Authored by George Shay via American Greatness,

The Legacy of Jesse Jackson Makes All of Us Less Safe

If you ride the trains or buses in Chicago with any regularity, you don’t worry about microaggressions.

You worry about being maced, mugged, or shoved onto the tracks—or, in one grotesque recent case, set on fire.

That’s the lived experience of Chicagoans navigating the Chicago Transit Authority and Metra. Not academic theory. Not seminar-room sociology. Reality.

So naturally, when a modest pilot program is introduced allowing the transit agencies to suspend individuals who assault conductors, spit on drivers, punch random riders, or otherwise turn public transportation into a Thunderdome audition, what does the Chicago Tribune decide is the story?

Not whether the program works.

Not whether it can be enforced.

Not whether it deters crime.

No.

The story, apparently, is that it’s racist.

Because roughly 90 percent of the approximately 40 individuals suspended under the program are black or Hispanic.

Forty people. In a city of nearly three million. On a transit system carrying hundreds of thousands daily.

That’s the scandal.

The Exercise in Futility Nobody Wants to Discuss

Let’s start with the obvious: The program is likely an exercise in futility.

How exactly do you enforce a transit ban in 2026 Chicago?

There are no ticket agents.

There are no conductors policing turnstiles.

Bus drivers sit behind plastic shields—cages, really—installed because too many of them were being attacked.

You think a driver is going to step out from behind that barrier and say, “Excuse me, sir, our records indicate you’re under suspension”?

There’s no one at the station entrances checking IDs. There’s no practical mechanism to stop someone from tapping a Ventra card or just hopping a turnstile.

And if you suggest facial recognition technology?

Prepare for the five-alarm firestorm about privacy, surveillance, and civil liberties. The same activists who say the suspension program is racist would melt down over any serious enforcement mechanism.

So yes—from a practical standpoint, the whole thing may be symbolic.

But here’s the key point: at least it’s an attempt to impose consequences.

And in modern Chicago, consequences are controversial.

Identity Politics over Public Safety

Instead of asking whether violent or abusive behavior on transit should carry penalties, the Tribune frames the issue through the lens of “disparate impact.”

There they are again—the two most dangerous words in the English language.

Disparate impact.

The idea that if outcomes are uneven across racial groups, the policy itself must be suspect—regardless of intent, regardless of behavior, regardless of context.

The CTA cannot control who spits in a conductor’s face.

It cannot control who punches strangers for sport.

It cannot control who brandishes a weapon on a train platform.

It responds to behavior.

If 40 people were suspended, it is because 40 people committed acts that met the suspension criteria. The racial breakdown of that group is a function of who committed the acts—not who wrote the rule.

Yet in Chicago, we are conditioned to treat every enforcement disparity as evidence of oppression.

This mentality has warped policing.

It has warped prosecution.

It has warped policy.

And it has made the city less safe.

A City That Attacks Its Defenders

Look around.

A tactical police unit does proactive enforcement? It’s accused of bias.

Transit officers remove an aggressive passenger? It’s framed as racial profiling.

ICE agents enforce federal immigration law? They’re portrayed as villains.

Meanwhile, the criminals—the people actually harming others—are treated as a protected class.

We spend more time investigating the motives of law enforcement than the motives of the lawless.

The message is unmistakable: enforce at your peril.

And so enforcement retreats.

Woodlawn and the Real Victims

Just this week, five people were shot in Woodlawn, a neighborhood on the South Side of Chicago not too far from the University of Chicago.

Gang violence continues to erupt across parts of the South and West Sides. The victims are overwhelmingly people of color. The residents pleading for safety are people of color. The families fleeing to Indiana, Texas, Tennessee—many of them are people of color.

Yet the narrative machine grinds on.

The real injustice, we’re told, is that 40 individuals suspended from public transit are disproportionately black or Hispanic.

Not the grandmother afraid to take the Green Line at night.

Not the nurse working second shift who carries pepper spray in her purse.

Not the kid dodging gang recruitment on his walk home.

The obsession with optics overrides the reality of harm.

The Jesse Jackson Legacy

It’s an uncomfortable truth, but we cannot understand modern Chicago politics without acknowledging the long shadow of Jesse Jackson.

