https://www.sott.net/editorials Signs of the Times: The World for People who Think. Featuring independent, unbiased, alternative news and commentary on world events. en-us Original content Copyright 2026 by Signs of the Times/Sott.net. For other content, see our Fair Use Policy at www.sott.net. Fri, 17 Apr 2026 20:06:18 +0000 https://www.sott.net/images/sottlogo_rss.jpg SOTT.net https://www.sott.net https://www.sott.net/article/505790-Fun-With-AI-4-Trillions-Into-the-Void-The-Black-Budget-Black-Hole-Thats-Hiding-in-Plain-Sight What if the real conspiracy isn't secret plots — but the openly insane way "democracy" funnels taxpayer money into unaccountable black projects? Just a reminder of the premise of this little series of articles: AI cannot inject its own "ideas". It can only recombine what's in existing texts through predefined language patterns. To some extent, that can provide insights that look "new" (but hey, maybe they just look new to you because you haven't seen them before - doesn't mean that nobody has - the AI was trained on more texts than any of us can ever read), but it's not on the same level as what humans can come up with. There is clear limitation: the source material. Any AI output has to be based on that. Human thinking can go beyond that. So how "new" anything from AI is is basically a matter of semantics. The more important metric, IMO, is whether it's useful. And I'd say it certainly can be. Many of the answers are brilliant and capture the inner workings of the system we live... https://www.sott.net/article/505790-Fun-With-AI-4-Trillions-Into-the-Void-The-Black-Budget-Black-Hole-Thats-Hiding-in-Plain-Sight Fri, 17 Apr 2026 19:58:05 +0000 https://www.sott.net/article/505701-SOTT-Earth-Changes-Summary-March-2026-Extreme-Weather-Planetary-Upheaval-Meteor-Fireballs Solar Cycle 25 continued to defy expectations in March, with activity ramping up in the "post-peak phase". On March 16, Active Region 4392 produced an M2.7 flare, triggering an R1 radio blackout over the Atlantic, Africa, and southern Europe, and a vivid auroral display visible at mid-latitudes. On March 26, the AR4403 unleashed an M3.9 flare, and the month closed with a dramatic exclamation point: an X1.4 flare from AR4405 on March 30, the strongest event of the month. The eruption prompted forecasters to issue watches for G3 (strong) to G4 (severe) geomagnetic storms - a development that also raised concerns for NASA's Artemis 2 mission, scheduled to launch just days later. March 2026 brought catastrophic flooding and severe storm activity spanning nearly every continent: https://www.sott.net/article/505701-SOTT-Earth-Changes-Summary-March-2026-Extreme-Weather-Planetary-Upheaval-Meteor-Fireballs Mon, 13 Apr 2026 02:56:45 +0000 https://www.sott.net/article/505700-NewsReal-Trump-Card-US-Blockades-Irans-Blockade-to-Unblock-Strait-of-Hormuz If you were writing this for a Hollywood script, it would be rejected for being unrealistic. Trump's latest scheme to 'unblock the Strait of Hormuz' is almost certainly not going to work, but more importantly, what is the likelihood that hostilities will recommence between the US and Iran? Also, what really happened during that so-called 'rescue mission' south of Isfahan last week? And should we have sympathy for Trump? He seems to be at the mercy of forces he can neither placate nor out-maneuver... Running Time: 01:49:21 Download: MP3 — 100 MB https://www.sott.net/article/505700-NewsReal-Trump-Card-US-Blockades-Irans-Blockade-to-Unblock-Strait-of-Hormuz Sun, 12 Apr 2026 20:48:35 +0000 https://www.sott.net/article/505577-Fun-With-AI-3-Learned-Helplessness-The-Architecture-of-Self-Disabling Learned helplessness isn't just a psychological quirk — it's one of the most elegant control mechanisms ever engineered. In this installment, Mandatory Intellectomy dissects how modern institutions (from schools to healthcare to finance) systematically train people to doubt their own capabilities, defer to 'experts,' and collaborate in their own disempowerment. Properly prompted AI cuts through the noise to reveal the pattern: the System doesn't need constant brute force when people police themselves from the inside. Today, we present another fun discussion between Mandatory Intellectomy and his friendly AI sidekicks. But, before we dive in, I'd just like to remind the reader of a few salient facts about using AI. Knowledge isn't mere accumulation of data but a navigation of perceptions, biases, and justifications toward ontological alignment (what is). Consider two books: "Thinking: Fast and Slow" by Daniel Kahneman and "Blink" by Malcolm Gladwell. Yes, we humans can make