Study Finds Between 29% and 39% of Americans believe they are currently living in the end times. That is not a fringe position held by a handful of doomsday cults. It cuts across Evangelical congregations, climate activist circles, Silicon Valley boardrooms, and rural prepper communities alike. And according to a new study, it may be one of the most consequential and least examined forces in how the public responds to the biggest threats facing the planet.
March 16, 2026
Money
Newsweek - Trump’s signature spending bill, the “One Big Beautiful Bill,” was passed with no Democratic support after extensive back-and-forth and signed into law by the president on July 4, 2025. Among other measures, it extended Trump’s 2017 tax cuts, lowering taxes for corporations and for individuals across most income brackets, eliminated federal taxes on overtime and tips and increased the deduction limit for state and local taxes (SALT).
While the president spoke of the bill as offering tax savings to all Americans, experts and critics warned that the richest Americans stood to benefit more from it than the poorest.
According to estimates from the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office (CBO) and Joint Committee on Taxation (JCT), the bill is expected to cut taxes for the richest 10 percent of Americans by more than $14,700 per year per household and cut taxes for the richest 1 percent of Americans by more than $50,000 per year through 2035.
InvestorsObserves’ report, based on analysis by the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy, found that the impact of the Trump administration’s OBBB is heavily tilted in favor of those already at the top.
According to the company, the near-wealthy save over 2,000 times more than the poor thanks to the changes introduced under the megabudget bill.
Just how much the richest Americans benefit from Trump’s tax cuts more than the poorest changes wildly from state to state. In Montana, the richest residents receive tax breaks 2,194 times larger than the poorest taxpayers, “enough to cover nearly a year of mortgage payments versus two gallons of milk,” InvestorsObserver wrote.
Trump and the law
The Guardian - The BBC has asked a US court to throw out Donald Trump’s $10bn (£7.5bn) lawsuit over the way a documentary edited one of his speeches, warning that proceeding with the case would have a “chilling effect” on its reporting on the president.
In papers filed to the Florida court dealing with the case, the BBC’s US lawyers claimed Trump’s reputation had not been damaged by the documentary, given it aired in the UK a week before his re-election.
The broadcaster’s lawyers also reiterated that the Panorama documentary, Trump: a Second Chance, was simply not published in the US, including Florida, meaning the court had no jurisdiction to hear the case.
They also cited other cases to argue that defendants should not have to deal with “expensive yet groundless litigation”, which restricted the ability to cover public figures.
“All the more so when [the] plaintiff is among the most powerful and high-profile individuals in the world, on whose activities the BBC reports every day,” the BBC’s case states.
“The chilling effect is clear. Federal courts in Florida therefore frequently dismiss defective defamation claims like this one at the pleading stage.”
The corporation’s lawyers cited a recent Trump lawsuit against CNN, which was dismissed as “meritless”. The 2022 suit objected to the network’s use of the phrase “the big lie”, which it used to refer to the president’s claim that the 2020 election was “stolen”.
The BBC has already apologised personally to Trump for a 12-second clip in the 2024 documentary, which spliced together two parts of the speech made on 6 January 2021. The clip suggested that Trump told the crowd: “We’re going to walk down to the Capitol and I’ll be there with you, and we fight. We fight like hell.”
The words were taken from sections of his speech almost an hour apart. When the edit emerged at the end of last year, the BBC issued a retraction for “unintentionally” giving “the mistaken impression that President Trump had made a direct call for violent action”.
However, the BBC said the documentary was not shown in the US or Florida.
Its case states: “More than a year later, even after being re-elected with the support of a sizeable majority of Florida voters, the president alleged that the documentary defamed him in Florida – where defendants never aired it.”
Roll Call - The Trump administration vowed Friday to appeal a ruling from a federal judge that an investigation into Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell was likely politically motivated and blocked a grand jury subpoena.
Jeanine Pirro, the U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia, made the announcement at a news conference as the ruling was unsealed Friday. Her office has reportedly been investigating Powell’s 2025 testimony before the Senate Banking Committee about cost overruns on renovations to the Federal Reserve’s building.
Judge James E. Boasberg of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia issued the decision on Wednesday and said he would unseal it Friday. The judge cited months of statements by President Donald Trump pressuring Powell to make decisions to lower interest rates and criticizing Powell.
Boasberg also said Pirro appeared to act at Trump’s direction to initiate the investigation. “A mountain of evidence suggests that the Government served these subpoenas on the Board to pressure its Chair into voting for lower interest rates or resigning,” Boasberg wrote.
“On the other side of the scale, the Government has produced essentially zero evidence to suspect Chair Powell of a crime; indeed, its justifications are so thin and unsubstantiated that the Court can only conclude that they are pretextual,” Boasberg wrote.