He was a gifted organizer. A charismatic voice. A man who mobilized communities and reshaped the political landscape.

But he also institutionalized a politics of grievance—a framework in which virtually every enforcement action is interpreted through racial suspicion.

Over decades, that lens hardened.

Today, even when transit employees—themselves often minorities—attempt to protect riders, the reflex is to assume racial motive.

The result?

Law enforcement paralysis.

When every policy risks being labeled racist, the safest bureaucratic move is to do nothing.

And that is precisely what too many agencies in this city have chosen to do for years.

The Population Tells the Story

Chicago continues to struggle with population decline. Census estimates since 2020 show net losses, even if the exact numbers fluctuate year to year.

Who leaves?

Taxpayers.

Families.

Working-class strivers.

Including many black and Hispanic Chicagoans who are tired of living in what feels like an upside-down moral order.

Where criminals roam freely.

Where police are second-guessed.

Where enforcement is suspect.

Where newspapers fan the flames instead of confronting the facts.

Public safety is not racist.

It is foundational.

Without it, everything else—schools, jobs, investment, opportunity—erodes.

A City Turned Upside Down

We are living in a moment where common sense is treated as provocation.

Suspend someone for assaulting a transit worker?

Racist.

Crack down on repeat violent offenders?

Carceral overreach.

Cooperate with federal authorities?

Fascism.

Meanwhile, ordinary Chicagoans—black, white, Hispanic, Asian—simply want to get to work without being harassed or harmed.

They want buses and trains that function.

They want a city where criminals fear consequences more than police fear headlines.

The transit suspension program may not work. In fact, it probably won’t, absent serious enforcement mechanisms.

But attacking it as racist misses the point entirely.

The real disparity in Chicago is not racial.

It’s moral.

Between those who obey the law and those who don’t.

Between those who ride the train to work and those who turn it into a crime scene.

Between taxpayers and predators.

Until we stop viewing every enforcement action through the distorted prism of identity politics, we will continue to decline.

And the biggest victims will be the very communities progressivism claims to protect.

Authored by Naveen Athrappully via The Epoch Times,

Travelers in the United States are facing significant delays at airports due to the ongoing federal government shutdown, the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) stated on March 8 in a post on social media.

“Today, travelers are facing TSA lines of up to nearly 3 hours long at some major airports,” said Lauren Bis, deputy assistant secretary for public affairs at TSA, on X.

This has resulted in “missed flights and massive delays during peak travel.”

Referring to TSA officers, Bis said, “These frontline heroes received only partial paychecks earlier this month and now face their first full missed paycheck, leading to financial hardship, absences, and crippling staffing shortages,” and called on Democrats to fund the Department of Homeland Security (DHS).

A recent travel update issued by William P. Hobby Airport in Houston, Texas, shared by DHS, stated that passengers should arrive at least four to five hours before flight departure to allow enough time for TSA screening, with estimated wait times for the screening exceeding 180 minutes or 2.5 hours.

“Houston Airports urges passengers to remain flexible as the government shutdown may impact security operations from one day—and even one shift—to the next,” the post stated, advising travelers to get in touch with their airlines for further support.

The federal shutdown, which began on Feb. 14, is in its 23rd day. DHS funding issues arising from the shutdown have resulted in staff shortages.

On March 5, the House of Representatives passed a bill to fund DHS. The vote was 221–209, with four Democrats joining all Republicans in voting for it.

However, Senate Democrats blocked the funding legislation, which received 51 votes with 45 opposed. Sixty votes are needed for the spending bill to move forward.

The Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and Customs and Border Protection, which are part of DHS, are funded through 2029 under the One Big Beautiful Bill Act. However, TSA, the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), and the Coast Guard, are impacted.

Democrats have demanded certain conditions that primarily apply to ICE operations to be met before allowing the funding bill to pass.

These include limiting immigration enforcement to targeted operations, requiring judicial warrants before entering private property, ending what they describe as indiscriminate arrests, verifying citizenship before detention, requiring agents to clearly identify themselves, and restricting operations in locations like churches, schools, and medical facilities.

Flight Delays

As of Sunday at 9:40 p.m. ET, there have been 7,233 flight delays and 673 cancellations at U.S. airports, according to data from FlightAware. On March 7, there were 9,693 delays and 1,339 cancellations.

