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Exclusive: US Patriot missile stocks in Europe are ‘beyond critical’ due to Iran war, officials say WASHINGTON (AP) — The U.S. military is experiencing a “beyond critical” shortage of advanced missile interceptors in Europe largely driven by President Donald Trump’s war with Iran, a U.S. defense official in Europe and a NATO official told The Associated Press, raising concerns about vulnerabilities in NATO countries to a potential Russian attack. https://apnews.com/article/patriot-missiles-iran-war-russia-ukraine-trump-09c7d8030a2e11fbd8ee3f7176b3f2d4?

Trump’s Reflection Pool Repairs Reveal New Embarrassment The peely pool saga continues. Efforts to repair President Donald Trump’s botched renovation project have exposed just how shoddy the work truly was. A video shared on X on Wednesday by photographer Joe Flood captured workers pulling up “chunks” of loose blue sealant as they power washed the basin of the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool. The workers could be seen pulling up flaps of the “American Flag Blue” liner with their bare hands, while scraps of damaged sealant were jostled loose by the power washer. The White House deferred questions from the Daily Beast to the Interior Department, which did not immediately return a request for comment. The basin of the reflecting pool was drained once again as crews began efforts to repair its cracked liner last week, according to The Washington Post. Trump, 80, has repeatedly claimed that his peeling pool is the result of vandals who cut a gash hundreds of feet long into its liner, but even his own prosecutors disagree. Jeanine Pirro, the president’s top federal prosecutor for Washington, D.C., dropped charges against former Olympian David Hearn after determining that the pool’s damage was likely caused by a “botched installation” by the contractors. The Department of Justice had also dropped misdemeanor charges against three others accused of vandalizing the pool. Trump said that he was “very disappointed with Jeanine Pirro,” adding that she “folded like an umbrella.” “There may have been some contractor difficulty, but the major damage was caused by VANDALS!” Trump later wrote on Truth Social. While repairs have been underway, new signs were placed on the fences surrounding the pool, stating that crews were ‘repairing areas damaged by vandals’ and blaming past administrations for tourists being unable to enjoy it. “Since 1922, prior administrations have neglected this iconic landmark, evidenced most recently by more than half of the pool’s pipes being clogged and the sidewalks and granite coping stones being filthy dirty,” the sign reads. “The Reflecting Pool will remain drained while this work proceeds so that it can truly reflect the beauty, dignity, and grandeur of our nation’s capital.” Work on the historic attraction has continued on and off since June, as Trump’s idea to restore the pool by painting it “American Flag Blue” failed miserably. Instead, the renovation spurred the pool’s largest algal bloom in years. The same contractor who worked on the initial renovation, Atlantic Industrial Coatings, was hired again for the repairs, as Interior Secretary Doug Burgum told CNN that “they did a fantastic job.” https://www.thedailybeast.com/trumps-reflection-pool-repairs-reveal-new-liner-peeling-embarrassment/? ps:Just pathetic!! Everything this man gets his hands on turns out to be a disaster!!

Ratko Mladic, ex-Bosnian Serb warlord who oversaw atrocities, dies as a prisoner at 84 https://apnews.com/article/ratko-mladic-obit-03abf53803bef360978882d89024c475? ps:A real sweetheart of a human!!