Roll Call - The Trump administration vowed Friday to appeal a ruling from a federal judge that an investigation into Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell was likely politically motivated and blocked a grand jury subpoena.
Jeanine Pirro, the U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia, made the announcement at a news conference as the ruling was unsealed Friday. Her office has reportedly been investigating Powell’s 2025 testimony before the Senate Banking Committee about cost overruns on renovations to the Federal Reserve’s building.
Judge James E. Boasberg of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia issued the decision on Wednesday and said he would unseal it Friday. The judge cited months of statements by President Donald Trump pressuring Powell to make decisions to lower interest rates and criticizing Powell.
Boasberg also said Pirro appeared to act at Trump’s direction to initiate the investigation. “A mountain of evidence suggests that the Government served these subpoenas on the Board to pressure its Chair into voting for lower interest rates or resigning,” Boasberg wrote.
“On the other side of the scale, the Government has produced essentially zero evidence to suspect Chair Powell of a crime; indeed, its justifications are so thin and unsubstantiated that the Court can only conclude that they are pretextual,” Boasberg wrote.
Its case states: “More than a year later, even after being re-elected with the support of a sizeable majority of Florida voters, the president alleged that the documentary defamed him in Florida – where defendants never aired it.”
Roll Call - The Trump administration vowed Friday to appeal a ruling from a federal judge that an investigation into Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell was likely politically motivated and blocked a grand jury subpoena.
Jeanine Pirro, the U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia, made the announcement at a news conference as the ruling was unsealed Friday. Her office has reportedly been investigating Powell’s 2025 testimony before the Senate Banking Committee about cost overruns on renovations to the Federal Reserve’s building.
Judge James E. Boasberg of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia issued the decision on Wednesday and said he would unseal it Friday. The judge cited months of statements by President Donald Trump pressuring Powell to make decisions to lower interest rates and criticizing Powell.
Boasberg also said Pirro appeared to act at Trump’s direction to initiate the investigation. “A mountain of evidence suggests that the Government served these subpoenas on the Board to pressure its Chair into voting for lower interest rates or resigning,” Boasberg wrote.
“On the other side of the scale, the Government has produced essentially zero evidence to suspect Chair Powell of a crime; indeed, its justifications are so thin and unsubstantiated that the Court can only conclude that they are pretextual,” Boasberg wrote.
Buttigieg opposes the electoral college
Pete Buttigieg - This outdated system means the presidency can—and has—gone to candidates who lost the popular vote. It disproportionately favors certain states, ignores millions of voters, and undermines the fundamental democratic principle of "one person, one vote."
Every American vote should carry the same weight, but right now, your voice counts differently depending on where you live. We can do much better for our people.
We need a fair, straightforward system that truly represents the will of the people.
Most overweight cities
WalletHub - WalletHub today released its report on 2026's Most Overweight and Obese Cities in the U.S., as well as expert commentary. The report highlights the places where residents are in the most danger of weight-related health conditions, and thus need to improve their exercise and diet.
In order to call attention to the communities where weight-related problems are most prevalent, WalletHub compared 100 of the most populated U.S. metro areas across 19 key metrics. Our data set ranges from the share of physically inactive adults to projected obesity rates by 2050 to healthy-food access.
To read the full report and your city’s rank
In order to call attention to the communities where weight-related problems are most prevalent, WalletHub compared 100 of the most populated U.S. metro areas across 19 key metrics. Our data set ranges from the share of physically inactive adults to projected obesity rates by 2050 to healthy-food access.
| Most Overweight & Obese Cities | |
| 1. Little Rock, AR | 11. Columbia, SC |
| 2. McAllen, TX | 12. Knoxville, TN |
| 3. Memphis, TN | 13. Birmingham, AL |
| 4. Jackson, MS | 14. Wichita, KS |
| 5. Augusta, GA | 15. Greenville, SC |
| 6. Lafayette, LA | 16. New Orleans, LA |
| 7. Fayetteville, AR | 17. Myrtle Beach, SC |
| 8. Shreveport, LA | 18. Winston, NC |
| 9. Mobile, AL | 19. Louisville, KY |
| 10. Baton Rouge, LA | 20. Fort Wayne, IN |
To read the full report and your city’s rank
FCC chair threatens TV broadcasters
The Guardian - Donald Trump reinforced comments made by Brendan Carr, the chair of the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), threatening the broadcast licenses of news organizations that report unfavorably on the war in Iran.
In a Truth Social post on Sunday night, Trump said he was “thrilled” that Carr was “looking at the licenses of some of these Corrupt and Highly Unpatriotic ‘News’ Organizations. They get Billions of Dollars of FREE American Airwaves, and use it to perpetuate LIES …”
Carr wrote in a post on X on Saturday that broadcasters “that are running hoaxes and news distortions – also known as the fake news – have a chance now to correct course before their license renewals come up. The law is clear. Broadcasters must operate in the public interest, and they will lose their licenses if they do not.”
