CMR is the leading provider of funding and management support for small to medium-sized businesses and entrepreneurs 

Authored by J.B. Shurk via American Thinker,

The European Union has over four-hundred-fifty million people. The non-E.U. nations of Europe - including the United Kingdom, Switzerland, Norway, Serbia, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Moldova, and Albania but excluding Russia, Belarus, Ukraine, and Turkey - have another hundred million people. Combined, Europe has over two hundred million more people than the United States and over four hundred million more people than the Russian Federation. As an "associate member" of the E.U., Canada would give Europe another forty million bodies.

There is no reason why Europe should struggle to defend itself with this kind of population advantage. In fact, it is downright embarrassing that it depends on Americans from the other side of the ocean to secure its borders when the United States (with its significantly smaller population) has military obligations throughout the world. It has been eighty years since the Second World War, and somehow the European Establishment still hasn't figured out how to survive without American money and muscle.

Professors and pundits toss out all kinds of reasons why this is the case: The Europeans were saddled with debt and destruction after two continental wars within thirty years and had to rebuild much of their infrastructure and manufacturing capacity. As the Soviet Union and the U.S.-led allies carved up post-war Europe, the Cold War froze the continent in a state of transition for the next half-century. U.S. political leaders embraced America's transformation into a global empire with global responsibilities. Peace in post-WWII Europe seemed fragile, and parts of Europe appeared broken; two generations had been lost to war and depression, and a sense of nihilism extinguished much of the early-twentieth-century exuberance that pervaded the continent before the First World War.

All of this is true. Still, there is no excuse for the continent to be struggling with the responsibilities of political sovereignty four generations after the defeat of Nazi Germany.

Josep Borrell, the E.U.'s former high representative for foreign affairs and security policy, said in a speech four years ago, "Europe is a garden. We have built a garden." After a heavy pause, he then observed, "The rest of the world...is not exactly a garden. Most of the rest of the world is a jungle. The jungle could invade the garden. The gardeners should take care of it."

Political leaders from around the world took umbrage at Borrell's condescending view of non-European nations and saw in his garden/jungle demarcation the residual bigotry of European colonialism.

Aside from his rather tone-deaf description of Europe, though, Borrell's view of the continent seems anachronistic. European greatness hasn't existed for more than a century. Most of the noble houses have fallen, while most of the extant aristocrats live in obscurity.

Europe does not create new things; it steals (and taxes) America's innovation and ingenuity. Europe does not build things; it depends on China for industrial output and manufacturing. Europe does not produce enough energy; even while declaring Russia its enemy, much of Europe depends upon Russian oil and gas to survive. Europe does not mine anything; it depends upon child slaves in Africa to do its heavy lifting. Europe does not have babies; it depends upon mass immigration for population replacement. Europe does not generate real economic growth; it depends upon central bank magic tricks, investment bank commissions, and government spending to conjure the illusion of a functioning economy. Finally, Europe does not defend itself; it depends upon NATO, which is to say that it depends upon the United States of America to protect its half a billion people from real and imagined enemies.

If Europe is a "garden," it is because the rest of the planet allows it to exist as one. It would have no vegetation if the "jungle" did not supply it with imports; it would have no "gardeners" if America did not secure Europe's lands and keep trespassers out.

The United States is the only reason that Europe is not part of the "jungle" today. Americans have subsidized Europe's economy for eighty years by allowing Europe to enjoy the advantages of one-way tariffs against U.S. manufacturers and the security umbrella of America's military might. Europe survives because of the kindness of strangers living in towns across America.

This one-sided relationship cannot continue as it has for most of the last century. European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen and her Eurocentric friends in Brussels, Berlin, London, and Paris believe that their "garden" should remain the focus of the world. They believe that their "climate change" fanaticism should drive economic regulation around the globe. They believe that their International Criminal Court should be the planet's chief arbiter of "justice." They believe that their multicultural, cosmopolitan, Marxist-socialist brand of globalism should become a kind of secular religion for all nations. In essence, Europe wants to force the "jungle" to play by its rules.

But this is not how the "law of the jungle" operates.

The lions, elephants, hippos, and hyenas don't have any use for Brussels bureaucracy. They see no need to bow down to unelected Queen Ursula or to respect her "European values." They do not cripple their food supplies out of misplaced devotion to "global warming" gods. They do not outlaw oil and gas exploration, bankrupt refineries, or shutter nuclear power plants while depending upon adversaries and enemies to keep the lights on and the heat flowing. They do not outsource their security to jungle predators with the misguided expectation of not becoming prey.

The jungle doesn't stop at the garden's entrance just because the old empires from the last millennium like to pretend that they still matter.

In the capitals of Europe, incompetent gardeners continue to insist that everything will be fine just as soon as they can expel disruptive forces such as Russian Federation President Vladimir Putin and U.S. President Donald Trump. So long as they can censor social media platforms, Europe's gardeners will be able to disseminate the "proper narratives" to the masses. So long as they can force "green energy" regulations on China, India, Russia, and the United States, Europe's gardeners will be able to regulate markets and limit the jungle's economic growth. So long as they can replace their own people with foreign immigrants, Europe's gardeners will be able to sufficiently "divide and conquer" their own populations.

But you cannot invite the jungle into the garden and expect the garden to survive. The jungle grows fast, and the garden requires too much attention. Without the means to beat back the jungle, the garden is eventually overrun.

This is Europe's last chance at survival. If it does not put down its ideological obsessions and pick up the tools needed for real economic growth, Europe will be impoverished. If it does not relinquish its love for bureaucratic regulation and free its workers so that they may prosper, Europe will become irrelevant. If it does not give up its "rules-based" delusions and build walls for its own defense, Europe will be devoured.

The jungle does not care that old cathedrals, monuments, and palaces exist all over Europe. The jungle does not care about Europe's past glories. Europe is just another place for the jungle to conquer next.

Half a billion people should have a say about Europe's future. They should not have to follow Queen Ursula, Chancellor Merz, President Macron, Prime Minister Burnham, or Prime Minister Carney down the path toward extinction. They should not have to watch their economies implode while the gardeners promise them nothing but "climate change" austerity and nuclear war with Russia. The people of Europe should not have to behave as statues for the gardeners while everything around them is destroyed.