👋 Good morning! There's a new UConn women's basketball docuseries on Apple TV, and a new Vince Young documentary on Netflix. Highly recommend both. In today's edition: LIV Golf timeline, NFL axes the Pro Bowl, Behind the Lens with Getty Images, fantasy football punishments, Champions League draw, the US Open's $23 pour, and more. Yahoo Sports AM is written by Kendall Baker and Jeff Tracy. Let's sports...   🚨 ICYMI HEADLINES 🏈 NFL axes Pro Bowl: The NFL is pulling the plug on the Pro Bowl amid declining interest. Instead, the league will simply name a Pro Bowl team — consisting of 88 players — and invite them to Los Angeles for an in-person celebration in February, presumably during Super Bowl week. 🏀 Historic viewership: Sunday's Fever-Sky matchup drew 3.3 million viewers on NBC and Peacock, making it the most-watched WNBA regular-season game since the league's inaugural weekend in 1997. 🎾 Doubles champs: Karolína Muchová and Jakub Menšík won the US Open's unique mixed doubles tournament on Wednesday, taking home a $1 million grand prize (or $500,000 each). Not bad for two days' work. 💵 Battles of the Busses: Jeanie Buss has petitioned a Los Angeles Superior Court to block her five siblings from selling the family's 17.8% stake in the Lakers. Meanwhile, two of those siblings, Joey and Jesse, acquired 5% of the Padres. ⚾️ Ohtani nears return: Shohei Ohtani will throw a bullpen session tomorrow and, if all goes well, could start on Sunday against the Tigers, according to Dodgers manager Dave Roberts. The two-way star hasn't pitched since July 3 due to knee and biceps injuries.   ⛳️ MONEY GAME SPLITTING THE FAIRWAY: HOW LIV FRACTURED GOLF (Chung Sung-Jun/Getty Images) As the curtain closed on LIV Golf Indianapolis this past weekend, it may have ended not just the season but — at minimum — version 1.0 of the upstart golf league, which plans to lay off the majority of its staff amid an uncertain future. Whether LIV ultimately lives on or not, the disruption it unleashed forever changed golf. The build-up (2020-21) Rumblings of an upstart PGA Tour challenger materialized in the early 2020s, a startling reality that the Tour met swiftly with both repudiation (for competitors) and retention efforts (for players). January 2020: The World Golf Group, believed to be financed by Saudi backers, announces plans for the Premier Golf League. PGA commissioner Jay Monahan warns that aligning with PGL could lead to PGA ineligibility. April 2021: PGA unveils the Player Impact Program, which will reward the top 10 "needle-moving" players with a $40 million bonus pool. October 2021: LIV Golf Investments is officially announced, with Greg Norman named CEO. November 2021: The PGA reveals significant increases in player pay for the upcoming season. The launch (2022) LIV played its first events in mid 2022. With those events came the first defections, many of them high-profile, thoroughly unsettling a golf establishment religious in its traditions. February 2022: It's revealed that Phil Mickelson is involved with LIV Golf, and he extolls the newfound leverage over the PGA Tour to Alan Shipnuck. March 2022: LIV announces inaugural eight-event, $255 million series for 2022 beginning in London in June. May 2022: PGA Tour denies players' release request to play in LIV events. Dustin Johnson, Sergio Garcia, and Louis Oosthuizen are among the players revealed as participants in the first event. June 2022: Charl Schwartzel wins LIV Golf London, the competition's first event. Bryson DeChambeau and Brooks Koepka are among the stars to join in the following weeks. August 2022: 11 LIV Players file an antitrust suit against the PGA Tour. The PGA Tour announces the addition of new Elevated Events, increased purses, and commitments from top players to play 20 events. October 2022: The PGA Tour files a lawsuit against Saudi Arabia's Public Investment Fund (PIF) and its governor. (Matthew Lewis/Getty Images) The negotiations (2023-24) The opposing parties soon began a negotiating dance, exploring the terms of a possible merger while also navigating their own independent business aspirations. June 2023: The PGA Tour, PIF and DP World Tour announce a "framework agreement" to form a new entity and end litigation. December 2023: Parties move to extend the December 31 deadline for their merger. Jon Rahm joins LIV. January 2024: The PGA Tour announces a $3 billion investment deal with Strategic Sports Group. The deal will give players up to $1.5 billion in equity in a new commercial entity, PGA Tour Enterprises. March 2024: A PGA Tour delegation that includes Tiger Woods meets with LIV officials in the Bahamas for "constructive" talks. A false new dawn (2025) 2025 brought new blood into LIV leadership, but the weight of past investment began to catch up with the upstart league, and cracks emerged. January 2025: Scott O'Neil replaces Greg Norman as CEO of LIV Golf. The competition signs a multi-year media rights agreement with Fox Sports. February 2025: Adam Scott, Jay Monahan, Tiger Woods and Yasir Al-Rumayyan join President Trump at the White House for merger talks, briefly increasing prospects of reunification. October 2025: Financial disclosures show that LIV's international division lost $590 million in 2024, bringing three-year losses to $1.4 billion. The company had reportedly received $4 billion in equity injections through the end of 2024. December 2025: Koepka leaves LIV, citing "personal reasons." The beginning of the end of LIV 1.0 (2026) Speculation about the loss of ongoing funding soon became reality, as LIV scrambled to court prospective investors and forge a path toward the end of this season and the beginning of a new one. January 2026: Koepka rejoins the PGA Tour through the Returning Member Program, which applies to four elite players. April 2026: PIF releases its new 2026-2030 investment strategy, which appears to deemphasize sports relative to the prior cycle. An emergency meeting is called at LIV's Mexico event amid (later confirmed) speculation that PIF is pulling funding. August 2026: LIV announces that it has secured a new lead investor to fund the upcoming season in a structure that will make its players the majority equity holders. LIV's Team Championship event is canceled, and the purse for LIV Golf Indianapolis is halved. Looking ahead: LIV's new structure could reportedly require reduced purses, a bankruptcy filing and restructured player contracts, raising questions about the league's viability, whether its players want to stick around and what their potential path back to the PGA Tour might look like. This story first appeared in Yahoo Sports Biz, our new sports business newsletter. Sign up here to begin receiving it every Monday, Wednesday and Friday.   