A veritable treasure trove, including exceptionally rare brass trumpets, has been found on board a 16th-century shipwreck by archaeologists with Croatia’s International Centre for Underwater Archaeology (ICUA).The unknown sailing ship, which was armed with English iron cannons, sank off the southern coast of Istria, near Cape Kamenjak, in Croatia. The ship likely experienced trouble during storms, which ultimately led to its demise.At the time, the ship was carrying various goods, including ceramic vessels, colorful glass beads, and red glass bowls. But recent excavations have also found a cargo of brass trumpets on board the sunken vessel. The objects were extremely rare and expensive during the 16th century. Luka Bekić of the ICUA told Croatian Radiotelevision that seems they were likely "more than ten" of these instruments, which were being transported in pieces.The trumpets recovered from the vessel appear to have been transported in pieces.IMAGE CREDIT: INTERNATIONAL CENTRE FOR UNDERWATER ARCHAEOLOGY.The archaeologists have identified inscriptions on trumpets that state where they were created, which include Strasbourg, France, and Leiden, in the Netherlands. The best-preserved example includes the inscription “LVGDVNY BATAVORVM”, which is the Latin name for Leiden.“Until now, no trumpets from those cities were known or have been preserved anywhere in the world,” the ICUA explained in a statement.An examination of the cargo and other details on the vessel has led archaeologists to think the ship was likely Dutch and was trading between Leiden, Venice, and Constantinople (modern Istanbul). However, this is far from being conclusive; the researchers will have to spend several more years investigating the cargo and the ship’s other archives for more conclusive answers.Excavation of the site has also found materials belonging to the ship itself, including wooden structures, pieces of ropes, and wooden pulleys. Archaeologists have also found three cannons that will remain in situ while they consider the best methods to safely remove them from the sea floor.The researchers are using digital methods, including photogrammetric models, to help document the segments of the ship that have already been examined. This technique in particular will help create a fuller picture of the site when the research finishes.The cannons and the ship’s anchor will be preserved for diving tourists to visit in the years to come.

Komodo dragons’ status as possibly the ultimate killing machine has been enhanced with the discovery their teeth are tipped with iron. There’s also reason to suspect predatory dinosaurs may have used the same trick, allowing them to puncture and pull prey apart with extra speed.It’s a curious thing that arguably the closest survivor to a living tyrannosaur in body and behavior – although not genetics – exists on only a few small islands, and bits of a larger one, but there they certainly rule the roost. Komodo dragons (Varanus komodoensis), the largest living lizard, have a kill rate when hunting that puts any other vertebrate to shame. They also have more hidden weapons than a ninja in a Hollywood action film.Already known for serrated, curved teeth, like many theropod dinosaurs, a new study shows the tips and cutting edges are enriched in iron. This explains how their teeth remain capable of pulling prey apart despite an enamel coating much thinner than in mammals.Komodos are not unique in strengthening their teeth with the addition of the metal. Chitons like Cryptochiton stelleri, a type of mollusk nicknamed the “wandering meatloaf”, have also adopted the idea. Curiously, chitons are not terrifying predators (although the image in the previous link may haunt your nightmares). They use the iron to allow themselves to scrape their teeth on rocks to collect algae and bacteria without them wearing down too fast.Iron is a common feature in reptilian teeth, presumably adding strength, but the concentrations are small. Puzzlingly, however, Komodo dragons and their nearest relatives are the only reptiles we’ve yet found that have taken this a stage further by concentrating the iron where it counts. The capacity to sequester iron into a discrete coating in just the right places appears to be a rare adaptation. This innovation keeps the serrated edges of dragon teeth sharper than would otherwise be possible.The iron does make the dragons’ teeth orange, but other dragons probably think that’s sexy.Given that the resemblance between the shape of Komodo dragons’ teeth and that of the larger predatory dinosaurs has been noted for a while, it was natural for researchers to wonder if T. rex teeth were iron-tipped too.