For eighty years, Europe's leaders have failed to bring peace and prosperity to the continent. For the garden to live, the gardeners must go.

We publish a variety of perspectives. Nothing written here is to be construed as representing the views of ZeroHedge.

Authored by Remix News Staff via Remix News,

The mayor of the German city of Frankfurt (Oder), Axel Strasser, has called on residents to demonstrate greater civic courage after bystanders did nothing as a group of teenagers repeatedly punched and kicked a 14-year-old student, including to the head, while he lay on the ground outside a high school earlier this month. Now, critics are calling his statement a recognition of the failure of state authority.

After a security conference with police, prosecutors, schools, youth welfare, and immigration authorities, Strasser, an independent, said it was unacceptable that people stood by without intervening. "We truly appeal to this urban society to show civic courage," he said.

The attack occurred on Oct. 14 outside the Heinrich-von-Kleist High School. Video of the assault, which circulated widely on social media, showed roughly 10 teenagers surrounding the victim, striking him and continuing the assault after he fell.

The German government implemented a policy of mass migration, which has resulted in mob beatings and bullying of German students across the country. Now, government officials are calling on citizens to put their lives on the line and intervene in these mob beatings, including in this latest case in Frankfurt (Oder).

A commentary published by Lennart Zielke in Ostdeutsche Allgemeine, titled "Youth Violence in Brandenburg: The State Gives Up - The Citizen Is Supposed to Put Himself in Mortal Danger," calls the appeal an admission of state failure. The piece argues that urging ordinary bystanders to intervene shifts the risk onto unarmed civilians who lack training, protection, or backup in confrontations with groups of attackers.

"You just have to imagine the scene in concrete terms. A group of violent youths, the perpetrators outnumbered the witnesses, the situation is confusing, and there are possibly knives or firearms involved. And now the average citizen is supposed to intervene - without training, without protection, without support. Anyone who intervenes is highly likely to end up in the hospital," wrote Zielke.

Individuals on social media also highlighted the absurdity of asking the general public to step in to perform law enforcement actions.

"Since politics is failing - or, better said, has no desire to change anything - Mayor Strasser from Frankfurt/Oder is calling for more civic courage to be expected. He can go ahead and stand up to a horde of 20 migrants if he feels like it. I won't!" wrote one user.

Weil die Politik versagt oder besser, keine Lust hat etwas zu ändern, ruft OB Strasser von Frankfurt/Oder dazu auf, dass mehr Zivilcourage erwartet wird. Der kann sich ja mal einer Horde von 20 Migranten entgegen stellen, wenn er Lust hat. Ich nicht!

— Das Nordlicht ???????? (@sma_nordlicht) October 28, 2026

Remix News broadly covered the beating video, including police statements threatening prosecution for publishing the video.

Authorities are investigating nine suspects, ages 13 to 15, who hold Polish, Russian, Syrian, and German nationality. They face allegations of dangerous bodily harm; earlier reports also referenced robbery. Police have spoken with the suspects and their families.

Strasser described the incident as "the first case of this dimension" in the city and said everyone immediately recognized the drama of the situation. Unlike recent group attacks in Potsdam that involved more entrenched youth structures, this case does not, according to officials.

The city and police plan heightened presence near schools after the autumn holidays, parent conferences, and anti-bullying efforts. An investigative team is active. The victim is receiving intensive support through the school and relevant authorities; youth welfare is examining further measures. "Offers of help are available and will be accepted," Strasser said.

Residence-law options are under review, but Strasser said he sees little prospect of success. He added that there will be no simple solutions to rising youth violence in Germany or the influence of social media.

Brandenburg Integration Minister René Wilke (SPD) is pressing for accelerated reviews of protection status for Syrian suspects. He said 16 cases linked to violence incidents in Potsdam and Frankfurt (Oder) - including five minors in the latter - have been reported to the Federal Office for Migration and Refugees so their status can be checked more quickly. "We have asked that the examination be brought forward," Wilke said. Revocation of protected status can lead to deportation but does not automatically do so; each case requires individual assessment that can take months.

"If a child is out of control and the family shows no integration efforts, it can become tight," he noted.

Interior Minister Jan Redmann (CDU) has spoken of influence from the "gangster-rapper milieu" and people who boast about their acts online. Redmann has also pointed to integration shortfalls in some cases and said authorities will use available tools of criminal and residence law, while stressing rapid action to stop the violence.

The attack prompted an AfD demonstration that drew up to a thousand people. The party pointed to migrant violence and called for deportations, including the families of perpetrators.

Strasser has said the city will not simply return to business as usual. He has also emphasized that protection granted in Germany is not deserved by those who abuse it so brutally, while stressing coordinated action by security authorities regardless of the origin of the suspect.

As Remix News has reported in the past, 40 percent of all violent crime suspects in German schools are foreigners.

Germany faces an imminent cold snap with natural gas inventories well below their 15-year seasonal average, leaving Europe's largest economy with a limited buffer against back-to-back cold blasts. Prolonged cold would accelerate storage withdrawals and increase dependence on costly replacement LNG supplies from international markets. 

European NatGas prices are trading north of 100 euros per megawatt-hour.

Germany's gas storage was about 61.2% full on Saturday, short of the 70% average it was supposed to reach by Sunday, according to AGSI figures reported by the German news agency DPA. The miss comes as Europe heads into an early cold spell. As we reported, European gas crossed the 100-euro "psychological mark" on Oct. 28 on winter supply fears.

The target is a blend of two rules. The Federal Network Agency's storage page sets 80% as the November 1 level for every site, and 45% for six named ones: Bad Lauchstädt, Frankenthal, Hähnlein, Rehden, Stockstadt and Uelsen. The agency's overall requirement works out to 70%, according to the energy site Clean Thinking.

The government says the shortfall is not a problem. An Economy Ministry spokeswoman told DPA that "Germany's gas supply is secure for the coming winter, even with the current storage levels." The Federal Network Agency said "Security of supply is guaranteed" and that it "continues to consider the risk of stressed gas supply to be low."

The storage industry is less relaxed. Sebastian Heinermann, managing director of the storage association INES, called the missed target a "serious warning." 

"Germany is entering the heating season with smaller safety reserves," he said, and warned of vulnerability "in the event of exceptionally low temperatures."