📸 PHOTOGRAPHY BEHIND THE LENS (Donald Miralle/Getty Images) Each week in Yahoo Sports AM, we'll be going "Behind the Lens" with Getty Images to get the backstory on the best photographs in sports. This week's photo: A woman competes during the preliminary heats of the 2026 Super Girl Surf Festival, the world's largest women's surf and music festival. Photographer: Donald Miralle Location: Oceanside, California Date: August 22 📸 Behind the lens: Here's Donald… As a life-long surfer, I love the opportunity to shoot the "Sport of Kings," especially if it's in my own backyard. I saw the forecast called for epic weather and clean surf all weekend for the event, which is now in its 20th year. I have been a licensed and insured drone pilot since the inception of the first prosumer DJI drones circa 2010, back when they were pretty rudimentary and no one used them yet at sporting events. Now most photographers and videographers carry them as an essential part of their camera bag for good reason! In this particular shot, I saw how the light was cutting through the water, revealing the sand churning below, as well as the contrast of the breaking wave with the surfer wearing the red jersey. I captured this frame about 60 feet above the surfer to avoid distracting her with the drone props while still capturing a wider scene. I composed the surfer off-center in the frame using the rule of thirds, giving the photo room to breathe a little with the dynamic of her cutback and the wave. Since I was only shooting photos and not video, I really didn't have to fly very long to capture this, but just had to predict when her turn was going to happen on the wave as there's a long delay on triggering of the shutter for the drone, and you really only get one frame. Happy it all came together in the photo, and shows the beauty of the sport and our local break! Equipment and technique: Donald shot this with a DJI Mavic Pro, using a wide angle lens with an f/4 aperture and a shutter speed of 1/2500th of a second at a setting of ISO 100.   📚 GO DEEPER GOOD READS (Grant Thomas/Yahoo Sports) 🏈 Jeff Eisenberg: Lose your fantasy league, suffer the consequences: Inside the wild world of last-place punishments Last-place punishments have long been a fantasy football staple, providing incentive for bottom-dwelling managers to keep trying after they've already been eliminated from playoff contention. In recent years, leagues have become increasingly creative and ruthless with their punishments, making the battle to avoid last place as high stakes as the race to finish first. (Taylor Wilhelm/Yahoo Sports) 🥊 Elliot Worsell: What does boxing's world heavyweight title actually mean in 2026? In the old days, back when the meaning was clearer, the belts of boxers were pretty things coveted by all. Now, all we hear is that there are too many belts in boxing and that the proliferation of them has diluted what it means to be seen wearing one. There is even talk of boxing's belts being removed altogether. (Amy Monks/Yahoo Sports) 🏈 Ross Dellenger: SEC v. LSU? Lane Kiffin's brazen approach raises question of whether league would sue its own school A month ago, Lane Kiffin turned toward a reporter and agreed that LSU had, indeed, become the villain of college football. He is the central figure — the brash man who signed a $90 million contract, who unabashedly exploits loopholes, who left his former program for an archrival amid a postseason run, and who, one day, believes he'll be a hero. Why? Kiffin smiled. "You'll be a hero if you win."   📺 VIEWING GUIDE WATCHLIST: THURSDAY, AUG. 27 The clubhouse and 18th green at East Lake. (Ben Jared/PGA TOUR via Getty Images) ⛳️ Tour Championship The top 30 golfers tee it up today (11am ET, ESPN; 1pm, Golf) at East Lake Golf Club in Atlanta for the season finale, where a staggering $40 million purse, including a $10 million grand prize, is up for grabs. Notable tee times: Three-time champion Rory McIlroy and three-time runner-up Xander Schauffele (12:54pm); defending champion Tommy Fleetwood and Ludvig Åberg (1:12pm); Wyndham Clark and Cameron Young (1:48pm); Scottie Scheffler and Matt Fitzpatrick (2pm). 🏈 NFL Preseason, Week 3 The final week of the preseason begins tonight with a four-game slate: Steelers at Bills (7pm, NFL); Patriots at Browns (8pm, Prime); 49ers at Raiders (8pm, ESPN+); Rams at Chargers (10pm, NFL). Counting down the days: The NFL regular season kicks off in 13 days, with the Seahawks hosting the Patriots on Sept. 9 in a rematch of Super Bowl LX. More to watch: ⚾️ LLWS: Iowa vs. Ohio (9am, ESPN); Nicaragua vs. Japan (9am, ESPN2) … Winners join Nevada and Curaçao in the U.S. and International Championship games. ⚾️ MLB: Dodgers at Braves (7:15pm, FS1) … Yoshinobu Yamamoto (12-7, 2.61 ERA) and Chris Sale (12-9, 2.20 ERA) square off in a battle of aces. 🏀 WNBA: Valkyries at Liberty (8pm, Prime) … Golden State's defense is in a league of its own, allowing just 76.3 ppg. Plus: ⛳️ LPGA: FM Championship at TPC Boston (9am, Golf); 🚲 Vuelta a España: Stage 6 (8:45am, Peacock); 🎾 US Open: Rising Stars Exhibitions (6pm, ESPN+)   ⚽️ LET'S PLAY TRIVIA TIME The Champions League trophy ahead of today's draw. (Francesco Scaccianoce/UEFA via Getty Images) The 2026-27 Champions League field is officially set, and the draw to determine the League Phase fixtures will take place today. Question: Can you name the five clubs that have won at least five Champions League titles? Hint: Spain (2x), England, Italy, Germany. Answer at the bottom.   🍈 LIQUID GOLD THE US OPEN'S $23 POUR Fans of the US Open's famous novelty drink, the Honey Deuce, can rejoice, as the price of the drink was frozen at an ever-so-modest $23 this year. Yes, but: Despite the price freeze, the drink's price has still risen far more sharply than broader inflation and alcoholic-beverage-specific inflation since its introduction at $12 in 2007. No deterrent: The price has not hampered demand. The USTA sold 738,459 Honey Deuces (+32%) at last year's tournament, grossing over $17 million in revenue.   Trivia answer: Real Madrid (15 titles), AC Milan (7), Liverpool (6), Bayern Munich (6), Barcelona (5)

