January 2, 2026

Solovyov panics as Z-bloggers tell the truth - Break the Fake - TVP WORLD

Kremlin propagandist Vladimir Solovyov has finally discovered new enemies – and this time, they come from his own side.

In a rare public meltdown, Solovyov attacked pro-war Z-bloggers for reporting Russian military failures near Kupyansk, accusing them of “hysteria” and helping Ukraine simply by telling the truth.

In a new episode of Break The Fake, Jonasz Rewiński exposes a growing crack inside Russia’s propaganda machine.

Even loyal voices are no longer allowed to describe reality if it doesn’t match the official narrative.

In today’s Russia, bad news is betrayal, facts are dangerous, and losing is not an option – at least on state television.

January 2, 2026

Let's talk about Trump and Iran exchanging words on social media.... - Belle of the Ranch

Well, howdy there Internet people. It's Belle again. So, today we're going to talk about Trump and Iran exchanging words on social media.

Economic demonstrations are sweeping Iran. While they haven't reached the size or scope of those we saw in 2022, and they haven't become nationwide events as of time of recording, they've gotten incredibly tense and have spilled over a number of times. The demonstrations have been held in several provinces and multiple clashes with security services have occurred. It seems the most intensity is in a relatively rural area about 200 miles southwest of Tehran. The current situation in the country seems to be slowly escalating and it appears there have already been at least seven lost though it's hard to get an accurate count because the semiofficial news service is giving one number, sources more aligned with the demonstrations are reporting higher numbers, and the official state-run news position is that no violence has occurred, or at least they aren't reporting on it yet.

In the wee hours of this morning, Trump posted to social media, "If Iran shots and violently kills peaceful protesters, which is their custom, the United States of America will come to their rescue. We are locked and loaded and ready to go. Thank you for your attention to this matter. President Donald J. Trump.”

It seems as though the requirements Trump has established for US intervention occurred before he ever posted his comment. How exactly the US would come to the rescue of demonstrators is anybody's guess, but it seems unlikely any tangible assistance could be provided from the air alone. This is Trump adding yet another potential conflict he seems prepared to insert US forces into.

The list of places Trump seems willing to send US forces is growing by the week. We have Venezuela, Nigeria, Gaza, and now Iran. Iran's government quickly responded to the threat from Trump. An adviser to the country's supreme leader responded on social media saying that any interventionist hand that gets too close to Iran's interest would be cut and said, "The people of Iran properly know the experience of being rescued by Americans."

The Secretary of Iran's Supreme National Security Council also posted to social media. A rough translation is "Trump should know that intervention by the US in the domestic situation corresponds to chaos in the entire region and the destruction of US interests. Americans should know that Trump began the adventurism. They should take care of their own soldiers."

That's probably a vague reference to US troops wounded during Trump's previous back and forth with Iran. Iran has suggested that US influence has had a hand in staging or directing the demonstrations. We don't have evidence of that. But I mean, it's not like US hands in the region are squeaky clean, like they've been cleaned with Ajax. I know that was a weird line, but it was for the few people watching this who are familiar with Iranian history circa 1953.

Some analysts have suggested Trump's post was actually an attempt to encourage wider demonstrations by implying US assistance if needed. Even without US intervention, this is a dynamic situation that is changing quickly. So, be ready for updates. It's weird how the anti-establishment president of peace keeps finding ways to attempt to insert US troops into situations that are completely in line with long-term establishment goals. Right.

Anyway, it's just a thought. Y'all have a good day.

January 2, 2026

Law enforcement foils ISIS-inspired New Year's Eve terror attack in North Carolina - NBC News

Law enforcement officials held a press conference to discuss their efforts thwarting an ISIS-inspired terrorist attack that an 18-year-old man planned to carry out on New Year's Eve in North Carolina.

January 2, 2026

What are the potential complications of Trump's expanded travel ban? - DW News

Seven more countries are now subject to a travel ban in the United States, bringing the number on US Presdient Donald Trump's banned list to 39.

Citizens of Burkina Faso, Mali, Niger, South Sudan, Syria, Laos and Sierra Leone cannot now enter the US. The Trump administration claims the nations fail to meet passport screening standards which it says could pose risks for the United States.

Chapter Breakdown
0:00 Trump expands travel ban
0:32 Allen Orr, US Immigration Lawyer, on the Trump admin's declared reasons for extending the ban

January 2, 2026

Ukraine unleashes Storm Shadow missiles on Russian strategic objects - RFU News

Today, the biggest news comes from the Russian Federation.

Here, Ukraine’s winter strike campaign is expanding in scope just as Moscow enters the most demanding phase of the season. And now, the newly delivered Storm Shadow missiles from the United Kingdom are being brought into the campaign, as winter demand peaks, repair cycles become exhausted, and repeated damage becomes impossible to absorb across Russia’s energy system.