George Bush Intercontinental Airport (IAH) in Houston asked passengers in a post on X to arrive early to make time for TSA clearance.

The Louis Armstrong New Orleans International Airport, which serves New Orleans and the Gulf Coast Region, said in a March 8 post on X that there were “longer-than-average lines” at the airport due to a shortage of TSA workers.

The airport advised passengers to arrive at least three hours prior to their scheduled departure time to make sure there is enough time for security screening.

The Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport also issued a warning in an X post, saying passengers could expect longer wait times at TSA checkpoints due to staffing constraints and the “residual impacts from two ground stops issued Friday.”

The Austin-Bergstrom International Airport had warned back in a March 5 post on social media that “unanticipated delays” could occur due to the partial federal shutdown.

In a March 8 statement, Chris Sununu, the CEO of Airlines for America, a trade association of leading U.S. airlines, said that TSA officers are facing a $0 paycheck this week and that the DHS shutdown was causing “significant strains” across the aviation system.

At some airports, TSA lines are two hours to three hours long, resulting in flights being delayed and passengers missing their timely travel, the CEO said.

“The shutdown is having very real consequences, and hardworking federal aviation workers, the airline industry and our passengers are being used as a political football once again. This is simply unacceptable and un-American,” Sununu said.

“We are in spring break travel season and expecting record numbers of people to take to the skies. Airlines have done their part to prepare; now Congress and the administration must act with urgency to reach a deal that reopens DHS and ends this shutdown. America’s transportation security workforce is too important to be used as political leverage.”

West Texas Intermediate crude futures spiked as high as $111 a barrel on Sunday evening as the deepening Middle East conflict sent panic through oil markets, with supplies from key Gulf producers going offline and the Strait of Hormuz remaining paralyzed into week two.

The key question on some energy desks is whether this energy shock will force President Trump to scale back Operation Epic Fury in a TACO-style retreat by Tuesday with WTI in triple-digit territory. That is hard to say, given that U.S. Central Command stated on X over the weekend that the operation will only accelerate from here.

But BofA’s Michael Hartnett suggests a de-escalation of the Iran war in March (read the note). That’s because Trump’s approval ratings for the economy (40%) and inflation (36%) are back at their lows.

The larger concern now, beyond the energy market, is the risk of a global spillover. As Jared Cohen, President of Global Affairs and Co-Head of the Goldman Sachs Global Institute, warned investors on the GS Weekend Macro Call, the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps maintains cells across multiple emerging market countries and could begin activating them.

“What I am looking for next is that they have meaningful cells in the Tri-Border Area of Latin America, West Africa, and elsewhere. They could hit an embassy, they could hit a consulate, or they could hit a cultural center in any one of the twelve countries they have already attacked,” Cohen explained. 

He continued, “They could do something in Europe. They could carry out a meaningful cyberattack. Right now, in the Strait of Hormuz, they have essentially blocked it by driving up insurance costs. They could still mine it. And the Houthis have not done anything yet in the Red Sea. You could also see something involving undersea cables, where 80% of Europe-Asia internet traffic flows.”

“So that’s kind of what I’m watching for,” Cohen told clients. However, he didn’t mention in that thought of whether terror fallouts would wash up on the shores of the U.S. Homeland, given the illegal alien invasion by the Democrats under the Biden-Harris administration. 

The U.S. Homeland has already had a few wakeup calls:

Operation Epic Fury Sparks Homeland Terror Fears Amid Fallout From Biden’s Illegal Alien Invasion

Two Radicals Arrested After Targeting Anti-Islam NYC Protest With Shrapnel-Packed Devices

While JPMorgan analysts are closely watching the risk of Gulf oil shut-ins exceeding 4 million barrels per day by the end of next week, Cohen’s role at Goldman is to focus on geopolitical risk, and anyone who heard his webinar this weekend would come away with the view that spillover risks ex-Middle East could soon be a major risk. 

Authored by James Howard Kunstler,

Farther Along

Don’t lose the plot. Embrace the suck. This is the world’s hard time, for now. The birth of anything can be a bloody horror. It can even look like death. Don’t be too afraid to see what comes on the other side of this awful spectacle.