Exclusive: RFK Jr. said a Samoa trip had nothing to do with vaccines. New documents refute that NEW YORK (AP) — Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. repeatedly told lawmakers who held the key to his confirmation last year that a 2019 visit to Samoa before a deadly measles outbreak had “nothing to do with vaccines.”New documents obtained by The Associated Press and The Guardian refute that testimony. https://apnews.com/article/rfk-jr-kennedy-samoa-vaccines-mmr-ba6ad3ffadca48599b1c178a392fb37b? ps:How pathetic is this guy?

Trump Begs MAGA to Play Make-Believe to Save GOP in Midterms The president is well aware that his loyal supporters may not bother to vote in November. Donald Trump is pleading with his MAGA base to “pretend” he is on the ballot in the midterms in a desperate bid to avoid a GOP electoral wipeout. The 80-year-old president’s plan to encourage unenthusiastic Republican voters to turn out in November was teased by Fox News’ Sean Hannity on his Wednesday night show, as part of a full interview set to be broadcast on Sunday Night in America with Trey Gowdy. “There’s a theory that when Trump’s on the ballot they win, when he’s out of the ballot, the people don’t go to vote. And I’m asking the people to get out and vote and pretend I’m on the ballot,” Trump said. “And if we don’t, our country is going to be in sad shape because we’re going to go through a lot of things.” Historically, the ruling party suffers major losses in the midterms. Intense backlash to Trump’s second term and voter dissatisfaction with the economy mean the GOP could suffer particularly brutal defeats in November and potentially lose control of both the House and the Senate. The GOP faces another worrying trend of Trump supporters not bothering to turn out to vote for Republican candidates unless Trump’s name is also on the ballot during a presidential election year. Polls have frequently shown that Republican voters are also less enthusiastic about voting in November’s midterm elections than Democrats because Trump does not need their votes. In February, a Washington Post-ABC News-Ipsos survey found that 85 percent of people who voted for Kamala Harris in 2024 said they were certain to vote in the midterms, compared with 70 percent of Trump voters. The poll also found that 19 percent of Trump voters said they would only “probably vote” in November, while 10 percent said there was only a 50-50 chance that they would decide to turn out and cast a ballot. Trump is so aware of the issue of his supporters not turning out when he is not on the ballot that he has instructed his team to paint November’s elections as a referendum on himself. On Tuesday, The Atlantic reported that the president held an Oval Office meeting earlier this month to detail plans to launch a blitz of television advertisements highlighting his apparent achievements during his second term in an effort to convince his base to turn out to the polls in November. However, some Republican strategists are concerned that it may not be a good idea to put the president, who is recording near-record-low approval ratings on hot-button issues such as the economy, front and center of the GOP’s midterm strategy. “When the issues that you typically campaign on don’t move voters—or voters are p---ed off at you about those issues—the question becomes: What do you campaign on?” one person familiar with the Oval Office meeting told The Atlantic. Hannity also desperately pleaded with Trump’s base to turn out in November during his Wednesday night show. “Let me explain this: He is on the ballot, because if we don’t get Republicans in the House and Senate, all progress in this country will come to a screeching halt,” Hannity said. “You, we, all of us, we will get the government we deserve. I hope you will commit in your heart, mind, and soul that this is important, and we need to stop this right dead in its tracks.” https://www.thedailybeast.com/trump-begs-maga-to-play-make-believe-to-save-gop-in-midterms/?

Trump Judge Slaps Down DOJ’s Bid to Toss MAGA Architect’s Conviction The DOJ is going to bat for Trump’s former adviser Steve Bannon. A Trump-appointed federal judge has denied the Department of Justice’s request to throw out Steve Bannon’s criminal conviction for refusing to testify before Congress about the Capitol riots. Bannon served four months in prison after a jury convicted him of contempt of Congress in 2022 for defying a subpoena from the House committee investigating the violent attempt to overthrow Trump’s 2020 election loss to Joe Biden. He later challenged his conviction before the Supreme Court. In February, Trump’s ultra-loyalist U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia, Jeanine Pirro, also filed a motion to vacate the indictment that led to Bannon’s conviction. Judge Carl Nichols, however, rejected the motion on Wednesday, writing that Pirro had failed to explain why dismissal was in the public interest. The appellate courts have ruled that prosecutors must submit “a statement of reasons and underlying factual basis” justifying the dismissal, and not just a “mere conclusory statement by the prosecutor” that dismissal is warranted. Nichols noted that Pirro’s motion included just one “explanatory sentence” that read, “The government has determined in its prosecutorial discretion that dismissal of this criminal case is in the interests of justice.” “That is the kind of ‘conclusory statement by the prosecutor’ that the Court of Appeals has said is insufficient to justify” dismissal, he ruled. The decision, however, left the door open for the government to file a renewed motion that complied with the law. The Daily Beast has approached the DOJ for comment. Bannon worked on Trump’s 2016 campaign and served as chief strategist to the White House during the president’s first term. The two men fell out in 2018, but Bannon has continued to cheerlead for Trump—including encouraging him to seek an illegal third term—and try to influence White House policy via his War Room podcast. Besides being convicted of contempt of Congress, he pleaded guilty in 2025 in New York state court to defrauding donors who contributed to a $25 million private scheme to build a wall along the U.S.-Mexico border. He also faced federal charges over the wall campaign but was pardoned by Trump in the final hours of the president’s first term. https://www.thedailybeast.com/trump-judge-slaps-down-dojs-bid-to-toss-maga-architect-steve-bannons-contempt-conviction/? ps:Good for him!!!!

