Trump’s remarkable Middle East tour is all about striking megadeals and outfoxing China

There has never been a US presidential visit to the Middle East like this one.

This week, success will be measured not in conventional diplomacy, peace deals, or arms sales, although Donald Trump did make some news by lifting sanctions on the Syrian leadership, urging Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman to join the Abraham Accords by normalizing relations with Israel, and agreeing to a $142 billion weapons package for Riyadh.  

Trump’s remarkable Middle East tour is all about striking megadeals and outfoxing China

Trump’s ‘100% tariff’ on non-American movies sounds bad for anime

ClandesTime 154 – Hollywood Goes To Space Command

Trump’s ‘100% tariff’ on non-American movies sounds bad for anime

Hollywood production has been of particular interest to the president since he took office for his second term. In January, Trump named actors Jon Voight, Sylvester Stallone, and Mel Gibson as “special ambassadors” to Hollywood in order to crack what was apparently wrong with the business. According to Deadline, Voight has taken the title seriously, and recently met with studios and artistic guilds to better understand the issues plaguing production. The potential of a national incentive to bring more production back to the U.S. is a rare bipartisan issue in the industry, at least on the surface; since the wildfires that swept the Los Angeles area in early 2025, many in the film business have rallied the California and national government to incentive studios to shoot local.

Trump’s Hollywood Ambassadors: a dream team of cinematic patriotism, expertly trained in the fine art of Pentagon-approved storytelling. Each has worked closely with the Defense Department’s Entertainment Media Office, ensuring that military narratives get just the right heroic glow. Now, under Trump’s watchful eye, they’re promoted from script advisors to official cultural envoys—because nothing says diplomacy quite like a blockbuster-ready version of history. If reality ever gets messy, don’t worry—they’ve got years of experience cleaning up inconvenient details. /s

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China Has Quietly Won the Trade War—and Now Leads the World

China has quietly won the trade war and is now reshaping global leadership—not through force, but through strategy, stability, and vision. It’s time for the West to learn, adapt, and embrace a shared future led by a preponderant China.

“There are decades where nothing happens; and there are weeks where decades happen.”
—Vladimir Lenin

China Has Quietly Won the Trade War—and Now Leads the World (archived)

H/T: The Most Revolutionary Act

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Quote Origin: Days Into Which 20 Years Are Compressed

Trump billionaire tech ally Peter Thiel sells ‘smart’ AI ‘war fighting’ system to NATO while talking up U.S. trade war with China

Trump billionaire tech ally Peter Thiel sells ‘smart’ AI ‘war fighting’ system to NATO while talking up U.S. trade war with China

Thiel went on to say he believes some industrial capacity should be moved from China back to the U.S., where it will be handled mostly by AI and robots, and the rest should be moved from one communist country, China, to another communist country, Vietnam.

So don’t believe all the talk about Trump wanting to leave NATO. His buddy and financial backer, Peter Thiel, is totally invested in NATO as a war fighting machine.