Badlands Brief
Bicameral Deal-Making and Accelerationism Acknowledged
The Badlands Brief is your daily drop of Badlands’ takes on the narratives dominating the info war. Read on, and join the conversation in the comments section.
Trump Makes the Deal; Gives [60 Day] Peace a Chance … Kind Of …
According to reports, the U.S. and Iran reached a tentative agreement on Thursday to extend the existing ceasefire by another 60 days and ease shipping restrictions through the Strait of Hormuz.
Under the reported deal, the U.S. would lift its blockade of Iranian ports and some sanctions on Iranian oil sales in exchange for unrestricted shipping through the strategic waterway.
However, the agreement remains pending approval from President Trump and Iranian leadership.
Iranian state media reported that the text had not been finalized or confirmed.
U.S. Vice President JD Vance said the sides are “not there yet, but we’re very close,” while a U.S. official described the American strikes as defensive measures to preserve the ceasefire.
GhostofBasedPatrickHenry: The Art of the Deal Story.
Throughout this second term, Steve Witkoff has made it clear that whenever President Trump dispatches his envoys to negotiate peace, he empowers them to act with the necessary autonomy to maneuver and flex in order to get the deal done.
That's why President Trump is sending in his close friends and confidants, and not some career diplomats from the State Department. He trusts his friends. He doesn't trust the State Department.
The idea that terms were negotiated by the President's envoys that may be unacceptable to the President flies in the face of everything we have come to understand about the dynamic between the President and his envoys. They know going into these meetings Trump's endgame; what he can and cannot accept. With the stakes as high as they now are, there's no way they would walk out of that room with an agreement in place unless they were certain that Trump would accept it.
With all of that said, I love what President Trump is doing here. He's giving himself ‘veto’ power over a deal that surely he has already approved. This due diligence period provides all the snakes and jackals ample time to slither out from their holes to try and thwart it, exposing themselves in the process. It also serves as a reminder to the observing world who is holding all of the cards.
But that's not what makes this The Art of The Story.
The Art of The Story is the narrative quest Trump is now leading.
This Dark Night of The Soul serves as a Hero's Journey for the public's perception of the Islamic Republic of Iran.
It's similar to the journey we took in Venezuela, though that one was rather abbreviated compared to this one, and understandably so.
The story of a "scary" Iran has been deeply embedded in the modern zeitgeist. The American mythos must be rewritten so that a real and lasting peace can be cultivated between the American People and the Iranian People.
I suspect that we will soon see President Trump completely change his posture and rhetoric on Iran, much like he has done with Venezuela.
Just like he dragged the populist-nationalist movement kicking and screaming into this conflict, he will drag the NeoCons and Zionists kicking and screaming into this peace.
And it will be glorious to watch them fight back.
The Iran War Narrative Is Caught in a Doom Loop ... And That’s a Good Thing
Burning Bright: You know that deal Ghost is referencing above?
Well, the Media Industrial Complex immediately refuted it, using the ghost of Little Khamenei
Most weekdays now open with a familiar dialectic: reports that US negotiators and their Iranian counterparts have finalized, or are hours from finalizing some framework, memorandum of understanding or extension.
Halting optimism bubbles up from the ether, markets flicker and then, within hours, the counter-beat lands—denials from the so-called Iranian ledger, albeit always translated through the Media Industrial Complex.
The two sides alternate this pattern, sometimes within the same news cycle, both sustaining and ultimately ratcheting a low-grade whiplash that is entirely engineered.
To read this pattern as ultimately a GOOD thing for our side of the ledger requires operating from two core premises:
The first is that baseline truth in this theater is functionally inaccessible to us, and that every major media organ translating it for public consumption is operating at roughly the same level of reliable information as the audience—while having demonstrated, repeatedly that even IF they possessed better maps of reality than we did, they would NOT be trusted to translate them accurately, but more often to do the polar opposite, which is useful enough for us to know.
This is why Donald Trump has been consistent in his alternatingly-bombastic and dismissive commentary on the war he is supposedly fighting, replete with fake Ayatollahs, fake navies, and, in this writer’s estimation, a fake war whose actual phase was concluded before most of the current story beats kicked off.
The Media Industrial Complex, meanwhile keeps reaching for increasingly-threadbare justifications to keep their chaos narrative alive—up to and including the recent suggestions that when the supreme leader finally reappears, he may be unrecognizable in both voice and visage.
Which is patently absurd to believe.
The second premise is that both sides of this Mind War continue to believe that prolonging the story cycle itself inflicts greater damage on the opposing side.
Obviously, only one of them can be correct given the zero-sum nature of the Multipolar War.
The Media Industrial Complex and its aligned institutions appear to believe that sustaining the Iran storyline continues to bleed Trump’s core mandate and threaten his congressional map ahead of the very dramatic Midterms (that Trump himself just told you he doesn't care about.)
They treat every fresh escalation or contradictory leak as another day’s attrition against the mandate of a president they still imagine can be worn down by narrative pressure.
Trump, by contrast has given every public signal that he is unbothered by either metric.