Germany's 15-year average for this time of year stands at around 91%.

Last week, the EU's benchmark TTF NatGas closed at 104 euros per megawatt-hour for the first time since the 2022 energy crisis.

Just weeks ago, Gas Infrastructure Europe data showed that EU NatGas inventories declined for the first time this year. This is troubling because the EU as a whole has limited buffers ahead of winter.

We noted earlier on Sunday that Europe has to seriously rethink its energy dependence, as it must fight Asian traders for LNG cargoes on the open market. With the Strait of Hormuz still a mess, prices could keep rising.

European NatGas trades at roughly 11 times the US price.

Looking ahead, meteorologists are tracking an unprecedented sudden stratospheric warming event that could weaken the polar vortex. See the latest report on the event.

Authored by Larry C. Johnson via Sonar21,

The midnight brawl at Poland's Constitutional Tribunal is not a Polish problem. It is the local flare-up of a continental disease. Across Europe, when voters pick the wrong candidate, the establishment reaches for a judge, an intelligence service or the EU's checkbook, and calls the result "defending democracy." The Journal of Democracy wrote the textbook. Warsaw is the teaching hospital.

The article

In December 2023, two months after Donald Tusk's coalition pushed Law and Justice (PiS) out of power, Jaroslaw Kuisz and Karolina Wigura of Kultura Liberalna published a how-to guide in the Journal of Democracy. The title says it all: "How to Dismantle an Illiberal Democracy."

Consider the provenance. At the time, the Journal was the flagship publication of the National Endowment for Democracy, the outfit that does in daylight what the CIA used to do at night. It split from NED this year after DOGE cut off NED's funding in 2025, and it is now independent and partnered with Stanford's CDDRL. In 2023, though, this was the democracy-promotion establishment telling Warsaw how to clean house.

The argument, stripped of its footnotes:

• Poland needs a "second wave" of transitional justice to deal with PiS "violations of the rule of law."
• Avoid vague treason charges. Prosecute specific acts: the 2015 Constitutional Tribunal appointments, the 2020 attempt at an all-mail presidential election and the 2023 visa-for-cash scandal.
• Jaroslaw Kaczynski bears responsibility but will be hard to convict.
• Parliamentary investigative committees are the main tool.
• Expect resistance from the PiS-aligned presidency, Supreme Court and State Tribunal.
• Stabilize the system without breaking it.

The authors close with a disclaimer worth framing: "There is no clear roadmap... One should therefore not expect miracles."

The critique

The defenders of democracy have written a manual for dismantling one. They don't see the irony, and that is the most instructive thing about the essay.

Start with the word "illiberal." It is not a legal category. It is a label handed out by people with conference budgets to governments they dislike. PiS won the 2015 and 2019 parliamentary elections outright. Yet the article treats its officials less like a defeated party and more like the communist nomenklatura of 1989, in need of a "transitional justice" process.

In fairness to Kuisz and Wigura, they are more careful than their cause. They warn against show trials and vague charges, and they admit nobody knows how to do this. But manuals are not read for their caveats. Politicians skip the footnotes and go straight to the chapter on tools.

Here is the core contradiction. PiS stands accused of capturing the courts, ignoring rulings and stacking institutions with loyalists. The cure prescribed is to purge the courts, ignore rulings and install the right loyalists. The sin becomes a sacrament when the right people commit it.

Poland, three years later: the manual in action

This week the manual left the library and went to the streets of Warsaw, escorted by riot police.

Since 2023, Tusk's government has refused to recognize the Constitutional Tribunal and has ignored its rulings. Starting in March, parliament elected eight new judges. President Karol Nawrocki refused to swear in five of them. They held their own oath ceremony and mailed the oaths to the presidential palace, which is a new one even by Central European standards.

Then came October 30. According to Notes from Poland and ProtoThema:

• Judge Anna Korwin-Piotrowska suspended Chief Justice Bogdan Swieczkowski and declared herself acting head of the Tribunal.
• Justice Minister Waldemar Zurek moved to strip Swieczkowski's immunity.
• Riot police blocked Swieczkowski from entering his own court. His supporters cut through the fence with power tools.
• Nawrocki turned his plane around on the way to Senegal and, around 1 a.m., pushed his way past judges into the building. Each side accuses the other of physical aggression. Protesters outside called it a coup.

Tusk's response, per Euronews: "In certain matters there can be no compromise." He also warned about Russian bots, because no European crisis is complete without them.

Not everyone in the coalition is cheering. Szymon Holownia said Poland should be ashamed and that forcing a fix only deepens the decline. Holownia and the PSL are now attending Nawrocki's talks. When your own partners start taking meetings with the other side, the roadmap has a pothole.

Kuisz and Wigura told us not to expect miracles. This isn't a miracle. It's a mirror.

The disease, not the symptom

Poland is just the case where the patient is thrashing hardest. Look at the rest of the ward and the same pathology shows up everywhere: elections treated as advisory, with the final say reserved for institutions nobody voted for.

• Romania. On December 6, 2024, the Constitutional Court annulled the first round of a presidential election after Calin Georgescu, an outsider polling in single digits, came in first. The grounds were declassified intelligence about "aggressive hybrid Russian attacks" and alleged illegal campaign financing. In March 2025 the electoral commission barred Georgescu from the rerun, while he was "the favourite in all the polls," and the court unanimously agreed. That is one way to fix an election: hold it again without the winner.
• France. In March 2025 a Paris court convicted Marine Le Pen of embezzling EU parliamentary funds and banned her from office for five years, effective immediately. The frontrunner for 2027 was gone with one gavel. In July the appeals court upheld the conviction but cut the ban to 45 months, 30 of them suspended, so she can run after all. The judges giveth, and the judges taketh away. Either way, the judges decide.
• Germany. In May 2025, the BfV, Germany's domestic intelligence service, branded the AfD a "confirmed right-wing extremist" party. The AfD polls at 24 to 26 percent. In February a Cologne court suspended the label, ruling the conditions for it "are not met." Lawmakers are still pushing to have the Constitutional Court ban the party outright. Banning the party a quarter of your voters support is certainly one way to win an argument. In my old business, we called a spy agency monitoring the main opposition party something else.
• Brussels' checkbook. The European Commission froze about €137 billion for Poland under PiS. On February 29, 2024, eleven weeks after Tusk took office, it released the money. One of its own officials conceded, "That does not mean the rule of law is fully restored and everything is fine," and the reform plan was "still a draft ambition." The rule of law, it turns out, is measured by who sits in the prime minister's office. Hungary got the same treatment. Its new prime minister, Péter Magyar, promised to go to Brussels "to have EU funding released." Message received in Budapest.