Carr’s comments drew a rebuke from both Democrats and Republicans noting the first amendment protects news organizations from government censorship. Trump’s comments suggest he will widen his campaign against the media.
The Hill -Carr has gotten a lot of backlash for this warning. Several Democrats quickly slammed Carr, calling it “authoritarian,” “unconstitutional” and “totalitarian takeover.”
Even Republican Sen. Ron Johnson (Wis.) is concerned about Carr’s threat. “I am a big supporter of the First Amendment,” Johnson told Fox News’s “The Sunday Briefing.” “I do not like the heavy-handed government, no matter who is wielding it. … I would rather the federal government stay out of the private sector as much as possible.”
Bendan Carr, Wikipedia - As chair, Carr investigated companies over their diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) policies, threatening to block business decisions if organizational hiring practices were not changed. He was involved in the merger of Skydance Media and Paramount Global, securing an ombudsman to ensure a "diversity of viewpoints"; Carr's role in the merger led to ethics concerns... In September, Carr threatened broadcasters to suspend the late-night talk show Jimmy Kimmel Live!, leading to broad criticism.
Tech tips
Sam Smith - In a major technolgical and money saving step forward, I've thrown out all my calendars and replaced them with two or three pages of upcoming events. Those that my wife will want to keep in mind I highlight with a yellow background, important deadlines with a red one and repeated events - like birthdays - I highlight in blue. After the repeated events are over I just copy them and paste them at the bottom of the schedule so that next year they'll come right up on time. Here's a bit of what it looks like:
MAY 1 REPLACE SMOKE ALARM BATTERIES: 4 alarms using 3 9volt batteries
MAY 3 MEREDITH BD
JUN KATHY CAR REGISTRATION JUN 30
JUN 14 POTLUCK SUPPER OUTSIDE MALLET BARN
JUN 15 JULIA BD
JUN 15 TAXES
Among the good things about this is I don't forget birthdays and I can find this info on my Ipad or Iphone when on the road. And it takes far less effort than searching for a calendar book.
The war on the media
Democratic Values - CBS News is on the verge of becoming part of the largest pro-Trump media monopoly in America. Two of the nation’s biggest news organizations — CBS News and CNN — along with CBS entertainment (home to Stephen Colbert), Comedy Central (home to Jon Stewart), HBO (John Oliver), and TikTok (where 1 out of 5 Americans now get their news) — are all about to become one giant mega-media monopoly under the control of Trump allies and suck-ups: multibillionaire Larry Ellison and Ellison’s son, David.
It could make Rupert Murdoch’s media empire of Fox News, The Wall Street Journal, and the New York Post look scrupulous by comparison.
The truth is as simple as it is frightening: Trump cares more about TV news than he does about his presidency.
In fact, TV news is his presidency. He chose his Cabinet members on the basis of their total loyalty to him and how they look and sound on TV. He spends all day watching coverage of himself on TV. And now he’s on the verge of having effective control over a gigantic media monopoly.
You know who can stop this from happening? State attorneys general. They have the power to enforce antitrust laws and sue to stop this merger. They have legal standing and necessary resources to challenge this monstrosity.
Trump's anti-democracy bill
NPR - The bill would require a photo ID that proves U.S. citizenship, like a birth certificate or passport, in order to register to vote. Millions of Americans don’t have easy access to those documents, NPR’s Miles Parks says. As the vote approaches, it is increasingly likely that Trump will be disappointed with the results. Senate Democrats are firmly opposed to the bill. To pass the legislation, it needs 60 votes to break the filibuster threshold, but Republicans only hold 53 seats. Trump has insisted he doesn't want a watered-down version of this bill. But Parks says that if it were narrower and possibly focused solely on photo ID, it might have garnered more support from both parties.
The New Republic - Under the bill, all registered voters would be required to go to a voting registrar in person to reregister, providing proof of citizenship. For those in 45 states, a Real ID will not suffice; voters would need a passport, passport card, or certified birth certificate (not a copy). For married women who have changed their names, there are many more hoops to jump through, including a marriage certificate and other proof of the legitimacy of their name.
Half of Americans do not have passports; getting one costs at least $165, plus photos, and requires … a birth certificate or certificate of naturalization. A passport card, with the same requirements, costs $65 plus photos. Marco Rubio’s State Department has cut the passport office in half and removed the ability of people to submit applications for a passport to local libraries, meaning physically going to an official office, which for many would mean traveling hundreds of miles.
Many millions of Americans have no idea where their birth certificates are or have one that will not suffice under this bill; getting an official one, which is not always easy, can cost up to $100.
