THE NEWS

If you or someone you know is having thoughts of suicide, please contact the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 1—800-273-TALK (8255).When Patrick Clancy took the stand in his ex-wife’s murder trial, he had already begun building a new life hundreds of miles away in New York City, over four hours away from the Duxbury, Massachusetts home where Lindsay Clancy killed their her kids.Lindsay Clancy, 36, faces three counts of first-degree murder in the deaths of her children — Cora, Dawson and Callan, all under age 6 — who were found strangled at the family’s home in January 2023. The prosecution concluded its case Monday morning, and her defense attorney has since begun presenting arguments, asserting that she was in the grip of postpartum psychosis when she killed her children.LINDSAY CLANCY PROSECUTORS ‘SQUEEZE’ TIMELINE FROM EX-HUSBAND AS JURY WEIGHS ‘MURDER VERSUS MADNESS’: EXPERTPatrick Clancy, a business applications sales executive at Microsoft, has since divorced Lindsay, relocated to New York City and wed Dr. Rachel Danis in a Central Park ceremony in spring 2026. She reportedly moved into Patrick’s Upper East Side apartment in 2025.He moved to New York City in spring 2023, just months after Lindsay Clancy killed her three children, according to public records obtained by the New York Post, and filed for divorce in February 2024.Kevin Reddington, Lindsay Clancy’s defense attorney, said in court that Patrick “suffered one of the worst tragedies that anyone could ever suffer.””How that guy is not an emotional basketcase is beyond me, and he is trying hard to move on with his life. As the court is aware, they’re divorced, he’s remarried, he has a family,” Reddington said.Danis and Patrick Clancy have no children together, though she has spoken publicly about wanting to become a mother.LINDSAY CLANCY’S EX-HUSBAND DETAILS PILL USE AS EXPERT SAYS EVIDENCE COULD SHAPE MURDER TRIAL”I remember when I first froze my eggs, I felt like, I mean, even sometimes still, feel like this black sheep,” she said on the Fertility Forward podcast in September 2024. “I think for women, it’s just really hard. We have so much pressure to balance career and personal growth, but like, we’re riddled with this fertility stuff.”Patrick Clancy was seen with his wife, Rachel Danis, on Aug. 13 at an apartment in Manhattan, a source told TMZ.A shared passion for hiking and fitness brought the couple together, Men’s Journal reported.Patrick Clancy, along with family members, founded the Heard Foundation, which seeks to “change how parents are cared for—so no parent faces perinatal mental illness in silence and no family is left behind.”According to the foundation’s website, it was “founded in memory of Cora, Dawson, and Callan Clancy.”Just days after Lindsay Clancy killed her kids in January 2023, Patrick wrote on a GoFundMe page, “I want to ask all of you that you find it deep within yourselves to forgive Lindsay, as I have…The real Lindsay was generously loving and caring towards everyone – me, our kids, family, friends, and her patients.””The very fibers of her soul are loving. All I wish for her now is that she can somehow find peace,” he wrote.Patrick Clancy remained composed while testifying in his ex-wife’s murder trial, though he struggled to hold back tears as he spoke about his children.LINDSAY CLANCY JURORS VISIT CRIME SCENE IN KAREN READ-STYLE MOVE TO TEST TIMELINE: RETIRED JUDGE”Cora was into princesses and she had a lot of friends,” Patrick Clancy said. “She just liked taking care of people.”FOLLOW THE FOX TRUE CRIME TEAM ON XHe said that Callan, the youngest child, “was just a happy baby.”LINDSAY CLANCY JUDGE SHIELDS 911 CALL, AUTOPSY PHOTOS IN MOM’S TRIPLE-MURDER TRIALPatrick Clancy said Dawson “liked the television show Paw Patrol” and was into firefighters and trucks.SIGN UP TO GET THE LATEST TRUE CRIME NEWSDonna Rotunno, a criminal defense attorney, noted in an interview with Fox News Digital that Patrick Clancy’s own mother, Susan Clancy, was a witness for the defense.PROSECUTOR CORNERS LINDSAY CLANCY’S CATHOLIC MOTHER-IN-LAW WITH ‘MORTAL SIN’ QUESTIONLIKE WHAT YOU’RE READING? CLICK HERE FOR MORE”She is extremely sympathetic to what Lindsay was going through. And if you thought that, you know, anybody would wanna be upset about the loss of their grandchildren, it would be her, correct? She’s the father’s mother, and she’s there supporting Lindsay so much so that she nodded to her as she walked out of the courtroom in this unbelievable, I think, show of humanity,” Rotunno said.SEND US A TIPWATCH:LISTEN TO THE NEW ‘CRIME & JUSTICE WITH DONNA ROTUNNO’ PODCASTSheila Cavanaugh, a board-certified chaplain at Brigham and Women’s Hospital, testified Thursday that during her visit with Lindsay Clancy on Jan. 31, 2023 — just days after she killed her children — the woman accused of murder told her, “I am so glad my children are safe.”LINDSAY CLANCY DESCRIBED A MALE VOICE ORDERING HER TO ‘KILL HER CHILDREN AND KILL HERSELF’: TESTIMONYGET BREAKING NEWS BY EMAILCavanaugh said she responded that the children were safe in heaven with God, and the two prayed together.Judge William Sullivan ended court early on Thursday after one witness testified, sending jurors home until Friday.

