Hi everyone. It’s Wednesday, September 9, and there is a lot to get through, so let’s get into it.
Here’s what we’re tracking today:
Oil surges past $101 a barrel as the Iran war escalates on multiple fronts
Iran issues a seven-point list of demands and threatens 20 strikes for every 2 it takes
U.S. destroys five Iranian oil tankers, Iran hits back with what could be its largest attack of the war
Iran fires ballistic missiles with cluster munitions at U.S. forces in Jordan, as U.S. casualty toll is quietly updated to 838
Diesel prices closing in on $6 a gallon nationally
Russia’s Lavrov invokes the assassination that sparked World War I
Ukraine sends drones a record 3,300 kilometers into Russia
Israel intensifies strikes in southern Lebanon
UK, Canada, and France sanction Israeli settlements
Trump gave three young female aides $45,000 in cash gifts
A former Anthropic and OpenAI researcher warns AI could kill us all by 2030
The Republican midterm convention in Dallas is reportedly already a disaster
Missouri’s redistricting fight heads back to the Supreme Court
Thanks again to everyone who continues to preorder our book WTF America! If you ordered your copy recently, let me know in the comments. There are a couple deals sellers are offering for the book right now. We received word that Barnes & Noble is running a pre-order promo from 9/9-9/11, offering 25% off pre-orders for B&N members and an additional 10% off for Premium members with code PREORDER25.
And Bookshop.org is offering 15% OFF + a free sticker with code WTF15 at checkout.
It’s been an awful morning for Donald Trump, and it just kept getting worse from there. So let’s dive in. And if you’re not yet a paid subscriber, consider joining now to support our work.
The Iran War Continues to Spiral
Crude oil blew past $100 a barrel this morning and kept climbing, hitting $101.17, up more than three percent on the day. Iranian media is already making celebratory graphics with the number on them, because they know this is a huge pain point for the U.S. and that Trump is directly to blame.
Iran didn’t stop at celebrating. An IRGC general Mohammadi laid out 7 demands to end the war, including releasing 24 billion dollars in frozen Iranian assets and ending interference in Iran’s nuclear and missile programs, and said the era of limited retaliation is over. The U.S. says it destroyed five Iranian oil tankers overnight, the largest single strike on tankers since World War II. Iran responded with its largest attack in the Strait of Hormuz of the entire war, hitting ten vessels including two U.S. destroyers. Two for one is now the pattern, and Trump appears to have walked right into an escalatory trap of his own making.
Then there’s Jordan. Iran fired roughly twenty ballistic missiles, some carrying cluster munitions for the first time in months, at a U.S.-used air base there. We’re talking somewhere between 60 and over 100 Patriot interceptors fired in response, each one running four to five million dollars. Do that math and you’re looking at potentially half a billion dollars in missiles burned through in one night. That’s part of Iran’s strategy: fire off cheap missiles and let the U.S. burn through its extremely expensive and limited interceptors. U.S. officials insist all troops are accounted for and the attack was ineffective. Meanwhile, the Pentagon quietly updated its own casualty tracker to show 838 American casualties since this war began (an additional 26 injured added), 18 killed and 820 wounded. That is the cost of Trump’s war that he will never talk about.
Meanwhile Saudi Arabia is getting hit too, with Yemen’s Houthis launching strikes after Saudi conducted 48 airstrikes on Yemeni provinces in twelve hours. CNN reports a construction surge at Pickaxe Mountain, Iran’s suspected underground nuclear site, as the U.S. weighs how to strike something buried deep enough that our current bunker busters may not be able to touch it. An Iranian lawmaker is now openly warning the region is on the brink of World War III.
And the bond market continues to revolt. The Treasury tripled its long-term debt buybacks to six billion dollars and yields still rose, pushing the 10-year note above 4.85 percent for the first time since November 2023. Diesel is about to hit $6 a gallon nationally. Even Trump’s own advisers are giving up. Axios reports Republicans in the White House no longer even try to talk him out of anything, with one longtime adviser simply asking “why bother.” Joe Kent, who quit as Tulsi Gabbard’s deputy over this war, says the hawks who pushed for it are now trying to pin the whole disaster on Trump alone to save themselves.
