership, the legitimate aspirations of the Palestinian people,” Abbas said. Saudi Arabia King Salman and MBS sent issued separate formal diplomatic cables congratulating Trump. MbS and Trump have long been close, despite during Trump’s first term the Jamal Khashoggi murder creating tensions and some distance between Riyadh and Washington. King Salman also praised the “historically close [bilateral] relations that everyone seeks to strengthen and develop in all fields.” Iraq Iraqi Prime Minister Mohammed Shia al-Sudani formally congratulated Trump. “We affirm Iraq’s firm commitment to strengthening bilateral relations with the United States on the basis of mutual respect and common interests,” he said. “We look forward to this new phase being the beginning of deepening cooperation between our two countries in various fields, which will contribute to achieving sustainable development and benefit the two friendly peoples.” Tyler Durden Wed, 11/06/2024 – 16:40

Watch: Kamala Harris Gives Concession Speech After speaking with President-Elect Donald Trump earlier in the day, and after ghosting thousands of supporters last night who showed up for her at Howard, Kamala Harris is giving a concession speech. Watch: *  *  * Vice President Kamala Harris has called President-Elect Donald Trump to concede the election and congratulate him on beating her like Doug Emhoff’s ex-girlfriend. A crestfallen Wolf Blitzer delivers the news: JUST IN: Kamala Harris has called President Donald Trump to congratulate him and concede the 2024 election. “We are told she talked about the importance of the transfer of power…” pic.twitter.com/AuprXkAgxr — Collin Rugg (@CollinRugg) November 6, 2024 Harris campaign manager, meanwhile, sent a letter to staff in which she said “losing is unfathomably painful. It is hard. This will take a long time to process. But the work of protecting America from the impacts of a Trump Presidency starts now.” The media cope, meanwhile, continues… Pure, perfect projection. The lack of self-awareness is awe-inspiring. pic.twitter.com/CQrrJFJMs6 — Michael Shellenberger (@shellenberger) November 6, 2024 Check back for updates… Tyler Durden Wed, 11/06/2024 – 16:24