Fox Host Freaks Out That Republicans Face ‘Brutal’ Midterms Candidates aren’t being told the truth, says Trump ally. Fox News host Laura Ingraham delivered a stark warning about Republicans’ prospects in the November midterms—and knew who to blame. On Wednesday’s The Ingraham Angle, Ingraham blasted GOP consultants, saying they were failing to prepare candidates for what she called a “brutal” election cycle. “These consultants drive me nuts,” Ingraham said. “They fly around in private jets. They collect a huge amount of money. And I think they’re lying to these Republican candidates. This is going to be a brutal cycle. Republicans might pull it out. We all hope they do.” Her warning comes as Republicans face difficult polling ahead of the midterms. An Emerson College poll has Democrats leading Republicans by 8 points on the generic congressional ballot. The latest Reuters/Ipsos survey also found Democrats ahead among independent voters, 33 percent to 19 percent, when respondents were asked which party they would support for Congress. Republicans are trying to hold onto their majorities in both the House and Senate, but the historical odds are against them. Since World War II, the president’s party has gained congressional seats in the midterms just twice in 1998 and 2002. Trump’s historically low approval ratings amid his deeply unpopular war with Iran, which has seen gas prices spike, add another hurdle. The latest Reuters/Ipsos poll showed just 33 percent of Americans approve of Trump’s job performance—a personal low for Trump. The same poll found Democrats leading Republicans 36 percent to 28 percent on which party is better equipped to handle the cost of living—the largest Democratic advantage since the question was first asked in October 2025. Despite those concerns, Trump has reportedly concluded that Republicans should make the election a referendum on his record, with plans for national television advertising highlighting his administration’s achievements, The Atlantic reported. Some Republicans have publicly expressed concern about the strategy. “We’ve got 71 days, and right now we don’t have a positive message to tell farm country,” retiring Sen. Thom Tillis said this week. Republican strategist Alex Conant similarly told Reuters last month: “The White House officials have been saying since January that they need to win economic arguments. It’s hard to win the economic arguments when you’re clearly focused on foreign policy.” Democratic strategists have also issued warnings. Strategist James Carville said this month: “It’s so hard after being so obsessed with Trump for so long for the last 10 years; it’s just been Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump—the country is starting to turn away from him.” Ingraham, who served as an informal Trump adviser during his first term, urged Republicans to sharpen their message, arguing that voters need to hear that Democrats are coming for “your money, your gas-powered car, your air conditioner” and “your private health insurance.” “I’m sorry I’m getting mad,” she added. “I mean, I guess I should be a consultant or something.” https://www.thedailybeast.com/fox-host-freaks-out-that-republicans-face-brutal-midterms/?

Republicans Panic That Trump’s Convention Will Backfire Horribly The so-called “Trumpapalooza” event will take place in Dallas next month. Republicans fear that Donald Trump’s plans to energize Republican voters with a huge midterm convention will be a waste of time. The 80-year-old president and the Republican National Committee are hoping to avoid a political catastrophe in November’s elections by holding a two-day event in Dallas next month. The idea is that the event, which Trump will headline on the second night, will give the GOP a much-needed boost ahead of the midterms amid fears of an electoral wipeout, and convince Trump’s loyal MAGA supporters to actually turn up and vote in November, even though he will not be on the ballot. Multiple panicked Republican figures have told CNN that they do not think the convention will have the desired effect, citing numerous potential issues. These include whether it is a good idea to center the GOP’s midterm strategy around Trump amid his dire approval ratings. Other issues include the eye-watering $25,000 entrance fee for House members and whether it is necessary to pull candidates from their districts to attend the Dallas event during a crucial campaign period. “I’ve heard people say, why are we doing this? What’s going on?” Reb Wayne, a Texas-based Republican consultant, told CNN. “It was a good idea at the time, but as we’ve gotten closer to it, I’m not sure it’s going to serve much benefit.” The convention, once dubbed “Trumpapalooza,” is part of the president’s plans to make the midterm elections a referendum on himself. The plan is to try to stave off a Blue Wave by dragging his MAGA supporters to the ballot boxes in November, even though they will not be voting for him.“What is always the biggest issue when Trump is not on the ballot? Voters don’t show up,” a Republican lawmaker in a competitive race said. “So what’s [Trump] trying to do? Motivate the base to come out.” However, CNN reports that some in the GOP have “cringed” at the prospect of making the midterms about Trump, seeing as the president is at near-record-low approval ratings and facing intense voter backlash over major issues such as the economy and the war in Iran. Some are also concerned that, rather than using the convention to boost Republicans’ election hopes, Trump will waste his headline appearance by rambling on about his White House ballroom or suggesting that the affordability crisis faced by tens of millions of Americans is a “hoax.” Another potential issue is who exactly will be watching the convention. Both events will be held on the same nights as the first two games of the NFL season, which are guaranteed to draw a bigger primetime audience. “I don’t understand the programming still. It seems to just be five hours of speeches,” one GOP donor told CNN. “The upcoming Midterm Convention will showcase the momentum behind President Trump’s agenda and Republicans’ record of delivering real results for the American people,” RNC spokeswoman Natalie Baldassarre said, adding that “while Democrats remain divided and distracted, Republicans are united behind a shared vision.” The Daily Beast has contacted the White House for comment. https://www.thedailybeast.com/republicans-panic-that-trumps-midterms-convention-will-backfire-horribly/?