A core element of the Jim Crow laws in Southern states to block Black people from voting was a poll tax, used from the 1890s to the 1960s. It was outlawed for federal elections by the 24th Amendment in 1964, and by the Supreme Court for state and local elections two years later. The SAVE America act is a modern poll tax, plain and simple, and is flatly unconstitutional.
Iran War
NPR - The conflict in the Middle East shows no signs of slowing down as Israel announced new strikes on western Iran yesterday. Iran’s foreign minister has denied President Trump’s claim that Iran asked for a ceasefire. The Strait of Hormuz remains closed, cutting off a quarter of oil and natural gas supplies from the rest of the world. Trump is pressuring countries to help reopen it. New Israeli ground operations in Lebanon are also heating up a second front in the war....
As gas prices soar, global markets struggle and polls show that Americans are skeptical of the war, Trump's administration is pushing a message of victory. The administration at first struggled to provide clear justification for U.S. involvement in this war, leaving it politically vulnerable, NPR’s Franco Ordoñez says. \.
The GOP plan to get anti-democracy SAVE America Act passed
The Hill - President Trump’s allies are planning to take over the Senate floor this week in a bid to pass the SAVE America Act, setting up a major test for Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.) who is under pressure from Trump and the MAGA base to extend the debate over voting reform for as long as possible.
GOP senators are playing their cards close to the vest ahead of this week’s marathon debate over the Safeguard American Voter Eligibility (SAVE) America Act, which would require people registering to vote to show documented proof of citizenship.
But they’re bracing for long hours and possible late nights in a bid to build momentum for the bill, which already has broad public support. A recent Harvard CAPS/Harris poll of 1,999 registered voters found that 71 percent support the SAVE America Act.
Word
The Hill - Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer (N.Y.) is calling the SAVE America Act, the voting reform legislation that Senate Republicans will bring to the floor this week, “one of the most despicable pieces of legislation I’ve come across in the many years I’ve been a legislator.”
“Nothing is more important than defeating this dagger to the heart of our democracy,” Schumer said during a press call Sunday.
“American hatred is growing so great that partisans, perversely enough, often view kindness and tolerance from political opponents as a threat.” — David French, Opinion columnist
Democratic senator blames both parties for Iran tactics
The Guardian - Democratic US senator Cory Booker has criticized both his own political party as well as its Republican counterpart for being “feckless” in ceding congressional war powers to Donald Trump, saying that their decision could embolden the president to unilaterally attack Cuba, North Korea and other countries. “I’m going to be one of those Democrats [who] say I think both parties have been feckless in allowing the growth of the power of the presidency,” Booker said on Sunday on CNN’s State of the Union.
Trump stuff
The Hill - Ahead of a key vote, President Trump is urging his handpicked board of trustees for the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts to move ahead with his controversial plan to temporarily shutter the institution for renovations, saying, “You have to close it.”
“I think everybody agrees, but subject to board approval, we determined that the fastest way to bring the Trump-Kennedy Center to the highest level of beauty and grandeur is to cease the entertainment operations for a two-year period of time as we complete really high quality construction,” Trump said on Monday as he kicked off a Kennedy Center board meeting in the White House’s East Room.
Alternet - US President Donald Trump late Sunday floated “treason” charges against media outlets that he accused of reporting false information about the Iran war as the human and economic costs of his illegal military assault continued to mount.
In a tirade posted to his Truth Social platform, Trump wrote that media outlets he accused of circulating “fake news” should “be brought up on Charges for TREASON for the dissemination of false information.” The maximum penalty for treason in the US is death.
Trump specifically called out the Rupert Murdoch-owned Wall Street Journal for reporting over the weekend that “five US Air Force refueling planes were struck and damaged on the ground at Prince Sultan air base in Saudi Arabia.” Citing two unnamed US officials, the Journal noted that “the tankers were hit during an Iranian missile strike on the Saudi base,” and that the planes were “damaged but not fully destroyed and are being repaired.”
Time - President Donald Trump lashed out at “the courts,” which he said treat him “so unfairly,” in a two-part social media missive Sunday night full of falsehoods and pointed criticisms. He noted that his posts “will cause me nothing but problems in the future, but I feel it is my obligation to speak the TRUTH.”
“Trump just posted a lot of words about the Supreme Court and other courts — many of which were not true,” Politico senior legal affairs reporter Kyle Cheney posted on X, after the President’s Truth Social posts. “The rest is one of the most incendiary attacks on the court in memory.”
The first post started with Trump blasting the Supreme Court for ruling last month that most of the sweeping tariffs the Administration imposed on imports since the start of Trump’s second presidential term were illegal.