mistakes... https://www.sott.net/article/505577-Fun-With-AI-3-Learned-Helplessness-The-Architecture-of-Self-Disabling Mon, 06 Apr 2026 12:25:08 +0000 https://www.sott.net/article/505451-NewsReal-Trumps-D-Day-Do-or-Die A month into his "little excursion" in Iran, Trump's campaign of sustained airstrikes is yielding preposterous results: significant damage in Iran, but also in America's regional client-states, and also in key global supply chains. Every Monday he calms 'the markets' with assurances that the war is won and "very nearly over," and every Friday, when markets close, he threatens "TOTAL DEATH AND DESTRUCTION!" In the meantime, non-stop rumors of American troop movements suggest Trump is seriously considering a ground invasion of Iran, ostensibly to "reopen the Strait of Hormuz." Which actually is open, just now on Iran's terms. The US president apparently seeks to return shipping there to the status quo ante. But can he do it with a small landing force? And would such a move even work? It's D-Day for the West as we knew it: do, or die. Running Time: 01:37:39 Download: MP3 — 89.4 MB https://www.sott.net/article/505451-NewsReal-Trumps-D-Day-Do-or-Die Mon, 30 Mar 2026 20:37:09 +0000 https://www.sott.net/article/505274-NewsReal-Iran-War-Winding-Down-or-Escalating-Israel-Leading-Trump-Towards-Quagmire Trump's "short-term excursion" in Iran is going from bad to worse. And so are his incoherent positions on the situation and what to do about it. With gas prices jumping the world over, humanity is staring down the barrel of global food shortages and severe energy disruptions, while the US military is seriously considering direct military confrontation with Iranian forces to "free the Strait of Hormuz." In the midst of all this, rumors are flying about Netanyahu's whereabouts, and 'someone' is carrying out missile strikes, in Iran's name, against high-profile military sites like the US-UK military base on Diego Garcia in the Indian Ocean, against energy infrastructure targets in neutral countries, and against important cultural sites like Jerusalem's Old City. 'They' seem determined to cause global FUBAR. Can Trump do anything to stop them? Or has he become their hostage? Running Time: 01:38:24 Download: MP3 — 90.1 MB https://www.sott.net/article/505274-NewsReal-Iran-War-Winding-Down-or-Escalating-Israel-Leading-Trump-Towards-Quagmire Sun, 22 Mar 2026 20:52:59 +0000 https://www.sott.net/article/505249-Screw-the-Pooch-Betray-the-Base According to Gallup polling from last year, up to 45% of adult Americans identify as political independents. That's a plurality, as the remainder is evenly split between Democrats and Republicans, with 27% each. Forty-five percent is around 120 million adults, and that number has been growing for the past 20 years, driven largely by the younger generations. It's easy to see why. Neither party represents them. Every four years, independents are put in the position of either throwing their vote away for a third-party candidate who will get at most 3% of the popular vote, or choosing what they see as the lesser of two evils. (In the last 50 years, only Ross Perot came close, winning 19% in 1992.) That's not to say independents are a homogeneous group. Slightly more independents lean Democrat than Republican (20% vs. 15%), with a core 10% who explicitly reject both parties. Given the choice (and an electoral system that would support it), their votes might be split among a handful of... https://www.sott.net/article/505249-Screw-the-Pooch-Betray-the-Base Fri, 20 Mar 2026 20:18:21 +0000 https://www.sott.net/article/505196-SOTT-Earth-Changes-Summary-February-2026-Extreme-Weather-Planetary-Upheaval-Meteor-Fireballs Widespread flooding and landslides across Europe, Asia, and South America, alongside record snowfalls and deadly avalanches in Japan and the Alps, marked this month. Volcanic eruptions occurred at Mount Semeru in Indonesia and Kanlaon in the Philippines, while a powerful cyclone struck Madagascar. Multiple meteor fireball sightings were reported globally, and severe storms caused power outages and disruptions in several regions. Early in the month, solar activity included multiple X-class flares that triggered geomagnetic storms and auroras visible in parts of the U.S. and Europe. https://www.sott.net/article/505196-SOTT-Earth-Changes-Summary-February-2026-Extreme-Weather-Planetary-Upheaval-Meteor-Fireballs Tue, 17 Mar 2026 15:11:16 +0000 https://www.sott.net/article/505175-NewsReal-USA-Israel-Confident-of-Victory-Despite-Strong-Iranian-Resistance Something's gotta give. Iran is being practically carpet-bombed, resulting in widespread civilian destruction. Despite near-total