OSanctaSimplicitas

JD Vance is considering not running for President in 2028 due to "family priorities" - WaPo

Donald Trump is now considering inviting Belarusian dictator Alexander Lukashenko to the White House.

TRUMP: I WILL DEPLOY ICE AGENTS TO AIRPORTS ON MONDAY IF DEMOCRATS DON'T AGREE TO FUND DHS

⚡️This is coerced negotiation being run through public whiplash. That is the real signal. Nothing in that sequence is random. The line keeps changing because the pressure campaign is moving through stages in real time. “No ceasefire” tells Iran there will be no equal bargain. “Winding down” tells markets and allies there is an off ramp. “Peace talks” tests whether Tehran is actually ready to fold. “Open Hormuz in 48 hours or lose the grid” is the hammer when Washington decides the answer is still too slow. So what is happening behind the scenes? Three clocks are colliding at once. The military clock says Iran has been degraded enough that compellence might work now. The macro clock says the oil shock is too dangerous to let drag on. The diplomatic clock says if Iran is going to accept a smaller future, now is the moment to force the terms. Trump is speaking to all three clocks at once. That is why the messaging looks schizophrenic on the surface. Underneath, it is one coherent ladder. Pressure. probe. threaten. offer off ramp. threaten harder. Keep the settlement door open while making the cost of refusing it unbearable. This means Washington thinks Iran is weaker than it looks, but not yet broken enough to simply obey. That is why the public language keeps oscillating between exit and annihilation. They are trying to find the exact pressure point where Tehran decides reopening the artery and swallowing humiliation is less dangerous than taking another round of strategic punishment. The real objective has become brutally clear. Reopen Hormuz. Stop the oil shock. Lock in Iran’s downgrade. End the hottest phase only after America can say it forced the result. That also means there are probably competing factions inside the machine right now, but the competition is over timing, not direction. One faction wants to cash out soon and stabilize the system. Another wants one more hard squeeze because they think Iran is already on the edge. A third cares most about oil, inflation, and domestic blowback. Trump is arbitraging all three. He wants maximum leverage without owning an endless war. So what is the real read? The off ramp is real. The threats are real. The peace chatter creates the opening. The ultimatum is meant to force Iran into it. That is why the sequence looks crazy if you read each line literally as a standalone truth. It makes total sense if you read it as coercive bargaining under time pressure. The danger is obvious. Once you start threatening the civilian power grid of a 90 million person state, you are no longer just degrading military capability. You are threatening regime paralysis and societal breakdown. That can force compliance fast. It can also trigger the most desperate retaliation of the whole war. So the next phase is the narrowest bridge yet. Forced settlement on one side. Violent overshoot on the other. The deepest truth is this: Behind the scenes, they are trying to end the war by making the next refusal catastrophically expensive.

Spanish NATO troops in Iraq pull out and head home via Turkey. Europe is not in love with Trump to say it mildly

Trump on Strait of Hormuz: At a certain point, it will open itself