France is spiraling as student protests turn violent, bond yields climb and the debt crisis deepens, while President Macron looks everywhere except home. In this episode we break down how the euro crushed French competitiveness, how Macron's parliamentary election gamble left a broken parliament and sidelined Marine Le Pen's National Rally, and why rumors now point to Macron angling for the top job at the European Central Bank after Christine Lagarde. Is France too big to bail out, and could a French crisis finally bring down the entire euro system?
Timeline:
00:00:00 France protests spiral out of control
00:01:03 The euro as the root of France's decline
00:02:37 Macron's answer was always more Europe
00:04:23 Bond yields, debt and angry students
00:05:25 Le Pen, Melenchon and who is steering the protests
00:06:17 The election gamble that broke parliament
00:07:36 Macron's 2027 exit and the ECB rumor
00:09:09 Too big to fail, too big to bail out
00:10:43 Two paths forward for France
00:13:14 Would Germany back an ECB rescue of France
Ivana Nikolić Hughes, President of the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation and Senior Lecturer at Columbia University, with Glenn Diesen on AI and a new nuclear arms race.
Larry Johnson and Col. Lawrence Wilkerson with Danny Haiphong on a report they treat as a CIA leak: how much trouble Israel is in, and why it is pressing, with US help, to restart the Iran war despite that warning.
Johnson is a former CIA analyst. Wilkerson is a retired US Army colonel and former chief of staff.
Carl Zha and Warwick Powell on whether Washington is losing control across Iran, the Strait of Hormuz, Ukraine, and China.
Powell argues fuel and diesel prices show a gap between claims that Hormuz flows are back to normal and what oil markets, depleted strategic reserves, and continued attacks indicate.
The talk then covers an overstretched U.S. military, China's choice to avoid direct confrontation while tightening energy security and ties with the Global South, Beijing's limits on refined petroleum exports, and Europe copying Washington's trade stance toward China.
Jaime Maussan on the Kumburgaz case in Turkey, and Yalcin Yalman's 2007–2009 footage of craft and occupants over the Sea of Marmara.
On Interestelar, Maussan pays tribute to Yalman and reviews the case. The channel says optical close-ups showed structures with volume, open hatches, and the silhouette of occupants aboard the craft.
The episode revisits field work in Turkey with Haktan Akdogan, Antonio Urzi, and Dr. Roger Leir. The show says that analysis challenged science and confirmed the filmed objects were authentic.
SpaceWeatherNews on a solar storm and a hurricane this week.
The episode links an ALMA image of spiral galaxy M83, Webb's view of stellar jets in nebula NGC 7129, a Planetary Science Institute proposal to study a possible lunar cave under NASA's PRISM program, and a University of Texas finding that the Ames meteor impact in Oklahoma happened 100 million years later than previously thought.
Putin has rejected Modi's Ukraine ceasefire proposal, and the fallout could shake BRICS just as Brazil looks set to walk away from the bloc. On this episode we break down why India's peace plan irritated Moscow, how Zelensky has already burned through the EU's 90 billion euro loan, and why Brussels is once again eyeing the frozen Russian assets in Euroclear. With Ukraine's tax base collapsing and the drone campaign against Russian refineries losing its effect, how much longer can Europe keep the money flowing?
Timeline:
00:00:00 Intro: Diplomacy, BRICS and Ukraine's money problem
00:02:13 India's peace initiative and Putin's irritation with Modi
00:03:26 Russia rejects a freeze: Medvedev, Peskov and Istanbul plus
00:04:42 Why Modi made this move
00:06:19 Brazil election, Bolsonaro and a possible BRICS exit
00:10:00 Why India matters more to Russia than Brazil
00:11:50 EU's 90 billion loan already spent
00:13:09 Ukraine's budget hole and collapsing tax base
00:16:10 Frozen Russian assets and Euroclear back on the table
00:18:43 Drone campaign on Russian refineries losing effect
Iran has refused Trump's last counteroffer in full and decided that ships crossing Hormuz will pay in rials only, Transition Protocol's sources say — decisions taken hours before this recording and not yet announced.
