https://www.cnn.com/2026/09/12/middleeast/yemen-houthi-saudi-us-blame-intl

By Nic Robertson, Lauren Kent

The desperate pleas for air cover from Yemeni generals started coming mid-morning on Thursday. An advance by the Iran-backed Houthis toward Yemen’s strategic port city of Mocha was in full swing, and backup support from chief ally Saudi Arabia was nowhere in sight.

“The Houthis committed everything they had – waves upon waves of fighters … along with their available ballistic missiles and weapons,” a senior Yemeni source attached to their military forces told CNN. The source said he contacted the United States Central Command (CENTCOM) and was assured the US was “watching the situation closely and that Saudi air support was coming.”

“But the air support never came,” the source said. “And Mocha has now fallen.”

Hours later, on Friday, the Houthis captured another key coastal asset, Perim Island, at the mouth of the Red Sea. The island splits the Bab al-Mandeb Strait in two, giving Tehran de facto control over another key shipping route.

The Houthis’ rapid advance amounts to an extraordinary 36 hours in a conflict that had been largely on ice for years. But the kindling for renewed fighting had been laid for months amid the conflict between the United States and Iran, as Tehran seeks to use oil prices – and their impact on the global economy – as leverage.

Now, Yemen and the Red Sea have the potential to become a true second front in the Iran war.

https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2026/09/11/world/middleeast/houthis-yemen-red-sea-shipping-maps.html

Why the Houthis’ Lightning Advance Threatens Global Shipping
By Sergio Peçanha, Lazaro Gamio and Weiyi Cai
Updated Sept. 11, 2026, 3:20 p.m. ET

In a surge of attacks this week, the Houthi militia struck across Yemen’s border into Saudi Arabia; captured a strategic port on the Red Sea; and seized an island at the Bab al-Mandab Strait. The swift advance tightens the Iran-backed group’s grip on a crucial choke point of global oil and cargo shipping.

The Bab al-Mandab Strait is just 12.5 miles wide at some points, making it a narrow passage for cargo ships heading from Asia and the Middle East to the Suez Canal.

Shipping lanes through the strait run less than three miles from Perim Island, well within range of the Houthis’ missiles and drones.

THANK YOU, DONALD TRUMP, AND THAT OTHER MORON, PETE KEGBREATH.  AND YOUR TWO “NEGOTIATORS” — KUSHNER AND WIKOFF.

Why does Saudi Arabia need US assistance?  They have a huge air force:  They have 72 Typhoons, 81 Tornados, 232 F-15’s and refueling planes — let them have at it.

Get some help from Eygpt, they make about 10 billion a year off the Suez Canal which will drop to zero with no Red Sea traffic.

Where our military would fight from . . . seeing as how Iran has destroyed all our Mideastern bases and our ships are, well, you know, not very well
supplied.

Send them Barron, Eric, and Jr. to show trust and honest intent in meaningful negotiation.

Meanwhile, Trump is off in Ireland at a golf tournament and Kegbreath is working on his pushups.

Over the past few days the gang of morons led by Donald Trump and Pete Hegseth suffered a devastating defeat in their already disastrous war in the Middle East.

AMMAN, Jordan — A key Saudi Arabian pipeline to the Red Sea was shut down after it was hit by “several drones” launched from Iraq, the Saudi Foreign Ministry said in a statement early Saturday, as Iranian-backed Houthi fighters claimed major victories in Yemen, expelling Saudi forces from the country’s Red Sea coast.

The separate attacks posed new challenges to the region’s ability to export oil amid the ongoing U.S. war with Iran, and further unnerved global oil markets. The price of oil briefly jumped above $110 per barrel, its highest level since May.

“This is the first day that Iran really started winning the war,” said a Yemeni official, who is part of the country’s internationally recognized, Saudi-backed government.

The Saudi statement said it would reserve the right to retaliate for the pipeline attack, but in response to a request from Iraq, would give Baghdad the opportunity to prevent such attacks.

The Iraqi government condemned the attack and confirmed that it was launched from Iraqi territory. A statement from the Iraqi prime minister’s office said that the military commander in the southern Iraqi province of Maysan, where the strike originated, had been dismissed.

The Houthis in Yemen and militant groups in Iraq, both allied with Iran, this summer opened new fronts against Saudi Arabia and its alliance with the U.S. In July, the two countries launched joint airstrikes against what they said were militant sites in Iraq.

Saudi Arabia and other oil-producing countries in the region have relied increasingly on alternative, land-based pipelines and sea passages to replace shipments through the traditional Persian Gulf export route, where vessels have come under attack in the Strait of Hormuz during the months-long standoff between Iranian and U.S. military forces.