regional censorship, satellite imagery and some video footage is documenting mild-to-strong 'hits' on US bases and other assets across the whole region. Trump assures us Iran's military is 'destroyed', yet he acknowledges Iran's de facto closure of the Strait of Hormuz and the high risks this presents for the regional and thus global economy. The heavy criticism Trump has come under for 'blundering into war' overlooks something though: neither he nor the 'permanent govt' advisors he listens to is oblivious to the knock-on effects of what they're doing. However chaotic the situation appears - and the situation IS chaotic! - they're confident they can contain both Iran and the 'oil shock' situation they've created. They are, after all, "history's actors," and the rest of us are left, as usual, "to study what they do..." They may be losing public support,... https://www.sott.net/article/505175-NewsReal-USA-Israel-Confident-of-Victory-Despite-Strong-Iranian-Resistance Sun, 15 Mar 2026 22:02:24 +0000 https://www.sott.net/article/505058-NewsReal-Operation-Epic-Fury-What-Are-The-Americans-Furious-About One week into the US-Israeli attack on Iran, the mission has been extended from "4 days" to "4 weeks" to "4 months" to "as long as it takes." But what IS the mission? It was "regime change," but Iran is not "surrendering" despite its leadership being assassinated. In fact, surviving Iranian leadership is conveying that its counter-strikes will continue until ITS mission is accomplished. So, a war of attrition until one side blinks? In the meantime, damage to neighboring countries in the Middle East, and to the global economy, is already setting in. This missile war threatens to become a maelstrom of truly epic proportions. Which brings us to what is motivating the Americans to do this. We all know they're in lockstep with an Israeli regime that has been salivating at the prospect of "taking out Iran" since 1979. But why the desperation, extreme rhetoric, absurdity and gross risk-taking from the Americans? What, truly, made them furious enough with Iran to even name their operation... https://www.sott.net/article/505058-NewsReal-Operation-Epic-Fury-What-Are-The-Americans-Furious-About Sun, 08 Mar 2026 21:50:30 +0000 https://www.sott.net/article/236475-The-Most-Dangerous-Cult-in-The-World Comment: Given that many conservatives today, including Donald Trump, support Israel, we thought it time to republish this article, first posted 19 years ago. The article explores the explosive intersection of Christian Zionism, dispensationalist eschatology (often called Armageddon theology), and the long-standing push for a Third Temple on Jerusalem's Temple Mount. Drawing from the works of Gershom Gorenberg (The End of Days) and Grace Halsell (Forcing God's Hand), it examines how certain evangelical Christian groups — along with allied militant Zionist elements — view the modern State of Israel, the regathering of Jews, and preparations like the breeding of unblemished red heifers as literal fulfillments of biblical prophecy signaling the approach of Christ's Second Coming, the Rapture, Tribulation, and ultimate apocalyptic battle. These beliefs, rooted in 19th-century teachings from figures like John Darby, portray support for Israel's expansion and control over contested holy... https://www.sott.net/article/236475-The-Most-Dangerous-Cult-in-The-World Thu, 05 Mar 2026 15:53:45 +0000 https://www.sott.net/article/504974-Fun-With-AI-1-The-System-By-Design-Not-Stupidity How LLMs turn vague red-pill intuitions into crystal-clear explanations (and why "AI censorship" is just user error) Tired of knowing the world is rigged but struggling to explain it without sounding like a tinfoil-hat guy? In the launch of my new "Fun With AI" series, we hand the hardest questions to uncensored LLMs and get back answers so sharp they'll make normies choke on their Kool-Aid. From psychopathic power structures to why the masses cheer for their own enslavement, this is the clearest breakdown you'll ever read — and proof that the "censorship" people complain about is just a skill issue. Welcome to the red-pill classroom. ~~~ You've probably all realised at some point that you understand relatively well how most things work in our world, but explaining it to others is a different matter. You accumulate knowledge over decades and understand many things intuitively, but formulating them in a way that normies can grasp is often difficult to impossible. LLMs simplify this... https://www.sott.net/article/504974-Fun-With-AI-1-The-System-By-Design-Not-Stupidity Wed, 04 Mar 2026 14:44:25 +0000 