This is because he has spent more than a decade forging a mandate the other side cannot replicate, and because he continues to behave as though he holds the decisive cards on timing, off-ramps and the ultimate codification of whatever settlement emerges on the other side of the Iranian Knot.
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Federal Judge Slapping Dems on Mail-in Ballots & Citizenship Checks
A federal judge has cleared President Trump’s executive order on voter citizenship checks and tighter mail-in voting rules to move forward.
U.S. District Judge Carl Nichols ruled that Democratic plaintiffs failed to demonstrate legal standing or sufficient harm to justify a preliminary injunction blocking the order.
The judge found that the executive order does not directly require the plaintiffs to take any action, and that no federal agency had yet implemented steps under the order that could cause them harm.
Judge Nichols rejected arguments that the order would disenfranchise millions of voters, calling those claims speculative. He noted that the order mandates procedures allowing individuals to access, review, and correct information in any state-by-state citizenship lists used to maintain voter rolls.
The judge also dismissed privacy concerns over the sharing of basic voter data—such as name, age, and residence—between government agencies, ruling that such sharing does not rise to the level of injury required for Article III standing.
The ruling removes a key legal obstacle and allows the Trump administration to proceed with implementing the executive order’s provisions on policing voter rolls for citizenship and restricting mail-in voting.
No specific timeline for rollout was detailed in the decision.
Ashe in America: My state AG has a reported 65 lawsuits against the Trump Administration and its agenda. He’s joined on to all the nonsense, and he’s counting these lawsuits as campaign accomplishments in his run for Governor.
That could be understood as using state funds for his campaign, but that would never be prosecuted in Colorado.
“Plaintiffs have failed to show that they are likely to have Article III standing or that they will suffer imminent and irreparable harm absent an injunction. The Court recognizes that the Postal Service may ultimately issue a final rule that directly affects Plaintiffs or their members, or that the Government may develop State Citizenship Lists that omit specific individuals due to particularized flaws. Plaintiffs may, of course, renew their motions if and when those future actions occur. Until then, however, Plaintiffs cannot show that preliminary injunctive relief is warranted.”
It’s not about justice, it’s about obstruction. These states (and Colorado is one of many) are pursuing frivolous legal actions to obstruct the lawful agenda of the People’s duly-elected Commander in Chief.
And they’re losing.
That’s the real takeaway — the establishment efforts to stop the President’s agenda are largely unsuccessful.
The weeping and gnashing of teeth will continue.
Accelerate.
Trump Admin Tells Prosecutors to Stand Down on Rodriguez
The Trump administration has directed federal prosecutors in Miami to stand down on criminal investigations into Venezuela’s acting President Delcy Rodríguez.
The move is intended to support efforts to stabilize Venezuela following Nicolás Maduro’s ouster and to facilitate U.S. investment in the country’s oil sector.
Prosecutors were told to avoid actions that could upset ongoing diplomatic and economic initiatives with Rodríguez’s government.
Rodríguez, a longtime target of the DEA with prior U.S. sanctions for alleged involvement in drug trafficking, gold smuggling, and money laundering, has not been criminally charged in the United States. Sanctions against her were lifted after she was recognized as Venezuela’s sole head of state.
She has hosted U.S. delegations and participated in ceremonies with American oil executives as oil flows have increased.
The directive aligns with a broader pattern of pausing high-profile probes into certain foreign leaders during the current administration.
GhostofBasedPatrickHenry: Our Girl, Delcy "Kokomo" Rodriguez, strikes again.
Despite the fact that it was the first Trump administration that sanctioned Kokomo, and opened an investigation into her, here we are today.
Perhaps Delcy was never the target?
Perhaps this was all misdirection?
Perhaps it was a ruse to mislead certain parties?
It's my understanding that John Bolton was responsible for the sanctions imposed on Delcy and others in the Maduro circle, and that tracks, given that he served in the administration from April 2018 until September 2019.
It was November 2019 that Erik Prince secretly traveled to Caracas to meet with Delcy on behalf of President Trump.
This was later reported as an "outreach" to the Maduro government.
According to Colonel Douglas Macgregor, who served as a senior military advisor during the first administration, President Trump wanted nothing to do with John Bolton until Israeli tycoon Sheldon Adelson asked that Bolton be brought onboard.
Suddenly, Trump was all for it.
In all likelihood, Bolton was a spy sent by the Israeli oligarchy to infiltrate the Trump cabinet and report back their activity.
All the behavior of Trump's administration from April 2018 to September 2019 would suggest that Trump was under the spell of the NeoCons, and carrying out their foreign policy objectives in Venezuela, even if unwittingly.
Then Bolton is fired, Erik Prince (who had previously offered to provide 5,000 mercenaries for a ground invasion) is dispatched to meet in secret with Delcy, and on January 3rd, 2020, Trump takes out Soleimani—who I believe was a Mossad asset.
Then COVID hit, and Trump's relationship with Israel became very rocky, as he had to wrestle with Netanyahu to shut down the construction of illegal settlements in the West Bank, and twist Bibi's arm to get them to sign the Abraham Accords.