The Los Angeles Dodgers have become baseball’s evil empire over the last few years, starting with the signing of Shohei Ohtani in late 2023.They added Yoshinobu Yamamoto, Teoscar Hernandez and Tyler Glasnow that offseason as well, then won the 2024 World Series over the New York Yankees. And instead of resting on their laurels, they kept going afterward. The front office signed Tanner Scott and Blake Snell, Roki Sasaki chose LA over the other interested teams and they brought back Tommy Edman and Teoscar Hernandez. Then won the World Series again.In the 2025-2026 offseason, baseball fans, particularly on X, lost their collective minds and any and all connection with rationality when LA added Kyle Tucker and Edwin Díaz. Nobody could compete with the Dodgers talent, the argument went, and with no weaknesses, they were virtually unstoppable other than with a salary cap.MLB’S SALARY CAP PROPOSAL WON’T FIX THE LEAGUE’S NON-EXISTENT COMPETITIVE BALANCE PROBLEMSFast forward to August, and Tucker’s been a below average hitter this year and Edwin Díaz has an ERA around 12. The Dodgers went just 2-11 over a recent stretch against the Red Sox, Chicago Cubs and Milwaukee Brewers. Those Brewers, near the bottom in total payroll, have the best record in baseball, along with the tiebreaker over LA in the race for the best record in the National League.The Dodgers’ financial advantages over most teams, and their success in building consistently competitive rosters, has created a subculture of fans who view LA as the ultimate enemy. Fans who prefer when teams do not try to win, and when billionaire owners pocket more profits instead of signing players. And those fans were given an enormous gift when news broke that one of the team’s owners, Mark Walter, was under investigation by the federal government over a series of loans connected to insurance companies he owns and controls.The details of the investigation are complicated, to say the least, but the short version is that two companies Walter controls, both insurance companies, used investor funds on private-credit deals, essentially making loans directly to businesses. Some of those businesses were also under Walter’s control.This isn’t entirely unusual, but the scale of it allegedly seems to go well beyond what’s “typical” in these types of investments, and there are questions about how they were handled in investor disclosures.The scale of the potentially improper loans could be quite significant, with some reports putting it at $16 billion and others at $20 billion. Even for someone as wealthy as Walter, that’s a lot of money. Which could explain why he was willing, or even looking, to sell the Los Angeles Lakers after just a year as team owner, for $12.5 billion.The widespread reaction to this on some corners of baseball internet has been that the insurance company loans meant that the Dodgers payroll and team is based on fraud. Particularly that the massive deferrals built into Shohei Ohtani’s contract are part of some sort of Ponzi scheme. That is inaccurate, not what the investigation covers, and viral posts on X are misleading people either through incompetence or purposefully misleading information.One such example? That the Dodgers pioneered deferred contracts or took advantage of deferrals to sign Ohtani. Deferred contracts have been in place in Major League Baseball for decades, and most teams in the league have either used that strategy or are currently using it.Rafael Devers has $75 million deferred. Jose Ramirez has $70 million. Alex Bregman has $70 million. Corbin Burnes has $64 million. Dylan Cease has $64 million. Max Scherzer, Anthony Santander, Francisco Lindor, Nolan Arenado, Christian Yelich, Giancarlo Stanton, Framber Valdez, Christopher Sanchez and Devin Williams are all examples of players with significant deferred compensation.Yes, the Dodgers have used it more aggressively than other teams, but the assumption that deferred contracts are simply pushed out for free is wrong. Teams are required to put the present value of the deferred amount into specific accounts within roughly two years of the season the money was made. Organizations and owners can’t just use the deferral system to offload every dollar to decades in the future, it has to be accounted for in the present day.Ohtani’s specific case, which started the misinformed outrage over deferrals, is even less controversial. The Dodgers didn’t demand he take just $2 million in salary and pay the $68 million later, he offered it. And he didn’t just offer it to the Dodgers. When deciding between LA, the Giants, Blue Jays and Angels, Ohtani’s agent presented the same arrangement to all the interested parties. The Dodgers, Blue Jays and Giants accepted, the Angels didn’t. Had he picked the Blue Jays, as was rumored, they’d be the ones with $680 million in deferred payments, not the Dodgers.ZERO BS. JUST DAKICH. TAKE THE DON’T @ ME PODCAST ON THE ROAD. DOWNLOAD NOW!Deferrals are not simply to benefit ownership either. For players in high tax states like California or New York, deferring that money to after their playing days are over can save them millions in taxes. The money is accounted for, safely in an specific investment account, they still receive big paychecks now, but get tens of millions in their retirement each year, when they live in Florida or Arizona, with much lower income tax rates than they pay in LA.Another supposed controversy? That the Dodgers, and by extension, Walter, own part of the Spectrum SportsNet LA channel. The YES Network is also partially owned by the New York Yankees, along with Main Street Sports Group, Amazon, The Blackstone Group, Red Bird Capital Partners and other investment groups. Welcome to modern financing in the sports world.Walter, too, owns just 27% of the Dodgers, with the rest broken up among members of the Guggenheim Partners group and other individuals. He may or may not need to sell his portion, but that would leave 73% of current ownership in place.Opposing fans on X have spent the past few days saying the Dodgers are broke, bankrupt, that this is worse than the Astros’ cheating scandal, or that the entire organization is fraudulent and they signed players because of fraud. None of this is remotely accurate.It was widely reported not long ago that the Dodgers were the first team to bring in over $1 billion in revenue, with the contention being that their television deal is the sole reason for financial advantages over other organizations. The television deal, again, another source of inaccurate information, averages around $325 million per year. That leaves $675 million, at least, in revenue from other income streams.LA also benefits from an MLB rule that shields some of their television income from the revenue sharing that goes to small market teams, due to the team’s bankruptcy under previous owner Frank McCourt. Estimates vary, but most estimate around $55 million to 60 million in revenue sharing that the Dodgers are able to keep. Even if that money were distributed to the other 29 teams, that’s $2 million per team, per year, at best. Hardly enough to close the payroll disparity.The Dodgers are baseball’s enemy because their ownership group has shown a willingness to win, and their front office is smart enough to do so. The Mets spend as much, or more, than the Dodgers. They have deferred contracts and signed the richest contract in sports history. They’re also bad, so nobody cares.As is so often the case, though, the facts don’t matter. Anger and outrage do. Even if the Dodgers had a smaller TV deal that guaranteed half of its current value, they’d have made more than $830 million in 2025. If Mark Walter sells his 27% stake, it doesn’t mean the team will be broke or bankrupt. The deferred contracts have nothing to do with Walter’s insurance company loans. Nothing they’ve done with those contracts is illegal or against MLB rules. Does it matter to the angry masses? No, of course not.Reality never does.

