“Al Qaeda militants are moving closer to seizing the capital of the West African nation of Mali, which, should the city fall, would become the first country in the world run by the U.S.-designated terrorist group.
The rapid advance of the jihadists in Africa comes after Islamist groups took power in both Afghanistan and Syria, but, if they take Bamako, it would be the first time militants with direct and current connections to al Qaeda achieve such a feat.”
“The law imposed a set of strict internal accounting controls and, most famously, imposed criminal penalties on CEOs who knowingly signed off on quarterly earnings reports that were found to be fraudulent in any way.
Just over 23 years later, the law is considered a success. Since its passage, there have basically been no major corporate accounting scandals
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What they likely never realized is the massive unintended consequences caused by their law, which we are still living with to this day—consequences more severe than if existing laws and self-correcting market forces were used to deal with the deceptive accounting that was occurring.
For starters, SOX is very expensive to comply with, typically costing companies millions of dollars per year, on an ongoing basis, and thousands of man-hours. The increased administrative cost has affected companies’ decisions to go public. Some firms simply do not want the additional regulatory scrutiny that is associated with being public. As a result, fewer companies have gone public over time. In the late 1990s, there were more than 6,500 public companies; today, that number stands at 4,700, depending on the index. There are not even enough public companies to fill the Wilshire 5000 Index, which is a measure of the total market capitalization in the United States. As of 2025, there are now more exchange-traded funds than publicly traded stocks. Having said that, the regulatory burden of SOX is certainly one of many factors that determine whether companies go public. Some don’t want the scrutiny from Wall Street analysts. Some don’t want to be exposed to shareholder lawsuits. Some don’t want to deal with activist investors. But the cost of SOX is the primary factor.”
“A federal judge has indefinitely extended her order banning the Trump administration from mass firing federal employees during the government shutdown.”
“Senate Republicans will block a Democratic bill that would keep federal food aid flowing to 42 million Americans as they try to build pressure to reopen the government, Majority Leader John Thune said Wednesday.
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Thune separately told reporters that if the Senate starts “going down the road of … take care of this group or that group … it just begs the larger question, how long is this going to drag on?”
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Democrats and even privately some Republican lawmakers argue the Trump administration has the legal authority to tap a $5 billion contingency fund, or other USDA funds, to ensure SNAP benefits keep flowing during the shutdown. Dozens of Democratic governors and attorneys general have sued the administration over its decision not to tap those funds.”
“The ongoing federal shutdown could cost the U.S. economy between $7 billion and $14 billion, according to a new report from the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office.”
“The plaintiffs are disputing the Trump administration’s statements that it doesn’t have the legal authority to use the $5 billion it has in emergency funds to pay for at least part of SNAP, which requires more than $8 billion to pay for November benefits. They also argue that USDA could tap Section 32 funds, which it did to tide over the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children, to fully fund SNAP next month.”
“American goods are losing ground fast. A recent KPMG survey finds that “60% of businesses reported decreased overseas sales” in the first six months of President Donald Trump’s tariffs. For instance, U.S. liquor exports tumbled 9 percent in the second quarter of this year, with steep declines across the European Union, Canada, Britain, and Japan, which together buy about 70 percent of these exports. In another example, China—once a key customer for U.S. farm goods—has turned instead to Argentina and other suppliers, and total U.S. soybean exports are down 23 percent this year.
Smaller companies are also adversely affected. A valve and gas component maker in Napa Valley just announced that it will shut down a plant and discharge 237 employees, citing weak overseas demand linked to tariffs. Let’s not forget the upcoming Supreme Court case of V.O.S. Selections, Inc. v. Trump, where U.S. importers and resellers of wine, electronics kits, apparel, and other goods argued that the April 2 “Liberation Day” tariffs disrupted their supply chains, forced steep price increases, and threatened their viability.
American consumers, too, are paying the price. KPMG finds that nearly half of American companies have already raised prices because of tariffs; two-thirds have passed at least part of those costs on to shoppers; and nearly 40 percent have paused hiring, with a third cutting jobs.
CEOs overwhelmingly expect tariffs to weigh on business for years. Goldman Sachs estimates U.S. consumers are now footing 55 percent of the total tariff bill, while foreign exporters bear only a sliver of the costs.”
“Like Patel, Bondi was confirmed after promising to be guided by the facts and the law rather than the president’s grudges. “The partisanship, the weaponization, will be gone,” she declared. “America will have one tier of justice for all….There will never be an enemies list within the Department of Justice.”
Blanche sang the same tune during his confirmation hearing. “Politics should never play a role in the Department of Justice,” he said. “We will work to restore the American people’s faith in our justice system.”
Whether or not Bondi and Blanche meant those words when they said them, the president plainly does not share the vision they described. “They’re all guilty as hell,” Trump said in the Truth Social rant addressed to Bondi, which mentioned Adam Schiff, the not-yet-indicted Democratic senator from California (whom Trump also mentioned on Wednesday), along with Comey and James—a list to which he has now added three more names. Guilty of what? The Justice Department’s job, as Trump sees it, is to figure that out.”
China’s stranglehold on the supply of rare earths is damaging America’s ability to build military equipment and commercial cars. So far, Trump’s trade war on China is costly with little to no reward.