Happy Wednesday Everyone! Today’s newsletter: 1,045 words…3.8 mins
🗞 Today’s Edition: Trump In South Korea: Gets A Gold Crown, Russia Tests Doomsday Torpedo, Brazil’s Deadliest Narco Raid, Monkey Plague, Don Lemon Calls Megyn Kelly ‘Trans’, Elon Launches Grokipedia, Nvidia Crosses $5T… & much more!
🚨 Watch For:
President Trump to meet with President Xi Jinping: Thursday, Oct 30th
NYC Mayoral elections: Tuesday, Nov 4th
📜THE HIGHLIGHT
One killer insight to stash in your back pocket
Left: South Korean President Lee Jay Myung presents President Trump with a Gold Crown and the Grand Order of Mugunghwa—the nation's highest civilian award; Top-right: Checking out some Trump souvenirs; Bottom-right: At the Gyeongju National Museum. Source: X/@WhiteHouse
🇺🇸👑🇰🇷 Trump’s ‘Golden Age’ Tour in South Korea
Donald Trump just pulled off the most on-brand state visit in modern diplomacy — complete with a golden crown, “YMCA,” and a $350B trade deal.
Landing in Busan to a 21-gun salute and the Village People blaring, Trump was greeted with royal theatrics that looked straight out of a Netflix historical drama.
South Korean President Lee Jae Myung then upped the ante — gifting Trump a replica of a massive Silla-era gold crown, symbolizing divine leadership.
Trump called it “very special,” as critics back home dubbed it “the coronation of MAGA.”
📜Beneath the spectacle, a serious play:
A trade deal slashing U.S. tariffs on Korean imports from 25% → 15%
In exchange, South Korea will invest $350B in shipbuilding, manufacturing, and U.S. infrastructure.
Trump sold it as “a deal that works for everybody” — a rare note of diplomacy amidst the “America First” rhetoric.
📍At the APEC summit in Gyeongju, Lee dubbed the moment a “new golden age” in Korea-U.S. ties. Trump? Delivered warm remarks and lapped it all up— under literal gold.
The Republic of Korea is a cherished American friend and a close ally... it's truly one of the most remarkable nations anywhere on Earth.
💡Why it matters: This isn't just a photo op. Much like Japan, Seoul's betting big that these moves ensure Team Trump 2.0 will shield them from China and North Korea, whilst also giving them a reprieve on tariffs.
⚡Bottom line: It was half geopolitics, half gilded theatre — and 100% Trump.
♟️THE CHESSBOARD
Geopolitics Decoded In 3 Moves
☢️🌊Russia Tests ‘Poseidon’ Doomsday Torpedo
Vladimir Putin just flexed the world’s newest nightmare: the Poseidon, a nuclear-powered unmanned underwater vehicle capable of triggering radioactive tsunamis and rendering coastal cities unlivable.
The Kremlin says it launched the 70-knot, 6200 miles (10,000-km) range “super torpedo” from a carrier sub — its first full-power nuclear test.
Putin bragged there’s “no analogue in the world.” Translation: It cannot be intercepted… meaning, deterrence by apocalypse.
💡 Why it matters: The Poseidon’s a nuclear equivalent of bringing a flamethrower to a knife fight. It signals that despite Western sanctions, Putin’s arsenal of apocalyptic weapons is moving from blueprint to reality.
🇳🇱🔥The Netherlands’ Populist Showdown
The Dutch are voting in a snap election that feels more like a stress test for Europe’s democracy.
Far-right firebrand Geert Wilders and his Party for Freedom (PVV) are polling on top — but no one wants to govern with him.
Wilders’ anti-Islam platform mirrors the populist surge reshaping Europe.
Every mainstream party has already sworn they'll refuse to form a coalition with him—even if he wins the most votes—a rising trend in nations across Europe.
Context: Snap elections were triggered by a coalition collapse in June over immigration, and this race centers around asylum policy, housing, and national identity.
💡 Bottom line: The outcome could significantly influence not just Dutch domestic policy but also broader European populist movements, as Wilders' electoral momentum is seen as a litmus test for far-right strength across Europe.
🇧🇷⚔️ Brazil’s ‘Operation Containment’ Turns Deadly
Rio de Janeiro just saw its deadliest police raid ever. Officials called it “narco-terrorism”; witnesses called it war.
Over 2,500 officers stormed favelas in a blitz against the Comando Vermelho gang - the country’s oldest and most powerful criminal organization.
132 dead and 110 arrested.
The gang reportedly used drones to drop explosives on officers, a chilling new escalation.
The crackdown, launched before Rio hosts the C40 Climate Summit, is being slammed by Lula for bypassing federal oversight.
💡Bottom line: Brazil’s fight against organized crime now looks a lot like urban warfare.
🗽THE EMPIRE FILES
Political Drama From DC To NYC
🐵Mississippi Monkey Plague
In a story straight out of nightmares — a truck hauling lab monkeys flipped on I-59 in Mississippi, unleashing six rhesus monkeys — one still MIA.
Problem? Cops warned they were aggressive and possibly carrying COVID, hepatitis C, and herpes (yes, all three).
Tulane University says hold your bananas — the monkeys aren’t theirs and aren’t infected. But locals are spooked.
Wildlife officials are still hunting the last escapee.
💀 Bottom line: If your 2025 bingo card had "Mississippi monkey plague," congratulations. You win nothing but existential dread.
Developing story. Do NOT approach. Seriously.
🎙️Don Lemon’s Podcast Meltdown
Ex-CNN host Don Lemon called Megyn Kelly "trans" and "clockable" on his podcast—using transgender identity as an insult about her appearance.
The problem: Lemon's literally built his brand on LGBTQ+ allyship.
Now, he’s being dragged for weaponizing identity politics and reviving old misogyny allegations that got him booted from CNN.
Kelly hasn’t responded yet.
⚡ Bottom line: Lemon’s “comeback” is sounding more like cancellation déjà vu
🤖 CODES & POWER
Tech Wars, Crypto Chaos, and AI’s Black Mirror Moments
💰 Nvidia Becomes a $5 Trillion Titan
Nvidia just became the first company to hit a $5 trillion market cap — a level so massive it equals 25 Disneys, 50 Nikes, or 3,000 JetBlues.
The stock popped 5.5% Wednesday, cementing its reign as AI’s undisputed kingmaker.
Wall Street’s worship is now bordering on religious. The average S&P 500 firm? Just $125B.
⚡Nvidia isn’t a company anymore — it’s an economy with GPUs.
🤖 Musk Launches Grokipedia
Elon Musk just launched Grokipedia, his AI-built encyclopedia aimed squarely at Wikipedia — or as he calls it, “Wokipedia.”
The site claims 885K+ articles, powered by Musk’s chatbot Grok, promising “neutral” info after slamming Wikipedia’s “leftist bias.”
Lab leak theory? RFK Jr.? All rewritten with both sides energy.
Wikipedia hit back fast — already labeling Grokipedia “right-wing” and “Musk-slanted.” Musk’s camp’s response? “Legacy Media Lies.”
⚡The battle for the internet’s soul is now an edit war between a right-wing AI and a crowd of left-wing activists.
📺 FUN FACTS & TRIVIA
Background: Engineers working on the Mark II; Foreground: Actual image of the moth taped into the logbook.
The First Computer Bug
The first known computer bug was a literal bug—a moth found trapped in the Harvard Mark II computer in 1947 (an electromechanical calculator built by Harvard University, IBM, and the U.S. Navy).
The engineers taped it into the logbook with the note, "First actual case of bug being found."