Pennsylvania Dangles Permitting Carrot For Data Centers That Bring Their Own Power

Submitted by Ethan Howland of UtilityDive

Pennsylvania will give data center projects preferential permitting treatment if they commit to a set of power supply, environmental and cost-responsibility requirements under an executive order issued Tuesday by Gov. Josh Shapiro, D.

The state Department of Environmental Protection will develop the new review process. To receive a faster state permitting review, data center projects in Pennsylvania must source their electricity from new power supplies, including from growing amounts of firm clean power, according to the order, which affects proposals for projects with a peak demand of more than 25 MW.

The order “should further close the door” to the idea that independent power producers like Talen Energy, Vistra and PSEG Power will be able to sell power from their existing generating assets under long-term contracts to data centers in Pennsylvania, Jefferies equity analysts said in a note on Wednesday. However, Talen’s legacy deal to sell power from its majority-owned Susquehanna nuclear power plant to an Amazon data center appears safe, according to the note.

Shapiro’s executive order comes amid a wave of action by state and local governments aimed at setting limits on data center development. At least 81 cities and counties have moratoria on data center development, according to a National League of Cities database unveiled Wednesday.

Under the permitting framework set by the executive order, data center developers that sign a consent order and agreement requiring them to abide by the state’s infrastructure development standards unveiled in February will receive preferential treatment compared to those that don’t.
Pennsylvania Public Utilities Commission Chairman Steve DeFrank speaks Aug. 18, 2026, at a data center-related executive order signing ceremony. Courtesy of Pennsylvania governor’s office

For example, applicants that execute a consent order and agreement will have their projects reviewed by DEP on a rolling basis, whereas for developers that don’t sign, the state won’t consider their applications until they have all local permits in hand as well as any needed water withdrawal or wastewater discharge authorizations.

“We have so much speculation in Pennsylvania — like, gold rush speculation on these data centers,” Katie Blume, political and legislative director for Conservation Voters of Pennsylvania, told Utility Dive in an interview. “A lot of this [order] is going to be weeding out those bad actors because they’re not going to want to spend five years in the permitting process.”

But Dan Diorio, executive vice president for state policy and government affairs for the Data Center Coalition, sounded a note of caution in an emailed statement.

