NICE: Murders plummeted more than 20% in U.S. in 2025, study shows.

Murders plummeted more than 20% in 2025 from the year before, the single-largest one-year drop on record — and it might be the lowest murder rate in the U.S. since 1900, a study released Thursday by the Council on Criminal Justice found.

The annual crime trends report analyzed data from 40 large cities across the United States for 13 different crime types, including murder, carjacking, theft and drug offenses.

Alongside homicides, which dropped 21% from 2024, carjackings have declined 61% since 2023, while shoplifting is down 10% since 2024. In general, the overall crime rate declined, with violent crimes at or below levels seen in 2019, the analysis found — drug offenses were the only category that rose during this period, while sexual assault remained even.

Researchers pointed toward multiple reasons for the large drop in homicides, but cautioned that “identifying decisive factors with certainty is challenging.”

Did they ignore the obvious factor?

Turns out that jailing or deporting repeat violent offenders greatly reduces the murder rate https://t.co/sXdT2eUVOO

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) January 22, 2026

NICE: Europe Fades As Latin America Rises. Milei Is Leading the Way.

MATTHEW SHOEMAKER: Russia’s 90-Day Warning.

For three years, the world has waited for the Russian economy to implode. Instead, we watched a “Kalashnikov economy” defy gravity, fueled by high oil prices and a “friendship without limits” with Beijing. But as of January 2026, the gravity of basic math has finally caught up with Vladimir Putin.

The catalyst isn’t just the stalemate on the front lines; it’s a legislative “kill shot” from Washington and a quiet betrayal from the East. Between the new Graham-Trump Sanctioning Russia Act and a mounting domestic liquidity crisis, the Kremlin isn’t just running out of options—it’s running out of time.

The most significant development of 2026 isn’t a new missile system; it’s a tariff. The Graham-Trump Bill, greenlit by the White House on January 7, has fundamentally rewritten the rules of economic warfare. By threatening a mandatory 500% tariff on any country—including China and India—that continues to purchase Russian petroleum or uranium, the U.S. has finally weaponized the one thing Russia’s allies value more than cheap crude: access to the American consumer.

The shockwaves were instantaneous. On January 15, reports emerged that China’s largest state banks, including ICBC and Bank of China, began halting Ruble-denominated settlements. They aren’t waiting for the bill to be signed into law; they are pre-emptively cutting Russia loose to save their own export margins. When Beijing chooses its $500 billion trade surplus with the U.S. over its “strategic partner” in Moscow, the Russian war machine loses its primary life support system.

Still, it’s almost impossible to think that Russia won’t find illicit buyers for discounted oil. Their shadow tanker fleet has done just that for years.

This doesn’t look great though: “While the external walls are closing in, the internal floor is rotting. On New Year’s Day, Russia’s VAT officially jumped to 22%. This isn’t a sign of strength; it’s an act of desperation. The Kremlin is cannibalizing its own middle class to plug a federal budget revenue gap that fell 20% short of targets in 2025.”

Ouch.

KRUISER’S MORNING BRIEFING: Good Week for Trump, Rough Week for Vestigial Eurotrash. “The world leaders who have good relationships with Trump are the ones who aren’t destroying freedom, like Italy’s Giorgia Meloni, who can bring any leftist loudmouth male to tears with just her stare. Meloni’s boldness can save Italy from the kind of fate that the leaders of France, Germany, and the United Kingdom are dooming their people to.”

HMM: Does SR-72 Hypersonic Dark Star Have Technical Challenges?

It’s hard to imagine a stealthy manned or unmanned 6th-gen or above jet capable of reaching hypersonic speeds in flight … could be cancelled. Seems unlikely, given the flurry of attention it received, speculation it inspired and capability it promised … yet the SR-72 Son of Blackbird aircraft seems to have vanished into a mysterious mist of uncertainty. Virtually “no” new information on the aircraft has emerged, and there has been very little speculation or hype about the “star” aircraft featured in the movie “Maverick” for quite some time.

The absence of emerging information could signal one of two opposite possibilities: the SR-72 has either become even more secret than it may have been previously, so Pentagon developers are simply leaving no room for new speculation, or the platform has not performed as promised and is simply cancelled or vanishing from existence. However, an effort to determine if the SR-72 is somewhat paradoxical as one must first affirm and verify that the platform, in fact … exists.

Technical complications?

Certainly the possibility of a highly maneuverable, manned hypersonic fighter jet has both Hollywood appeal and real-world tactical merit, yet establishing and sustaining stable hypersonic flight, in reality, remains challenging.

While very cool in theory, there are budgetary, performance, or necessity reasons could have led to the SR-72 (or whatever it’s called) being cancelled. Still, I’d like to think that the program turned out to be such a success that the Air Force put it under even tighter wraps.

PRIORITIES:

Most California thing ever: spending 3/4 of your fire prevention budget complying with regulations to ensure you are not damaging endangered plants etc only for them all to be obliterated in the wildfire you failed to prevent https://t.co/BG4yKihDQP

— Toby Muresianu 🇺🇦 (@tobyhardtospell) January 22, 2026

ICYMI: Things Are Actually Worse Now in Seattle Than During the COVID Lockdowns.

WATCH AS MINNESOTA GOES OUT OF THE FRYING PAN AND INTO THE FIRE: Klobuchar files campaign paperwork for Minnesota governor.

She is the first Democratic candidate to form a gubernatorial candidate committee since DFL Gov. Tim Walz announced earlier this month he would not seek reelection, according to Minnesota Campaign Finance Board records.

“This is a preliminary step necessary for any candidate considering a run,” a source close to Klobuchar told 5 EYEWITNESS NEWS. “The senator will make an announcement of her plans in the coming days.”

