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Wednesday, December 17, 2025

The greatest composer of all time only lived to be 56 years of age and the Grand Maestro had so much, much more music to compose. One of the torch-bearers at Ludwig van Beethoven's funeral was the pioneering Franz Schubert who lived in the shadow of the great composer in Vienna. Schubert, himself a musical visionary, worshipped Beethoven at a distance and even though both composers lived in Vienna at the same time, there is no evidence to support that they ever met. Beethoven's 9th Symphony No. 9 in D minor, Op. 125 (Ode to Joy') is the national anthem of the European Union (EU). In Japan, "Ode to Joy" is played nationwide on Christmas and New Year's Eve.


Under the Epstein Files Transparency Act, the Justice Department must release its documents on Epstein within 30 days after the bill was signed into law. Dummkopf Trumpf signed the act on 19 Nov, meaning the files must be released by 19 Dec. Not all of the documents could be released, as the law makes an exception for documents that "would jeopardize an active federal investigation or ongoing prosecution, provided that such withholding is narrowly tailored and temporary."


Pro-Kremlin nuns from Belarus, operating stalls at Christmas markets across Europe, are raising funds to directly support Russia's war in Ukraine.


For the first time in history, maritime drones disabled a submarine. The Security Service of Ukraine (SSU) deployed underwater drones to attack a Kilo-class Russian submarine in the port of Novorossiysk, causing it critical damage and rendering it ineffective.


Tuesday, December 16, 2025

Via Executive Order, Dummkopf Trumpf ordered various restrictions or a complete ban of people coming to the US from Afghanistan, Burma, Chad, Republic of the Congo, Equatorial Guinea, Eritrea, Haiti, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Yemen, Burkina Faso, Mali, Niger, South Sudan, Syria, Gaza Strip/West Bank; Laos, Sierra Leone, Burundi, Cuba, Togo, and Venezuela.


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Maestro's Arturo Toscanini and Herbert von Karajan conducted robust high tempo versions of Beethoven's Ninth Symphony, both versions slightly over one hour. One of the challenges conductors have had over the decades was performing Beethoven's Ninth Symphony in exactly one hour, like this: Beethoven's 9th in One Hour.

And this is what Beethoven's Tenth Symphony in E-flat major might have sounded like, as pieced together in 1988 by Barry Cooper from the Immortal Maestro's fragmentary sketches for the first movement. Barry Cooper used no AI in his hypothetical arrangement: Beethoven's Tenth Symphony (Unfinished)

For those of you with time, two non-paywall NYT articles regarding Jeffrey Epstein follow. One describes his meteoric rise in the world of high finance and society and the other is a diary of one of Epstein's girlfriends, revealing some insights into the deceased child sex trafficker:

1) Meteoric Rise

2) Diary Secrets

Former Israeli spy Ari Ben-Menashe claims in his book "Epstein: Dead Men Tell No Tales" Jeffrey Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell were Israeli spies. Ben-Menashe alleges they ran a "honey-trap" operation, providing young girls to politicians for sex and then using the incidents to blackmail them for Israeli intelligence.

Ben-Menashe, who claims to have been Ghislaine Maxwell's handler, states that Epstein was introduced to Mossad by Maxwell's father, Robert Maxwell, also an Israeli espionage agent. The book suggests that Maxwell may have worked for other governments as a double or triple agent.


The Ukraine SSU and the Ukrainian navy conducted the unique special operation using Sub Sea Baby naval drones against the Russian submarine that was launching Kalibr cruise missiles against Ukrainian targets. Map: Novorossiysk

On Day 1,392 of the Kremlin's brutal invasion of Ukraine, the Russian military has lost ~1,190,620 personnel, 1,150 in the past 24 hours alone. In addition to the ruined submarine, Russia has lost 432 aircraft and 347 helicopters.

An international arrest warrant for war crimes issued by the ICC remains active for Vladimir Putin. An indictment is merely an allegation. Mr. Putin is presumed innocent until proven guilty beyond a shadow of a doubt at an international tribunal to be held for him at the Hague at a future date.

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