“It’s important that rules are not changed midstream impacting ongoing investment in verified and responsible data center projects,” Diorio said. “Data centers take compliance and accountability seriously, building only where they are authorized to do so under local, state, and federal rules and regulations.”

The infrastructure development standards include requiring data centers to pay for “all costs caused in whole or in part by the interconnection, service, or load of a [data center] project, including any costs associated with energy and ancillary services, transmission, distribution, network upgrades.”

Besides requiring data centers to be supplied by new generating resources from the same local PJM Interconnection zone where the facilities are built, they must be supplied from growing amounts of firm clean energy such as solar, advanced nuclear and battery storage, Shapiro said when he signed the executive order.

The firm clean energy requirements ramp up from 10% on Jan. 1 to 14.5% three years later and 32% by Jan. 1, 2035.

The executive order directs the Pennsylvania DEP to expedite permitting for clean energy and storage facilities on brownfield sites. The DEP must also facilitate the use of advanced reconductoring and other advanced transmission technologies on existing transmission rights-of-way.

In prepared remarks, Shapiro pointed to the speed of data center development in the state, which he said has “seen an unacceptable number of speculative proposals … many of them led by developers who have no regard for local communities.”

PPL Electric has about 20.7 GW of potential data center load with electric service agreements in Pennsylvania, according to an Aug. 7 investor presentation. FirstEnergy utilities in Pennsylvania have data center contracts totaling nearly 1 GW, the company said in a July 28 presentation.

It is unclear how those data center projects will be affected by the executive order, but slowing data center development could affect utility transmission spending in the state, the Jefferies analysts noted.

Exelon, FirstEnergy and PPL are “materially increasing their transmission investment with data center demand a key driver,” the analysts said. “If the pace of data center growth slows, we see downside pressure to the pace of transmission investments.”

Currently, data center-driven transmission costs are being shared with residential and other utility customers, they noted.

Shapiro’s executive order directed the state Office of Transformation and Opportunity to remove any existing data center project from the PA Permit Fast Track Program, established in 2024, and rescinded their eligibility for the program. It also barred state agencies from entering into confidential agreements with data center developers.

Tyler Durden
Thu, 08/20/2026 – 23:25

Caitlin Clark and Paige Bueckers added another memorable moment to their growing on-court rivalry Thursday night, this time in the closing seconds of the first half of Dallas’ eventual 91-85 win over Indiana.With less than 10 seconds remaining in the second quarter, Clark controlled the ball as Bueckers played defense. Bueckers then wrapped up Clark’s left arm in an effort to stop the possession before halftime. The Wings notably had a foul to give at the time.Clark appeared frustrated by the contact as Bueckers continued trying to complete the foul. Clark then reacted and fired the ball down the court, with it sailing near Bueckers’ head before the two teams headed to the locker room.CLICK HERE FOR MORE SPORTS COVERAGE ON FOXNEWS.COMThe moment sparked a brief exchange between the two star guards, though television microphones did not clearly pick up what was said.ZERO BS. JUST DAKICH. TAKE THE DON’T @ ME PODCAST ON THE ROAD. DOWNLOAD NOW!Bueckers was whistled for a common foul on the play, but the tension seemed to carry into the second half. She was later assessed a technical foul after arguing with an official following a separate foul on Clark in the third quarter.Kelsey Mitchell led Indiana with 37 points, while Clark finished with a team-high nine assists. For Dallas, Arike Ogunbowale scored a team-best 32 points, and Bueckers added eight assists.Just last week, the Fever and Wings squared off, with Clark and Bueckers delivering matching 29-point performances. Indiana ultimately pulled away for a 98-87 victory, but Clark came away impressed with the Dallas star.”Obviously, she’s an incredible player. [She] makes it really hard on us defensively… Paige is a tremendous player,” Clark told reporters during a postgame media availability. “She takes what the defense gives her; she doesn’t force anything; she’s smooth; she finds the open teammate. So she’s just a really tough guard.”