Put the cases side by side and the illness has a clear set of symptoms. Courts annul or narrow the choices on the ballot. Intelligence services rate which parties are fit to compete. Brussels pays for good behavior, defined as the right government. All of it is done in the name of protecting democracy from the people who vote in it.

That is why the Kuisz and Wigura essay matters beyond Poland. It isn't a Polish policy paper. It is a clinical protocol for treating a voter who votes wrong, written for a continent whose elites have concluded the electorate can't be trusted with the keys. Tusk is just the first surgeon to try it without anesthesia.

What this means for NATO

An alliance is only as strong as the governments that have to say yes. Right now several of NATO's key European members are too busy fighting their own voters, courts and presidents to launch any foreign venture. In some cases they couldn't if they tried.

Start with Poland, the country Washington holds up as NATO's model member and the frontline state on Belarus and Ukraine. Under Poland's constitution the president is the supreme commander of the armed forces. Poland's president and its prime minister are currently accusing each other of a coup. Ask yourself who gives the order to deploy in that situation. Then ask whether a Polish soldier knows whose order to follow. A country with two constitutional courts and a commander-in-chief shoving past judges at 1 a.m. is not preparing to project power. It is trying to hold itself together.

The rest of the ward is no healthier:

• Germany is debating whether to ban the opposition party that a quarter of its voters support, and that party wants nothing to do with a war against Russia. Any German government that sends troops east hands the AfD its next election.
• France faces a 2027 presidential race in which Le Pen, whose party has long been skeptical of NATO's integrated command, is back on the ballot. No French president facing that race will gamble on a foreign adventure.
• Romania, home of NATO's base at Mihail Kogalniceanu on the Black Sea, is still governed under the shadow of an election its own court canceled. Its political class has a legitimacy problem it cannot afford to aggravate with a war.

NATO runs on consensus. Every one of these governments is now weighing a foreign deployment against a domestic electorate it has spent years managing rather than persuading. When the elite's grip at home depends on courts, intelligence services and Brussels' money, asking voters to send their sons east is the one request it can't risk. Sooner or later, the bill for treating the voter as the enemy comes due.

The irony is hard to miss. The project was sold as protecting democracy from the barbarians at the gate. What it has produced is an alliance whose members cannot agree with their own voters, let alone with each other. Moscow didn't have to lift a finger. Europe's "defenders of democracy" are doing the job for it.

The Globalists refuse to go away

Strip away the vocabulary of "rule of law" and "transitional justice" and you find a project aimed at Polish nationalism itself. PiS's real offense was not packing a court. Plenty of governments pack courts. Its offense was putting Polish sovereignty, Catholic identity and the nation-state ahead of Brussels.

The record is consistent. Poland refused the EU's 2015 migrant relocation quotas, and in April 2020 the European Court of Justice ruled that Poland, Hungary and the Czech Republic had broken EU law by refusing. That July, the Commission denied twinning grants to six Polish towns over their "LGBT ideology-free" resolutions. Then came the €137 billion freeze. The message from Brussels never varied: national identity is welcome as folklore, not as policy.

To the globalist wing of the Western establishment, meaning NED, Brussels and the foundations and think tanks that orbit them, nationalism is a disease to be treated, not a view to be debated. A nation that insists on deciding what it believes, whom it admits and how it runs its own courts is "illiberal" by definition. Kuisz and Wigura simply gave that attitude a legal procedure.

Now look east, because the same people take the same attitude toward Russia, with fewer manners. NED has funded Russian civil-society groups for decades, which is why Moscow made it the first "undesirable organization" under its 2015 law. In June 2022, the U.S. Helsinki Commission held a briefing titled "Decolonizing Russia: A Moral and Strategic Imperative." The title says the rest. Russian nationalism, like Polish nationalism, is treated not as a fact to be dealt with but as a pathology to be cured, by sanctions, regime change or, if the seminar circuit gets its way, partition.

Here is the irony I find most delicious. Washington and Brussels spent years cheering Polish nationalism when it was pointed at Moscow. Poland's hostility to Russia was the alliance's favorite asset. Point the same nationalism at Brussels and it suddenly becomes a threat to democracy requiring riot police. Polish patriotism, it turns out, is a weapon to be aimed, not a conviction to be respected. Poles should notice that the people eager to dismantle Russia's sense of nationhood are the same people dismantling theirs.

That is my assessment, not the article's. Kuisz and Wigura frame everything as restoring the rule of law, and insist that the PiS started this. Its 2015 Tribunal appointments were a power grab, and in its 2021 Xero Flor ruling the European Court of Human Rights found that a bench including an improperly appointed judge violated the right to a fair trial.

Nawrocki's refusal to swear in the new judges is hardball too. Both camps have real legal arguments. That is exactly why riot police at midnight are the wrong way to settle it.

Even if you set motive aside entirely, judge the project by its adverse effects: a country with two rival constitutional courts and a president shoving past judges in the dark.

On NATO, a caveat. Domestic turmoil makes an offensive or expeditionary venture far less likely, but it does not mean these countries would refuse to defend their own territory. Both camps in Warsaw back heavy defense spending, and a direct attack on a member tends to unite even the most divided parliament. My argument is about appetite for adventure, not the willingness to fight at the border.

None of these caveats changes the central point. The fight in Warsaw isn't really about judges. It is about whether a European nation may still define itself, or whether that right now belongs to Brussels, NED and the people who write manuals on dismantling democracies. Moscow got that answer years ago. Warsaw is getting it now.

Authored by Michael Snyder via The Economic Collapse,

What in the world is going on? Why are governments all over the planet suddenly encouraging their citizens to become preppers? Do they know something that they aren't telling us? If it was just one nation that was suddenly instructing people to stockpile food, water and other essential supplies, that wouldn't be a big deal. But it isn't just one nation. As you will see below, quite a long list of countries have simultaneously decided that now is the time for everyone to get prepared. So what has prompted this sudden sense of urgency?