The Houthi territorial claims, following a large-scale military operation aimed at controlling the Bab al-Mandab Strait entrance to the Red Sea, would mean that Iran and its Houthi proxies can now threaten — if not entirely block — energy and other cargo shipments through two key chokepoints.

 Brent crude is climbing, even hitting $110 a barrel in the past few days:

We will need to brush up on our geography in the coming days but here is the best map I could find that helps explain the gravity of what is happening:

As of September 11, Houthis had destroyed two sections of the Saudi’s East-West pipeline as well as closing the Bab-al-Mandab.  The Strait of Hormuz is all but closed, with only 6-8 ships a day passing through instead of the 120-150 before Trump’s ignorant war.  The Suez Canal does not have the capacity to replace the Bab al-Mandab.

 By taking control of key areas this week, including islands off the coast, the anti-west Houthis hope to gain a direct presence near the Bab al-Mandab strait, a 20-mile stretch of water and vital trade and energy route that connects Asia with Europe. ​

The strait’s name is roughly translated as “the gate of tears” or “the gate of grief”, and its strong currents and winds made the passage between the Arabian peninsula and Africa’s east coast hazardous for centuries. Modern-day cargo ships have no physical issue passing through.

 But with ​the Houthis close to closing the natural chokepoint, the impact on the global economy could be disastrous. Ships would have to reroute around the southern tip of Africa, adding thousands of extra nautical miles.

The fighting in Yemen, as well as Houthi missile strikes on Saudi Arabia, is the most significant violence in the country since the UN-brokered peace plan in 2022.

The UN special envoy for Yemen, Hans Grundberg, told an emergency security council meeting on Thursday that the country faced “a new and more dangerous phase of war”.

“This renewed war should alarm us all,” Grundberg said. “It effectively marks the end of the relative calm that Yemen has experienced for over four years since the UN-brokered truce. It not only threatens to plunge Yemen into a prolonged and expanding war, but also risks yet again dragging the country into the wider and unresolved regional confrontation, with global repercussions.”

When your President is a moron with no sense of history and when your Secretary of Defense is a failed alcoholic who was released from the National Guard because he lacked the competence to serve . . . 

 Gas prices in the US have taken off again:

Diesel prices have exploded, hitting all times across the country, right as we enter the fall harvest season. In California, our most important agricultural state, diesel is approaching $8 a gallon right now:

Interest rates are taking off, raising the price of everything for everybody:

Trump also hit his lowest mark of the cycle in the Civiqs daily tracker, clocking in at -26:

Congress returns on Monday to this fresh new Trumpian disaster. Calls for Pete Hegseth to step down should become very, very loud.

Trump has had his shot and he has screwed ujp the US and the rest of the world so badly that the US and the rest of the world will be at least a decade recovering from the reign of this moron, supported by the 35% of the American voters who are just as stupid, if not more stupid. 

The most important thing about what is happening now in the US – and it is bad – is that we have the opportunity to set a new course – a new beginning – for the country this November.

DO NOT, DO NOT EVER, DO NOT VISIT VOTESAFE.ORG

It is ELOON MUSKRAT’S fraud voting site designed to STEAL YOUR PERSONAL INFORMATION

And delibertly named so as to appear similar to vote.org or the official vote.gov. (sneaky bstrd)

Elon Musk Is Paying Millions to Get Your Home Address, Your Cell Number, and Every Link You Click, and He Made It Look Like a Voting Website – Baller Alert

President Joe Biden, First Lady Jill Biden at the 9-11 site

Sleepy Donald Trump at the Pentagon

Why aren’t Republicans raving about “Sleepy Trump?”

This is Natalie Harp.  She is Trump’s 24/7 “media specialist.”  She carries a laptop and a printer so she can print articles praising Trump and give them to him.  She is with him until the early hours of the morning — she is the one who writes and produces all the shit Trump posts on “Truth Social.”

Her White House salary is $165,000 per year.  She recently received two “bonus” payments of $45,000 each.

Why did she receive $90,000 in cash for doing to Trump what Monica Lewinsky did to Clinton for free??

On February 4, 2014, Ross Ulbricht was charged with engaging in a continuing criminal enterprise, narcotics conspiracy, conspiracy to commit money laundering, and conspiracy to commit computer hacking. On August 21, 2014, a superseding indictment added three additional charges.[33] The trial began on January 13, 2015.