Screencap of Twitter/X video.
During a recent interview, former First Lady Jill Biden entertained the idea that Joe Biden may have been drugged before the debate in the spring of 2024.
This was the debate that ended Joe Biden’s presidency and his candidacy for reelection. His performance was so awful that Democrats and the media immediately began calling on him to drop out of the race.
But drugged? Really?
It is amazing to see Jill Biden take such a suggestion seriously.
FOX News reports:
Jill Biden entertains possibility Joe was drugged before debate, asked point blank if doctors ruled out stroke
Former first lady Jill Biden doubled down on the possibility of her husband, former President Joe Biden, being drugged ahead of the 2024 debate and was asked during a podcast Thursday whether doctors ruled out a stroke that night.
Podcast host Jamie Kern Lima asked Biden if a stroke was ruled out by doctors the night of the debate.
“Well, they did. They said, I mean, I didn’t say to them, when I was writing my book, I was reflecting, but I didn’t say, ‘God, did Joe have a stroke?’ I just said, ‘Is he OK? Is he OK?’” Biden responded.
Lima asked the former first lady what her gut told her happened, and Biden said she didn’t know.
“I mean, there’s all kinds of theories — you know, he had been traveling,” she said. “I know he was tired, he didn’t feel well that day, when I saw him, but there was nothing definitive that I could point to. And I had been on the road for two weeks up until that moment. So, I wasn’t with him. I didn’t see him days before, weeks before. I saw him maybe one hour before.”
Lima asked, “There’s no way anyone could have, God forbid, laced his drink or something?”
“Who knows? Who knows?” Biden responded.
See the video below:

Jill Biden won’t rule out Joe’s drink being “laced” before his debate with Trump:
“Who knows, right? Who knows.”
She’s really still doing this. pic.twitter.com/5w4GADfJ5D
— Western Lensman (@WesternLensman) August 21, 2026

Is she for real?
What is more likely, is that Joe Biden performed horribly in that debate because his brain was already turning into applesauce.
Everyone with a pair of eyes could see it.

The post WHAT? Jill Biden Entertains the Possibility That Joe Was DRUGGED Before His Awful 2024 Debate (VIDEO) appeared first on The Gateway Pundit.

Authorities in Delaware called on Dover residents Thursday to “STAY HOME” after a likely tornado caused “significant” damage throughout the city.

“Let’s Downsize”: Antifa Uses Instagram To Put ‘Luigi-Style’ Hit On Flock Camera CEO

Karlyn Borysenko, who describes herself as an anti-communist analyst and observer of the far-left, posted a screenshot of an Instagram post from an account called “3chordpolitics.” The post could be interpreted as a targeted, implicitly violent communication directed at Garrett Langley, founder and CEO of Flock Safety.

With high confidence, the 3chordpolitics post deliberately invokes violence against CEOs. As Borysenko wrote on X, “Antifa on Instagram is issuing death threats to CEOs, referencing bullets and Luigi Mangione, and essentially using the platform to call for more CEO assassinations.”

Antifa on Instagram is issuing death threats to CEOs, reference bullets and Luigi Mangione and essentially using the platform to call for more CEO assassination.
This was posted 20 minutes ago. pic.twitter.com/hchqfmVG5i
— Karlyn Borysenko, anti-communist cult leader (@DrKarlynB) August 19, 2026
Here are the threat indicators present in the post:

CEO Garrett Langley is individually named and pictured.
A black bar obscures his eyes, creating a targeting effect.
Three bullets appear alongside a Luigi character, likely a coded reference to Luigi Mangione and the killing of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson.
The slogan “No CEO Left Behind” appears to imply hostility toward Langley and CEOs as a class.
The caption “Let’s downsize” functions as a double entendre, suggesting the physical elimination of a CEO.

The account’s prior posts suggest it is aligned with the far-left, given its apparent sympathy for Luigi Mangione, calls to dox ICE agents, advocacy for work stoppages, and encouragement of rioting. These positions broadly reflect elements of both reformist socialism and far-left revolution.

Borysenko recently published a five-tiered “rainbow cake” depicting her view of the American left, ranging from establishment Democrats who favor incremental reform within capitalism to revolutionary socialists who seek to abolish the existing system and destroy the nation from within.

As a reminder, the DSA cult sits on the far-left.  

As of Thursday morning, Instagram had yet to remove the post. 

Tyler Durden
Thu, 08/20/2026 – 23:00

Broadcom CDS Explodes As It Seeks Up To $100 Billion In Massive Off-Balance Sheet Debt Deal

Amid the growing angst about hyperscaler CapEx (and more specifically, the historic flood of new debt issuance to fund it), attention among the always-bullish equity talking-heads has shifted – and rightfully so – to the bond markets as alarm signals flare up with an increasing frequency. Of course, for ZeroHedge readers, this is not a new topic, it is something we have been warning of for the past year, ever since we explained that debt was the true AI bubble last October:

The $1.8 Trillion Off-Balance Sheet Time Bomb At The Heart Of The AI Supercycle
Goldman Warns Massive Hyperscaler Bond Issuance Means “Risk Skewed To Downside”
“Generational Transfer Is Taking Place”: The Cash Crunch Is Coming For AI Hyperscalers
Hyperscaler Bond Spreads Blow Out After Google Shocks With Another $25 Billion Bond Offering
The AI CapEx Boom Is Building Twice As Fast As The Housing Boom
The Circular Delusion Of Markets: How Earnings Growth Runs On Borrowed Money (& The Smart Money Is Leaving)
Nvidia Confirms Record $500 Billion Off-Balance Sheet SPV Deal To Fund The World’s Biggest Circle Jerk
Nvidia’s $500 Billion Bet Shows Up In Credit
Hyperscaler CDS Volumes Explode To All-Time High On Credit, Circular Financing Fears
Then, last week we explained why – as Nomura’s Charlie McElligott also joined the credit chorus – the unprecedented flood of AI corporate debt had started to crowd out demand for US government paper, an ominous development as it meant continued massive capex would lead to even higher treasury yields… as well as even more inflation, a toxic mix to the Treasury.

