Jack of diamonds always gets his way.

Milo grabbed the gold...

My bobblehead from BigDave

I got back from Texas yesterday afternoon. I was gone for a while, left on October 19th, you do the math, I'm too tired.

It was a long show but a good show, I sold fairly steadily and met some nice people and new clients. Weather was near perfect with just one day of rain that I remember. Driving home was a different story but not too terrible.

I got to Round Top on a Wednesday and drove over and picked up a lovely germantown Navajo blanket that I had purchased from a friend. I love germantown eyedazzlers, they were made between 1865 and 1915 and were some of the most lovely and unusual native weavings.

Here is a picture of it on a bed in my motel room. Mint condition, with corner tassels and fringe and a very unusual yellow border color.

The wool was imported from a suburb of Philadelphia, the brightly colored commercial yard had four times the normal knot per inch count and allowed the Navajo to weave some of the most optically and visually interesting patterns that have ever been created.

I started setting up Thursday morning. 

For the last couple years I have favored a buff or sandstone backdrop paper but signals were crossed and I was instead given a bright yellow forsythia.

I thought that I would hate it but my stuff actually looked great on it so it was a happy accident and I will probably do it again.

I had about three days to setup, which is way more than enough so I had time to shop the other dealers and make some good buys including a room size Navajo that I sold to a California client.

Buying is always way more fun than selling in my line of work.

I also bought the two most beautiful aesthetic pieces of silver I have ever owned, sterling and mixed metal, replete with bugs, fish and turtle ornamentation.

Sold to a client instantly!

Steve and I also partnered a nice numbered lithograph by the latin artist Roberto Matta.

Booth turned out fine, I have gone from eighty foot of walls, to forty to thirty and now twenty but I think this size is perfect.

They threw in an outside wall which really helps.

I wasn't sure about the dealer across from me but he turned out to be as toxic, abrasive and sarcastic as I am and we ended up being a great fit together.

The show is more decoratively oriented than collector based so my inexpensive paintings sold first but I sold high end as well.

You have to bring a mix.

I have heard Roundtop referred to as the Texas Catwalk and it seems somewhat accurate.

Many of the women in Texas are stunningly beautiful and they parade through the show in similar dress.

I noticed much less ink than I see in California and far fewer full Ferdinand the bull style nose rings.

Breasts are not as augmented and eyebrows tend to be fuller and less plucked. 

There were less prairie dresses this year and possibly more plunging backlines. 

All in all, quite lovely and entertaining.

Found a great barbecue nearby in Burton, Truth Barbecue, their second location. 

One of the big Texas magazines calls them third best in the state.

I had ribs and brisket, potato salad and a root beer. 

Brisket was good but honestly the ribs were the best I have ever had.

I chatted with the owner, Leonard, for a few minutes.

Really nice guy.

I'm not going to talk to much about the food, was good and bad, ate too much beef and had some mediocre seafood.

Had two good meals at Las Patronas, quail and ribs.

Went to all my old haunts.

Did have a great steak and lobster meal at Burton Steak and Seafood with a bunch of friends and my sister Laurie, who drove up from Corpus Christie.

I love and admire my little sister.

I didn't take many pictures, was too busy, only when compelled.

Barry thought I was remiss in not including a picture of this colorful young woman who wandered into my booth. 

A lawyer no less.

We exchanged instagram addresses. Hmmm.

Room for all of god's creatures.  

Think she might have benefitted from an older fellow's wisdom and guidance.

Of course I was there on Halloween and there were some other clever if less revealing costumes walking around.

Unfortunately the show was mired in tragedy. A dealer I had known for over thirty years was murdered in a strange love triangle scenario. I think I know what actually went down but won't speculate publicly here.

He may have said something to the wrong guy at the wrong time, in the company of the wrong woman.

The deceased owed me thousands of dollars for many years, finally paid up but stiffed a good friend of mine for several thousand dollars in show fees at Napa. 

My last interaction with him was not very pleasant in Santa Barbara, he was jealous of me for some reason and decided to be an asshole.

Still it was a shame. He was finally finding his footing and building up a clientele in Texas and was robbed of his life just as he was coming into his own. Had a son and a mom who loved him and he didn't deserve to die, for sure.

I left Sunday morning, drove into a small rainstorm. I stopped at Van Horn for a night and then Tucson where I bought a lovely Kawaiisu bottleneck basket from Mark. Then on to Phoenix to spend the last night at Steve's before the relatively short third day drive home. 