Host Zulfiqar Ali and Pepe Escobar, speaking from Bangkok after midnight, on what Tehran just decided, why the last diplomatic channel may be dead four weeks before the US midterms, and why Pakistan's diplomats see the Yemen war as the biggest threat yet to the House of Saud.
Timeline:
00:03:13 The rial rule: nothing other than Iranian currency, cleared through China's CIPS
00:04:34 The refusal: the Qatari-carried counteroffer rejected categorically
00:06:34 The clock: Escobar says the channel is dead; four weeks to 3 November
00:12:15 The Mecca question: an alliance to defend Saudi Arabia, but none for Gaza?
00:19:21 Pakistan's troops near Yemen: defence only, the host's sources say
00:30:01 Brazil's 25 October runoff, after Flávio Bolsonaro's first-round lead
John Michael Greer returns to Legalise Freedom for a conversation sparked by his latest book, The Magical Writings of W.B. Yeats. Topics include what magic actually is, its overlap with New Thought (popularly known as manifesting), advertising and propaganda as mass hypnosis, and how building a psychic firewall can help lead a freer life.
Prof. Richard Wolff talks with Danny Haiphong about why Trump's biggest mistake in the Iran war keeps getting worse, and how this quarter-trillion-dollar nightmare is digging the petrodollar, and the US empire's, grave.
Trump tells a Nebraska crowd that losing Los Angeles or San Diego would be a small price to pay to stop Iran getting nuclear weapons, and Alex breaks down the remark alongside a bleak Financial Times report on Odessa and Project Ukraine. From 650 drones launched toward Moscow and Ukraine's vanishing locomotives to Germany's talk of conscription, a Merz and Macron trade kill switch for Brussels, and the so called Muslim NATO activating against the Houthis, the collective West looks increasingly rattled.
Timeline:
00:00:00 Trump: Let them take out Los Angeles
00:03:10 Ukraine launches 650 drones toward Moscow
00:05:06 Financial Times bleak report from Odessa
00:06:45 Ukraine running out of locomotives
00:08:10 Kiev data center goes offline
00:08:58 Pompeo and the Siberia outbreak narrative
00:10:55 Rada to remove NATO from Ukraine constitution
00:12:35 Wadephul on conscription and Lavrov meeting
00:15:30 German spy chief warns of conflict with Russia
00:18:30 Merz and Macron want EU trade kill switch
00:21:15 Muslim NATO activated against Houthis
00:23:40 Protests in France spread to Belgium
00:24:50 US trade deficit hits 17 month high
00:25:45 Clown World: Telegraph on Russian spies in Finland
00:29:45 Stubb blames Russia for Spain migrant crisis
Episode 2198. Saudi Arabia's offensive in Yemen has begun, yet the Houthis are encircling Taiz and closing in on Aden, and Alex explains why MBS is now asking the Trump administration to step in. Alex also covers the US pulling its bombers out of RAF Fairford, Iran's 7 day proposal to reopen the Strait of Hormuz, the Russian Ministry of Defense telling Ukraine to blame Zelensky, Medvedev's Starlink warning, and Flavio Bolsonaro beating Lula in the first round in Brazil. With Sanchez calling snap elections in Spain, is the Zelensky curse about to strike again?
Timeline:
00:00:00 Saudi backed Yemen offensive begins
00:02:11 Houthis encircle Taiz with Aden next
00:04:33 US bombers leave RAF Fairford
00:08:29 Iran 7 day proposal to reopen Hormuz
00:09:57 Russian MOD says blame Zelensky
00:14:20 Peskov says Russia will fight with full force
00:15:56 Kiev bridges and the Crimean Bridge double standard
00:21:42 Trump team pushes trilateral meeting
00:23:20 Medvedev warns on Rassvet and Starlink
00:26:05 Merz in Kiev on German Unity Day
00:30:40 Flavio Bolsonaro wins first round in Brazil
00:33:15 Sanchez calls snap elections in Spain
00:34:50 Siberia lab incident
00:35:50 Romania protests over Georgescu
00:36:40 Clown world: Estonia moves troops to Russian border
