ELIZA BLEU AND THE PERPETUAL TRAUMA MACHINE—PART 2

Hormuz Chokepoint Claims Next Victim: World's Largest Aluminum Smelter Cuts Capacity The world's largest single-site aluminium smelter in the Middle East cut its output by about 20% on Sunday, marking yet another troubling development for the global economy. The disruption in the Strait of Hormuz is no longer just an energy story - it's now spreading into industrial metals. These second- and third-order effects could soon disrupt global supply chains and tighten aluminium availability, thus pressuring prices higher.  Bloomberg reports that Aluminium Bahrain (Alba) began a controlled, safe shutdown of three...

OPEC+ Agrees To Boost Output By Another 206,000 Barrels A Day When Strait Of Hormuz Reopens With the world's attention glued to every headline out of Iran, it is understandable why today's OPEC+ meeting was largely ignored, although with roughly 12% of global oil output throttled at the Strait of Hormuz, it's not as if even OPEC+ could do much to offset the supply shock.  Earlier on Sunday, the oil-producing cartel (where Iran is a founding member yet was missing from the Joint Ministerial Monitoring Committee) warned that damage to Middle...

Federal Judge Rules IRS Illegally Shared Taxpayer Data With ICE Authored by Jack Phillips via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours), A federal judge on Feb. 26 ruled that the IRS acted illegally by disclosing taxpayer information to Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). The IRS in Washington on Jan. 6, 2026. Madalina Kilroy/The Epoch Times U.S. District Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly said the IRS erred when it shared the taxpayer information with ICE and the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) as part of an agreement between the two agencies in a bid to identify illegal...