Sue made a delicious ox tail beef pie with cinnamon and coriander from a recipe of Chef Ahmed, the owner of Jambo in Santa Fe.

So delicious!

Long trip, good to be home.

Bingo

 I think conservative commentator Erick Erickson said it best.

I could add a few things but why rub it in?

Remember the cowards

I am not foolish enough to make election predictions in our deeply divided nation. We will all know the eventual outcomes soon enough.

But I do predict a heaping amount of one metric in our near future, historical revisionism. The amount of Republicans who will try to tell you that they had thwarted their great leader at every turn during his tenure will be sky high.

Of course, they did it all covertly so no one on the outside would be able to tell.

The truth is that with the exception of a few outgoing retirees or lame ducks like Tillis, Cornyn and Cassidy the GOP has been conspicuously silent on all matters Trump.

People that should have stood for something, people like Mike Johnson and Thune, stood by and let the Orange monstrosity do his worst with nary a peep. Cowards.

Let's not forget.

The Rapper

Paxton Blues

I landed in my destination in Texas this afternoon after three full days of driving. I have been watching the political signage both in Texas and Arizona, saw nothing in New Mexico.

Trump's name appeared in Andy Biggs signage as Trump endorsed. Not many places where that is broadcast with Trump's abysmal polling numbers but I guess he still shines in Tucson.

I saw very little Trump signage in Texas but a lot of signs endorsing Paxton for Senate. Two for Talarico. 

Keep waiting to see one that reads "I'm voting for the adulterer."

Newen Afrobeat plays Fela Kuti

My favorite worldbeat band.

The Sirens of Elon

The world's richest man wants congressional democrats to know that he is keeping a list and they better not go after him or risk holy hell.

Elon Musk vowed to push back on Democratic lawmakers who may seek to use oversight powers against him if they're able to gain control of one or both chambers of Congress.

Musk responded to a story by Politico that detailed how Democrats have considered ways in which they could investigate the billionaire and his businesses like Tesla and SpaceX.

"Live by the sword, die by the sword," Musk wrote in a post on his X platform.

"Those who pick fights with me should understand that I will find out who is really pulling the strings and come for them, not just their puppets."

On the heels of being caught lying to the world about throttling Ukraine's Starlink connection, one would be a fool not to believe that the man would do anything to destroy his perceived enemies. Think of his immense power. who could stand up to it?  That is why we should never allow such power to be controlled by a private citizen. It ended up killing a bunch of Ukrainian children last week.

Think Trump is vindictive? This man will take it to a new level, he is quite deranged. Remember when he labelled the people who rescued the Thai children trapped in caves pedophiles. Something is just not right with this guy. And he has some rather peculiar habits, to say the least.

Elon Musk refers to the mothers of his 14 known children as “breeders” and is fixated with procreation, according to a new documentary on the world’s richest man.

The film Musk, directed by the Oscar-winning director Alex Gibney, was filmed over three years and charts his rise to becoming the world’s first trillionaire.

After the four-hour documentary premiered at the Venice Film Festival on Tuesday, reviewers described it as a “lacerating portrait” that depicts Musk as “petty, narcissistic, megalomaniacal, cruel”.

Perhaps he will reseed the galaxy with a host of his own divine offspring?

There has been talk the DOGE illegally sucked up a lot of very private and personal data from American citizens. I sure would like to know what the extent of his involvement was and if he kept anything he should not have.

The man seemingly has no boundaries, financially or morally.

I was thinking about Musk today and my mind kept going back to the 1959 Kurt Vonnegut book, The Sirens of Titan. 

It was never my favorite, some loved it, but there is a very Musk like character in the book named Malachi Constant.

A man who had it all and ultimately went to space.

Malachi Constant is the richest man in a future North America. He possesses extraordinary luck that he attributes to divine favor which he has used to build upon his father's fortune. He becomes the centerpoint of a journey that takes him from Earth to Mars in preparation for an interplanetary war, to Mercury with another Martian survivor of that war, back to Earth to be pilloried as a sign of Man's displeasure with his arrogance, and finally to Titan where he again meets the man ostensibly responsible for the turn of events that have befallen him, Winston Niles Rumfoord.