Insiders Reveal Alarming Reason Behind CIA Chief’s Trip to Russia John Ratcliffe flew into Moscow on a U.S. military transport aircraft. The worrying reason CIA Director John Ratcliffe took a secret trip to Russia has been revealed. Speculation has run rampant after a U.S. military transport aircraft unexpectedly landed at a Moscow airport. It was later revealed that Ratcliffe was traveling aboard the Boeing C-17A Globemaster III in what was the CIA chief’s first publicly known visit to the Russian capital. Insiders have now told The Wall Street Journal that Ratcliffe’s trip on Tuesday was to warn Russia not to launch an unprovoked attack on NATO countries. There have been fears that Russian President Vladimir Putin, who has faced multiple humiliations as Ukraine continues to resist Russia’s invasion, could lash out by carrying out an attack ranging from a cyberattack to an incursion into a neighboring country in order to test NATO’s resolve in the coming years. Any scenario in which Putin attacks a member of the military alliance could have devastating consequences around the world. Under NATO’s Article 5, an attack against one NATO country is considered an attack against all 32 allied members. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov confirmed to reporters on Wednesday that Ratcliffe held talks with Russian intelligence officials during his visit, but said the CIA director did not meet with Putin. “All I can ⁠tell you is that there have been contacts via the security services. I can tell you that there have been no meetings with the Russian president. Naturally, President Putin is kept informed of everything without delay,” Peskov said. U.S. officials previously told the Journal that it had long been assumed Putin would not provoke NATO while he was still fighting Ukraine—a conflict that has now dragged into its fifth year. However, this assessment changed earlier this year when Kyiv began fighting back with wave after wave of drone attacks that put Moscow on the back foot. This includes targeting Russia’s major oil refineries, which play a key role in funding the invasion, as well as warehouses and facilities used by Wildberries, Russia’s largest online retailer, to cripple Moscow’s economy. It is also believed that the U.S.’s dwindling stockpiles of munitions amid Trump’s war in Iran could influence whether Putin decides to attack a NATO country. The U.S. has also been a major supplier of weapons and munitions to Ukraine as it supports its bid to fight off the Russian invasion. It remains to be seen how successful Ratcliffe’s trip to the Russian capital will prove to be. William Burns, who led the CIA under former President Joe Biden, was the last known intelligence agency head to visit Moscow, heading there in November 2021. Burns’ trip was to warn Putin not to attack Ukraine, which the Russian president did three months later. Heather Conley, a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, said Putin would be hoping to fracture the NATO alliance with an aggressive move against one of its member states. “The question mark is how the United States would respond in that case,” Conley told the Journal. “It has always been a goal [of Russia’s] to challenge the credibility of NATO and to separate the United States from its allies.” Kremlin spokesperson Peskov tried to frame Ratcliffe’s visit as positive, saying talks between U.S. and Russian intelligence agencies could help repair the poor diplomatic relations between the two countries. “These ⁠contacts often continue even during the most difficult periods in bilateral relations. Our president, incidentally, has spoken about this. However, it is still too early to say to what extent this ⁠will, overall, help to steer our bilateral relations out of the profound crisis in which they currently find themselves,” he said. President Donald Trump downplayed the significance of Ratcliffe’s Moscow visit during an interview on Glenn Beck’s radio show Wednesday. “He’s there on, you know, very sort of semi-routine. I hate to disappoint people,” Trump said. “John Ratcliffe is a fantastic guy. He’s the head of the CIA, and he is not in there for any of the things that you said. Now something may come out, you know, out of it. We’re working very hard to get that war ended.” The Daily Beast has contacted the White House and the CIA for comment. https://www.thedailybeast.com/insiders-reveal-alarming-reason-behind-cia-chief-john-ratcliffes-trip-to-russia/?

Judge denies Minnesota’s bid to compel the extradition of an ICE officer from Texas BROWNSVILLE, Texas (AP) — A federal judge on Wednesday refused to order Texas to extradite an Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer charged with shooting a man and lying about it during the immigration crackdown in Minneapolis. https://apnews.com/article/minnesota-texas-ice-shooting-christian-castro-extradition-384843049feeba26fac6fc09412161ca? ICE officer’s release from Texas jail opens a new front in the escalating fight over extradition BROWNSVILLE, Texas (AP) — The release of an Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer from a Texas jail on Thursday despite Minnesota’s request for his return could set a dangerous precedent, increasing friction between states and helping criminal defendants avoid justice, legal experts said. https://apnews.com/article/minnesota-texas-ice-shooting-christian-castro-extradition-d1299b21657fe35afae615386d40552d?

Spy on Me No More: The Shocking Windows 11 Upgrade Every PC User Needs Microsoft is finally blocking downloaded software from secretly accessing your camera, mic, and location without asking. https://www.pcmag.com/news/spy-on-me-no-more-the-shocking-windows-11-upgrade-every-pc-user-needs?

