Happy Monday Everyone! Today’s newsletter: 1,300 words…4.9 mins
Today’s Edition: Minnesota’s “Ghost Daycares”, Silver Overtakes Nvidia, Trump Welcomes Zelensky to Mar-a-Lago, Hamas Confirms Death of Its Masked Mouthpiece, Elon And Netanyahu Talk AI, Times Square Ball To Drop Twice… & much more!
📜THE HIGHLIGHT
One killer insight to stash in your back pocket
Shirley exposing a non-operating learning center that hilariously spelt “learning” incorrectly.
🔍 Minnesota’s “Ghost Daycares” — & The Somali Network Behind Them
A viral 42-minute exposé by independent journalist Nick Shirley just blew open what critics say is one of the largest public-fund fraud schemes in modern U.S. history — and it’s not just about bad paperwork.
📹 The footage: Shirley visits licensed childcare and healthcare sites across Minnesota that appear empty, locked, or non-operational, yet collectively received $110+ million in taxpayer funds.
One Minneapolis daycare reportedly pulled in $1.9 million in 2025 CCAP money despite racking up 95 violations from 2019-2023; and no visible children.
Another cluster of centers allegedly collected $3 million annually with “zero kids.”
👀 The pattern: Many of the flagged facilities are tied to Somali-linked networks, echoing earlier scandals like Feeding Our Future ($250M) and Medicaid and autism-clinic fraud cases.
Funds traced overseas to Somalia - including possible Al-Shabaab terrorist ties - raising alarms about organized, repeat exploitation of social programs, not isolated abuse.
👮 Federal escalation: FBI Director Kash Patel confirmed a surge of agents to Minnesota before the video went viral.
He called the situation “the tip of a very large iceberg.”
The bureau is pursuing criminal charges, asset seizures, and immigration consequences, including denaturalization and deportation where fraud is tied to false status claims.
🗣 Political response: The backlash is landing squarely on Gov. Tim Walz and Rep. Ilhan Omar.
💣 Walz is facing mounting criticism for ignoring FBI tips and internal warnings dating back two years.
Despite the red flags, his administration kept the money flowing, and Walz publicly touted $316M in funding.
He’s since framed the scandal as an “administrative issue,” a defense critics call grossly insufficient.
💥 The fraud’s epicenter sits in Rep. Ilhan Omar’s district, with her "MEALS Act" linked to enabling Feeding Our Future.
Her husband's firm received over $600,000 from involved entities
She has been photographed with convicted fraudsters like Abdul Dahir Ibrahim (arrested December 2025).
She blamed weak COVID-era “guardrails” for the fraud
She dismissed whistleblowers as “racist.”
💡Bottom line: When empty buildings print millions, it isn’t a loophole — it’s a system being gamed at scale. And Minnesota may just be the test case. House Republicans are now calling for nationwide audits, prosecutions and deportations.
♟️THE CHESSBOARD
Geopolitics Decoded In 3 Moves
🏝 Trump Welcomes Zelensky At Mar-a-Lago
Trump hosted Zelensky at Mar-a-Lago for a 2.5-hour, deal-heavy sit-down, preceded by a “very productive” call with Putin.
The headline offer: A 15-year, legally binding U.S. security guarantee to deter Russia.
Zelensky countered: 30–50 years, arguing Ukraine’s been fighting since 2014. Trump says he’s open to discussing it.
The talks are framed as “final stages,” but landmines remain — territory, Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant, and foreign troop deployments.
Ukraine is willing to do whatever it takes to stop this war.
💡Bottom line: Peace talks are moving fast — but guarantees, not handshakes, are the real battleground.
🇨🇳 Beijing Turns Up the Heat on Taiwan
China kicked off “Justice Mission 2025”, a full-spectrum PLA drill encircling Taiwan — army, navy, air force, rocket forces, the works.
The play: Simulated blockades, port seizures, live-fire zones around the island for 10 hours.
Beijing calls it a “stern warning” to Taiwan independence forces and foreign meddling, explicitly naming external interference for the first time.
Timing isn’t subtle: It follows an $11.1B U.S. arms sale to Taiwan and Japan’s new PM hinting at military intervention.
💡Bottom line: This isn’t rehearsal — it’s normalizing siege politics in the Indo-Pacific.