“The decision that mattered most to me was TARIFFS!” Trump wrote. “The Court knew where I stood, how badly I wanted this Victory for our Country, and instead decided to, potentially, give away Trillions of Dollars to Countries and Companies who have been taking advantage of the United States for decades.” But the President falsely claimed the Supreme Court gave him the “absolute right” to charge the tariffs in “another form”—something Trump has repeatedly suggested but the six-justice majority did not entertain—and he said his administration has “already started” to pursue that.
Trump then thanked Justices Samuel Alito, Clarence Thomas, and his own appointee Brett Kavanaugh—all of whom dissented in the tariff ruling—for “their wisdom and courage,” while sharply criticizing the court’s majority. While Trump did not mention particular justices, Trump bristled at how “they openly disrespect the Presidents who nominate them to the highest position in the Land, a Justice of the United States Supreme Court, and go out of their way, with bad and wrongful rulings and intentions, to prove how ‘honest,’ ‘independent,’ and ‘legitimate’ they are.” Of the justices in the majority, Trump nominated Amy Coney Barrett and Neil Gorsuch, while Chief Justice John Roberts was nominated by former President George W. Bush, Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan were nominated by former President Barack Obama, and Ketanji Brown Jackson by former President Joe Biden.
“This completely inept and embarrassing Court was not what the Supreme Court of the United States was set up by our wonderful Founders to be,” Trump added. “They are hurting our Country, and will continue to do so. All I can do, as President, is call them out for their bad behavior!”
In a follow-up post, Trump broadened his attacks, targeting “highly politicized” lower courts. “The Courts treat Republicans, and me, so unfairly, always seeming to protect those who should not be protected,” Trump said, before citing the treatment of Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell as an example.
Trump and his allies have targeted Powell, whom Trump blames for the U.S.’s economic woes and has nicknamed “Too Late” for not acceding to his demands to lower interest rates faster, over the central bank’s $2.5 billion renovation of its headquarters, alleging that the Fed Chair mismanaged it and lied to Congress about it.
Trump then said that because of his “well justified criticism” of Powell, he has been “viciously and wrongfully blamed by, as usual, a Wacky, Nasty, Crooked, and totally Out of Control Judge,” naming James Boasberg, the chief judge of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, who has ruled against Trump before and last week ordered subpoenas linked to the Administration-led investigation into Powell to be nixed on the basis, according to an unsealed opinion, that “a mountain of evidence suggests that the Government served these subpoenas on the Board to pressure its Chair into voting for lower interest rates or resigning.”
Trump called Boasberg “a man who suffers from the highest level of Trump Derangement Syndrome (TDS),” and he criticized the D.C. Circuit as having “eagerly supported the arrest and persecution of innocent Republicans for no crimes at all, but is now preventing even a basic investigation into the gross financial mismanagement of the Federal Reserve.”
“In case after case, Boasberg has displayed open, flagrant, and extreme partisan bias and contempt against Republicans and the Trump Administration,” Trump added. “To preserve the integrity of the Judiciary, he should be removed from all cases pertaining to us, and suffer serious disciplinary action, as should numerous other Corrupt Judges that, unfortunately, our Country has had to endure! What Boasberg has done on the ‘Too Late’ Powell case, and many others, has little to do with the Law, and everything to do with Politics. He is exactly what Judges should not be! Boasberg would do better to focus on Justice and Fairness, not his own, and the Democrats’, Political Agenda, which has become LEGENDARY!”
Washington Post - For nearly two centuries, the White House’s main entrance — framed by a row of graceful Ionic columns — has been a signature image of the seat of American power.
Now the Trump-appointed head of a federal arts commission is proposing to replace them with a more ornate style favored by President Donald Trump. Those more decorative columns, a style known as Corinthian, are considered the most luxurious in classical architecture and appear on buildings such as the U.S. Capitol and the Supreme Court. They have long been deployed on Trump’s properties, and the president has handpicked them for his planned White House ballroom, too.
“Corinthian is the highest order [of column], and that’s what our other two branches of government have,” Rodney Mims Cook Jr., the Trump appointee who chairs the Commission of Fine Arts, a federal panel charged with advising the president on design matters, said in an interview last week. “Why the White House didn’t originally use them, at least on the north front, which is considered the front door, is beyond me.”
Immigration
MS NOW - President Donald Trump’s got a new problem. It seems hard to believe, but some of his own base thinks his administration hasn’t sufficiently cracked down hard enough on illegal immigration.
News emerged last week that the White House wanted to soften the president’s reputation on immigration enforcement by reportedly discouraging the party from talking about “mass deportations” and suggesting a rhetorical focus on removing violent criminals. Immediately, a group of pro-Trump immigration hawks began a lobbying effort to deter Trump from even pursuing his mostly cosmetic attempt to moderate on the issue. Inconveniently for the president, this group calls itself the “Mass Deportation Coalition.”