For some reason, governments in Europe seem to have more of a sense of urgency than anyone else...

Governments in the UK, Sweden, Germany, Ireland, the Netherlands and France have encouraged households to keep food, water, medicines and other essentials available for emergencies.

I can't recall a time when so many European governments have been so concerned about making sure that their citizens are prepared for an emergency.

In the UK, the "Be Ready campaign" has been launched.

Every citizen is being encouraged to stockpile at least enough food and bottled water to last for 72 hours...

Every Briton is being urged to stock up to nine litres of bottled water and three days' worth of food in new government guidance designed to ensure that households can survive a weather, cyber or other serious emergency.

The Be Ready campaign is aimed at persuading people to stock up with supplies to last 72 hours, amid growing official concern about the impact of the climate crisis, technological dependency and hostile state threats.

Dan Jarvis, the security minister, said that "those who can follow this advice should follow this advice". It amounted to "simple steps to be ready for everyday emergencies" as part of a wider, community-oriented effort "to improve our resilience as a nation", he said.

So why has it suddenly become so important to do this?

The UK's defense secretary is saying that it is because we "live in a more dangerous and turbulent world"...

UK families are suddenly being told to stock up on emergency supplies - and to prepare for war.

Wes Streeting, the UK's defense secretary, went on a media blitz to push a new "Be Ready" campaign to boost Brits' preparedness for crises - which he said could range from floods and wildfires to terrorism and cyber attacks and ultimately even war.

"There's no sugarcoating the fact that we do live in a more dangerous and turbulent world," Streeting told BBC's "Newsnight."

"It's about saying to households across the country to be ready by just having some everyday essentials indoors should there be disruption from these sorts of events."

Yes, our world has certainly become more "dangerous" and more "turbulent", but I also get the impression that there is something that he isn't telling us.

In Sweden, citizens are being told that they may have to survive on their own for at least a week "in case of crisis or war"...

In Sweden, the country's civil defense guidance is warning households to be able to manage on their own for at least one week 'in case of crisis or war.'

'The state of the world has worsened drastically in recent years. War is being waged in our vicinity. Extreme weather events are becoming increasingly common. Terror threats, cyberattacks, and disinformation campaigns are being used to undermine and influence us,' the bulletin stated.

It is noteworthy that Swedish authorities are using the word "war", because a lot of people out there are convinced that military conflict is what has prompted all of this talk about preparing.

On social media, many are speculating that European governments are getting ready to go to war with Russia...

But if European governments are bracing for a military showdown with Russia, why is the government of Japan urging their citizens to stockpile food, water and other necessary supplies?...

Statements from Japan's Disaster Management Minister indicate that the government is preparing to issue a national "emergency request"? on November 2, 2026. The request aims to urge all households across the country to stockpile essential survival supplies. The announcement is planned for the same day as the official launch of Japan's National Disaster Management Agency.

The new national agency will lead coordination efforts across the country regarding disaster planning, immediate emergency response, long-term recovery, and reconstruction.

I can't remember the Japanese government ever doing anything like this.

Just like in the UK, Japanese citizens are being instructed to have enough on hand to last for at least three days...

The emergency request lays down a self-sufficiency window of at least three days. However, the Disaster Management Minister Gishi Hosono emphasized that a one-week supply is recommended wherever possible.

Here in the United States, Project FORTRESS has just been initiated.

The goal is for the U.S. military to be able to keep fighting for at least 90 days if all civilian infrastructure goes down...

The Pentagon is preparing U.S. military bases to keep operating for at least 90 days without outside support as it prepares for the possibility of a major war that could cripple power grids, disrupt supply chains and threaten critical infrastructure on American soil.

The new requirement is part of FORTRESS, a broader military initiative aimed at ensuring American forces can continue fighting even if the civilian systems they depend on are disrupted, according to documents reviewed by Fox News Digital.

"We don't want to rely on standard civilian municipal infrastructure to run our national defense. We just simply can't. It's an intolerable risk," Pentagon chief spokesperson Sean Parnell told Fox News Digital.

What kind of scenario would "cripple power grids, disrupt supply chains and threaten critical infrastructure"?

I can only think of a few, and most of them involve military conflict.

So what do they think might happen?

Shortly after we learned about Project FORTRESS, former Deputy Director of the FBI Dan Bongino issued a very urgent warning...

The former Deputy Director of the FBI has issued an urgent warning to Americans as countries worldwide start stockpiling supplies for a potential crisis.

Dan Bongino, who left the bureau in January, said the public needs to do what the UK and European governments are telling citizens: Have a preparedness plan and at least three days of food and power ready.

'Have yourself an emergency radio, have yourself some batteries, get yourself some emergency food, get yourself a rain collection and water filtration, some filtration tablets,' he said on Monday.

'Get your stuff today. Please. Do it for your family,' Bongino added.

Even though he no longer works for the government, Bongino still has lots of contacts inside the government.

Has he been told something that would prompt him to literally beg his listeners to go out and buy emergency supplies?

Someone should really ask him that question.

And why is he urging us to have a "rain collection" system?

You wouldn't need to collect rain unless you were facing some sort of a long-term catastrophic emergency.

Without a doubt, everything that he is saying is wise advice.

But why has he suddenly developed such a sense of urgency?

I have a feeling that something big is coming.

Perhaps after the midterm elections in the United States we shall find out what it is.

A Chinese startup claims it has developed a $1,000 machine capable of hunting mosquitoes with artificial intelligence and shooting them down with a laser, bringing a futuristic approach to an age-old household nuisance, according to the NY Times.

Photon Matrix, based in Changzhou, says it has already secured 5,000 prepaid orders for its Laser Mosquito Air Defense System and is preparing to begin large-scale manufacturing. The company is also working to secure regulatory clearance in China, Europe and the United States.

The machine borrows technology from autonomous vehicles, using lidar to monitor a designated area and identify tiny moving targets. It sends out 100,000 low-intensity laser pulses every second to locate insects before directing a much stronger beam at their wings.

In a recent demonstration, mosquitoes reportedly dropped from the air in rapid succession, accompanied by brief flashes of colored light. The laser destroys their ability to fly without necessarily killing them immediately. According to company founder Wang Chuan, some disabled mosquitoes can remain alive for days.

