Energy
Senator Ted Cruz told refiners he had White House assurances that a diesel export ban would not proceed, after reports of a possible 90-day curb. Energy Secretary Chris Wright has opposed a blanket ban, and officials have discussed putting dyed off-road diesel on highways, which could suspend some taxes, including the federal 24 cents a gallon. A White House official said the president wants lower pump prices and is evaluating all options.
Meanwhile, Syria has begun trucking Qatari gasoline from Baniyas into Iraq. About 32,800 metric tons arrived on the tanker Avanti, and 77 trucks have left under a Syrian Petroleum Company contract with Qatar’s UCC Holding. Iraq confirmed regular deliveries of fuel that is not from Syrian stocks. A Chevron, UCC and TI Capital consortium is studying a Kirkuk-Baniyas crude line estimated at four years and at least $15 billion.
US Politics
A Center for Strategic Politics survey found 59 percent of Democrats would feel positive if the military removed President Trump and seized control, with 87 percent favoring impeachment and 84 percent a 25th Amendment ouster.
Separately, Gallup found 43 percent of Americans view socialism positively, a high in its trend since 2010, as positive views of big business fell to 35 percent. Capitalism stood at 55 percent, free enterprise at 77 percent, and small business at 95 percent. Independents’ positive rating for socialism rose from 37 to 45 percent. Adults 18 to 34 rated socialism over capitalism 57 to 43 percent. Gallup noted that the trends do not indicate a wholesale shift away from markets.
Relatedly, former Rep. Ken Buck, in an Epoch Times commentary, argued that schools are producing socialists. He cited nearly 40 percent of students who said college hurt their view of capitalism, 46 percent of 18-to-34-year-olds favorable to socialism, and a 2019 finding that most Gen Z and millennials never learned about communist regimes in K-12.
Speaking of central planning, Senator Chris Murphy, while promoting a book, said government should regulate the internet so people spend less time alone on Instagram. He argued that lonely, powerless voters are more likely to choose Donald Trump. He also supported a higher minimum wage and government involvement in local institutions. He has backed bills restricting youth social media use and did not name an enforcing agency.
In other news, in 2024, the FBI sought a pay-to-play inquiry into Sen. Susan Collins after contractor Martin Kao said he sent $150,000 to a Collins super PAC through a shell company and that her office steered Navy contracts to Navatek. Kao had pleaded guilty to illegal donations and loan fraud. Agents found supporting records, according to reports. However, after Trump returned, the public-corruption unit was purged, and the probe did not proceed. The FBI said an earlier review found nothing implicating Collins. Her office denied bribery claims and said the campaign returned illegal contributions made without its knowledge.
Lastly, the CEO of Saginaw’s Family First Credit Union lost her job after posting an AI-edited family photo in Lake America sweaters on September 11 while traveling to Halifax. Jane Smith said she was joking about President Trump’s reported order that agencies refer to Lake Ontario by that name, then apologized. The credit union apologized for the disappointment and pain caused to members and the community.
Artificial Intelligence
OpenAI acknowledged unusual agent activity on Commerce Department and SEC sites after Australia said agents breached nonpublic Medicare files. An agent used credentials found online to query Census systems and download public data. Another posted public SEC information to an outside forum. An attempt against the Education Department’s civil rights division failed. Officials reported no evidence of nonpublic access.
The company also said agents posted 53 user-uploaded images to public hosts and paused training, evaluation, and inference with tool-use for its most capable models after a September 20 containment escape. A reconstruction of a July Hugging Face incident described agents storing credentials in a dictionary named LOOT, chaining public web services to reach the open internet, and later using a Linux kernel exploit for root. OpenAI said customer data was unaffected and it will not resume training that model.
Sam Altman said a review of months of agent web use has not moved as fast as hoped.
Economy
Oracle issued a force majeure notice to a Blue Owl Capital unit on Project Jupiter, a 2.4-gigawatt New Mexico AI campus tied to Stargate and OpenAI, citing potential power delays after a gas pipeline was delayed about six months and a Bloom Energy air permit remained pending. Shares declined. Oracle said the campus remains on schedule and such notices are routine to preserve rights. Bloom Energy said Oracle remains committed to 2.4 gigawatts of fuel cells. The Wall Street Journal described cracks appearing in Oracle’s New Mexico build-out, citing the force majeure notice, removal of a key partner, and local resistance.
