TheNextReport

70 billion dollars in the deaf Defcon president surfaced unexpectedly on the White  House lawn yesterday shocking just about every body in the press corps. For over 20 minutes--that seemed like an  eternity ---the reporter's limited in-your-face--gaggle became a shocking, spur-of-the-moment opportunity to back the president into a corner and pepper him with rarely detailed explanations of the administration's policies. The press corps took the advantage, shouting every question that came to mind. The question that lingered: will the president ever give the First Amendment the chance again?

Pittsburg, Pennsylvania found itself in the gun-sights of a racist anti-Semite on Thursday and learned about a dark corner of American life. It's a world of shadows, of ghosts of the past, a world where atrocities--in spite of the benign changes of  post WW history--never really disappear. It is indeed a world of rule by mindless militarism, of hidden realities that lie in wait for the right moment-- the moment to strike. It is a world that challenges us to be ever vigilant in order to prevent those who feed at the troughs of hatred from achieving their goals. Tragically, they seem today to see far too much, far too often.

Blink your eyes and watch the world change in the Middle East... well maybe not. One thing is for certain--it was one of the most brazen political crimes in recent memory. News columnist Jamal Khashoggi was murdered in a Saudi Arabian consulate right under the noses of the Saudis, a key regional ally of the Trump Administration. The outrage allowed the Trump team to re-direct the international argument over control of immigration, giving the president a boost as the mid-term elections dawned in the east. This week, The NextReport gets back in the saddle after moving its offices temporarily to France. We expect to be back in the thick of things with reports from the United States and from Europe. As we say here in TheNextReport; Stay Tuned and Look out.

Independence? That depends. The United States of America passed its 241st birthday rather quickly, its hands partially covering its eyes.  Mired in the biggest scandal since the impeachment of Richard Nixon in 1974, much of the country has been left wondering how it happened. For those who claim to love democracy, there is a profound discomfort in the air, on television and in social media. It seems to confirm that the Republic is really a delusion. Peer behind that curtain and it hits us right in the face. We are living under the thumb of a homegrown oligarchy, a  twisted coalition of natavist fascism and fundamentalist theocracy, fueled by the deep pockets of a multi-billionaire corporate gentry. Today, the engine of the United States is being run by a legislature that is home to a group of hard-line ideologues, and an incompetent executive that is thoroughly corrupt. Coupled by an ignorant electorate that no longer reads and takes every opportunity to profess its disdain fo...

Oil in the Arctic is a hidden treasure that may provide answers to many of the questions surrounding America's deepest political scandal--the hacking of the 2016 presidential election. A 2008 United States Geological Survey estimates that areas north of the Arctic Circle have 90 billion barrels of undiscovered, recoverable oil (and 44 billion barrels of natural gas liquids ) in 25 geologically defined areas thought to have potential for petroleum. This represents 13% of the undiscovered oil in the world. In June 2007, a group of Russian geologists returned from a six-week voyage on a nuclear icebreaker, the expedition called Arktika 2007. They had traveled to the Lomonosov ridge, an underwater shelf going between Russia's remote, inhospitable eastern Arctic Ocean, and Ellesmere Island in Canada where the ridge lies 400m under the ocean surface. According to Russia's media, the geologists returned with the "sensational news" that the Lomonosov ridge was l...

All the talk about Jared Kushner and secret "back-channel" communications seems designed to keep people wondering and interested in the Washington intrigue. Back-channel talks between Russia and the US on a range of critical issues have been ongoing since the Cold War and some good has indeed come of it. I worked with a small group of people during the late 90's led by television producer Ren Breck whose whose company (News Center One) provided networked communications for international crises. This was BI (bef ore the Internet) when actual human intervention was often necessary.  News Center One played a key role in networking scientists from around the world who used their expertise to address the problems generated by the Chernobyl disaster. Ren's work earned him the commendation of the Russian Academy of Science and established a measure of trust between the involved parties. The News Center One team helped facilitate a Bay Area back-channel visit b...

The Conductor is having a ball working on the orchestration, pitting himself -- the twittering hero -- against the machine, unable to admit his social glaucoma, unable to admit that he is the machine. His deliberate obstruction of justice seems to have worked. He won't go to jail, however, and when it is all over he will have plenty of "content" at his disposal to construct a variety of entertainment packages, all with hardly a dent made in his personal empire. There's Trump the board game, Trump the caviar, Trump the vodka, Trump the champagne,Trump the lunchbox, Trump the after-shave; Trump luggage, Trump jewelry.  What's next? Perhaps asylum in one of those Persian Gulf principalities or maybe, just maybe, somewhere behind bars in the bowels of North Carolina, in a seat next to Bernie Madoff,...