The Times writes that the biggest obstacle may be safety. The system employs a Class 4 laser powerful enough to cause serious eye injuries almost instantaneously. To reduce that danger, Photon Matrix has equipped the machine with cameras and sensors designed to recognize people, animals and potentially hazardous reflections, automatically blocking the laser when necessary.

Owners must also pass a mandatory safety quiz before they can unlock the device using fingerprint authentication.

Wang said the company originally experimented with lower-powered lasers but found them unreliable. Engineers ultimately settled on extremely brief bursts from a stronger laser, attempting to balance effectiveness against the risk of accidental exposure.

While the immediate market is mosquito control, the underlying technology could have broader applications, including systems capable of identifying and intercepting small drones.

The idea of using lasers against mosquitoes has been explored before. Intellectual Ventures demonstrated a similar concept in 2010, but it never became a commercial product. Photon Matrix is now betting that advances in AI, sensors and manufacturing can finally bring the concept to market.

Authored by Naveen Athrappully via The Epoch Times,

The Department of Justice (DOJ) announced it identified roughly $29.1 million in government benefits fraud in Minnesota over a one-month period.

Between Sept. 30 and Oct. 30, the DOJ's National Fraud Enforcement Division and the District of Minnesota charged, convicted, or sentenced 13 individuals for proven or alleged schemes that caused nearly $83 million in intended losses to the federal government.

The DOJ said in an Oct. 30 statement that it uncovered $29.1 million in fraud in newly charged cases, which is part of the total $83 million.

The targeted benefits programs include Minnesota's Medicaid program, the Federal Child Nutrition Program, and the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP. Some are accused of engaging in bribery as part of carrying out their schemes.

In one case, Shaakir Mohamud Ibrahim, 54, of Pelican Rapids, Minnesota, is facing wire fraud and money laundering charges for being part of a scheme to defraud the Federal Child Nutrition Program through the nonprofit Feeding Our Future.

Ibrahim and his co-conspirators are alleged to have falsely claimed to be serving thousands of meals to children every day for four months. The department alleged he used this fake meal distribution to collect more than $1.1 million in reimbursements through the nonprofit.

In another case, the DOJ said it charged Feisal Mohamed Elmi, 46, of New Brighton, Minnesota, with 11 counts related to health care fraud in an $8.2 million scheme that targeted the state's Medicaid program.

So far this year, the Justice Department said it has issued more than 1,000 subpoenas and executed over 40 warrants to identify fraud in Minnesota.

"Minnesota is the epicenter for fraud in America," acting deputy attorney general Trent McCotter said in the statement.

"The Trump administration's crackdown is working, and the results speak for themselves. Through the Minnesota Fraud Task Force, we are systematically dismantling schemes preying on Americans. Backed by more than a thousand subpoenas and 40 warrants, the message is simple: No one stealing from taxpayer-funded programs is safe," McCotter said.

The Epoch Times reached out to Shaakir Mohamud Ibrahim's legal representative for comment but did not receive a response by publication time. The Epoch Times could not reach Feisal Mohamed Elmi's legal representative.

During an Oct. 30 news conference, Trump administration officials highlighted the crackdown against fraud in Minnesota. FBI Director Kash Patel told reporters that FBI Minneapolis and other law enforcement officers executed 17 search warrants on Oct. 29, with four people arrested for allegedly seeking to defraud more than $41 million from thousands of victims.

Colin McDonald, assistant attorney general for the National Fraud Enforcement Division, said during the conference that prosecutors charged five people in the past week for Medicaid fraud schemes involving $48 million in intended losses.

"The days of indifference are over ... wherever the money leads, the full weight of government will follow," Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said at the event.

Earlier, in August, the Treasury said in a statement that various fraud schemes based out of Minnesota have siphoned off federal and state dollars meant for people with disabilities, individuals lacking housing, or those struggling with procuring food. This has potentially cost Minnesota billions of dollars, with some of the stolen funds laundered abroad.

To tackle this issue, the Treasury announced the renewal of a Geographic Targeting Order requiring money transmitters and banks in the state's Ramsey and Hennepin counties to report information about fund transfers of $3,000 or more to recipients or banks outside the United States.

The order aims to help law enforcement detect when fraud proceeds are sent overseas and act quickly to deal with the issue, the Treasury said.

"We will continue to give law enforcement critical tools to trace criminal networks that siphon taxpayer dollars and move them overseas. The Trump Administration will not allow criminals to profit from programs intended to help vulnerable Americans," Bessent said in the statement.

For three decades, the one trade every Australian knew by heart was "buy property in Sydney." Now it's disintegrating.

That's the gist of a Bloomberg feature from this summer, titled "One of the World's Longest Housing Booms Is Cracking in Sydney," which at the time read like a slightly alarmist look at a market that was "only" 3.6% off its peak. Two months, one rate hike and a whole lot of downward revisions later, it reads more like the opening chapter. According to the October Cotality data released just hours ago, capital-city prices fell another 1.4% last month and are now 8.1% below their March peak, with Sydney down 9.4% from a year ago. That's already most of the way to Goldman's latest peak-to-trough forecast of -12% (cut for the second time in two months), which would be a historically large drop for a country where housing is, well, basically the economy.

And the Reserve Bank of Australia is about to make it worse: on Tuesday the RBA is widely expected to hike for the fifth time this year, to 4.85%, the highest cash rate since the GFC. As Goldman's rates desk put it after last week's parliamentary testimony, the RBA made a "clear effort to downplay any dovish pushbacks (no concerns on financial stability, housing, household leverage, growth)."

In other words, the central bank has looked at the housing slump and decided it's somebody else's problem.

"The Surest Bet In Australia"

Start with the scale of the bet. "For the past three decades, buying a home in Sydney has been the surest bet in Australia," Bloomberg's Nasteho Said, James Mayger and Richard Henderson wrote on August 31. "Rising prices have enriched families and made property the engine of household wealth." That wealth engine is enormous: about 60% of Australian household wealth is tied up in property according to Commerzbank, and the average Sydney home costs almost 14 times annual disposable income, making it the second-most expensive city in the world to buy property after Hong Kong (per Demographia). Nationally, prices jumped about 67% in the past decade, while home values more than doubled in Brisbane, Adelaide and Perth.