Rumfoord comes from a wealthy New England background. His private fortune was large enough to fund the construction of a personal spacecraft, and he became a space explorer. Traveling between Earth and Mars, his ship—carrying Rumfoord and his dog, Kazak—entered a phenomenon known as a chrono-synclastic infundibulum, which is defined in the novel as "those places ... where all the different kinds of truths fit together."

I would not trade places with either Musk or Bezos. Life seems to lose its moral equilibrium when a person has it all and those surrounding them often become collateral, ancillary figures.

Shuggie Otis

Living large

As we all know the rich are getting richer. 

But the actual numbers are staggering. 

One man, Elon Musk, now has more money than the bottom fifty percent of the American public. 

It would be one thing if it was a square game but we all know that it is rigged.

Here is an interesting article on income inequality. 

...wealth inequality continues to grow. The top 1% saw their share of wealth increase from 31.7% to 32.5% just between the first and second quarters of 2026, a jump of over $8.5 trillion. That caps a steady climb from 30.9% in the last quarter of 2024 – and from 27.4% in 1999.

These recent gains come at the expense of the middle class – the 40% between the bottom half and the top 10% – who hold only 28.8% of all wealth despite being a group that’s 40 times larger than the top 1%. And the middle’s share is shrinking, down from 32.9% in 1999 and 30.2% at the end of 2024, according to the data.

But the ultra-wealthy, those in the top 0.1%, are pulling away even from the rest of the rich, the data shows. This tiny elite owns 15% of all wealth – almost half of all the wealth of the top 1%. Both the top 0.1% and the next 0.9% saw their share of wealth increase, but the top 0.1% captured two-thirds of the gains between the first and second quarters of 2026.

Even within the highest echelons of wealth concentration, these two groups are on different trajectories.

Crucially, the wealth of the top 0.1% is disproportionately boosted by corporate profits, which are up sharply overall. The top 0.1% reap the most from this growth because their portfolios’ value has soared on the promise of future increased profitability that’s driving up stock prices – especially thanks to the tech and artificial intelligence boom.

I wrestled with prop 40 but ended up voting for it. If you are a billionaire, giving 5% back should not kill you. And if you want to leave California and move to Florida to hang out with your Mar a Lago cronies, well be my guest.

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Shawn sent this graphic over.

Always blows me away how disproportionate the distribution of Private Jet traffic around the World is! This is from a 'live' feed called the "Apocalypse Early Warning System"! 😂

https://ews.kylemcdonald.net/

S.

John Prine

Devil is in the details.

Donald Trump proposed yet another $8 billion dollar farmer bailout for diesel fuels. Two weeks before the election.Somebody getting nervous?

"Tonight I'm also pleased to announce that the Department of Agriculture will be launching a new Harvest Fuel Relief program, providing our farmers with $8 billion in support to offset diesel costs during this harvest season," Mr. Trump said at a rally in Kansas Monday night.

What he doesn't tell them is that the program has no funding and will have to be taken from other government spending programs. 

..the internal USDA taxpayer-funded account Trump is tapping for the payments doesn’t actually have enough money in it right now to make the payments, meaning Congress will have to approve the new funds or the administration will have to take it from another program, according to three Trump officials who were granted anonymity to discuss private conversations.

And not all farmers are exactly giddy with the announcement.

"As a farmer of 50 years, this is embarrassing," said former GOP Chair Christopher Gibbs in response to the announcement. "This year one third of US farm income will have come from the taxpayers. The SAME taxpayers who are struggling at their own kitchen tables. I can't afford it, but however this comes, I'm pushing half to my local shelter and food bank."

The GOP is nervous about losing their heartland farm base after tariffs, diesel and fertilizer costs have skyrocketed. Nice bribe, might work. I saw one figure that this makes 47 billion in farm aid in 2026 alone. Socialism anybody?

Charles Ives - Symphony #2

Deep Cover

Donald Trump is pissed that Ukraine won't end the war with Russia. He says that they have had lots of opportunities.

What he doesn't tell you is that they all involve giving up large portions of Ukrainian land. And rather than condemn the Russian predation, he rewards it. I will never forget something he once said about Putin; "He loves his country and he wants to make it bigger." 

This attitude and lack of respect for national sovereignty explains a lot about his bullying of Denmark and Canada and all the 51st state bullshit. Man is a lying sociopath.

"He doesn't want to settle. He says he wants to settle, but he doesn't. No, I'm not a big fan of Zelenskyy," the US president said. Trump also claimed that the root cause of the war was Barack Obama's presidency, during which Ukraine was supposedly made to "give up Crimea". The US president described the temporarily occupied peninsula as the "most beautiful piece of land", surrounded by ocean on all sides.