The infighting illuminates a striking phenomenon. For once, it is not the Democrats who appear to be torn up about immigration as a wedge issue that could weaken their coalition. Instead it is the GOP for whom immigration is becoming a point of internal tension, and posing a dilemma to its leader. While there’s no reason to think Trump will ever become truly moderate on the issue, he will be vexed by questions of how to approach what was once one of his strongest policy issues ahead as the midterms near.
Winners and losers in the Iran war
Hartmann Report - There are several clear winners from Trump’s attack on Iran:
— Russia, who can again fund their violence against Ukraine with new oil revenue and now claims their unprovoked attack on that nation is consistent with this new Trump Doctrine;
— Saudi Arabia, which has long hated Iran and lobbied since at least 2008 for the US to attack that country;
— the United Arab Emirates (UAE), which has similarly pushed America to attack Iran since at least 2010;
— the American defense weapons industry, which is making additional billions;
— Don Jr. and Eric who have taken a big position in a drone-manufacturing business, getting them in on the Pentagon gravy train;
— Donald Trump himself, who’s succeeded in largely pushing Epstein off the front page;
— and Benjamin Netanyahu, who’s called for American strikes against Iran since 1992 and will stay out of prison as long as the war continues.
The losers include:
— The credibility of the United States and the rule of international law;
— the families of 13 dead and 140 injured American soldiers and airmen,
— the families of at least 160 dead Iranian little girls and thousands of other dead civilians in a dozen countries,
— American taxpayers who’re paying for the bombs;
— and future prospects for world peace.
But the biggest winner may be Jared Kushner, who apparently pushed Trump to initiate the war while he’s trying to solicit $5 billion from the same Arab states that have been begging American administrations for decades to attack Iran.
Trump and the law
ACYN - Federal Judge Luttig: Every single lower federal court judge has honored his or her oath to the Constitution of the United States to the letter. In almost every instance, those judges collectively have struck down as unconstitutional essentially every initiative of this president, as the Constitution required them to do.
So today, the only people who can save America are the lower federal court judges of the United States, and they are determined to do so simply by honoring their oath in every one of these cases.
There are hundreds of them. Every single time Donald Trump opens his mouth or takes an action, the American people are forced to go into court and litigate. That’s the tragic place America finds itself in today.
But to complete the thought, at this point it is only the Supreme Court of the United States that is standing in the way of the American people saving their country.
March 15, 2026
Tump and Israel's Middle East war
New Republic - None of us knows how long this war is going to last. But it’s certainly no Venezuela, which took—ready?—two and a half hours. Donald Trump may have told British Prime Minister Keir Starmer over the weekend that the war was “already won.” But also over the weekend, a prewar intelligence report was leaked to two Washington Post reporters showing that the National Intelligence Council, a panel of independent intel experts, seems to think that dislodging the regime could take a very long time indeed—at $37 million an hour, a rate that is almost sure to rise, especially if ground troops get involved.
Ethnicity
The Hill - Texas and Florida are facing criticism and potential legal challenges over moves to exclude Islamic schools from their school voucher programs. Both states have tried to designate the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), the largest U.S. Muslim advocacy group, as a foreign terrorist organization, despite it lacking a criminal conviction or any similar federal categorization. And now, GOP efforts to expand school choice options are running directly into what critics say is a rising wave of Islamophobia.
Weather
Newsweek - Heavy snow, strong winds, and ice are forecast to hit northern and western areas of the U.S., as the National Weather Service (NWS) warns people in nine states including Alaska and Hawaii to "stay indoors until conditions improve." Other states likely to be most affected by heavy snow, winds, and ice are Wisconsin, Minnesota, Michigan, South Dakota, North Dakota, Wyoming and Montana.
Immigration
NY Times - For years, the agricultural sector has faced a tight labor market as farmworkers age and fewer new immigrants and younger Americans are willing to toil in the fields. Top Trump administration officials vowed that mass deportations would help, leading to “higher wages with better benefits” and a “100 percent American work force.”
But the administration has quietly acknowledged in recent months that its immigration raids and crackdown on the border have aggravated the issue. So it has instead turned to an alternative source, making it cheaper for farmers to hire immigrant farmworkers on temporary visas.
Many farmers have celebrated those changes, made to an increasingly popular visa program known as H-2A, noting the difficulty in hiring American workers and tough economic conditions for the industry. But immigration hawks and labor unions alike are opposed, arguing the move will only increase the share of foreign workers and hurt native workers and suppress their wages.
The simmering debate underscores how some of the administration’s top goals of reducing immigration, keeping food prices low and helping American workers may inevitably conflict. The competing interests at play also show the spillover effects of Mr. Trump’s hard-line approach to legal and illegal immigration.