What’s worse, the market had finally started to pay attention, as one look at the surge in treasury swaption vol of vol made abundantly clear, which is why last week we warned – correctly – that Bessent was about to get very busy as bearish bets hit levels last seen during previous trasury market crises. 

Bessent will be busy https://t.co/0BslbpgnLs pic.twitter.com/kreaTPS1rh
— zerohedge (@zerohedge) August 11, 2026
One week later Bessent did in fact, get busy, and shocked the market with a “cringingly executed” (to quote McElligott) buyback directive announcement, one which lasted all of 23 hours before the entire move was reversed and yields are now trading 4 bps higher than where they were before the Treasury announcement. 

But while Bessent can address the market again any time he wants and threaten Treasury shorts (“By At LeAsT dOuBlE”), the bigger problem facing the Treasury is that the deluge of AI debt is really just starting – recall there is another $6-8 trillion in capex that has to be spent by 2030, most of it in the form of corporate debt, which will lead to relentless pressure higher on US interest rate for the foreseeable future. 

Some AI companies realize that it is only a matter of time before Bessent chills this AI debt diarrhea indefinitely; which explains why Bloomberg reported today that Broadcom is preparing another gargantuan SPV deal, and is in talks with a group of lenders to raise more than $60 billion in debt for an AI chip financing deal that will benefit Anthropic PBC and other companies. 

The financing, which is still being ironed out, may also include a roughly $30 billion junior debt tranche, said some of the people, who asked not to be identified because the information is private.

Under the proposed plan, Broadcom would guarantee a portion of the senior-secured tranche, which could range from about $60 billion to $70 billion. The numbers under discussion would potentially bring the total to as much as $100 billion, which would make it the largest SPV deal ever funded.

The agreement would add to a rush of deals aimed at financing artificial intelligence infrastructure. AI companies like Anthropic are taking a bigger role in the build-out, aiming to ensure they have enough computing capacity. Broadcom, meanwhile, is looking to sell more chips and other data center equipment, challenging Nvidia in this lucrative market.

Since AI infrastructure SPV require private credit backers, Blackstone and Apollo – the same firms that backstopped Nvidia’s recent $500 billion compute collateralized deal – are in talks with Broadcom to participate in the chip financing, following a partnership the three companies struck in June to help finance computing infrastructure. The debt – as one would expect ever since Meta set the standard with its Beignet off-balance sheet deal – would be issued by a special-purpose vehicle, or SPV, most of which won’t appear on any balance sheet.

The potential deal would help firms including Anthropic access chips and other key AI infrastructure, according to Bloomberg which broke the news. It could be similar to the $35 billion debt agreement that kicked off the group’s AI XPV partnership, they said. 

In the first deal for the AI XPV platform two months ago, we explained that Broadcom backstopped most of the debt and investors including Apollo and Blackstone financed the purchase of custom AI chips to lease to Anthropic. And in a sleight of brilliant financial engineering where everyone pretends there is no actual debt being issued, this enabled the senior debt tranches to win investment-grade ratings at lower borrowing costs. 

However, that is just the start… of both the debt issuance runway and Bessent’s headaches. The partnership, which plans to finance more than 20 gigawatts of computing power, will require hundreds of billions of dollars. That level of capacity would roughly equal the output of 20 nuclear plants. 

The unprecedented scale of the borrowing now under discussion underscores the capital requirements of the AI boom, which has prompted a slew of novel debt deals at a pace and scale that’s simultaneously unnerved some investors. In what was actually a huge nothingburger, Nvidia earlier this month announced that a coalition of major financial firms including BlackRock and Goldman Sachs Group were lining up more than $500 billion to help fund the AI build-out, although the agreement was only an MOU and was at best intended to provide some comfort to credit markets. It failed, since Nvidia CDS is now trading at all time wides. 

Broadcom’s chief executive officer said in March that the company expects AI chip sales to top $100 billion next year. The chipmaker has also struck other partnerships, including an accord with Apple that’s expected to be worth more than $30 billion. Broadcom’s valuation has soared in recent years, propelled by agreements to make custom AI chips for firms like OpenAI.