"Crimea is the most valuable part, by far, of Ukraine. You know what I'm talking about. Four sides of ocean. Most beautiful piece of land. I'm a real estate developer. I know good land. In Trump's view, Zelenskyy should make concessions to Putin because Moscow has a much larger pool of manpower to draw on in a war of attrition.

Thank god the Ukrainian people are not willing to give up their country for this nitwit. But what really irks me is when he says that if he had been around when Russia took Crimea in 2014, it would have never happened. He blames everybody but the predator itself.

“The fact is I had a very, very good meeting with President Putin," he said. “A lot was discussed -- about Syria, about security, about Ukraine.”

“About the fact that President Obama allowed a very large part of Ukraine to be taken [by Russia]," he added.

When a reporter stated that “it was President Putin who annexed Crimea,” Trump responded by saying, “That was President Obama’s regime. That was during President Obama. Right?

“It was President Obama that allowed it to happen,” he said.

U.S. and other Western countries criticized Moscow and imposed sanctions on Russia over its annexation of Ukraine’s Crimea region in March 2013 and its backing of separatists in eastern Ukraine.

Now how pray tell, would you have stopped it, Donald? Not saying Obama could not have been tougher but take whatever the orange monster days with a grain of salt. Remember he said that he could end the Russia Ukraine conflict with one phone call and that the Iran War wouldn't last a week? He always gives his buddy in Moscow a free pass.

The man is simply full of shit.

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Interesting to see the finger pointing between Musk and Trump over the slowing down of the Starlink connection over the Ukraine. 

Leaders at the Department of Defense received an order from inside the White House to slow the Starshield satellite system that Ukraine uses for battlefield communications and drone operations, two U.S. officials and a Western official briefed on the matter told Reuters Thursday.

It looks like Musk suggested it to Donald and he went along, when word got out they both ran for cover.

Mr. Trump told reporters on Friday he had not limited Ukraine's access to Starlink, adding he didn't believe Musk, SpaceX's CEO, was responsible either.

"Well, I don't know if it was anybody because it wasn't me, and I don't think it was Elon," Mr. Trump said while leaving the White House to travel for a rally in Georgia. "And from what I understand, it's the same as it's always been."

But the funny thing is that it is still slowed down but they are in denial mode and pretending it is not.

Mario Rubio today: 

I don't know what Zelenskyy said, I'm not sure Zelenskyy knows what he's talking about, but it wasn't deliberate," Rubio said. "We had nothing to do with that. I don't, the United States, nobody ordered that Starlink speed to be slowed down. It sort of happened, but my understanding is it's been restored, it's back to what it was before."

Zelenskyy obviously differs:

Ukraine is still unable to use its interceptor systems against Russian drones, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Saturday, because of speed restrictions imposed on Starshield, an upgraded military version of Elon Musk's Starlink, amid an ongoing row with President Trump.

"Unfortunately, we can't use Starlink or Starshield technology on our territory today to shoot down jet-powered Shaheds," Zelenskyy said in an online group chat with reporters at the EU Summit. "They fly, and we can stop them with aircraft and other air defense, but we don't use Starlink for that, unfortunately. God willing, this will be restored."

Zelenskyy said Kyiv was discussing the issue with U.S. officials, and he was told the restrictions were linked to technical issues. The Ukrainian president added, however, that Starlink appears to be operating at higher speeds on European Union territory. 

Sort of happened? 

Jorma

Blues for Challah

I was doing an AI search on why so many deadheads proportionately are Jewish and got this response, thought it was interesting:

Don't dream it's over

Bad humans

 

A Washington Post reporter who was watching Israeli settlers knock down Palestinians harvesting olives was herself knocked down and beaten today. 

“They just kept kicking me and kicking me,” photojournalist Heidi Levine recalled from a hospital bed after the attack. 

Dozens of masked Israelis, clad in black and armed with slings, clubs and gas canisters, attacked Palestinians harvesting olives in the Palestinian West Bank village of Abu Falah on Friday.

The mob then set fire to the grove, aided by Israeli soldiers in military jeeps who fired tear gas at the Palestinians, witnesses told Reuters.

Medics told Reuters two people were injured in the attack. One of them was Washington Post photojournalist Heidi Levine, who was clearly identified as a member of the press.