Regular readers know how Australians got here. As we noted in August in "Wealth Exodus: Australians Flock To Property Investment Over Business", a CEDA report aptly titled "Bricks, not Businesses" found that the share of wealth the richest 20% of households hold in businesses collapsed from 11% to 4.4% over two decades, while their investment-property share rose from 10.2% to 14.2%. And the borrowing kept accelerating right up to the top: here is what we tweeted in February, about a month before prices peaked.

Nearly double the consensus. Nothing says "healthy market" like quarterly mortgage growth running at twice what the economists thought possible.

Then three things hit at once. First, the RBA started hiking in February (more on that below). Second, the Hormuz energy shock sent Australian fuel prices to records (recall that back in March, hundreds of Australian gas stations literally ran dry), which pushed inflation higher and made the RBA even more hawkish. And third, Treasurer Jim Chalmers took aim at the investor bid itself in the May 12 budget: existing properties bought after May 12 no longer qualify for negative gearing, the tax break that lets landlords deduct rental losses from their personal income. As Domain's Nicola Powell told Bloomberg, "first-time buyers are not large enough to replace investors... We are really yet to see the true impact of fewer investors in the housing market."

The fallout spread quickly to the banks (mortgage applications fell as much as 20% after the budget, per Bloomberg) and to developers: in late August, Sydney developer Bathla Group fell into insolvency owing A$3.3 billion after borrowing heavily from private credit funds. Long-time readers may experience déjà vu: we covered a near-identical episode back in 2019 in "Australia Housing Slump Prompts Collapse Of One Of The Nation's Largest Developers." The difference this time is that the lender of last resort for overlevered builders is private credit, and we all know how relaxed private credit has been about marks this year.

Then It Got Worse. Much Worse

When Bloomberg published, Cotality's national index had just dropped 0.9% in August, for a cumulative decline of 3.6% from the March peak. The data since then has been ugly, and the data revisions even uglier.

A month ago, Goldman's Australia economics team (Andrew Boak and co.) reported that capital-city dwelling prices fell 1.2% in September after a downwardly revised 1.5% drop in August (originally reported as -1.1%), while July had also been revised from -0.9% to -1.5%. You can probably guess what happened next. In its note out this morning in Sydney, titled "Australia: Cotality House Prices: Large price declines continue", Goldman writes:

"Australian capital-city dwelling prices fell 1.4%mom in October, following a downwardly revised 1.5%mom fall in September (originally reported: -1.2%mom). Prices are now 8.1% below their March 2026 peak, to be around May 2025 levels. Prices declined most across the previously more resilient mid-sized capital cities, with the largest declines in Brisbane and Perth."

That's four straight months of drops of 1.4% or more, and every one of the previous three got revised lower after the fact. Annual growth in capital-city prices has swung from +7.7% in May to -4.8% y/y in October. Here is the bank's chart of each monthly vintage, which says all you need to know about how reliable the "first print" has been:

The downturn has also gone from a luxury problem to everyone's problem. Back in early September, Goldman noted that 93% of capital-city suburbs had recorded a decline over the prior three months, up from 46% over March-May, quoting Cotality: "what started as a more concentrated easing across higher-value segments has now become a much more generalised softening." In October the previously bulletproof mid-sized capitals got hit hardest again: Brisbane fell 2.0% m/m (its fourth straight drop of 1.8% or more) and Perth 1.7%, with both cities' once-spectacular annual gains (18.2% and 24.4% in May) now almost gone, at +0.4% and +3.9% y/y. Sydney fell another 1.6% and is now down 9.4% y/y, Melbourne is down 7.6% y/y, and only Darwin (+0.6%) and Hobart (+0.5%) managed to rise.

Seven months of declines have taken capital-city prices back to around May 2025 levels. In other words, the 2026 boom has been fully erased, and prices are now closer to the next line on Goldman's chart (a 10% fall takes prices back to mid-2024) than to the peak. At this pace, maybe two more prints get them there.

Volumes are, if anything, worse than prices. Cotality's latest chart pack showed an estimated 39,747 homes sold nationally in September, down 20.9% from a year earlier, with selling times blowing out to more than five weeks. In mid-October, just 1,423 homes went to auction across the combined capitals in a week, 45.8% fewer than the same week a year ago. And sellers are now paying up to get out: per today's Cotality release, "median time on market, at 39 days, is the highest since August 2020, while vendor discounting, at 4.7%, is the largest since May 2019." Even the one part of the market that was supposed to stay tight is cracking: the rental vacancy rate rose to 2.3%, close to its decade average of 2.4% (it was a record low 1.5% in February), while rents rose just 0.9% over three months, the smallest gain since January 2025.

Cotality also offered what may be the single most important sentence for anyone trying to figure out how deep this goes:

"With household debt at high levels, borrowers are far more sensitive to interest rates compared with almost fifteen years ago when interest rates were previously this high."

Hiking Into The Slump

Which brings us to the RBA. After cutting three times in 2025 to 3.60%, the central bank reversed course in February and hasn't stopped: hikes on Feb 3, Mar 17, May 5 and Sep 29 took the cash rate to 4.60%, fully undoing 2025's easing and then some. Tuesday's widely expected move to 4.85% would push the rate above the 4.75% peak of 2010-11 and to the highest level since the financial crisis.

The bond market noticed early. On the same day that Bloomberg's housing feature dropped, Australian 10Y yields hit a 15-year high.

The problem for the RBA is that inflation, which the IMF warned back in April would be among the highest in the developed world, keeps proving it right. Last week's Q3 CPI showed trimmed mean inflation of 1.00% q/q (3.66% y/y), "materially above" the RBA's August forecast of 0.83%, while monthly headline CPI hit 4.3% y/y, driven by a 9.4% m/m jump in fuel prices. As Goldman noted, the print "reinforces our expectation of a 25bp RBA rate rise to 4.85% at next Tuesday's November meeting" (available to pro subs, see "Australia: CPI: Underlying inflation increases +1.0%qoq").