The use of Storm Shadow in recent strikes reveals how Ukraine has been managing these missiles, as they appear to have been held in reserve for a concentrated blow, rather than expended immediately with reduced effectiveness. The arrival of the new batch from the UK reinforced the airpower even more, allowing Ukraine to treat refineries, ports, and gas facilities as high-value military targets, sharply increasing the defensive burden to Russia just as stability in fuel supply, transport, and export flows is most critical.

The clearest example is the strike on the Novoshakhtinsk oil refinery, where multiple impacts and secondary explosions point to a missile strike aimed at processing units. Novoshakhtinsk plays a central role in supplying southern regions and military logistics. The strike was designed to halt production and extend repair time through hitting pipeline junctions, power supply units, and control systems needed to bring processing units back online. This is the optimal moment to deploy Storm Shadow because winter fuel demand is peaking, repair crews and spare parts are already overstretched, and any disruption to processing units now compounds faster than Russia can restore capacity. The pattern of damage suggests attention to chokepoints such as pipelines, control systems, and power connections, which delays the restart of the facility for weeks. The Orenburg gas processing plant, the largest facility of its kind in the world, was also struck during this wave. Available reporting indicates a long-range drone was used as opposed to Storm Shadow, highlighting that Ukraine is deliberately mixing tools, using missiles to disable processing units, whilst drones are used to force air defenses to cover distant regions at the same time.

The sequence of strikes shows that Ukraine is applying hard pressure rather than waiting for weeks. As Ukraine hit the Syzran oil refinery in Samara Oblast, with Russian sources acknowledging disruptions that again point to processing units and targeting control infrastructure, instead of storage tanks alone. As Ukraine linked the refinery directly to military fuel supply, suggesting that Syzran remains on the target list instead of being considered a completed strike. On December 26, the Volgograd refinery supplying Lukoil was struck, with reports indicating damage to infrastructure used to produce lubricants and pipeline systems, a category of output that directly affects both civilian transport and military equipment maintenance.

At the same time, strikes on Novorossiysk’s port infrastructure destroyed multiple offshore terminals, and as a result, the port is now operating with only a single remaining loading point, turning one of Russia’s most important export hubs into a fragile bottleneck. The same day, Temryuk port in Krasnodar Krai was hit, with large product tanks set ablaze, a type of target that removes buffer storage and amplifies the impact of future strikes on refineries and pipelines feeding the port. A day earlier, strikes hit an oil tanker and port infrastructure along the Krasnodar Krai coastline, further tightening pressure on storage and shipping capacity in the region.

The fire at the Saratov refinery, which occurred without a new strike, is one of the clearest signs of how degraded Russia’s refining system has become. Saratov has been hit repeatedly over time, and while Russia has managed to restore partial output after earlier attacks, those repairs have increasingly relied on temporary fixes and equipment taken from other facilities. As spare parts run out and maintenance windows shrink, failures are no longer showing up as leaks or reduced efficiency, but as uncontrolled fires and full shutdowns. This shows a shift from recoverable damage to structural breakdown, where facilities begin to fail under their own accumulated stress

Overall, Ukraine’s winter campaign is pushing Russia’s energy system past the point where damage can be managed through rotation and repair. Repeated strikes, delayed maintenance, and the collapse of...

January 2, 2026

Kari Lake Has Gone Totally Insane - Farron Balanced

During a segment on Newsmax this week, Kari Lake demanded that the Department of Justice go after Donald Trump's political enemies - as if they haven't been trying, and failing, at doing that for the past year. Lake went totally off the rails in the segment, reminding everyone that she might be the most mentally unstable member of the Trump administration, even though she remains one of the most irrelevant members of the administration. Farron Cousins explains what happened.

January 2, 2026

Let's talk about Trump and Putin's nukes.... - Belle of the Ranch

Well, howdy there Internet people. It's Belle again. So, today we're going to talk about Trump and Putin's nukes. We'll go over the news, why this matters, and why the systems were previously banned, and then we'll get into what it means for a myth that continues to linger in the US.

First, the news. Putin has reportedly deployed the Oreshnik system in Belarus. The Oreshnik is an intermediate range ballistic missile system that is nuclear capable. As the name suggests, it's meant to hit targets at an intermediate range, but that's a relative term. All of Europe is in range of this system, but they were in range of the systems in Russia already. That's the core issue--intermediate range missiles are about time. They compress decision windows. They shorten warning times. They make it easier for a crisis to turn into a catastrophe because leaders have fewer minutes to figure out whether something is a signal, a bluff, a conventional strike, or the opening move of something nuclear.

Oreshnik in particular is being described in public reporting as extremely fast and difficult to intercept and Russia has framed it as a strategic tool meant to deter Western support for Ukraine. Belarus sits right on NATO's doorstep, close to Poland, Lithuania, Latvia, and not far from other key European locations.