Video of the attack’s aftermath captured by American journalist Jasper Nathaniel shows Levine, wearing a helmet and a flak jacket reading “PRESS,” slumped over in the road after the attack.

“They clubbed her, kicked her. Pulled her off the ground to beat her more. Robbed her of her equipment. If she didn’t have a helmet — and if she was Palestinian — she could be dead,” Nathaniel said.

Netanyahu went into his typical Trumpian doublespeak when describing the incident.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu claimed in a statement that the “approximately 40 Israeli youths” hadn’t attacked anyone but were instead attacked themselves by “some 200 Arabs and far-left activists.”

Netanyahu further claimed that Levine had been “knocked down and immediately helped to her feet by the same unidentified individual,” contradicting the journalist’s own recollection of the attack.

“We will not allow disputed incidents to be exploited to demonize the hundreds of thousands of law-abiding Jewish residents,” he said.

Doesn't sound like a disputed incident to me, Bibi. It sounds like more and more of what we have been hearing from your side. You have to stop making excuses for the settler's actions and the demonization of the Palestinian villagers and protect these people. And stop stealing their land.

Israel imposed new rules on the olive harvest this year, barring Palestinians from harvesting their trees located in Area C, an area under the Israeli military’s control, which comprises most of the West Bank’s agricultural land.

The new orders prohibit Palestinians from entering about 8,800 hectares (21,800 acres) of agricultural land – a 30% increase from the year prior – without the approval of the Israeli military. By contrast, the military gave Israeli citizens access to more land this year.

Obviously Jews can be every bit as bad as any other human. I have less and less affinity for Israel every day and the settlers' behavior makes me downright sick. wasn't it nice that the guy who knocked her down helped her back up? 

Thursday non sequitur

I was talking to a state Agricultural Inspector I know the other day at the donut shop. They found another one of the insects responsible for citrus greening Huanglongbing in Fallbrook. It was in an infected pomelo. This bacterium, Candidatus Liberibacter, is spread by the Asian Citrus Psyllid. We have been in citrus quarantine for some time.

It is 100% fatal for citrus trees. Florida has been totally decimated. I have about a hundred valencia orange trees left, it is quite scary.

First the South American Palm Beetle, then the agave weevil, now this. Sucks. 

One day you will never get a drink of orange juice again.

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I was talking to Russ, a rather svelte older gent I know the other day and he was telling me about the fat shots he is getting. His buddy Steve is too, has no more appetite. It seems like everybody is on GLP or Ozembic or something.

Am I the last guy standing who doesn't give a shit?

It seems like fat people are pariahs in today's society. If I am too heavy for you to talk to, talk to somebody else, okay.

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Speaking of Steve, his four year old grandson built this out of leggos.

Four years old? 

Amazing.

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I stepped off a curb wrong yesterday and twisted my right angle.

I iced it last night, took anti-inflammatory drugs and an epsom bath but it still aches.

Should make a three day drive to Texas extra fun next week.

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New Trump Press Secretary Katie Zacharia seems to have all the qualifications necessary for the job, first and foremost she is a great liar.

It would have been tough to find someone who could lie better than the last one, but it looks like he did.

Just look at the august group of prevaricators she is joining:

Sean Spicer (2017)

Sarah Huckabee Sanders (2017–2019)

Stephanie Grisham (2019–2020)

Kayleigh McEnany (2020–2021)

Karoline Leavitt (2025–2026)

Katie Zacharia (2026–present) 

They seem to get worse and worse but just when you think he hit bottom he finds a new brainless platinum eye candy blond to bring it down even further.

This one has claimed to be a lawyer for years, then a lawyer in China. Turns out she never passed the bar in any country.

Perfect!

Iceman cometh...

The website says that ICE has come to Fallbrook.

FALLBROOK, Calif. (FOX 5/KUSI) — ICE and Border Patrol agents have stepped up their efforts to detain migrants with questionable legal status.

The Washington Examiner reported on Operation Safe California which started Oct. 7. Community activists say they are seeing a significant increase in federal agents in the rural community of Fallbrook with several flash check points trying to detain people on their way to work or school on a one lane road near Santa Margarita Preserve.

“Our community is living under fear, is living under terror at the moment,” said Ricardo.

Interesting that there was a checkpoint on my lonely little road near the Santa Margarita Preserve. Never saw it.

No one has asked me but if it is a choice between ICE and my good hispanic neighbors, illegal or not, I will take the latter, thanks. 98% are very good people. The sheriffs can take care of the few bad ones. ICE sucks.