Trump & Israel's war on Iran
NY Times - A torrent of fake videos and images generated by artificial intelligence have overrun social networks during the first weeks of the war in Iran. The videos — showing huge explosions that never happened, decimated city streets that were never attacked or troops protesting the war who do not exist — have added a chaotic and confusing layer to the conflict online.
The New York Times identified over 110 unique A.I.-generated images and videos from the past two weeks about the war in the Middle East. The fakes covered every aspect of the fighting: They falsely depicted screaming Israelis cowering as explosions ripped through Tel Aviv, Iranians mourning their dead and American military vessels bombarded with missiles and torpedoes.
Time - Federal authorities have reportedly issued warnings about potential Iranian attacks within the U.S. since the beginning of the war, raising particular concern about cyberattacks and transmissions that could activate “sleeper assets” outside of Iran.
In late February, the FBI ...warned California police departments that it had received "unverified information" about Iran having “aspired” to conduct a “surprise attack” in the state using drones launched from "an unidentified vessel off the coast," ABC News first reported.
Experts tell TIME that Iran has the capability to carry out attacks in the U.S. by several means, including through cyberattacks and various groups or individuals it has forged connections with in North America, and that retaliatory efforts could persist even after American strikes in the Middle East end.
But John D. Cohen, who acted as the Under-Secretary for Intelligence and Analysis during the Obama Administration, explains that the U.S. is well prepared to handle these potential attacks.
MS NOW - Roughly a fifth of the world’s traded oil passes through the Strait of Hormuz, a narrow waterway at the mouth of the Persian Gulf. But Iranian forces have laid mines and threatened any ship that attempts to pass through, writes Adam Hudacek. The resulting bottleneck is expected to send crude oil prices even higher, and by extension, cause hikes in consumer goods, steel, aluminum and roughly a third of the world’s fertilizer supply — sending food prices soaring. That gives Iran the ability to exert pressure on the U.S. to end the conflict. Read more.
“The terms aren’t good enough yet,” the US president told NBC News. The Iranian regime wants to make an agreement, he claimed.
After days of conflicting messaging from the White House on how much longer it will continue to wage war on Iran, Trump alleged that US strikes had “totally demolished” most of Kharg Island, and told the network that its military may hit site “a few more times just for fun”.
Who's getting the most out of the Iran war?
Robert Reich - That war is costing the U.S. about $1 billion a day. The Pentagon’s budget is around $1 trillion this year, and Trump wants an additional $500 billion. Because of the war, the cost of oil has topped $100 a barrel, and the price of a gallon of gas at the U.S. pump now averages $3.67 — up from $2.92 before the war....
A new analysis by government watchdog Open the Books found that as the 2025 fiscal year was ending, Hegseth’s Pentagon spent: nearly $100,000 on a Steinway grand piano to outfit the home of the Air Force chief of staff; $60,719 on premium office furniture, including at least one luxurious $1,844 Aeron Chair; $12,540 for three-tiered fruit basket stands; $2 million on Alaskan king crab, $6.9 million on lobster tail, $15.1 million on ribeye steak, and $1 million on salmon; $124,000 for ice cream machines; and $26,000 for sushi preparation tables.
The Pentagon has failed every audit since it was legally required to start submitting them in 2018, and reports say it will continue to fail them at least through 2028.
The ballooning profits of military contractors are helped by their near monopoly on defense production. Since the 1990s, the number of prime contractors for the Defense Department has shrunk from 55 to five....
These giants have been spending more on enriching their investors than expanding production. Between 2020 and 2025, top military contractors devoted $110 billion to stock buybacks and dividends — more than double what they spent on capital expenditures — which boosted their stock values and the pay packages of their CEOs...
Finally, there’s Trump’s on-again, off-again ally Vladimir Putin. In just two weeks of war, Russia has reaped an estimated $6.9 billion from the increase in oil prices and the easing of sanctions.
How drones have changed the nature of war
Axios - Cheap, mass-produced drones have permanently changed the face of warfare, Axios' Zachary Basu and Colin Demarest report.
- Without them, Russia's overwhelming manpower and firepower advantage would grind Ukraine into dust.
- Without them, the Houthis are a ragtag militia in Yemen — not a force that brought global shipping to its knees.
- Without them, a sanctioned, isolated Iran couldn't inflict nearly as much damage to the most powerful military in world history.
Size no longer guarantees victory. Any nation, any proxy, any rebel group with access to cash and commercial components can now bleed a superpower slowly, expensively and without a clean answer.
Iran's Shahed drone — said to cost between $20,000 and $50,000 — has been the regime's great equalizer, forcing the U.S. and allies to respond in some cases with interceptor missiles costing millions of dollars each.
- In the first week of the war alone, Tehran fired nearly 2,000 drones at U.S. bases and allied targets across 12 countries — slamming into airports, five-star hotels and oil infrastructure across the Gulf.
