Happy Tuesday Everyone! Today’s newsletter: 1,200 words…4.6 mins
🗞 Today’s Edition: Hamas Bankrolled Greta’s Flotilla, Trump, Hegseth & the War Council, Taliban’s Internet Kill Switch, South African Ambassador’s Paris Death Mystery, TrumpRx, Harvard’s New Trade Schools, Open Ai’s New Sora App… & much more!
🚨 Watch For:
Deadline for Hamas to accept the peace deal: This week (open-ended)
📜THE HIGHLIGHT
One killer insight to stash in your back pocket
🪖 The War Council: When MAGA Meets the Pentagon
On Sept. 30, Trump and Defense Sec. Pete Hegseth hauled 800+ generals and admirals into the Marine Corps Museum at Quantico for a mandatory, global roll call—one of the biggest in-person gatherings of U.S. military brass in modern history.
No Zoom calls, no excuses. Cost: millions in flights and security.
We're reawakening the warrior spirit, and this is a spirit that won and built this nation
Hegseth’s play: A 10-point purge of “woke decay.”
“Gender-neutral” fitness = highest male standard.
End race/gender training.
Two annual fitness tests for generals/admirals.
New “combat field test” for units.
It’s tiring to look out at combat formations, or really any formation, and see fat troops … If you don’t like it, you should resign.
Trump’s pitch:
75 minutes of partisan swagger. Praised “incredible” generals, bragged nuclear strength, bashed predecessors—and warned he’ll fire leaders “on the spot.”
Floated turning high-crime cities like Chicago, LA and Portland into live training grounds to fight the “enemy within”.
We must be so strong that no nation will dare challenge us, so powerful that no enemy will dare threaten us, and so capable that no adversary can even think about beating us.
Military Leaders' Reaction:
Top American military leaders in the audience responded with a disciplined outward silence and minimal visible reaction, in keeping with a strict adherence to nonpartisan tradition; despite pointed and politically charged remarks - especially from Hegseth.
Buzz on X:
While many praised the “warrior ethos” theme; many others slammed it as a "complete freaking waste of taxpayers' money" and called Hegseth’s remarks, “offensive”.
💡Why it matters: This wasn’t just esprit de corps. It’s a hard rebrand of DoD into a “Department of War”—explicitly lethal, unapologetically partisan.
Signals prep for escalation abroad (Venezuela, Ukraine, Middle East), and combating high levels of crime at home.
🔍 Bottom line: America’s top brass just got a Trump-era loyalty test, with FAFO (f*ck around and find out) energy baked in.
♟️THE CHESSBOARD
Geopolitics Decoded In 3 Moves
Top-left: Zaher Birawi standing behind Greta during one of her pro-Palestine speeches; Bottom-left: Zaher Birawi with other senior Hamas leaders; Official documents showing very senior Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh, coordinating with flotilla organizers Zaher Birawi and Saif Abu Kashk among others.
🛜 Taliban's Internet Kill Switch
The Taliban just unplugged an entire nation from the internet after weeks of regional throttling - no WiFi, no mobile data, nada.
Taliban’s official excuse: Combatting “vice”.
Some reports suggest Supreme Leader Haibatullah acted after consults with Russia and Iran, who coached the Taliban on "securing communications infrastructure" (read: cutting off CIA surveillance).
Kabul’s flights grounded, banks frozen, humanitarian aid groups paralyzed. Women and minorities—already suffocated by the brutal regime—lose their last lifeline.
💡Why it matters: This isn't just authoritarian brutality—it's geopolitical coordination. Digital blackouts are the new proxy weapon as terrorist regimes use it to seal their borders and exert maximum control over their people - and the geopolitical narrative.
⛴🚨 Greta’s Flotilla Funded By Hamas
Israel’s Foreign Ministry just dropped bombshell docs confirming that Greta’s Global Sumud aid flotilla—50 boats, 44 countries, — is bankrolled by Hamas.
