The news drives people to drink. Old news directors in particular. But now, there’s so much “Slip ’N Slide” to the headlines, we just sit back (stone sober) and wonder how the world could possibly get any stranger.
Then we turn on the feed-screener and, oh boy. Things haven’t “hit the fan” but we can sure hear the whir.
Shot of China?
A quick click on Xinhua looks very much “normal” today. China is meeting with the Europeans and buttering them up. The hand shakes (mitt wobbling) is front and center. Then the usual pap about this-n-that’s. But normal is the sales pitch on this, the weekend before chunyun (Spring Festival) which rolls next week.
But how stable is China right now? Depends who you listen to. This post on X is typical. Speaking of 70-minute gun battles as an anti-Xi coup is alleged to be underway. Involving on one side Zhang Youxia and Liu Zhen while on the other, chief mitt wobbler Xi doing lots of stand ups with visiting foreign nationals.
Meanwhile, our inclination is to listen to what’s hinted by Lingling Wei who wrote this week about From Mao to Xi: The Perils of Absolute Power. Which rehashes the fallout between Mao Zedong and Lin Biao back in the day.
Despite the (typically) frantic reports on social media, we’re inclined to sit back and chill. China’s got a party week (a kind of Party’s party, come to think of it). Our only advice to those who might be suspected of being Zhang Youxia supporters? Don’t answer the door at strange hours without a 9 mm in hand.
Conspiracy #2 Fulton County
Our next hot spot is the reported FBI raid on Fulton County, Georgia, in a sweep for election records. FBI searches election hub in Fulton County, Georgia | Fox News.
Fine, easily talked-over by the left. But, what reader Roger (our gold star Phoenix news sniffer) rooted out was (1) Operation Absolute Resolve UPDATE 2: The Venezuelan Coup d’État Is Not About Oil, Drugs & Arms. Wait! The Maduro thing was over voting machine connections?
OK…here’s where I had to wheel out the AI to look at timelines and reconstruct what Mrs. and Mrs. Venezuela were doing about that time:
- 2019–2020: Maduro/Flores were overwhelmingly occupied with Venezuela’s internal crisis and external pressure; publicly they were not operating as plausible “inside operators” of U.S. election tabulation.
- Evidence standard: As of the best public sources available, the Maduro-as-vote-rigging-mastermind story is not supported by U.S. election-security findings and is entangled with repeatedly debunked vendor conspiracies.
- Fulton raid: real event; motivations and outcomes remain contested and developing.
Yeah – I know – “No way would the alphabet club be interfering in American elections from offshore!”
I just line ’em up and see where things point. But do notice that Rubio rules out further military action in Venezuela for now.
Then we get to this morning’s other earthquake from…
Donald Trump’s Truth Social Post
Where, it is alleged that a whole bunch of left and liberals have set up the Protest-Industrial Network.
Watch the video there – dozens of radical groups getting more than $100-million in taxpayer funds going into left wing riot promoters…
So yeah – Tequila Thursday. Chill and watch.
Like Iran This Weekend?
Hard pass. Smart seniors do street checks before venturing out, right? Iran on brink as streets now a ‘warzone’ with protesters shot dead in horror footage.
And the pressure is still building on the mullahs: EU ministers approve new Iran sanctions after Tehran’s crackdown on protests, EU diplomats say.
Here’s the worrying part: Report: Iran sees war preferable to US demands.
U.S. forces are piling into the region so “destination war” is now in sight.
The Adjusted Look-Ahead Calendar
We can only speculate on the future, but if you’re stocking Redenbacher and Zebra, then:
- This weekend or next, look for foreign countries to open up arms fire on Iran.
- Increasing pressure on dems by outing radical funders (and people like us who will cross-check using the Open Secrets political contributions reports) are looking more meek as Senators explore off-ramps to prevent a shutdown as Democrats lay out DHS reforms. Though the Riot-Industrial-Complex is a tough label to argue past.
- Then mid April – after Spring Festival and Xi’s “spring cleaning” THEN Mr. Reunification takes Taiwan and we roll into financial calamity realizing Europe-China is a major powerhouse.
But we knew it was coming. China had to “outgrow Vancouver” sometime, right?
To Market, To Market
Trade, Productivity, and UI Filers. (“Line ’em up, newstender!”)
Labor productivity:
Nonfarm business sector labor productivity increased 4.9 percent in the third quarter of 2025, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported today, as output increased 5.4 percent and hours worked increased 0.5 percent. (All quarterly percent changes in this release are seasonally adjusted annualized rates.) From the same quarter a year ago, nonfarm business sector labor productivity increased 1.9 percent in the third quarter of 2025. These rates were unrevised from the preliminary estimates released on January 8, 2026.
Trade
November exports were $292.1 billion, $10.9 billion less than October exports. November imports were $348.9 billion, $16.8 billion more than October imports. The November increase in the goods and services deficit reflected an increase in the goods deficit of $27.9
billion to $86.9 billion and an increase in the services surplus of $0.3 billion to $30.1 billion.
Year-to-date, the goods and services deficit increased $32.9 billion, or 4.1 percent, from the same period in 2024. Exports increased $185.7 billion or 6.3 percent. Imports increased $218.6 billion or 5.8 percent.
UI Filings
Around the Ranch: Name THAT George?
There’s most of a chapter in my book Mind Amplifiers about how a great deal of a person’s life depends on what they choose to name themselves. With my 77th birthday in spitting distance (I can spit 3-weeks into the future) I am asking again what should my name be for this next part of the ride.
One reason to change your name (or, at least what you and others call you) is it enables you to shake off back juju from earlier lives under different names, monikers, handles, and suchwise.
Everyone knows Barbi Benton was born with a different name, as was Marilynn Monroe and many others (including John Wayne). What you are called is critical to how your world around you is called into existence. (You need to read Calling Things That Are Not.)
Fact is, I got deeply into the “name calling” idea and found even The Mob had some famous name-changers.
“Dutch Schultz (born Arthur Flegenheimer, 1902–1935) was one of Prohibition-era New York’s most violent and independent crime bosses, rising from Bronx bootlegging to dominate beer, numbers, and labor rackets across the city and into New Jersey. Unlike the Italian Mafia’s commission structure, Schultz ran a tightly controlled, personal empire and became notorious for ruthless enforcement, which brought relentless law-enforcement pressure under special prosecutor Thomas E. Dewey.”
Dewey used his Dutch fame to become a three-time NY governor and then lose a presidential bid, but that’s beside the point. And what about “Lucky?” “Scar face” – Seeing the pattern?
Names matter.
I’ve been “Alex” “Bud” “Sport” “Flash” “George Garrett” and several more that are unmentionable.
Even people around here (d’Lynn sure looks like a poker player dealing a name). And if I were young and rambunctious, I might adopt a name like “Dangerous.”
“Howdy ma’am, I’m Dangerous…” (Women seem attracted to good names with some mystique (or that reek of money.)
I settled down as George Ure for more than 40-years, but I am almost tired of it. And I don’t want to be “dragged to the grave” by a worn-out name, for crying out loud.
Perhaps A.G. Kimbrough, (that famous fiction nom de plumer) can offer some ideas.
Something that is non-standard, memorable, markets well, and spans the space from tree farmer to technologist, writer to inventor, craftsman to comic.
“What would you call yourself if you didn’t already have a name?” (Elaine would name herself Jill Hunter.)
An odd thinking point, but it explains why this morning’s headline called it: Tequila Thursday.
I have to get back to getting older now; which means living in the gray between “news” and “what the hell are we watching?”
Write when you get rich,
George (or whatever) @ure.net
Read the full article here