So many Americans are rooting and wishing for the Iran war to turn out badly for Western Civ. And why? Because Trump. And why? Because at the same time he is ending Iran’s long-running nuclear blackmail game, he is terminating the rackets of the Democratic Party. The incipient changes in operational order create new categories of winners and losers.

Now you know why Hamas and Hezbollah terrorists run on the same track as America’s Woke-Jacobin-Marxists, including the pitifully deluded wine ladies of posh West LA, Grosse Point, Beacon Hill, Fairfax County, et cetera, whose brains have been hijacked by the cable news demon factory (and their sponsors). Chaos does everything possible to avoid meeting order.

And this is why passing the SAVE Act is as consequential as ridding the Middle East of its chief chaos agent. Do you realize how perfectly insane our country’s election procedure has become? The fraud is titanic and right in your face, and the remedy is so plain and simple. What possible excuse is there to thwart it? Non-citizens have no right to vote. Mail-in ballots are patently subject to chicanery. Vote tabulation machines are demonstrably hackable. 80-percent of Americans know this is the truth. How is there controversy over this?

How? Because among all the broken institutions in our country, Congress is the worst. The Congress of our time is demonstrating that we might not be worthy of governing ourselves. We are at a cycle-low for public rectitude. Anything goes and nothing matters as long as the campaign contributions keep rolling in.

You see how this has been going.

But mark this: we are going to get election reform one way or another. It’s that urgent, and failure to accomplish it by legislation will warrant a national emergency. And when the election machinery has been fixed, we had better do something about the plague of corporate money that runs like poison through our politics because of the Supreme Court’s foolish decision in the 2010 Citizens United case. They decided (by a slim 5-4 majority) that limitless campaign contributions by corporations amounted to free speech under the Constitution.

I will tell you concisely why this was tragically fallacious. Free speech in our country is a God-given right of sovereign citizens. Corporations are not citizens. Corporations don’t have obligations, duties, and responsibilities to the public interest (a.k.a. the common good). Corporations explicitly, by law, have obligations, duties, and responsibilities solely to their share-holders. The interests of corporate share-holders and the nation’s public interest are manifestly oppositional. Perhaps now you can see why this was such a dreadful invitation to political chaos.

So, Mr. Trump, for all his flaws, attempts to bring order out of chaos at home and in global relations, and the agents of chaos mightily resent the shut-down of their precious chaos. With Iran, it has come to fighting fire with fire. It’s unlikely that most of the people in that country seek to become martyrs. The cult of martyrdom is strictly the business of the maniacs who seized power there in 1979, a reign of terror, extended by proxy around the whole Middle East and beyond.

Entwined with Iran’s oil business, and the energy security of many nations, the mullahs inflect the trade of this primary resource with their chaos. The world cannot cope with chaos in the oil trade. The collapsing regime of the mullahs wants to go out turning the entire world into a martyr. Just like the Democratic Party wants to martyr the founding principles of the USA to preserve its matrix of moneygrubbing and power-seeking.

These are two forces that require the most severe discipline and Mr. Trump is acting to impose exactly that. It’s painful to witness, but it must happen if we want to continue the human project as a reality-based enterprise.

So, heed what is at stake in the events unspooling. This is a dark moment in a journey back to daylight. Have faith. As the old American hymn goes: Farther along we’ll know more about it; farther along we’ll understand why.

Views expressed in this article are opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of ZeroHedge.

Ten days into the U.S.-Israeli Operation Epic Fury against Iran, which has forced shut-ins at major Gulf oil and gas facilities, disrupted production at key oil fields, sent stockpiles soaring, sparked a global energy crisis (Brent crude hit $119/bbl highs overnight) and severely disrupted commercial shipping through the Strait of Hormuz, the world’s most critical energy chokepoint, new satellite imagery data from TankerTrackers, first cited by Bloomberg, suggests Tehran has recently moved substantial volumes of crude through the waterway.

Geospatial intelligence data from TankerTrackers estimates that Iran-linked tanker flows through the Strait of Hormuz have topped nearly 12 million barrels since Feb. 28, the start of Operation Epic Fury. Because the data is delayed, updated satellite imagery may only suggest that the actual figure is much higher.