https://www.sott.net/article/504928-NewsReal-Historic-Miscalculation-US-Israel-Decapitate-Iranian-Regime-Yet-Iran-is-Striking-Back-HARD And so it begins. This time it isn't 'kayfabe' and 'negotiated strikes and counter-strikes'. The 'peace president', when announcing joint US-Israeli strikes against Iran on 28 February, said it would just take a few days, and gloated that he 'took out the regime' by targeting top Iranian leadership, including Ayatollah Khamenei. But Iran's swift and massive response - bombing 11 countries housing US and Israeli military bases and installations, including a British base in Cyprus, EU territory - now has Trump saying the war will 'last for weeks'... What did they think was going to happen, that Iranians would 'rise up and take power from their oppressors'? The Americans appear to have truly believed their own propaganda. In reality, Iranians are defiantly rallying in support of their country, and government, while Muslims across the region are preparing to potentially join the fray and do as Iran has always sought: remove all American military forces from the Persian Gulf, if not the... https://www.sott.net/article/504928-NewsReal-Historic-Miscalculation-US-Israel-Decapitate-Iranian-Regime-Yet-Iran-is-Striking-Back-HARD Mon, 02 Mar 2026 08:14:31 +0000 https://www.sott.net/article/504838-The-Real-Pandemic-Profiteers They called us grifters. Then the Epstein Files opened. In 2021, the President of the United States told the nation that I and eleven other Americans were killing people — and the organization that gave him that claim was funded by the same dark money networks whose offshore vaccine profits we had been investigating. Executive Summary The hit job: In 2020-2021, a coordinated network of UK-based NGOs — funded by the same philanthropies whose pandemic-related financial interests they were protecting — deployed government officials, tech platforms, AI moderation systems, legal threats, and parliamentary privilege to brand twelve named Americans as killers, criminals, and terrorists for questioning official pandemic narratives. The architecture: Epstein file releases document that the individuals declared off-limits had designed offshore vaccine funds projecting "tens of billions" in returns, brokered Rothschild DOJ settlements through a convicted sex offender, and listed "pandemic" as... https://www.sott.net/article/504838-The-Real-Pandemic-Profiteers Wed, 25 Feb 2026 01:21:36 +0000 https://www.sott.net/article/504798-NewsReal-US-Iran-Stand-Off-Art-of-the-Trumpian-Deal-or-War-For-Oil-Israel The 'major build-up' of US military forces in and around the Middle East sure makes it look like D-Day for 'war with Iran' is imminent. What people are overlooking, however, is that this is Trump doing his 'maximum pressure' routine with a view to 'deal-making', not blowing the world up to kingdom come. The situation is certainly tense, a lot is at stake, and Trump is under tremendous pressure by Israel to 'commit', but the world has changed, and Iran is not Syria or Libya. There will almost certainly be 'kinetic action', but perhaps not the kind envisioned by most. Running Time: 02:03:28 Download: MP3 — 113 MB https://www.sott.net/article/504798-NewsReal-US-Iran-Stand-Off-Art-of-the-Trumpian-Deal-or-War-For-Oil-Israel Mon, 23 Feb 2026 08:38:19 +0000 https://www.sott.net/article/504793-EU-Sanctions-German-Journalist-In-Shocking-First-Over-Gaza-Reporting In January, a post I saw on Twitter/X shocked me. "URGENT: As of now, I have ZERO access to any money," Hüseyin Dogru wrote. "I can't provide food for my family, including two newborns, due to EU sanctions." Dogru is a journalist, a German citizen living in Berlin. After reading his post, I sent him a private message offering to order groceries and have them sent to his home. The reply shocked me even more. "Unfortunately, I'm not allowed to accept any financial or material support," Dogru wrote. Dogru is the first European Union citizen known to be living inside the EU to face extrajudicial sanctions imposed by Brussels - robbing him of fundamental civil and humanitarian rights. He's also the first person to be sanctioned specifically for his reporting related to Palestine. https://www.sott.net/article/504793-EU-Sanctions-German-Journalist-In-Shocking-First-Over-Gaza-Reporting Sun, 22 Feb 2026 21:17:15 +0000 https://www.sott.net/article/504775-Help-is-on-the-Way-Cosmic-Reset-Mechanism "There are periods in the life of humanity, which generally coincide with the beginning of the fall of cultures and civilizations, when the masses irretrievably lose their reason and begin to destroy everything that has been created by centuries and millenniums of culture. Such periods of mass