Anja Koch in Saxony-Anhalt, Germany08/15/2026August 15, 2026

For decades, coal was the lifeblood of the eastern German state of Saxony-Anhalt. But in 2020 the German government decided to phase out coal. To cushion the impact, the government approved a massive support program.

https://p.dw.com/p/5Iqwa

https://5d8704f2acaa29648c76de8c0a8f3113.safeframe.googlesyndication.com/safeframe/1-0-45/html/container.html

For more than a century, coal mining shaped eastern Germany, often at the cost of entire villages such as Grossgrimma, whose residents were relocated before mining plans were ultimately abandoned.

As Germany phases out coal by 2038, Saxony-Anhalt faces uncertainty over jobs, identity, and economic prospects. More than €5 billion ($5.8 billion) in transition funding is financing projects like a new education campus, but many locals remain skeptical, questioning how the money is spent and whether it will create lasting opportunities.

Despite concerns, some residents remain hopeful that innovation and younger generations can drive the region’s future.

BREAKING: The 60-day US-Iran deadline just ran out with no deal.

The Islamabad MoU gave both sides until today to lock in a final agreement. Nothing got signed.

They can’t even agree on what the expiry means. Washington calls it the end of a ceasefire. Tehran says the MoU ended the war, so there was never a truce to extend.

Hormuz is the real fight. Iran reclosed it, the US reinstated its blockade, and Trump’s now floating declaring the strait U.S. territory.

Everything points to more escalation. But six months in, both sides are exhausted enough that neither might have the appetite.

Source: Al Jazeera / Writer: Daniyal

https://twitter.com/Vivek4real_/status/2088689931229274116/video/1

BUCHANAN: Dublin Time Machine

@RobLooseCannon

Did you know the IRA went on the rampage against moneylenders, and got accused of anti-Semitism by the Dublin Jewish community? In the summer of 1926, armed volunteers turned up at the doors of known “Usurers”. Usury is giving loans charging high or illegal interest rates. The IRA demanded these moneylenders hand over their ledgers and account books.

Fiona Plunkett was one of those IRA members convicted. She was jailed for her part in a raid on Edward Levi’s home, where three volunteers demanded he hand over his books at gunpoint. An Phoblacht characterised the campaign as a kind of moral crusade, confiscating the tools of financial exploitation. But this type of action wasnt actually dealing with the poverty and institutional problems behind it.

The reality was Dublin’s tenement poor had nowhere else to turn for credit, despite the fact these moneylenders charged interest that could bury a family for a decade over the price of a coat or a coffin. Thats what needed to be addressed, creating a fair and sustainable societal system for the emerging Free State. A large number of moneylenders in Dublin at the time were Jewish. The IRA denied it was anti-Semitic and insisted this was purely about protecting the poor from usury, regardless of who was doing the lending. Not everyone believed them.

In 1926 Ireland’s Jewish population was about 3,686 people, and the overwhelming majority lived in Dublin. This Jewish community was concentrated around Clanbrassil Street, Portobello and the neighnourhood was fondly known as “Little Jerusalem”. Most of these people were descendents of immigrants from Lithuania and Russia. Relatively prosperous families of Litvak origin became heavily involved in moneylending and pawnbroking. They gave rise to the colloquial Dublin term “Jewman”.

Irish Jewish author Joseph Edelsteins novel “The Moneylender”, published in 1908, is set in Dublin’s Portobello district. It’s about a Jewish immigrant who flees Russian pogroms and becomes a ruthless moneylender in Ireland to exact revenge on Gentile society for his family’s past suffering. The book sparked considerable backlash within Dublin’s Jewish community. Obviously Jewish people werent the only moneylenders operating in Dublin and likewise Jewish Dubliners worked and participated in every aspect of society in the city, including medical and retail and commercial businesses.

The Mushatt Brothers of Francis Street are a great example. They single handedly provided affordable medical and community care for generations, which we`ve previously visited in the DTM. And of course theres patriotic families like the Briscoes, especially Robert Briscoe who was a hero of the War of Independence and made history as the first Jewish Lord Mayor of Dublin in 1956.

The whole IRA anti-moneylending campaign just fizzled out a few weeks later, when priests and community liased between the targetted moneylenders and the Volunteers. Sadly the extortionate enslavement of extortionate usury continued to prey on working class Dubliners. For more on what people, predominantly desperate mammies, had to do to make ends meet and put food on the table, check out some other DTM trips, including loan sharks.

https://www.gzeromedia.com/video/ian-explains/collapse-of-the-aid-system

The collapse of the aid system

Ian Bremmer

August 14, 2026

Make us preferred on Google

What happens when the world’s humanitarian safety net starts to disappear? On Ian Explains, Ian Bremmer breaks down the state of the collapsing global aid system—a problem that’s easy to ignore, until it isn’t. For decades, international aid has helped fight poverty, contain disease outbreaks, prevent famine, and keep fragile countries from collapsing. But after the United States shut down USAID and other wealthy countries began pulling back their own commitments, that system is under unprecedented strain.

From the Ebola outbreak in the Democratic Republic of Congo to soaring food and fuel costs caused by the war in Iran, the shrinking global aid budget is making global crises even harder to contain. In countries like Sudan and Somalia, where hunger and conflict are already driving people from their homes, daily life has become even more difficult. Foreign aid is often dismissed as charity, but Bremmer explains why the consequences of abandoning humanitarian relief extend far beyond the borders of the countries that need it the most.

GZERO World with Ian Bremmer, the award-winning weekly global affairs series, airs nationwide on US public television stations (check local listings).

New digital episodes of GZERO World are released weekly on YouTube. Don’t miss an episode: subscribe to GZERO’s YouTube channel and turn on notifications (🔔).

New research shows quantum states in the brain may link consciousness to the entire universe.

In a fascinating convergence of physics and neuroscience, recent research suggests that human consciousness may function as a quantum phenomenon—one that connects our minds with the broader universe.

Building on the controversial Orch OR (Orchestrated Objective Reduction) theory, scientists are now producing experimental evidence that supports the idea that microtubules—structures within brain cells—can maintain quantum coherence, even in the brain’s warm, wet environment.

These quantum states could be the key to consciousness existing as a wave capable of superposition and entanglement, potentially linking human awareness to quantum systems across space.

This theory has gained new traction thanks to simulations and experiments showing that quantum reactions can persist inside microtubules for significantly longer than expected.

Meanwhile, theoretical physicist Timothy Palmer suggests that consciousness may reside in a cosmic fractal “state space”—a shared geometric structure that might explain both free will and our sense of being interconnected with the universe.

While not yet definitive, this research marks a critical step toward understanding consciousness as more than a neural illusion: it may be a quantum feature of reality itself.