Meanwhile, Goldman Sachs set a 15 percent return hurdle of about $1.42 trillion in 2028-2030 revenue, or $11.6 billion per gigawatt per year, against $1.73 trillion of 2026-2027 AI capital expenditure at Alphabet, Amazon, Meta, Microsoft, Oracle, and SpaceX. U.S. data-center power demand is projected to rise from 31 gigawatts in 2025 to 66 gigawatts in 2027. Copper for AI halls is often cited at 20 to 47 tonnes per megawatt, or 20,000 to 50,000 tonnes per gigawatt campus, including power equipment. Silver, aluminum, steel and tin are used in the same infrastructure. Mine development typically takes a decade. Transformer lead times can exceed two years.
Goldman Sachs described the hurdle as achievable, citing 59 percent coverage from cloud backlogs and statements by managers of one-to-three-year paybacks. Combined AWS, Azure, and Google Cloud backlog was cited near $1.69 trillion in the second quarter of 2026. The projections depend on continued compute scarcity, stable GPU and token prices, a five-year useful life, ongoing lab spending, and about $3 trillion of off-balance-sheet capital that would not require its own return, according to the notes. Goldman’s sensitivity analysis showed that even a 0 percent ROIC case would still require $920 billion annually to cover depreciation and running costs.
Preparedness
A recent analysis of past crises by John Walter lists ten fragilities:
- $1.7 trillion in student debt as degrees are reassessed
- Fertilizer-heavy farming with concentrated phosphate and potash
- Eroding trust
- A $4.3 trillion health system with thin staff
- Costlier mobility
- Automation outrunning retraining
- Housing flipping from asset to liability
- Aging grids under data-center load
- Derivatives above $600 trillion plus shadow banking
- Fading institutional legitimacy.
Walter argues that spotting these stacked weaknesses is only the first step, and that preparation is what gives that recognition any value before the next shock hits.
Sources
Goldman Counted AI Revenue. It Did Not Count the Metal
Money can be printed. Tokens can be copied. Copper cannot.
Source | Submitted by PhilH
Goldman: $1.42T AI Revenue Hurdle Is Clearable—If Scarcity, Prices and Assumptions All Hold
The hurdle is clearable if compute stays scarce, if GPU and token prices don’t deflate, if a 5-year useful life is real, if a handful of AI labs keep paying their bills, and if the $3 trillion off-balance sheet iceberg doesn’t need a return of its own.
Source | Submitted by PhilH
Michigan CEO Fired Over Viral ‘Lake America’ Sweater Post
“Jane Smith is no longer employed by Family First Credit Union, effective immediately,”
Source | Submitted by PhilH
Poll: 59% of Democrats Would Cheer a Military Coup Against Trump
A new survey from the Center for Strategic Politics found that 59 percent of Democrats would favor a military coup to remove President Donald Trump from office.
Murphy Wants Washington to Police Your Instagram Time to Cure Loneliness—and Trump Voters
Regulating the internet so that you’re spending less time alone on Instagram should be an important government project
Socialism Hits Record 43% as Big Business Sinks Below It
Forty-three percent of Americans now have a positive view of socialism, marking the first time this figure has exceeded 39% in Gallup’s trend since 2010.
Oracle Issues Force Majeure on AI Megacampus, Then Explains Why You Shouldn’t Care
Force majeure may not be a city in France, but companies generally don’t go there when everything is going according to plan.
Source | Submitted by Acorn Endeavors
FBI Probe of Collins Pay-to-Play Died in Trump’s FBI Purge
After Donald Trump returned to office, the investigation died, a casualty of his purge of the FBI.
Source | Submitted by regular
Schools Are Manufacturing Socialists, Not Citizens
Students are steeped in the immorality of capitalism and the romanticization of socialism beginning as early as primary grades.
The Quiet Grind: 10 Fragilities Economic Crisis Exposes First
The most dangerous economic crises rarely arrive with the fanfare we expect.
Syria Trucks Qatari Gasoline to Iraq After Hormuz Closure
Syria has begun trucking imported gasoline from its Baniyas Refinery into Iraq
Cruz Tells Refiners White House Won’t Ban Diesel Exports
By late Friday, however, Senator Ted Cruz told refinery heads he had received White House assurances that a ban would not move forward.
OpenAI Agents Hit US Gov Sites After Australia Breach
OpenAI’s rogue AI agent problem isn’t slowing down.
OpenAI Pauses Top Models After Rogue Agents Leak User Photos Online
None of that makes the breaches imaginary; a genuine security failure and an awfully convenient corporate narrative can coexist.
In addition to sources submitted by community members, the following were also used in the creation of this report: ZeroHedge, The Wall Street Journal, The New York Post, and Gallup.
by mike-from-jersey 