After briefly declining, Broadcom shares rose as much as 1.1% in late trading after Bloomberg News reported on the discussions. The stock had climbed 5.2% this year through the close. But forget about the stock: these days all the action is in the bond trading and/or Credit Default Swap land, and is why Broadcom’s massive new bond deal illustrates the US Treasury’s uphill task in containing long-bond yields

Broadcom’s debt is interesting because its recent competition for Google’s TPU business has been accompanied by a spike in CDS. And, as Bloomberg notes, the monster debt deal will do little to alleviate that pressure and will likely feed down to the CDS of other chip/hyperscaler credit.

As we noted in our EOD wrap, hyperscaler CDS is already back near the July all-time wides, with names that issue new debt seeing clear spikes in CDS pushing their default risk slowly but surely every higher. 

The problem is that unlike equities, where there apparently is an infinite number of greater fools using other people’s money to force daily gamma squeezes, there will come a time – and yield – when the bond market simply refuses to keep funding these endless AI boondoggles, especially when China can now do pretty much everything faster, cheaper and almost as effectively. At that point, the AI bubble will finally burst. 

Tyler Durden
Thu, 08/20/2026 – 22:51

Screencap of Twitter/X video.
A woman who is supposedly the lead person from Zohran Mamdani’s team for city-owned grocery stores was recently asked if their plan will put privately owned stores out of business, which, it obviously will.
She explained that privately owned stores that are in trouble will be able to apply for grants from the city, which is only going to make things worse, and far more expensive.
To recap, taxpayers pay for city-owned grocery stores and then, when those stores threaten privately owned stores, taxpayers will fund grants for those stores. The taxpayers just keep paying and paying, no matter what happens.
Townhall reports:
In an interview on Wednesday, Waverly Neer, a senior vice president of the NYC Economic Development Corporation (NYCEDC), which is overseeing Mamdani’s city-run grocery-store rollout, revealed that one proposal under consideration would let nearby grocers apply for grants to offset revenue lost to the city’s subsidized stores. In other words, New York City may use taxpayer money to undercut local businesses, then use more taxpayer money to compensate them for the damage they caused.
“I think ultimately the goals of these locations, not just here in East Harlem, but you know, any borough location is to be complementary to the neighborhood,” Neer said. “And really, you know, rising tides, right? We can we can all cooperate and work together in a meaningful way. ”
“Do you mind? What is the I’ve heard that that term from EDC officials that these are meant to be complementary. What does that mean?” Spectrum News NY1’s Dan Rivoli asked. “What does that complimentary mean in terms of policy operations and things like that? ”
“Yeah, I think we’re, you know, as an agency, looking at a number of different complementary policies and programs, grants, incentives that can come alongside these grocery stores to support other, you know, local independent businesses that are in the neighborhoods,” Neer replied. “We’re going to continue to listen and we’re going to continue to engage and be, you know, alongside the operator as our partner. Like I said, making sure that we are complimentary to the other businesses that are here in the neighborhood.”
“So other locations, other grocery stores can get grants from the city under this?” Rivoli clarified.
“[That’s] something on the table,” Neer said.
Watch:

Lead official for Mayor Mamdani’s NYC Groceries tells me city may give grants to local grocers fearing competition from city-run stores
“policies and programs, grants, incentives that can come alongside these grocery stores to support other local independent businesses” pic.twitter.com/S57e8Ne13B
— Dan Rivoli (@danrivoli) August 19, 2026

These people have absolutely no idea what they’re doing.

The post Mamdani’s City Grocery Store Official Explains How Their Plan to Keep Privately Owned Stores in Business Will Make Things Even Worse (VIDEO) appeared first on The Gateway Pundit.

The All-Seeing Eye

Authored by Todd Hayen via OffGuardian,

What was once the paranoid whisper of conspiracy has become the marketed convenience of ‘life logging’ – yet beneath the promise of perfect memory lies the total erasure of privacy, turning every shrew into a unwitting performer on the surveillance stage.

(If you haven’t read enough of my work to know what a “shrew” is, read this: Sheep and Shrew)

During a recent three-hour ramble with my sister – one of those wide-ranging, idea-sparking talkathons we’ve shared for years – the little recording device I had just bought, attached to my phone, quietly drank it all in. Every tangent on culture, politics, family, and the state of the world was captured, summarized, and later served back as a tidy slideshow of “highlights.” It auto-suggested calendar entries, pulled up past chats on demand, and generally made itself indispensable.

For a moment, I felt the rush: This is the future. No more forgotten details, no more scrambling for notes. Pure magic.

I will disclose immediately that I have purchased several of these odd devices mostly out of curiosity, but also out of an attempt to record various “having fun moments” of my life (like a recent dog adventure to a local pond, and our three-day trip to New York City to see Swan Lake). I won’t go into my personal experience (with the intentions just stated) out of fear it will bore you; ask in the comments if you would like to know.

