This is a long one folks, but it will read fast. If you want to understand where journalism has gone wrong, and how it can be fixed, read the piece. It's my point of view based off of 40 years in the newspaper business.
DEA has agents in Juárez. Why was CIA involved? Drones. Recall, CIA contractors crashed in Colombia in 2003 while hunting coca fields/drug labs.
AP
After locating the labs using drones, officials found tons of material to manufacture drugs but no people, who were likely alerted beforehand and fled.
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The other "war" that has faded into the chaos. And yes, we're still siphoning oil from Venezuela and micro-managing their economy with no clear statutory authority to do so, and only opaqueness on where the money from oil sales is going, even as it cost taxpayers millions to maintain seized ships.
Filth is a strong word. But an apt description of the Epstein-protection racket running God and country now.
WaPo
Leo sharply condemned those “who manipulate religion in the very name of God for their own military, economic or political gain, dragging that which is sacred into darkness and filth.”
Trump met his match with Iran, a nation of 93 million. Mexico's population is 130M, including 1.6M US citizens, and our economies are intertwined.
AP
“We’ve seen the president raise her tone,” said Palmira Tapia, an analyst.. “There’s been a shift, and we’ve seen Sheinbaum be more vocal..”
TheGreatPretense.org
TheGr
Blue is the anti-Orban Tisza Party
This is how you beat fascism back to the grave. You overwhelm it. And then push it into the grave it dug for itself.
www.nytimes.com/live/2026/04...
Oil is an addictive drug for the rich and powerful. It's still a necessity for the rest of the world. Clean energy is the only way through this dire strait.
Do we have a foreign policy anymore? Trump declares the Western Hemisphere the eminent domain of the US. As repulsive as that is, it is a foreign policy position. Then he declares a pointless war (for the U.S., not Russia or China) in the Eastern Hemisphere? Insanity isn't supposed to make sense.
What Trump did to the world tonight wasn't a negotiating tactic. It isn't even protected by our own 1st Amendment — shouting fire in a crowded theater. But it is how I imagine Al Capone acting after the syphilis began eating at his brain.
Tactical nukes. They've never been used. The way Trump is talking about Iran? Hope isn't enough here.
ACC
"While no consensus definition exists, non-strategic nuclear weapons, otherwise known as tactical nuclear weapons, are generally low-yield nuclear weapons designed for use on the battlefield."
TheGreatPretense.org
This was a great interview by another journalist I respect greatly who also covers the drug war. José Olivares is the future of authentic journalism. We discussed my new book, The Great Pretense, but this interview also serves as a great reveal of the hidden story of the forever "war for drugs."
The focus now is on Iran. That's understandable. But the capture/rendition of Venezuelan President Maduro did not end the crisis in that nation, despite Trump's bluster and rhetoric. An excerpt from The Great Pretense: A Tour Through the Boneyards of the CIA's War for Drugs. TheGreatPretense.org
This is about the pilot just rescued in Iran. Trump claims disingenuously that Iranians only knew about the pilot from a media report. That kind of senility fails to address the obvious. The reason anyone in the press asked about a missing pilot is because the jet shot down has a 2-person crew.
He's taking a glory run around the bases after one home run rescue. But it's still the opening innings of the game. And he can't even make it around the bases without pausing for applause. Meanwhile, there's a war waging and the world economy is on the brink of collapse with the strait still closed.
Subs are an option for taking the Strait of Hormuz. Hard to hit a sub underwater with a drone.
Still risky.
Naval News
The U.S. Navy has a larger submarine force than China. 68..compared to an estimated 66. This makes the U.S. Navy the second largest submarine force in the world, after North Korea.