More like nothing on AIS. https://t.co/MkBEH2lA5f

— TankerTrackers.com, Inc. (@TankerTrackers) March 8, 2026

TankerTrackers’ data is notable because much of the traffic through Hormuz has been paralyzed, sending Brent crude futures to nearly $120/bbl in overnight trading. The firm’s data is useful for tracking Iran-linked dark fleet tankers that switch off their transponders.

On X, TankerTrackers reported that a Suezmax tanker that recently went dark by switching off its transponder while transiting the Strait has switched it back on and is now headed to India.

UPDATE: One of the Suezmax tankers has now appeared back on AIS, and is approaching Mumbai, India with a million barrels of Saudi crude oil. Her name is SHENLONG (9379210). There are still a few more which may appear on AIS given that at least one of them is heading to China. pic.twitter.com/MFqnjpkuCe

— TankerTrackers.com, Inc. (@TankerTrackers) March 9, 2026

Two days before Operation Epic Fury began, we told readers that Iran was rushing crude onto tankers in anticipation of an incoming conflict.

We noted last week that as long as Iranian crude continues to flow, pressure will only build on the Trump administration to address Kharg Island, Tehran’s main export hub, where roughly 80% to 90% of the country’s crude is loaded onto tankers.

Kharg Island Back In Focus As Seizure Talk Enters Mainstream Media Debate

The Oil Island That Could Break Iran

Kharg Island remains one of the IRGC’s most important financial lifelines, and if the administration is serious about dismantling the regime’s funding pipeline, the export island will become difficult to ignore. Whether that means bombing it, seizing it, or pursuing some other option is a separate question entirely. But we do think the conversation will soon shift to pathways for the US to control Kharg Island.

Authored by Luis Cornelio via HeadlineUSA,

Rep. Eric Swalwell has long maintained his primary residence in Washington, D.C., despite representing large portions of California in Congress. Now that he is running for California governor, his apparent on-paper-only California residency is under scrutiny – even from fellow Democrats. 

Eric Swalwell / IMAGE: Evening Standard via YouTube

Tom Steyer, a left-wing billionaire donor who is also running for the Democratic nomination for governor, called on California Secretary of State Shirley Weber to enforce the state’s residency requirements. 

Steyer’s campaign wrote to Shirley that Swalwell “appears to live in California on paper only” and is “unlikely to meet the basic residency requirements to run for Governor.” 

In a 55-page letter, Steyer’s attorneys argued that Swalwell has repeatedly failed to list a home address in campaign documents. 

For instance, Swalwell listed a law firm’s address in Sacramento as his address on a Candidate Intention Statement. 

Swalwell also designated his Eckington address in Washington, D.C., at 209 S Street NE as his principal residence in a deed of trust. 

Instead, Swalwell lists a California address on his voter registration form, but deed records do not show that he actually owns the property. 

The letter argued that “public records databases do not indicate Swalwell is a resident at that address.” 

The home is owned by a relative of Swalwell’s former deputy chief of staff and longtime mentor, Tim Sbranti. 

When Swalwell is in California, he stays in San Francisco hotels, according to campaign finance records. 

Steyer’s letter is not the first time Swalwell has faced accusations that he does not actually reside in California. In January, Swalwell was sued over his D.C. residency, with the lawsuit alleging that he does not live in the state and is unqualified to run for governor. 

“Tom Steyer has sunk to a new low, peddling far-right MAGA conspiracy theorist Joel Gilbert’s tired talking points. Gilbert is a quack who has published that Bruce Lee is alive and Paul McCartney is dead,” a spokesperson for Swalwell’s campaign said in remarks to Politico.  

“Billionaire Steyer is personally going after a public servant who has long rented in his East Bay Congressional district. California’s renters don’t need to be shamed by an out-of-touch billionaire,” the campaign added. 

In a statement, the California Secretary of State’s office said candidates will only appear on the ballot “if they meet the candidate qualifications and requirements outlined in the 2026 California Election Guide.” 

Since the start of Operation Epic Fury against Iran, Israel has suffered some rare mass casualty events and major destruction of sectors of its cities, especially in Tel Aviv.

