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@stats_feed Well I wish my grandson didn’t have a peanut allergy since it could kill him

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@AbakpaJob @tracybeanz The ferals that we TNR’d. They come morning and evening to our door and of course we feed them.

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@hmrtime @Lowes You might need to get in touch with corporate. We ordered replacement windows in April 2025 and are hoping with corporate involvement, we can finish this project in June 2026. Of course we paid in full when we placed order!

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@mattvanswol @greggutfeld I have followed your posts here and thought of you when I saw Leslie Stahl doing the segment on 60 Minutes.

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@Johnny_Joey We feed 3 sibling feral cats that we trapped & neutered. They bring us dead rats, moles, & lizards.

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@SteveOnSpeed Didn’t make sense for my husband and I because we needed to work until we could get Medicare at 65. My husband is 8 months older than I so he continued working until I turned 65 and we retired on the same day. We took social security at age 66.

[Peter Girnus 🦅 @gothburz]

I have two stacks on my desk. The left stack is financial disclosure forms from members of Congress. The right stack is waivers for members who filed their financial disclosures late.

The right stack is always taller.

On Wednesday morning, I watched a soldier get arrested on CNN.

I am a Disclosure Analyst for the House Ethics Committee. I have held this position for eleven years. My job is to receive the forms, verify their completeness, and file them. I do not investigate. I do not flag. I do not refer. I file. I have a lanyard. The lanyard says ETHICS.

The soldier's name is Gannon Ken Van Dyke. He is thirty-eight years old. He was stationed at Fort Bragg. He was Special Forces. In December, he created an account on a prediction market called Polymarket. On January 2nd, he bet $32,500 that the president of Venezuela would be removed from power. On January 3rd, he helped remove the president of Venezuela from power. He collected $409,881.

He has been charged with five federal crimes. Commodities fraud. Wire fraud. Unlawful use of confidential government information. Theft of nonpublic government information. Unlawful monetary transaction. The Department of Justice called it "the first-ever insider trading prosecution on event contracts."

I watched this on the television in our break room. Then I walked back to my desk and processed a late financial disclosure from a member of the House Financial Services Committee who purchased $250,000 in bank stocks eleven days before his subcommittee held a closed-door hearing on proposed capital reserve changes.

The filing was forty-seven days late. The STOCK Act requires disclosure within forty-five days. The penalty for late filing is $200.

I waived it.

I waive most of them. In 2021, fifty-four members of Congress and senior staff violated the reporting rules. The fines were minimal. Most were waived. I have a form for the waiver. The form has a box that says "Reason." I write "administrative delay." In ethics, "administrative delay" means the member's office forgot and then remembered when a reporter called. My approval rate is one hundred percent. In any other field, that number would trigger an audit. In mine, it is called thoroughness.

Let me show you what I processed this year.

January. A senator on the Armed Services Committee sold defense contractor shares worth $1.2 million. Three days later, his committee received a classified briefing that the Iran campaign had exceeded its projected cost by 340%. The stock dropped 8%. He filed the disclosure sixty-one days late. I calculated the fine. $200. His chief of staff asked if it could be waived. He did not ask what the senator traded on. Nobody asks that. The form does not have a field for it. I waived the fine. The senator's portfolio returned 23.4% in 2025. The S&P 500 returned 16.8%.

February. A representative on the Energy and Commerce Committee bought pharmaceutical stocks worth $400,000. Two weeks later, her committee advanced a bill that would extend patent exclusivity for the exact drug class she purchased. The stocks rose 14%. She filed on time. There was no fine. There was no investigation. There was nothing to investigate because buying stocks in companies regulated by your own committee is not illegal. It is legal. The STOCK Act made it legal by making it disclosed. In Congress, disclosed means legal. In my office, legal means filed.

March. A member whose spouse manages a portfolio worth $9.2 million reported forty-three separate transactions in a single quarter. Twelve of them were in sectors directly affected by legislation the member co-sponsored. The timing on eight of those twelve was within a two-week window of committee action. I logged all forty-three. None were flagged. We do not flag. We file.

I asked my supervisor once what would happen if I flagged a filing. She said we do not have a form for that. I never asked again.

In 2020, I processed 847 disclosures. In 2023, 1,211. In 2025, 1,614. The number of enforcement actions in each of those years was zero. The numerator changes. The denominator does not.

I want to tell you about the soldier again.