🥷 Hamas Confirms Death of Its Masked Mouthpiece
Hamas just confirmed what Israel claimed months ago: Abu Obaida, the masked voice of its armed wing, is dead.
His real name — Hudhayfa al-Kahlout — was revealed for the first time, alongside unmasked photos, after he was killed in an Israeli airstrike in Gaza in August.
A new spokesman has already appeared, inheriting the Abu Obaida alias like a franchise baton pass.
💡Why it matters: Abu Obaida wasn’t just a spokesman — he was Hamas’s most effective symbol, using calm, ominous videos to rally support for terrorism and shape the narrative in favor of “the resistance” across the West. Finally confirming his death after months of silence, deals a real propaganda blow to Hamas, even as supporters flood X with martyrdom tributes. In modern war, losing the messenger can hurt almost as much as losing the battlefield.
🗽THE EMPIRE FILES
Political Drama From DC To NYC
Left: A still from the MELANIA trailer; Right: Official film poster
👠 Melania’s Blockbuster: A $40M “Here We Go Again”
First Lady Melania, dropped the trailer for MELANIA, a cinematic, behind-the-scenes doc about the 20 days before Trump’s second inauguration — and she’s not just the subject, she’s the executive producer.
Amazon MGM reportedly paid ~$40M for the film and a follow-up series.
Directed by Brett Ratner, it premiers on Jan. 30, 2026 at the newly renamed Trump-Kennedy Center.
Everyone wants to know, so here it is.
⚡The film’s generated plenty of buzz for its unprecedented access and it builds on the success of Melania’s memoir released in 2024.
🪩 Time Square Ball Will Drop Twice This Year
In a first since 1907, New Year’s Eve celebrations in NYC are getting a second ball drop!!
Just after midnight, Times Square will roll out the “Constellation Ball” to kick off America’s 250th anniversary year.
Expect red-white-and-blue lighting, 2,000 lbs of confetti, fireworks, and Ray Charles’ “America the Beautiful.”
⚡Why now: This is the soft launch for a year-long semiquincentennial hype cycle, peaking July 3, 2026. Organizers are hoping “to inspire all 350M Americans to join in this moment.”
🤖 CODES & POWER
Tech Wars, Crypto Chaos, and AI’s Black Mirror Moments
🤖 Musk–Netanyahu Talk AI, Autonomy, and Israel’s Tech Ambitions
Elon Musk and Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu held a virtual call on AI cooperation, aiming to turn Israel into a global AI powerhouse — cyber-era playbook, upgraded.
The agenda: AI development, Tesla’s Robotaxi, and smart-transport legislation, with Musk set to headline Israel’s Smart Transportation Conference in March 2026.
It builds on past ties, from Starlink to Washington sit-downs.
⚡Israel wants AI dominance — and Musk’s ecosystem is part of the pitch.
📈 Silver Overtakes Nvidia in Global Asset Rankings
Plot twist of 2025: Silver just passed Nvidia to become the #2 global asset, behind only gold. With prices near $84/oz, silver’s estimated value hit ~$4.7T
The surge reflects a hard-asset supercycle driven by inflation fears, global rate cuts and silver’s booming role in EVs and AI hardware.
Key Figures (As of late December 2025):
Gold: ~$31–31.5 trillion
Silver: ~$4.7 trillion (new #2, after prices spiked to $84/oz)
Nvidia: ~$4.5–4.6 trillion
Followed by Apple (~$4T), Alphabet, Microsoft, and others.
⚡Signal: When metals outrank megacap tech, markets are rotating — fast.
📺 FUN FACTS & TRIVIA
“Midnight Ride of Paul Revere”, painted by Edward Mason Eggleston.
“The British Are Coming!”
The popular phrase "The British are coming!" was likely never shouted by Paul Revere. Historians note that Revere's mission was covert, and the phrase would have been dangerous in an area with many British loyalists.
They more likely referred to the British troops as "the Regulars" with many contemporary accounts suggesting Revere and other riders (like William Dawes) discreetly knocked on doors or passed messages like "The Regulars are coming out!"
The iconic phrase was invented for dramatic effect in Henry Wadsworth Longfellow's 1860 poem "Paul Revere's Ride," published about 85 years after the event; romanticizing the story to drum up Union patriotism in the lead-up to the Civil War.