Murder-for-hire charges
Federal prosecutors alleged that Ulbricht had paid US$730,000 (equivalent to about $1,010,000 in 2025) in murder-for-hire deals targeting at least five people, allegedly because they threatened to reveal the Silk Road enterprise. Prosecutors believe no contracted killing actually occurred. Ulbricht was not charged in his trial in New York federal court with murder for hire, but evidence was introduced at trial supporting the allegations. The district court found by a preponderance of the evidence that Ulbricht probably commissioned the murders. The possibility that Ulbricht had commissioned murders was considered by the judge in sentencing Ulbricht to life and was a factor in the Second Circuit’s decision to uphold the sentence. Ulbricht was separately indicted in federal court in Maryland on a single murder-for-hire charge, alleging that he contracted to kill one of his employees (a former Silk Road moderator). Prosecutors moved to drop this indictment after his New York conviction and sentence became final.

Conviction and sentence
On February 4, 2015, Ulbricht was convicted on all counts after a jury trial that had taken place in January 2015. On May 29, 2015, he was sentenced to double life imprisonment plus 40 years, without the possibility of parole, to be served concurrently. Ulbricht was also ordered to pay about US$183 million ($249 million in 2025 dollars) in restitution, based on the total sales of illegal drugs and counterfeit IDs through Silk Road. Following his conviction, two of the federal agents who participated in the investigation were arrested and charged with wire fraud and money laundering. As the corruption was never mentioned at his trial, Ulbricht unsuccessfully used it as an argument when appealing for a new trial.

During his first week in office, Trump pardoned Ulbricht.

On September 10, 2026, Ulbricht spoke at the “Republican National Convention” in Dallas where he praised Trump.

(The Center Square) – Gov. Katie Hobbs has vetoed numerous bills passed by the Arizona Legislature trying to honor Charlie Kirk’s life.

Thursday marks the one-year anniversary of Kirk’s death after he was assassinated in front of an audience of nearly 3,000 people at a Turning Point USA event at Utah Valley University. Kirk was shot in the neck while debating with students at the Orem, Utah campus. Kirk died at 31.

Tyler Robinson is accused of shooting Kirk. He has pleaded not guilty to aggravated murder and six other charges. Fourth District Judge Tony Graf ruled the 23-year-old will stand trial for Kirk’s death. Graf set Oct. 23 for a hearing in the Provo, Utah courtroom to determine the trial date.

U.S. Rep. Andy Biggs, R-Gilbert, who’s running against Hobbs, a Democrat, in the Nov. 3 gubernatorial race, called Kirk a “generational historical figure.”

He noted Kirk would go to college campuses that were “intolerant of free speech” and have good discussions with anyone who wanted to debate him.

https://www.thecentersquare.com/arizona/article_debde2ed-313a-4c10-afb1-81d27231a222.html

COMMENT

Charlie Kirk is a nobody who rose to some prominence among rightwing nutjobs for travelling around to college and high school campuses, spreading half-truths, simple-minded phrases, and rightwing bullshit.

Unless they were political junkies or right wingers, no one else had ever heard of him until he was shot.

He should not have been murdered but he did nothing to deserve honoraria from state legislatures.

Kirk will not even be a footnote in the histories of the era.

Trump promises $5,000 payout to U.S. adults if Republicans win election

Source: Reuters

President Donald Trump said on Wednesday that ​he would issue a $5,000 ‌dividend to every adult in the United States if Republicans ​maintain control of Congress ​in November’s election.

“If the Republicans ⁠win the House of Representatives ​and the United States ​Senate, both of them … because of our tremendous strength and success economically, ​I will issue a ​dividend to every adult citizen in ‌the ⁠United States of America for $5,000,” Trump said at a Republican convention in Dallas.

“The only ​caveat ​I ⁠have is that the dividend that we’re making ​must be spent ​in ⁠the United States of America,” he added.

No further details were ⁠immediately ​available about ​the proposal.

Read more: https://www.reuters.com/world/us/trump-promises-5000-payout-us-adults-if-republicans-win-election-2026-09-10/

COMMENT

Does anyone remember:

• After appointing Elon Musk to head the fictitious “Dept of Government Effeciency (DOG),” Trump promised that Musk had saved so much money, every American would receive a $5,000 DOGE check. That was over a year ago.  Raise your hand if you have  DOGE check.
• After the Supreme Court ruled that most of his tariffs were illegal, Trump vowed to restore the cost of tariffs to US households – he promised us all a $2,000 tariff relief check.  Have you seen yours?
• In response to thousands of people losing access to healthcare because of his “Big Beautiful Bill,” Trump promised $2,000 checks to all affected.  Did you, or do you know anyone, who received

If you believe Trump’s latest claim about a “$5,000 check to each American citizen if Republicans win in November,” then you are dumber than you look.