One's for blood at the point of a knife...

I saw that Zelensky quote today, "It's not about business for us, it is our lives" and immediately thought about the lyrics to the Grateful Dead song Jack Straw.

We used to play for silver, now we play for life;

And one's for sport and one's for blood at the point of a knife

And now the die is shaken, now the die must fall

There ain't a winner in the game, he don't go home with all

Not with all...

To kingdom come

Meanwhile...

Reports are that Kimberly Guilfoyle has been keeping notes on the Trump administration and some are quite nervous that she will spill. If I were her I would stay away from high windows for a while...

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Elon Musk's Starlink is apparently disconnecting the Ukrainians.

Ukrainian military’s access to Starlink satellite internet suddenly restricted - Launch of Russian ballistic missiles on Ukraine, with no US warning, coincides with outage of Starlink managed by Musk’s SpaceX

Pretty horrible when the world's richest man and one of the most unpopular of people, can hold people's lives in his hands like this and be allowed this much power over entire countries.

Ukraine’s military has suddenly had its access to Starlink satellite internet terminals restricted as the Trump administration has increased pressure on Ukraine to halt long-range strikes on Russia’s oil industry immediately.

The terminals, which are distributed and managed by Elon Musk’s SpaceX, are a key component of Ukraine’s military operations and the sudden restrictions on the terminals travelling at high speeds on Tuesday evening led to the failure of several combat missions, said an adviser on military technology to Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy.

The sudden outage came as Russia launched ballistic missiles at Ukraine without any advance warning from the US for a second night. For years, the US has provided Ukraine with intelligence when strikes were about to take place.

Musk is donating $336 million dollars to shore up Republicans in the midterms. A very dangerous man.

Like Trump, Musk has repeatedly oscillated in his stance on the war.

The billionaire turned on the Starlink satellite internet service over Ukraine shortly after Russia’s full-scale invasion in 2022.

It has become a lifeline for war-torn parts of the country, but has also facilitated battlefield communications ​and enabled the use of longer-range drones, given its resistance to signal jamming.

Musk agreed to ​turn off thousands of Russian-used Starlinks in Ukraine this year, causing problems ‌for ⁠the Kremlin’s forces. But in recent days, Musk has echoed Trump’s criticism.

The suggestion that his company might have deliberately limited Ukraine’s battlefield operations drew criticism in Europe.

“Hey, @elonmusk, big man, are you playing politics with your products again?” Polish Foreign Minister Radosław Sikorski wrote in a post on X, referencing a past clash over Starlink in which Musk called him a “small man.”

Sikorski continued; “As your European customers, we are watching you.”

No private individual should have this much power to disrupt. Remember this quote from Musk?

No matter how much I disagree with the Ukraine policy, Starlink will never turn off its terminals … We would never do such a thing or use it as a bargaining chip.

Elon Musk March 2025

Unless of course, it is Trump doing the disconnecting? But with 81% of America backing Ukraine and hating Putin, including a majority of his own party, he wouldn't be so stupid, would he? 

Postscript: Musk answers.

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ICE is trying to share voter data with Trump crony Peter Thiel's Palantir.

The nonprofit legal group Democracy Forward** obtained the government documents through a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit against ICE seeking any information about the agency’s role in election-related operations. The records are a series of reports Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) — the immigration agency’s investigative arm — made for other parts of the Department of Homeland Security.

HSI tried to share the information with Palantir as part of DHS’s sweeping search for illegal voting by noncitizens before the upcoming midterms. 

Thiel has been a major funder of Republican causes, including Trump’s 2016 campaign. 

“I no longer believe that freedom and democracy are compatible,” he once wrote, explaining his strategy for achieving his libertarian goals. 

In a July internal report, HSI indicated that data from those six states “are pending Palantir entry into ELITE,” the highly detailed map-based software the tech company built for ICE to identify, prioritize and locate people targeted for immigration enforcement.

The document noted that the information had been “enriched” by “iLab,” referring to HSI’s Innovation Lab. Generally, data enrichment refers to merging datasets to add missing context, depth or usability. The document did not indicate exactly what data iLab incorporated into the voter records.

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Inflation is rising quickly, either 3.4 or 3.7% this month according to divergent figures. Biden's numbers were 2.9 to 3.0 at the end of his term. A comparison of the economy under Trump and Biden. 

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