And the RBA has made no secret of where its priorities lie. In September, Deputy Governor Andrew Hauser told ABC that "people are furious about inflation... and what they want us to do is our job and bring inflation down." On housing he was remarkably relaxed: prices had fallen "a bit," but "house prices are still 3% higher than they were a year ago, and nearly 50% higher than they were at the beginning of this decade," and "a supply crisis" creates a "floor to house prices." (Capital-city prices are now 4.8% lower than a year ago, so that particular argument has already expired.) At the September 29 hike, Governor Bullock, per Goldman, "placed little focus on arguments which might have supported" a hold, "for example, the weakening housing market."

Last week's Senate testimony was more of the same. Bullock said "the labour market seems a little tighter than we previously judged" and that the NAIRU is "probably above where the unemployment rate is at the moment" (translation: expect more hikes, not fewer). The hedge funds got the message. Here is Goldman's AUD rates desk in its Oct 28 market update (available to pro subs):

"Immediately after CPI, there was strong interest from hedge funds to add to their November RBA shorts with the meeting climbing from 15.5 to 22.5bp of hikes priced... the front end bid shifted out into the February 2027 meeting which is now priced at a 50/50 chance of another hike post November... With this increased hawkish intensity, it feels the RBA is unlikely to let up in its tightening campaign until it sees clear evidence of a meaningful slowdown in the hard activity data."

Here's why that matters more in Australia than almost anywhere else: fewer than 5% of Australian mortgages are on fixed terms, according to the RBA (as Bloomberg noted). Unlike in the US, where homebuyers typically take out 30-year fixed mortgages, every hike lands on Australian household budgets within weeks. Ask Chris Hanna, the 33-year-old Sydney investor Bloomberg profiled with a roughly A$6.5 million portfolio of four properties, who said another quarter-point hike would cost him "an extra couple of thousand dollars a month" and who is now thinking about selling one or two homes instead of buying a fifth. Multiply him by a few hundred thousand leveraged investors who just lost their negative gearing on future purchases, and you probably get September's auction volumes.

Chasing The Floor

The most telling chart in this story may be the one tracking the forecasts. Before September, Goldman expected a 5% peak-to-trough decline in capital-city prices. Then, on September 3, it doubled the call:

"The RBA's policy trade-off has become more difficult over the past month, as a deeper housing downturn has coincided with a still-resilient economy and a much firmer-than-expected July CPI print... We now expect house prices to fall by a historically large 9% peak-to-trough (GS prior: -5%), prompting us to lower our growth and labour market forecasts."
- Goldman Sachs, "Australia & NZ Views: RBA To Tighten Into Deeper Housing Drag" 

Prices blew through most of that within two months (they are now down 8.1%). So last Wednesday, after the CPI print, the bank cut again: "we now forecast a larger peak-to-trough fall in house prices of 12% (prior: 9%), slower 2027 GDP growth of 1.6% (prior: 1.8%) and a higher unemployment rate peak of 4.9% by end-2027." It also pushed back the start of RBA easing to 4Q 2027. Westpac, meanwhile, now sees prices falling just over 10% peak-to-trough, which it says would be the largest decline since national price measures began in 1980 (with Sydney seen down 12% this year alone). "That risk is crystallising with turnover already down 20% and prices off 8%," wrote Westpac's Matthew Hassan.

Notice a pattern? The forecasts keep moving to where the prices are going, a month or two late. Now, to be fair, there's a bull case, and AMP's Shane Oliver made it to Bloomberg: prices "keep falling into the June quarter," the RBA starts "making noises about potentially cutting interest rates through the second half of next year," and that sets up "some sort of rebound in property prices through 2027 and 2028." It's also worth remembering that the last time a big Aussie bank turned this bearish, in 2022, CBA called for a 15% drop, and the actual drawdown stopped well short of that (it's visible in Goldman's chart above) before the RBA pivoted and the boom resumed.

The difference this time? In 2022-23 the RBA was hiking into a market where investors still had their tax breaks and inflation was about to roll over. In 2026, the investor bid has been legislated away, oil is still elevated thanks to the Iran war, and the RBA itself keeps telling anyone who will listen that inflation will be higher than it forecast. CommBank's Belinda Allen, who also expects 4.85% on Tuesday, put it bluntly: "the RBA has picked a side and is leaning into the fight."

Meanwhile the banks are already fighting over scraps. According to Goldman's Sydney futures desk, CBA just launched a mortgage rewards program, including tokens for phone bills and travel, "as the country's lenders vie for a dwindling pool of customers amid the fastest housing slump in a generation." Free phone credit with your jumbo variable-rate mortgage: surely that will stem the tide.

Catastrophic? Ask Anyone Holding 60% Of Their Wealth In Bricks

So is "catastrophic" really on the table? Maybe not tomorrow, but for a country where property is the household balance sheet, the banking system's main asset and the government's favorite policy lever, a 12% decline would be bad enough. The transmission is unusually direct: variable-rate mortgages, a central bank that has explicitly declined to weigh housing, falling turnover that hits stamp-duty revenue and construction, and a private-credit-funded developer sector that is already cracking. Even the RBA's chief economist Sarah Hunter acknowledged in September that falling prices would weigh on the economy through lower turnover, wealth effects and construction activity, before adding that the RBA "wouldn't expect right now to see a recession or anything like that in the economy." Which is probably what every central bank says right up until it does.

As Bloomberg noted, "there are few recent examples of countries trying to tackle overheated housing markets without seeing a sustained slump": China is five years into a property crisis, New Zealand's boom turned into a prolonged downturn, and a 20% plunge in Canadian home prices still hasn't fixed affordability there. Australia is now trying to deflate one of the frothiest housing markets on the planet while hiking rates into a stagflationary energy shock. Our bet: Goldman's -12% gets revised again before this is over, and the "supply crisis floor" Hauser described in September will prove about as durable as his "prices are still 3% higher than a year ago" argument did.

Then again, as one Castle Hill seller told Bloomberg after slashing his asking price by A$300,000-A$400,000 to sell to the only bidder who showed up: "We decided to take the money and run." Probably good advice. The RBA decides on Tuesday at 2:30pm AEDT (10:30pm ET Monday), with the latest house price print already in hand. We doubt it changes their mind.

Much more in the full Goldman Sachs "Australia & NZ Views: RBA To Tighten Into Deeper Housing Drag," "Australia: CPI: Underlying inflation increases +1.0%qoq" and "Cotality House Prices: Price falls broaden further in September" notes, all available to pro subs.