The official death toll stands at eleven civilians killed, and dozens wounded and injured; while Israel’s military just suffered two troop deaths in southern Lebanon.

The most devastating single incident was when nine people were killed in an Iranian missile strike on Beit Shemesh near Jerusalem on March 1, amid Iran’s retaliatory action.

On Monday there are widespread reports of another significant deadly missile impact in the heart of Israel. Local media reports that at least one person was killed and two others seriously wounded after an Iranian missile carrying a cluster warhead struck central Israel on Monday.

Illustrative: Cluster bomb open source image.

Already there’s been evidence of advanced hypersonic missiles sent on Israel, but cluster munitions by Iran may be something ‘new’ deployed in the war with Israel.

Times of Israel describes that the cluster warhead hit at least six locations across central Israel, including Yehud, Or Yehuda, Holon, and Bat Yam. One man was killed and another critically wounded at a construction site in Yehud, while a third man was seriously wounded in Or Yehuda, medical officials have said.

Large craters, and damage to area buildings and cars were witnessed at these scenes – and the diffusion of shrapnel. Shrapnel from these cluster attacks is among the most dangerous aspects to the warhead, which is banned across many countries according to international treaties.

“At the construction site, two men in their 40s were critically hurt by shrapnel, with one succumbing to his wounds, Magen David Adom said. The second man was taken to a hospital,” Times of Israel detailed.

Iran’s state broadcaster IRIB praised the strike, announcing that the country’s armed forces launched its “first wave of missiles under Mojtaba Khamenei towards occupied territories” – in reference to the newly appointed leader chosen Sunday to succeed his father, Ali Khamenei.

Iranian cluster munition in central Israel, part of a fresh wave of ballistic missile attacks launched by Iran in retaliation amid the escalating U.S.-Iran-Israel conflict. pic.twitter.com/cLtVBI2vbV

— NextMinute News (@nextminutenews7) March 9, 2026

Some open source analysts have pointed out that cluster bombs have been used since nearly the start of the war – but Monday’s incident appears the first instance resulting in serious casualties.

Since the start of Operation Epic Fury against Iran, Israel has suffered some rare mass casualty events and major destruction of sectors of its cities, especially in Tel Aviv.

The official death toll stands at eleven civilians killed, and dozens wounded and injured; while Israel’s military just suffered two troop deaths in southern Lebanon.

The most devastating single incident was when nine people were killed in an Iranian missile strike on Beit Shemesh near Jerusalem on March 1, amid Iran’s retaliatory action.

On Monday there are widespread reports of another significant deadly missile impact in the heart of Israel. Local media reports that at least one person was killed and two others seriously wounded after an Iranian missile carrying a cluster warhead struck central Israel on Monday.

Illustrative: Cluster bomb open source image.

Already there’s been evidence of advanced hypersonic missiles sent on Israel, but cluster munitions by Iran may be something ‘new’ deployed in the war with Israel.

Times of Israel describes that the cluster warhead hit at least six locations across central Israel, including Yehud, Or Yehuda, Holon, and Bat Yam. One man was killed and another critically wounded at a construction site in Yehud, while a third man was seriously wounded in Or Yehuda, medical officials have said.

Large craters, and damage to area buildings and cars were witnessed at these scenes – and the diffusion of shrapnel. Shrapnel from these cluster attacks is among the most dangerous aspects to the warhead, which is banned across many countries according to international treaties.

“At the construction site, two men in their 40s were critically hurt by shrapnel, with one succumbing to his wounds, Magen David Adom said. The second man was taken to a hospital,” Times of Israel detailed.

Iran’s state broadcaster IRIB praised the strike, announcing that the country’s armed forces launched its “first wave of missiles under Mojtaba Khamenei towards occupied territories” – in reference to the newly appointed leader chosen Sunday to succeed his father, Ali Khamenei.

Iranian cluster munition in central Israel, part of a fresh wave of ballistic missile attacks launched by Iran in retaliation amid the escalating U.S.-Iran-Israel conflict. pic.twitter.com/cLtVBI2vbV

— NextMinute News (@nextminutenews7) March 9, 2026

Some open source analysts have pointed out that cluster bombs have been used since nearly the start of the war – but Monday’s incident appears the first instance resulting in serious casualties.