He made $409,881. He tried to delete his Polymarket account by calling customer service and saying he lost access to his email. He moved his profits into a foreign cryptocurrency vault and then into a new brokerage account. He used his real identity. He placed thirteen bets. Every single one was connected to an operation he personally participated in.

In my eleven years, I have processed disclosures from members of Congress who traded on:

Pending FDA approvals they learned about in committee.
Defense appropriations they voted on.
Trade policy they negotiated.
Pandemic response measures they drafted.
Interest rate decisions they were briefed on before the public.

None of them have been charged. None of them have been investigated by the Department of Justice. None of them have been referred to the SEC. The STOCK Act has produced zero prosecutions since it was signed on April 4th, 2012.

Fourteen years. Five hundred and thirty-five members. $635 million in trades last year alone. Zero cases.

My daughter asked me once what happens when someone breaks the rules. I told her we write it down. She asked what happens after that. I said it depends. She was nine. She is twenty now. It does not depend. Nothing happens after that.

The soldier made $409,881 and faces decades in prison. Nancy Pelosi entered Congress in 1987 with a portfolio worth approximately $785,000. It is now worth $133.7 million. That is a return of 16,930%. The Dow Jones returned 2,300% over the same period. Professional fund managers who beat the market for three consecutive years are considered exceptional. She has beaten it for thirty-seven. If a hedge fund produced those returns, the SEC would subpoena the records on a Thursday. She produced them from a building with a chapel and a gift shop.

She announced her retirement last year. No investigation was opened. No disclosure was flagged. Her filings were on time. In my office, on time means compliant. Compliant means closed.

I want to tell you about the fine.

$200. That is the maximum penalty for violating the STOCK Act's disclosure requirements. $200 for a member of Congress whose portfolio gained $4.7 million in a single quarter. I calculated what $200 represents as a percentage of $4.7 million. It is 0.004%. I could not find a comparison that made it meaningful. It is less than the price of the parking pass in the Rayburn garage. It is less than lunch at the members' dining room if you order the crab cakes, which I am told are excellent though I eat at my desk.

Since 2012, thirty-one bills have been introduced to restrict congressional trading. I keep a list. The list is longer than the STOCK Act itself.

On March 5th, 2026, a representative from Michigan introduced the thirty-second. He called it the "No Getting Rich in Congress Act." The bill would prohibit the President, Vice President, members of Congress, and their spouses from trading individual stocks, cryptocurrency, futures, and commodities while in office.

The bill was referred to committee. The committee has not scheduled a hearing. The committee is chaired by a member whose spouse executed $2.1 million in trades last year.

The bill will be reviewed. In my office, reviewed means read. Read means acknowledged. Acknowledged means a status has been assigned. A status is the absence of an action that has been given a name so it looks like one.

The soldier used classified information to make $409,881 on a prediction market. He has been charged with five federal crimes. The Department of Justice announced the case on the same day I processed three disclosures from members who traded on committee knowledge worth a combined $3.8 million.

The difference between the soldier and the members is not what they did. It is the building they did it in. He did it from Fort Bragg. They did it from the Capitol. He used a prediction market. They used the New York Stock Exchange. He bet on a military operation. They bet on the legislation they write.

He did not write the law. They did. They wrote the STOCK Act. Then they funded its enforcement at zero dollars. Then they set its maximum penalty at $200. Then they gave my office the authority to waive it. Then they traded $635 million.

The soldier flew to Caracas. He breached a compound. He put his body between a mission and a bullet. The people who ordered the operation were in a building with a credenza and sparkling water. They did not go to Caracas. They went to their brokerage accounts. The soldier made $409,881 and is now in federal custody. The people who knew what he was going to do before he did it made more and filed less. His prosecution is not a failure of the system. It is the system. One conviction per decade, at the lowest level, so the briefing slides can say enforcement exists. The $409,881 is not the crime. It is the cost of making $635 million look supervised.

In my field, we call this self-regulation.

The soldier's Polymarket account has been frozen. His military career is over. He will spend years in federal prison. My office will process every congressional disclosure filed this year. Every trade logged. Every $200 fine calculated and waived. The system is immaculate.

Fourteen years. Zero prosecutions. $635 million a year. A 16,930% return.

I have not leaked a document. I have not filed a complaint. I have not deviated from the process one single time. The process was written by the people whose forms I process.