When systems like this move west, the distance that used to buy diplomats time gets eaten up. That has two immediate effects. First, it forces NATO to think more seriously about air and missile defense posture on the eastern flank. Not because defenses are perfect. They aren't. But because allies will feel compelled to reduce vulnerability and reassure frontline states. You're likely to see more attention to layered defenses, dispersal of assets, and readiness measures because deterrence is partly psychological. Allies will have to believe they can absorb a punch without collapsing.

Second, it adds fuel to the escalation ladder problem. Intermediate range systems are tailormade for brinkmanship because they can be used to threaten targets that are politically sensitive but not necessarily strategic nuclear exchange level: air bases, logistic hubs, command nodes. That blurs the line between conventional and nuclear signaling. Especially when the system is openly described as nuclear capable. There is no way to know whether a missile fired from the system is nuclear or conventional until it detonates. That means the West will have to assume it's nuclear. That's why they were previously banned under a Cold War era treaty. Trump let that treaty fail in 2019.

Now, let's get to the myth. There is no clearer sign that Putin thinks Trump is scared, weak, and incapable of leadership than this. The mere possibility of NATO arms being stationed directly along Russia's border at some point in the future was used by Russia as a pretext to invade Ukraine. Russia is actually putting previously banned missile systems on NATO's border, releasing video of them doing it, and admitting they're doing it. They feel comfortable doing this because Putin sees Trump as too weak to respond. Putin convinced Trump and a large portion of Americans and Europeans that he was their friend. Now he's moving a system up that is perfect for a first strike and laughing because the West was too weak and confused to respond. The US hasn't been perceived as this weak since the 1800s. Truly a Golden Age.

Anyway, it's just a thought. Y'all have a good day.

January 2, 2026

Who replaces Russia in its backyard? - Eastern Express - TVP WORLD

Russia’s grip on the post-Soviet space is weakening, but what replaces it is far from clear. From Central Asia to the South Caucasus, local governments are navigating a new era of fragmented influence and strategic uncertainty. Multiple powers are stepping in, but none are willing to assume full responsibility for regional stability. This episode explores the risks and opportunities of a post-Russian Eurasia. And why managing the vacuum may be more dangerous than the dominance that came before.

January 2, 2026

It's Begun! Sanctions Corrupted the Core of the Russian Economy - The Russian Dude

What happens when a regime lies long enough that even its own economy stops obeying the script? This video breaks down how Western sanctions are finally delivering devastating, irreversible damage to the Russian economy — despite years of Vladimir Putin insisting that sanctions “don’t work.” From the myth of Russian self-sufficiency to the post-2022 shock that never ended, this analysis explains why sanctions are not a temporary inconvenience but a structural poison slowly hollowing Russia out from the inside.

You’ll see how the 2014 Crimea sanctions already exposed Russia’s dependence on global supply chains, killing competition, empowering oligarch monopolies, driving prices up, and lowering quality for ordinary Russians. The 2022 invasion of Ukraine escalated everything: Russia became the most sanctioned country on Earth, inflation became permanent, real purchasing power collapsed, and the economy split into a privileged war sector and an impoverished civilian one. This is how a war economy traps an entire society, locking it onto military tracks that are almost impossible to reverse.

The video also dives deep into Russia’s oil problem — the backbone of the state budget. With Europe gone, Russia now depends on China and India, selling oil at massive discounts that expose Moscow’s weakness and drain long-term revenues. These “new partnerships” are not strategic wins but economic dependency, forcing the Kremlin to squeeze its own population harder through hidden taxes, fees, and collapsing social services just to keep the war alive.

Most importantly, this breakdown explains why the damage is no longer reversible without collapse. Sanctions don’t just hurt today’s numbers — they rot the future. Innovation dies, skills decay, monopolies harden, loyalty replaces efficiency, and trust disappears. Putin keeps lying because admitting the truth would be politically fatal. But denial doesn’t save economies. It only delays the crash. This is not Russian resilience — it’s economic cardiac arrest in slow motion, and no amount of propaganda can bring it back.

January 2, 2026

USA Dollar Crashes - Joe Blogs

The US dollar has had one of its weakest years in nearly a decade — and the move in 2025 has caught many people by surprise.

In this video, I break down how the US dollar performed in 2025, using the latest estimates from major currency indices. While the dollar is often seen as a safe haven, the numbers show it lagged behind many of the world’s major currencies.

I compare the US dollar’s fall of around 9.4% with other leading currencies and rank them from worst to best performer. What stands out is that currencies such as the British pound, euro, Swiss franc and Swedish krona all strengthened noticeably over the year.

We also look at why this matters:
• Why a weaker dollar is a problem for the US as a net importer
• How higher import costs and tariffs can feed through into prices
• Why any boost to exporters can be offset by higher input costs and inflation
• And why expectations around further interest rate cuts remain important for the outlook

This video takes a data-led look at where the US dollar stands now, what drove the weakness in 2025, and what it could mean going forward.

Chapters:
0:00 Intro
0:59 US DOLLAR
7:23 WHY?
10:25 DONALD TRUMP
12:30 INFLATION
14:30 DEFICIT
16:44 IMPLICATIONS