Here I will make my general comments on what I feel the impact such devices will have on our human culture. What masquerades as personal empowerment is a profound archetypal shift toward total surveillance, eroding privacy, authenticity, and human freedom – normalizing the sheeple’s willing submission while shrews must stay vigilant.

Woo-hoo, what else is new?

During my conversation with my sister, the shrew in me stirred almost immediately. That ancient archetype of the All-Seeing Eye – once reserved for gods, tyrants, or paranoid fantasies – had slipped into the room wearing the friendly face of convenience. What felt like an innocent companion was, in truth, a silent recorder turning private exchange into permanent data. And I had invited it in.

This is how the trap springs. Not with jackboots and cameras in every corner (though those exist too), but with sleek little devices marketed as extensions of ourselves. Wearable AI pins, smart glasses, neck discs – they promise perfect memory while quietly building the most intimate profile imaginable: where we go, what we say, who we say it to, and how we feel about it all. Street cameras and smartphone sensors already blanket the public square; these wearables drag the surveillance indoors, into our conversations, our homes, our unguarded moments with loved ones. The panopticon goes portable.

We’ve seen this pattern before. Remember when “just a phone” became a pocket tracker? Or how contact-tracing apps during the scamdemic morphed from “temporary emergency tools” into permanent fixtures in the biosecurity state? The same sleight of hand is at work here. Tech companies dangle the carrot – Never forget a name! Relive every precious moment! Let AI organize your chaos! – and the sheeple flock to it, bleating about how “empowering” it all feels. The sheep, yes, and at least one sheep-like shrew. Me.

Meanwhile, the other shrews (you) feel the water getting warmer. You are more aware than me that every logged conversation is fodder for training models, targeted ads, behavioural predictions, or worse – subpoenas, hacks, or authoritarian overreach. Deepfakes already erode trust in video evidence; add always-on personal recording, and alibis become meaningless, private truths become contestable, and authentic human connection withers under the gaze of the machine.

My sister and I laughed about it at first. Then the unease settled in. What if one of those “helpful” summaries gets shared without consent? What if the data shapes how others (or algorithms) perceive us? The archetype of the all-seeing eye doesn’t just watch – it consumes. It flattens the rich, contradictory mess of human life into clean, marketable data points.

From a Jungian perspective, this is no mere gadget problem. It is the externalization of the Self’s shadow – the watcher within projected onto silicon. Privacy is not just a legal right; it is the sacred space where the psyche breathes, where shadow integrates, where anima and animus dance unseen. Strip that away, and we become performers, constantly curating our words for an invisible audience. The sheepsters may not notice – they’ve grown accustomed to the slowly boiling pot. But the shrew feels the contraction of soul.

This is the latest chapter in the long war on autonomy waged primarily by the advocates of transhumanism and technoculture. Digital passports, social credit systems, vaccine mandates – each promised safety or convenience while tightening the noose. AI wearables complete the circle: they don’t just monitor the body or the public square; they ingest the mind itself, turning inner dialogue into training data for the next generation of control.

We are not far from the logical endpoint – stylish glasses with always-on cameras, or worse, neural implants that record thoughts before they become words. The marketers will call it “seamless augmentation.” The shrew calls it the end of anything resembling private life. But here we go.

Woo-hoo again, what fun!

Obviously, we have known about all this techno-joy for quite some time: science fiction novels, 50’s SciFi movies, superhero comic books, Star Trek, Outer Limits and Battlestar Galactica TV series, among many other media enticements. All techno gadgets presented in these resources have been emblazoned into our feeble brains (not you, of course!), always looking for the next exciting and fun thing to engage with.

Why do we have to move back into the techno-less past in our effort to survive? Why can’t we take this fun ride into a more convenient, more joyous, more exciting future with interesting “things” to fiddle with? Primarily because there is likely an evil intention behind it all. We can never forget the agenda, and one of the prime tools of manipulation the agenda thrives on is private information.

So, what do we do? Do we stop participating in this new science-fiction-turned-reality world? Do we just get the hell off the grid, and live in some backward fourth-world country drinking milk out of a coconut? That’s one way to do it; another is to simply become more aware and conscious.

Awareness itself is resistance. Turn the All-Seeing Eye inward. Use these tools sparingly, consciously, and never without remembering what they truly cost. Talk with your pack. Document the unease. Keep the conversations that matter offline when you can.

The water is heating, my dear shrew. But we still have legs to jump – and voices to warn the others before the lid clamps shut for good.

Todd Hayen PhD is a registered psychotherapist practicing in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. He holds a PhD in depth psychotherapy and an MA in Consciousness Studies. He specializes in Jungian, archetypal, psychology. Todd also writes for his own substack, which you can read here.

Tyler Durden
Thu, 08/20/2026 – 22:35