As long as the disclosures go up and the cases don't, my performance review says I am meeting expectations.

My lanyard still says ETHICS. In eleven years, nobody has asked me to define the word.

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@TomSteyer On 4/14/2026 I paid $3.659/gal in central Florida

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@MeghanMcCain I voted against it in my state of Florida. I knew there was big money behind wanting it legalized. So many commercials & billboards trying to get it to pass. Glad it failed.

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@Ryanmatta The wife is usually the last to know….

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@asymmetricinfo @Heminator There’s a reason for so many ads pushing the advantage plans. It’s good for the insurance companies profits and not good for the senior citizens. I am sticking with traditional Medicare + a supplemental plan.

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@greta When I lived in TN, I was telling a coworker that I had to bring pop to my son’s soccer game. She asked “who’s Pop”?

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@gotrice2024 I had a Lowe’s delivery scheduled for today for a window and the driver said he had a pick up ticket to pick up sliders. He did not have my window. I ordered replacement windows from Lowe’s in April 2025 and as of today, only half the windows are installed. Not happy!

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@VickieforNYC @micsolana Never underestimate the ignorance of the American voter and even worse are the people who don’t even bother to vote.

[Shanaka Anslem Perera ⚡ @shanaka86]

BREAKING: The US Just Changed the Rules of Oil Warfare

At 6am today, US forces boarded the Skipper off Venezuela’s coast.

1.1 million barrels seized. Two helicopters. Twenty operators. Zero resistance.

This is not about one tanker.

The Skipper was sanctioned in 2022 for financing Hezbollah and Iran’s Revolutionary Guards through an illicit oil network run by Gulf businessman Viktor Artemov. It loaded Merey crude at Port José on December 4.

Destination: Cuba, then Asia.

It never arrived.

What happens next will reshape global oil markets.

Every Venezuelan shipping contract now requires “war clauses.” Freight costs are exploding. Merey crude discounts have doubled from $8 to $15 per barrel below Brent. PDVSA has lost all negotiating power.

One analyst: “When enforcement moves from paper sanctions to boots on deck, the market dynamics change completely.”

The mathematics of deterrence are brutal. Venezuela exports 921,000 barrels daily. Analysts estimate 300,000 to 500,000 barrels per day could vanish as shadow fleet operators recalculate risk.

The collateral damage is visible. Cuba’s oil imports have collapsed 35% this year. Provinces receive 2 to 4 hours of electricity daily. The seized tanker was their lifeline.

Meanwhile: 15,000 US troops in the Caribbean. The USS Gerald R. Ford carrier strike group on station. 87 killed in 22 strikes since September.

Trump yesterday: “Maduro’s days are numbered.”

Maduro today: “It’s not a time for cowards. It’s time for combat.”

The shadow fleet era just hit its breaking point.

This is not a seizure. This is a demonstration.

Paper sanctions are over. Physical enforcement has begun.

Watch the insurance markets. Watch China’s teapot refineries scramble.

The cascade is starting.

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@Lowes we needed to replace the windows in our home and had a Lowe’s representative come to our house in mid April 2025. We ordered 12 windows and paid in full. 7 months later, we still only have had 6 of the 12 windows installed. Our frustration level is off the chart!!!!

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@OneManCircus87 Drank 2 bottles just yesterday. It was awful but I survived. Now I will have to decide if I really want to do this again in 5 years like suggested….

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@newheightshow @tkelce @JasonKelce As a wife, I hate trying to figure out daily meals. I feel her pain!

[Gunther Eagleman™ @GuntherEagleman]

BREAKING: This mother on TikTok has a NONVERBAL autistic son, and she's been watching HHS and RFK Jr. like a HAWK, especially after they announced the supercharged research into autism.

After the recent announcements about Tylenol, she looked into Leucovorin because NOTHING else helped her son.

"He's been on on this medication for LESS THAN 48 hours and my son just SPOKE FOR THE FIRST TIME!"

"My nonverbal son just spoke for the FIRST TIME in over THREE YEARS!"

This is HUGE! Imagine how many more children would have LIFE CHANGING results if the TRUTH was told more!

Kudos to this mother for being BRAVE ENOUGH to speak the TRUTH!

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@LincolnMotorCo cam phasers need replacing at only 63,000 miles?? Really?? Navigators are NOT cheap and the dealer quoted a ridiculous amount to fix. No thanks!