madness, often coinciding with geological cataclysms, climatic changes, and similar phenomena of a planetary character, release a very great quantity of the matter of knowledge. This, in its turn, necessitates the work of collecting this matter of knowledge which would otherwise be lost. Thus the work of collecting scattered matter of knowledge frequently coincides with the beginning of the destruction and fall of cultures and civilizations." - George Ivanovich Gurdjieff, quoted by P. D. Ouspensky, In Search of the Miraculous: Fragments of an Unknown Teaching (1949). On July 7th, 2003, SOTT.net's founding editor Laura Knight-Jadczyk published 'Independence Day', in which she posited a 'cosmic... https://www.sott.net/article/504775-Help-is-on-the-Way-Cosmic-Reset-Mechanism Sat, 21 Feb 2026 22:38:17 +0000 https://www.sott.net/article/504740-Confirmed-Israeli-Intelligence-Installed-Maintained-Security-System-at-Epsteins-NYC-Apartment-Complex The Israeli government installed security equipment and controlled access to a Manhattan apartment building managed by convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, according to a set of emails recently released by the Department of Justice. The equipment was installed starting in early 2016 at 301 E. 66th Street — the residence where former Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak frequently stayed for stretches at a time. The security operation at "Ehud's apartment" was in place for at least two years, emails from the DOJ disclosure show, with officials from the Israeli permanent mission to the United Nations corresponding regularly with Epstein's staff regarding security. The apartment was technically owned by a company connected to Epstein's brother, Mark Epstein, but was effectively controlled by Jeffrey Epstein. Units in the building were frequently loaned out to Epstein's contacts and used to house underage models. Rafi Shlomo, then-director of protective service at the Israeli mission... https://www.sott.net/article/504740-Confirmed-Israeli-Intelligence-Installed-Maintained-Security-System-at-Epsteins-NYC-Apartment-Complex Thu, 19 Feb 2026 21:19:48 +0000 https://www.sott.net/article/504665-SOTT-Earth-Changes-Summary-January-2026-Extreme-Weather-Planetary-Upheaval-Meteor-Fireballs It seems like Solar Cycle 25 still has some surprises in store with sudden high-level activity despite being "post-peak". An X1.9-class flare erupted on January 18 at 18:09 UTC from AR4341, classified as the strongest of the month, triggering an R3 radio blackout and followed by a fast coronal mass ejection (CME) traveling at around 1700 km/s toward Earth. This led to a severe S4 solar radiation storm on January 19 — the first such event since 2003 — posing risks to astronauts and polar flights, while producing vivid auroras visible globally. The spikes in solar activity have influenced this month's seismic activity, amplified storm intensity, and contributed to atmospheric instabilities worldwide. January 2026 saw extreme weather, including record snowfall in North America and unseasonal cold snaps in Europe, alongside devastating floods and landslides in Asia and Africa. Seismic activity included multiple magnitude 6+ earthquakes in Mexico, Japan, the Philippines, and Pakistan.... https://www.sott.net/article/504665-SOTT-Earth-Changes-Summary-January-2026-Extreme-Weather-Planetary-Upheaval-Meteor-Fireballs Sun, 15 Feb 2026 23:08:34 +0000 https://www.sott.net/article/504651-NewsReal-Epstein-Epistemology-Why-Trump-Wants-Epstein-Files-To-Go-Away It seems as if everyone who is reading and discussing 'the Epstein Files', most of which are emails exchanged between Jeffrey Epstein and the 'great and powerful', is assuming the worst from them: that Epstein himself, and his co-conspirators, engaged in child sex-trafficking and indulged in the worst abuse of minors, including 'ritual sacrifice' and even cannibalism. While there is evidence for such dark practices in 'elite circles', the hard evidence for such in 'the Epstein Files' isn't there. When considering whether or not to 'assume the worst', consideration must also be given to the context in which these 'revelations' are occurring: Trump's second term and the major damage it can do to his intention of enacting the electoral mandate he was given by the American people. In the meantime, Trump is also under tremendous pressure to 'regime change Iran', an issue he has made clear he does not want to see result in a protracted bloody conflict, but which 'the deep state',... https://www.sott.net/article/504651-NewsReal-Epstein-Epistemology-Why-Trump-Wants-Epstein-Files-To-Go-Away Sun, 15 Feb 2026 19:32:41 +0000