Lavrov Invokes World War One, Ukraine Sends Drones 3,300 Kilometers Into Russia
Russia’s foreign minister Sergey Lavrov compared the current moment to the assassination of Archduke Ferdinand in Sarajevo, the spark that lit World War I, and floated something like a Reichstag fire as a possible trigger for wider war. Whether or not you take that as a threat, it tells you Lavrov knows exactly how nervous this Trump regime is about a wider conflict, and he is leaning into it. Russia struck a residential building in Kyiv with a Shahed drone overnight. Ukraine answered by flying drones a record 3,300 kilometers into Russia, roughly the distance from New York to Colorado, hitting a stabilization plant in Yamalo-Nenets. The Financial Times reports CIA Director John Ratcliffe may be taking over much of the shuttle diplomacy currently run by Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner, the two envoys I’ve been calling Dumb and Dumber given how little their trips to Moscow and Kyiv have produced.
And this war just got frighteningly close to Zelenskyy himself. Norwegian Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Støre said Zelenskyy’s plane was almost struck by a drone as it was preparing to take off from Moldova, according to Norwegian broadcaster NRK. Zelenskyy was traveling to Oslo for King Harald’s funeral. This news puts Lavrov’s statement into a whole different context.
Israel Intensifies Lebanon Strikes While UK, Canada And France Sanction Settlements
Fighting between Israel and Hezbollah has escalated in southern Lebanon, with Israeli strikes killing at least 28 people and wounding 79 since Saturday. Lebanese officials are asking Washington to intervene.
Britain, Canada and France announced sanctions on Israeli settlements this week, with UK foreign secretary Ed Miliband saying his government believes there is ethnic cleansing happening in parts of the West Bank. In response, Arkansas Governor Sarah Huckabee Sanders is threatening to use the state’s anti-boycott law against any British company that complies with its own government’s policy. Her father, Ambassador Mike Huckabee, is warning of economic consequences for British firms.
Trump Gave Aides $45,000 Cash Gifts, MeidasTouch Grills Homan On ICE Tactics
New financial disclosures show Trump personally handed out 45,000 dollars in cash gifts to three young female aides, Natalie Harp, Margo Martin and Chamberlain Harris, each amount equal to nearly a third of their salaries. A former Bush ethics lawyer says the payments likely violate federal law. Separately, our correspondent Luke Radel pressed border czar Tom Homan on ICE arresting a father in front of his teenage son at a school bus stop. Homan claimed he wasn’t aware, despite ICE having already confirmed it happened and Homan being asked about it recently on CNN. Here’s a clip:
Trump’s Convention Train Wreck
Tonight’s Republican midterm convention in Dallas is reportedly going about as well as you’d expect. Politico’s Playbook quotes a GOP lobbyist saying the vibes are terrible and that his only hope is nobody watches since it’s competing with NFL games. Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins went on NewsNation and, asked about sky-high prices under Trump, immediately pivoted to blaming Biden. That’s always her go-to move.
And U.S. Attorney Jeanine Pirro held a press conference ostensibly about crypto scams, which is rich given how much scrutiny Trump’s own meme coins and NFTs deserve, but refused to answer a single question about the reflecting pool controversy, repeating “no” over and over rather than engaging.
AI Leaders Sound the Alarm
Separately, a former Anthropic and OpenAI researcher named Jacob Coxon resigned this week and said publicly that people building AI genuinely believe it could kill us all by the end of the decade. Two current Anthropic employees backed him up, with one putting the odds of extinction above 10%. I don’t exactly like those odds coming from a senior employee at one of the top AI companies. This technology needs to be regulated. Fast. And our government has gone completely MIA. Actually, to the contrary, this Trump regime has been actively encouraging the proliferation of AI without any guardrails. Trump wants data centers in everyone’s backyard.
Missouri’s Redistricting Fight Escalates Into A Full Blown Contempt Battle
The Missouri redistricting mess got even messier. The state Supreme Court had ordered Secretary of State Denny Hoskins to show cause for why he shouldn’t be held in contempt, after he directed local officials to use the GOP’s favored 7-1 map, the one Republicans want, despite a federal court order requiring the use of the 2025 map, known as HB 1, while the underlying legal fight plays out
Rather than comply, the state is now asking a federal judge to step in and block its own state Supreme Court from holding Hoskins in contempt for defying that same federal order. In other words, Missouri got caught telling counties to use the wrong map, got hauled toward a contempt hearing over it, and its response is to ask a different court to make the contempt problem go away rather than just following the order in the first place.
We’ll be tracking all of this. Stay tuned for more updates throughout the day. Shoutout to the Meidas Mighty!