Papers show Hamas’s overseas arm, the PCPA, backed by Ismail Haniyeh, coordinating with flotilla organizers Zaher Birawi + Saif Abu Kashk (whose company - Cyber Neptune - owns many boats in the flotilla).
Organizers’ spin: We’re strictly humanitarian, just breaking Israel’s “illegal blockade”; insisting it’s aid, not PR.
💡Why it matters: Israel aims to strip the mission of its moral authority, while the flotilla bets its humanitarian narrative will withstand the allegations. The real showdown will be at sea, where the Israeli navy is poised to intercept the boats.
👀 South African Ambassador's Paris Death: Suicide or Something Darker?
South Africa's Ambassador to France, Nathi Mthethwa, plunged 22 floors to his death, from a Paris Hyatt on September 30 after texting his wife an apology and suicide note.
French cops found a forced-open window, no struggle, no drugs. Case closed?
The timing’s sus: Mthethwa was recently implicated in a major South African corruption inquiry. He was accused of political interference and was on a list of witnesses to be questioned.
Mthethwa, a former police + culture minister, had been ambassador since 2023. President Ramaphosa called the loss “traumatic,” as French authorities probe.
💡 Why it matters: High-profile "suicides" in European hotels have a history of raising eyebrows (see: Russian oligarchs, 2022-2023). Paris is also espionage central—every hotel is said to have intelligence services listening. Tragic? Definitely. Suspicious? Ask his wife.
🗽THE EMPIRE FILES
Political Drama From DC To NYC
💊 The TrumpRx.gov Website
President Trump unveiled TrumpRx —a direct-to-consumer drug site promising Americans cheaper meds without insurance middlemen - discounts ranging from 50% to 85%.
Pfizer struck a "most-favored-nation" (MFN) deal to match U.S. Medicaid prices with the lowest abroad, while pledging $70B in U.S. manufacturing, in exchange for a three-year tariff reprieve.
Trump framed the move as “historic,” pressuring Big Pharma to slash costs or face penalties
💡Why it matters: The administration argues, this ends a system where Americans subsidize cheaper drugs for other nations. Most recently, pharmaceuticals from other nations have been tariffed 100%.
🏫 Harvard…Trade Schools?
Harvard has struck a tentative deal to unlock $2.4B in frozen federal grants—but only if it invests $500M in launching and operating trade schools.
The standoff began over antisemitism complaints and affirmative action battles.
Trump framed the move as “forgiveness” for Harvard’s “sins,” while touting training in AI, engines, and skilled trades as a priority for reviving U.S. manufacturing.
⚡Education Sec. Linda McMahon confirmed the pact is nearly finalized.
🤖 CODES & POWER
Tech Wars, Crypto Chaos, and AI’s Black Mirror Moments
🤖 OpenAI Goes Full TikTok
OpenAI dropped Sora 2 on Tuesday—its upgraded video generator that actually respects physics (no more teleporting basketballs).
But the real flex? A new Sora app, a TikTok-style platform where users can star in AI-generated clips using a “cameos” upload.
The iOS app is invite-only (U.S./Canada first), with ChatGPT Pro users getting early Sora 2 access.
⚡Big question: will this be AI magic—or just more algorithmic slop?
🧬 Skin Cells to Embryos?
U.S. scientists pulled off a sci-fi leap: creating early-stage human embryos from skin DNA + sperm.
The Oregon team coaxed skin cells into acting like eggs, then fertilized them—82 “designer eggs” made it to day six of development.
Potential? Same-sex couples or older patients could one day have genetic kids.
⚡Reality check: success rate is ~9%, safety is shaky, and real-world use is likely a decade away. Still—a Dolly-the-Sheep-level flex.
📺 FUN FACTS & TRIVIA
The Origin of "The Big Apple"
The term "Big Apple" was popularized in the 1920s by John J. Fitz Gerald, a sportswriter for the New York Morning Telegraph. He used it in a column about horse racing, referring to New York City as the "Big Apple" because it was the ultimate prize for horses and jockeys.