Exactly the problem, AJ. Dragging Jesus into places where government holds sway. Vaxxing is an issue of public safety/health. It's not a religious matter. Lot of the religious issues today really have little or nothing to do with Jesus. Atheist countries have sense enough to execute bad actors, while so called Christian nations don't. "Christians" ring their hands over abortion, even though the Bible mandates it in certain situations. Luther said he would rather ~be a hog than be subjugated to bad religion.

That's what Jesus would do.

🍏 Coming attractions: Foldable iPhone Incoming Apple CEO John Ternus. Photo: Adam Gray/Bloomberg via Getty Images Apple sent invitations for a Sept. 9 event where it's expected to unveil its first foldable iPhone and other new products, Axios' Ina Fried writes. Why it matters: The launch would push Apple into a smartphone category it has long resisted — and give incoming CEO John Ternus a chance to put his stamp on the company's most important product. 🔭 Zoom out: Apple is preparing its latest devices as rising demand for AI computing pushes up memory and other component costs.

🛑 Big Tech faces Big Resistance Photo illustration: Sarah Grillo/Axios. Photos: Amy Harder/Axios and Jason Henry/Bloomberg, Sandy Huffaker/AFP via Getty Images Meta's landmark social media settlement marks the latest milestone in a decade-long unwinding of Big Tech's once-unfettered freedom to operate, Axios' Madison Mills writes. Why it matters: The AI industry is watching closely. Its expansion, already fraught with job risks and public anxiety, depends on building power-hungry data centers in communities where opposition is rising. 😡 State of play: "The last time we've seen the public this angry about an industry was during the financial crisis," Nidhi Hegde, executive director of the American Economic Liberties Project, told Axios. Meta's $17 billion settlement requires sweeping changes to how teens use Instagram and Facebook, including time limits and restrictions on certain beauty filters. Meta is calling on competitors to adopt similar protections as the industry standard, arguing there won't be "meaningful progress" on teen safety without them. Meta took a full-page ad in today's New York Times headlined, "An open letter to TikTok and YouTube to join us in supporting teens." Within hours after the terms were announced, state attorneys general from both parties called for a wider industry push, with several naming TikTok, YouTube and Snap. Investors were relieved by the settlement, with Meta stock up 1% yesterday. Between the lines: The pressure extends beyond Meta, as public frustration produces cash penalties and constraints on how tech companies operate. Amazon agreed last year to pay $2.5 billion to settle an FTC consumer-protection case over Prime subscriptions. Apple and Google have been forced to loosen their grips on their app stores after years of litigation. TikTok agreed just last week to pay $400 million to settle federal allegations that it violated children's privacy laws. ⚠️ Threat level: AI may be especially exposed because, unlike social media, its growth depends on a massive physical buildout in communities that can fight back. Share this story. Data: Axios research. Note: Google's 2018 fine was reduced from around $5.07 billion to $4.81 billion by the EU General Court in 2022. Google's 2017 fine was upheld by EU General Court in 2021. Amazon's 2021 fine was reduced from about $1.3 billion to around $878 million after court proceedings. Meta's settlement of up to $17.1 billion is partially contingent on whether other Big Tech platforms join it. Non-USD amounts converted at Aug. 26, 2026, exchange rates. Table: Sara Fischer/Axios For the first time, U.S. officials — at least at the state level — have proven they're as serious about policing Big Tech as their European counterparts, Axios Media Trends expert Sara Fischer writes. European fines against American tech companies have totaled well over $15 billion over the past decade. The Meta settlement eclipses all of those combined.

THIS DAY IN HISTORY August 27 1883 Krakatoa explodes with massive force The most powerful volcanic eruption in recorded history occurs on Krakatoa (also called Krakatau), a small, uninhabited volcanic island located west of Sumatra in Indonesia. read more Sponsored Content by REVCONTENT 19th Century 1875 Tycoon William Ralston drowns American Revolution 1776 British forces defeat Patriots in the Battle of Brooklyn Arts & Entertainment 1967 Beatles manager Brian Epstein dies Crime 2007 NFL star Michael Vick pleads guilty in dogfighting case 1979 Lord Mountbatten killed by IRA Sports 1976 Transgender athlete Renée Richards barred from U.S. Open U.S. Presidents 1908 Lyndon B. Johnson is born World War I 1916 Romania enters World War I

The average person in France sleeps 8.83 hours per day, the most in the developed world. James

The average person in France sleeps 8.83 hours per day, the most in the developed world. James