A slew of Republican candidates — including House Speaker Lisa Demuth and Rep. Kristin Robbins, chair of the House fraud prevention committee — had harped on Walz for staggering fraud in state welfare programs during his time in office.

“Harped.”

LYING SNITCHES CAN BE HAD FOR NOT THAT MUCH: How Much Did Jack Smith Pay to ‘Confidential Human Sources’?

OUCH: Extreme winter storm threat sparks historic natural gas spike. “The contracts for near-term US natural gas futures have skyrocketed more than 70% so far this week, according to FactSet data. That leaves natural gas on track for the biggest weekly increase since 1990 and at the highest price since 2022, according to Bloomberg.”

ICYMI: Up in Canada, They’re Signaling Genuine Virtue for Once (Really!)

THAT’S BIG: Wobbling exoplanet hints at a hidden exomoon so massive it could redefine the word ‘moon’ altogether.

MORE LIKE THIS, PLEASE: DHS Slates Mahmoud Khalil for Deportation to Algeria.

A VERY PUBLIC EDUCATION: ‘Portrait of a Graduate’ is lite on academics: They can’t read, but they have ‘global empathy.’

By the time I got my high school diploma, I could read, write and calculate, dissect a frog and analyze the causes of the Civil War. But that was the last millennium.

Today’s students need more, say educators. The national superintendents’ association urges schools to “establish a high-impact ecosystem by building clarity and conviction for a shared vision of learning. The newly trendy “Portrait of a Graduate” goes beyond academics to identify what “children in your community need to succeed in this rapidly changing, complex world.”

In Columbus, Ohio, for example, the portrait includes “global empathy,” ability to use technology, creativity, adaptability, communications and “critical thinking.”

“As of 2024, at least 20 states and countless districts had initiated ‘Portrait of a Graduate’ reforms, writes Daniel Buck, who directs the Conservative Education Reform Network, in Education Next. Educating the “whole child” is an old idea, he writes. This could be just another fad. However, the Education Testing Service and the Carnegie Foundation are working on tests to measure the unmeasurable. Is Caleb achieving the desired level of good citizenship? Is Emma sufficiently creative and collaborative?

Johnny’s failing algebra but he got an A in Groupthink.

SPOILER: SHE’S DEFINITELY A LIAR.

"The founders were racist genocidal colonialists, but I cherish the founding document they produced. I'm definitely not a liar." https://t.co/7Ijo1UnrCi pic.twitter.com/M5EbrBb0qT

— Duffyevsky ☦ (@TheIllegit) January 22, 2026

ACHIEVEMENT UNLOCKED: Things Are Actually Worse Now in Seattle Than During the COVID Lockdowns. “Well, that’s an unexpected achievement — for certain and entirely ironic values of ‘unexpected.'”

LIKELY STORY: Ms. Rachel caught liking call to ‘Free America from the Jews’ — claims she ‘was just tapping’ to delete in tearful apology.

Last year: YouTube star Ms. Rachel has been accused of spreading Hamas propaganda to children, according to an antisemitism watchdog that has penned a letter to Attorney General Pam Bondi.

LENIN ADVISED, “THE WORSE, THE BETTER,” AND IT’S A LESSON THE LEFT NEVER FORGOT:

China may not be pushing this, but the faction most aligned with China just happens to be. As in Virginia and Minnesota (and California), the effect is to make a state too dysfunctional to govern, live in, or enforce federal law in.

Kneecapping industry is not what we need… https://t.co/AZiCiWbjHG

— Martin Skold (@MartinSkold2) January 22, 2026

HENRY KNOX: The Most Unlikely Hero of the American Revolution.

IT WAS A BESTSELLER AND EVERYTHING:

He wrote an entire book about it. You’d think people would read the damned thing.

— Stephen Fleming (@StephenFleming) January 22, 2026

’TURNSTILE JUMPERS CHALLENGE’: Viral TikTok trend mocks NYC’s ‘foolproof’ $1.1 billion subway turnstile upgrades. “One particular group staged a recent late-night ‘Fare Evasion Olympics’ at Manhattan’s Broadway-Lafayette Street station, turning the evasion into a competitive sporting competition equipped with gold medals and a $3 cash prize, the cost of a subway ticket. The competition, organized by comedian Danny Fisher, featured a pole dancer, a parkour athlete, and a rock climber who took home the gold medal by scaling the overhead scanners.”

I get the feeling the Mamdani crew doesn’t much care.

RICHARD FERNANDEZ NAILS IT:

The results of the recon by fire is that you can see the attack in progress.

Now that you can actually see the open borders army it's certain they've been creeping forward a looong time. They took their time blending in. Carefully snipping the perimeter wire that is the police,…

— wretchardthecat (@wretchardthecat) January 22, 2026

MAKE IT VIRAL: Up in Canada, They’re Signaling Genuine Virtue for Once (Really!).

MOST LARGE-SCALE M&As FAIL TO DELIVER SHAREHOLDER VALUE: Netflix Stock Hits 52-Week Low, Analysts Cut Price Targets, See Warner Bros. Deal as a Drag. “The streaming giant’s fourth-quarter updates included news that it ended 2025 with more than 325 million global paid subscribers, up from 302 million as of the end of 2024. But the company’s financial outlook, especially for profit margins, disappointed.”

LOL, EXPERTS:

On French TV, a so-called expert gave viewers a quick geography lesson. Greenland, he said with more certainty than warranted, is closer to Europe than to the U.S.

The map had to be stretched so far that Iceland ended up south of Spain. pic.twitter.com/Bq6nsMUWSF

— blingsabato (@blingsabato) January 20, 2026

I thought it was Americans who didn’t know geography, but this “expert” sure seems to think his European viewers are ignorant.