Trump then had the 2020 election stolen from him, and Netanyahu was the first to call Biden to consecrate the coup.
Now the DOJ is being told to "stand down" on the Delcy investigation, probably because she was never a target.
After all, she did meet in secret with Erik Prince.
All of this feels connected. The timeline is the story, and the story makes sense.
Isn't it worth considering that maybe a similar dynamic is in play with Maduro?
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Gavin Newsom Runs Interference Before California Primaries, Announces 100% Tax on Anti-Weaponization Fund
California Gov. Gavin Newsom signed Senate Bill 73, which sharply restricts law enforcement access to ballots and election records.
The new law limits peace officers from accessing ballots, voter lists, rosters, and certified voting technology.
Officers are generally barred from interfering with election administration except in cases involving urgent public health or safety threats.
A court order is now required before law enforcement can take possession of key election materials, and removing packages containing voted ballots from election officials is classified as a crime.
Newsom stated that the measure is intended to “clarify the rules of engagement,” noting that violations can carry criminal penalties, fines, and up to three years in jail.
He also vowed to impose a 100% tax on any payouts that California residents receive from the $1.776 billion “anti-weaponization” fund established through President Trump’s settlement with the Department of Justice.
Newsom described the fund as a “slush fund” and linked it to Trump’s pardons of January 6 defendants, stating that recipients are being “rewarded” after being pardoned for “beating up cops.”
Ashe in America: This move by Newsom is hilarious.
If a Californian receives a payout for having the government weaponized against them, the state government will be weaponized to take the payout via a 100% tax.
I didn’t think Newsom could be more unlikable, but here we are.
How did this taxation come through representation?
It’s petty and punitive and intended to preserve a false narrative. I can’t imagine this law will stand up to legal challenges, so I hope Californians do the work and take their crooked governor to court.
He also signed this: “Removing packages containing voted ballots from election officials is also classified as a crime, with civil penalties of up to $50,000 for violations involving ballot custody.”
That is hilarious, considering ballot chain of custody is essentially non-existent.
Did our boy new just make status quo election administration a crime?
Trump’s Strategy on Cuba Rooted in ‘Accelerationism,’ According to Reports
The Trump administration is applying economic pressure to Cuba’s regime through expanded sanctions, a strategy described internally as “accelerationism” to hasten societal collapse in stages.
On May 1, President Trump signed an executive order imposing secondary sanctions on companies doing business with GAESA, Cuba’s military-industrial conglomerate.
This has already prompted several foreign firms—including Canadian miner Sherritt International and European shipping companies CMA CGM and Hapag-Lloyd—to suspend operations in Cuba, with more pullouts expected from banks and hotel operators.
Additional measures include the cutoff of Venezuelan oil shipments to Cuba, a Justice Department indictment of Raúl Castro over the 1996 Brothers to the Rescue shootdowns, and the termination of a GAESA executive’s U.S. green card.
The administration is also more aggressively enforcing existing sanctions while conducting multiagency planning for potential unrest or chaos on the island.
Senior officials say the goal is to methodically constrict Cuba’s economy and create conditions for a peaceful transition away from the current regime without immediate regime elimination. The approach includes limited humanitarian assistance routed through non-government channels, such as the Catholic Church and charities, to demonstrate alternatives to the current system.
GhostofBasedPatrickHenry: The best way to describe it is 'accelerationism,' " one senior administration official said, referring to the philosophy of hastening societal collapse.
Am I tripping on acid, or has the Trump administration been reading the Badlands News Brief?
Hey guys: if you need a consultant on this subject, I know a guy.
Accelerate.
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Feedback from flyover MN... My colleagues that are your ages and voted for Trump 3X are flipping out about everything, especially regarding that "he is a complete tool for the Jews!"
I keep pointing out your briefs to them et al. and I think they functionally agree with stuff like your analyses, but the lack of concrete, daily 'results' is tough for them to handle. Brent Crude Prices - controlled by England which is controlling(or trying) the distribution of oil - are falling, etc.
I agree with your analyses, especially with the dynamic that Trump just gives the floor to the actors and lets them show themselves; you haven't heard much publicly from Bibi these days and all others are overreacting everywhere.
Remember who Trump is - strategic: http://www.forbes.com/sites/realspin/2016/08/19/the-day-i-went-head-to-head-with-donald-trump/#624a2a035570
@Ghost “Throughout this second term, Steve Witkoff has made it clear that whenever President Trump dispatches his envoys to negotiate peace, he empowers them to act with the necessary autonomy to maneuver and flex in order to get the deal done.”
This is the precise definition of the word we read as “prophet” in the Old Testament (the original word looks like ‘nabi’ and rather than being directly translated the Greek word that it was determined most closely aligned with it, “prophètès”, was used) and which the Greek word we read as “apostle” in the New Testament were understood to mean in the cultures in which those terms were spoken. In other words, this is an ancient model that represents millennia of effective and efficient negotiations leading to treaties and alignments between nations!
Thanks Gordon!