Money, Money, Money (Illustration by The Atlantic. Sources: Brian Hagiwara / Getty; Nieudacza / Getty; Passakorn_14 / Getty.)   View in browser America’s national debt hit $40 trillion last week. That number certainly feels like something worth panicking over—the mind balks at all the zeros. But although the debt has been in the trillions for decades, not everyone has considered it a problem. One camp of economists has been warning about the perils of high debt for years: Budget hawks predicted that if the country kept spending and didn’t raise taxes enough to keep pace, the resulting fiscal crisis could be devastating. But others—the doves—have brushed it off. Their perspective was that as long as the U.S. GDP was growing faster than the interest rate it was paying on its debt, the Treasury would be able to keep rolling over its bonds without too much of a problem. For much of the 2010s, this was essentially the status quo, and debt panic was muted. We’re nowhere near a complete failure of the Treasury market, and yet, over the past couple of years, some economists who were once more dovish have switched teams. Martha Gimbel, the executive director of the Budget Lab at Yale and the author of a recent Atlantic story on this issue, told me that part of the reason these economists are pivoting is that they’re starting to realize that interest rates are “probably going to be elevated for quite some time.” The average interest rate on U.S. debt—that second variable the doves look at—has been relatively high for several years now, and it’s only growing. It was hovering around 1.5 percent in 2021, and it’s now roughly 3.4 percent. The yield on the 30-year Treasury bond has more than doubled since 2021. “I was not a deficit hawk, and that reflected the dynamics” of the 2010s, when rates were lower, Gimbel told me. Now, she said, “the environment has changed.” Why are rates rising? The Fed’s reaction to inflation is one reason. It may also have something to do with the extreme investments being made in AI, and these companies’ demand for credit. And it’s likely connected to the deficit panic—concern about the expansion of the national debt and the government’s ability to sustain it. Investors are starting to think of long-term Treasurys as riskier than they once did, and they’re demanding more money in exchange for taking on America’s debt. At the same time, the federal government has shown no real appetite to pull its two main levers for reducing the debt: cutting spending and raising taxes. Jared Bernstein, the former head of Joe Biden’s Council of Economic Advisers, wrote in The Atlantic a few months ago that he’d “flipped from dove to hawk”—and told me this week that it was partly the government’s complacency on this issue that spurred this change. “Neither side seems particularly motivated to do much of anything about this,” he said. Rather than attending to the debt problem, politicians of both parties have instituted major tax cuts and increased spending over the past 25 years. The U.S. had its credit downgraded by a major ratings agency last spring, in part because of rising debt. The One Big Beautiful Bill Act will add an estimated $4.7 trillion to the deficit through 2035, and Donald Trump’s efforts to decrease immigration will add another half a trillion to that number over the same period, per the Congressional Budget Office. Despite some recent attempts at short-term stabilization, his administration hasn’t done much to assure the country’s creditors that everything’s fine; they now appear to be seeking greater yields as a result. When longer-term bond yields rise, as they have been, everyday forms of borrowing such as mortgage rates and student loans tend to become more expensive as well. That’s why yields are ultimately “a kitchen-table issue in the same way that inflation is,” Ernie Tedeschi, a former chief economist for the White House’s Council of Economic Advisers, told me. Last week, in an apparent attempt to depress yields, the Treasury Department announced that it would be more than doubling the size of its longer-term-bond buybacks. It worked briefly—yields fell—but about 24 hours later, they climbed higher than where they were before. In a scathing (and AI-written) Wall Street Journal op-ed this week, the investor and longtime deficit hawk Stanley Druckenmiller, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent’s former mentor, stressed that the increased buybacks were a distraction from the real problem: the government’s spending. This political inertia likely stems from the fact that the two most important levers for reducing the debt—raising taxes and cutting spending—remain unpopular among lawmakers and voters alike. Bessent suggested last week that he’s interested in a third option: stimulating the economy enough that it once again outpaces interest rates. But without a concrete plan in place, this sounds like wishful thinking, especially when the more obvious solutions to fix the deficit remain untapped. “This is the era of ‘No tax on blank’ in our politics right now,” Tedeschi said. On the campaign trail, Trump promised to remove taxes on tips, overtime pay, and Social Security payments; he accomplished the first and second, and took steps toward the third. That’s “exactly the opposite mentality we need to have if we want to stabilize our debt going forward,” Tedeschi said. Likelier than a true collapse of the Treasury market, he told me, is that both the debt and interest rates keep rising over time, and that “the days of the 2 or low 3 percent mortgage of a few years ago are just gone.” With affordability concerns playing a major role in the midterms, politicians aren’t exactly clamoring to raise taxes on their constituents. But affordability is exactly what’s at stake if Washington doesn’t at least attempt to chip away at the debt problem. Related: Americans are already paying dearly for the national debt. The national debt’s unforgiving math

Strong AI chip demand fuels Nvidia's Q2 results well beyond Wall Street's expectations Nvidia's latest quarterly results once again blew past Wall Street's expectations as revenue for the computer chip company's high-end artificial intelligence chips soared, the latest sign that AI infrastructure spending remains strong. Read More.

Lucky Charms and Trix go au naturel as General Mills ditches artificial colors General Mills said Wednesday it has removed artificial colors from all its U.S. cereals, including Lucky Charms and Trix. Read More.

📸 1 for the road: Getting the shot Photo: Courtesy of Jean Fruth Famous sports photographer Jean Fruth recently gave some first-hand baseball photography tips to Axios San Diego's Claire Trageser. Fruth has shot games at every MLB park, and co-founded the nonprofit Grassroots Baseball. ⚾️ Fruth tells Axios that when she shows up to photograph a game, she's looking for stories. She starts at batting practice with small details, like a glove, bat, ball or a player's hand. "Then, of course, the game begins, and we have game action and reaction." "So game action, a home run, or a play at second. Now who's reacting? Maybe it's the player who created the action celebrating, maybe it's the opposing team, or maybe it's the fans." Go deeper ...