- Six U.S. service members were killed March 1 when an Iranian drone evaded air defenses and struck an operations center in Kuwait.
Ukraine, fighting for its life against Russian Shaheds for the past four years, is now the world's foremost authority on stopping them.
- As Axios first reported, Ukrainian officials offered Washington their anti-drone technology eight months before the Iran war started. The Trump administration turned them down.
- After the war started, the U.S. reversed course. Ukrainian specialists are now deployed to the Gulf to train U.S. and allied forces.
The U.S. has rushed 10,000 Merops interceptor drones to the Middle East, according to Army Secretary Dan Driscoll.
- The AI-enabled systems, stress-tested in Ukraine, cost roughly $14,000 each — cheaper than the Shahed it's designed to kill.
- The Pentagon says Iranian drone attacks are now down 95% from their peak.
Jeffrey Epstein
Headline USA - Sex criminal Jeffrey Epstein worked as a “financial bounty hunter” for the U.S. government, according to a memo included in the “Epstein files”—the trove of roughly 3 million documents released about the deceased multimillionaire pursuant to congressional legislation.
A financial bounty hunter refers to someone who tracks and recovers stolen assets.
“At some point in time, Jeffrey Epstein worked for the United States government as a financial bounty hunter,” states the unsigned and undated memo. “He has retained significant political connections with both Israel and the United States.”
Though the memo isn’t signed or dated, it does contain information suggesting that it’s a government document. For instance, the memo recommends obtaining information about Epstein from government agencies. It also accuses him of violating the “International Megan’s Law to Prevent Child Exploitation and Other Sexual Crimes Through Advanced Notification of Traveling Sex Offenders,” which requires sex offenders like Epstein to inform the government about his international trips.
Newsbreak - A prison guard on duty the night Jeffrey Epstein died inside his jail cell will appear before the House Oversight Committee. According to a report, the panel requested that Tova Noel — who was fired from the Metropolitan Correctional Center(MCC) in New York City following the disgraced financier'sshocking death — testify in Washington, D.C., on March 26. A letter to Noel signed by chairman James Comer reads: "Due to public reporting, documents released by the Department of Justice and documents obtained by the committee, the committee believes you have information that will assist in its investigation."
Decline of book reviews
Derek Wrissoff, Book Work - While we all know that newspapers more generally have been closing, shrinking, or consolidating, the reality for book review sections is even starker. It’s no longer just the smaller market papers that have given up covering books, but now even the largest dailies have ceased or cut back. When I put together the list back in September, the Associated Press had just announced that they were no longer publishing reviews. And we were dealt another big blow a few weeks ago with the shuttering of The Washington Post’s “Book World.” This brings the current list to just the following:
The New York Times Book Review (and its daily review)The Boston GlobeThe Minneapolis Star TribuneUSA TodayThe Wall Street JournalFinancial TimesThe GuardianThe Chicago TribuneWith occasional coverage still to be found in the LA Times & NY Post
What about magazines?
Magazines have been facing similar pressures to newspapers, with print circulation dropping dramatically. And online, in the world ruled by click-rate analytics, book review coverage has never drawn impressive numbers. Thankfully, despite all this, there are still mainstream glossy magazines that are covering books and see it as part of their identity as a publication and something their readers expect. Outlets such as the New Yorker, New Republic, Atlantic, Harper’s, and the Nation are still giving much-needed space to reviews, particularly of nonfiction, and, of course, the New York Review of Books and the Los Angeles Review of Books remain dedicated to their book-focused missions. Nevertheless, you can see that everyone is struggling to earn the ad revenue that justifies the space, and in some cases, the overall space of the publication is still shrinking.
Solar power
NPR - Easy-to-install solar panels that plug into regular outlets are gaining popularity as Americans worry about rising energy costs. These plug-in or balcony solar panels can reduce a homeowner's or renter's utility bill right away. To make them more widely available in the U.S., state lawmakers are proposing bills to eliminate complicated utility connection agreements. These are often required for larger solar rooftop installations, and most utilities say they should apply to plug-in solar too. But some legislators have delayed votes on these bills after electric utilities have raised safety concerns, primarily about lineworker safety during outages. Advocates for plug-in solar say concerns about the new technology have been addressed, and utilities are actually worried about losing business.
Deep sea mining
NPR - As global interest in deep-sea mining grows, the International Seabed Authority is developing rules for countries to lease and commercially mine internationally. The U.S. has opted out of the process and is forging ahead on its own. In January, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration said it would expedite permits to mine in international waters. The announcement alarmed conservation groups, who expressed concern about cuts to the environmental review process. Rebecca Loomis, staff attorney at the Natural Resources Defense Council. Says it's "exponentially more risky to cut off opportunities for analysis and public input" in this "brand-new industry."
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