“Unfortunately, using the technology we have at the moment, we can’t see whether fossilised dinosaur teeth had high levels of iron or not. We think that the chemical changes which take place during the fossilisation process obscure how much iron was present to start with,” said Dr Aaron LeBlanc of King’s College London in a statement. Nevertheless, the research was not wasted. “What we did find, though, was that larger meat-eating dinosaurs, like tyrannosaurs, did change the structure of the enamel itself on the cutting edges of their teeth. So, while Komodo dragons have altered the chemistry of their teeth, some dinosaurs altered the structure of their dental enamel to maintain a sharp cutting edge,” LeBlanc said.Nor is LeBlanc giving up on learning whether any dinosaur teeth were iron-tipped. “With further analysis of the Komodo teeth we may be able to find other markers in the iron coating that aren’t changed during fossilisation,” he said. Some such markers might survive fossilization, providing an answer to the dinosaur question.The team are also investigating some of Komodo dragons' closest relatives, including some extinct giants.The teeth of megalania, Australia's extinct even larger relative of the Komodo dragon, show similar serrations to Komodos', but there is no sign of the pigmentation that would indicate iron tipping.Image Credit: LeBlanc et al, Nature Ecology and Evolution 2024 (CC BY 4.0)It’s a myth that Komodo dragons’ mouths harbor lethal bacteria that accelerate sepsis in their prey. However, that doesn’t mean their size, speed, and fearsome teeth are their only weaponry. They have also been shown to have a layer of bony armor under their scales that has been compared to chain mail. Then there is their venom, which somewhat ironically could prove a lifesaver for stroke victims, and blood with powerful antibiotic capacities. You’d think with all these powers Komodo dragons would be the global apex predator, at least in the tropics, but apparently they just don’t like moving far from home, and will return there quickly if moved. Having such a limited range means that changes to their environment have put them on the endangered species list. Teeth of iron are no good if there’s nothing to hunt.The study is published open access in Nature Ecology and Evolution.

FIRST ON MRC: MRC Free Speech America has peered under the sheets to catch Google seemingly cuddling up to President Joe Biden to attack The Heritage Foundation’s Project 2025, just weeks before he exited the 2024 race. As always, the Media Research Center has the receipts to prove it. When Biden directed his 38 million X followers to “Google Project 2025” last week, MRC researchers took him up on his advice. MRC found that Google, the Democrats’ good old friend, exclusively promoted the scandal-plagued president’s website in searches for “Project 2025.” The new findings reinforce previous MRC reports exposing how Google has backed the scandal-plagued president until the days of his humiliating ouster from the Democratic ticket. Despite this, Google appears to have a new pal – the unpopular Vice President Kamala Harris. Backdrop: Over the past several months, the Democratic Party has deceptively labeled Project 2025 as Trump’s plan to upend the federal government and to transform the country just to conservatives’ liking. “Google Project 2025,” Biden wrote in a July 9 X post, reaching over 37 million views. Biden’s call to action followed his now-defunct campaign’s (@BidenHQ) month-long reliance on Google to draw attention to Project 2025. The X page now goes under Harris’s moniker, @KamalaHQ. The Findings, Explained: Conducted on July 10, a clean environment search showed that Google placed Biden’s Project 2025 landing page — https://joebiden.com/project2025/  — at the top of the search results. This website was filled with grossly misconstrued and even demonstrably false information about Heritage’s project. Tellingly, Google omitted Project 2025’s official website in all 106 results reviewed by MRC’s researchers. This means the tech giant barred curious Americans from learning about the initiative’s intent and proposals in its own words, rather than through the partisan lens of the Biden-Harris campaign. Google linked to news articles from the left-leaning BBC and CBS News as the second and third results, respectively, before linking to a PDF copy of Project 2025’s Mandate for Leadership: The Conservative Promise as the fourth result. The tech giant also shared Wikipedia’s Project 2025 page, where it is characterized as an“authoritarian, Christian nationalist plan to steer the U.S. toward autocracy.” Only then did Google show a Heritage Foundation-owned page related to Project 2025 which offered only a brief introduction to the initiative. Again, Google did not show Project 2025’s official website — https://www.project2025.org/ — in any of the results.  In response to these findings, MRC Free Speech America Vice President Dan Schneider suggested Google is making an in-kind contribution to the Biden campaign. “MRC has been sounding the alarm for years that Google is fighting tooth and nail to keep Democrats in the White House. What’s disturbing is that they’re doing it right before our own eyes,” Schneider said. A Google spokesperson did not immediately respond to MRC’s questions about potential coordination with the Biden campaign (now Harris’s) before the president mandated Americans to “Google Project 2025.” The tech giant frequently refuses to answer MRC’s questions. What Exactly Is Project 2025 and Why Biden Attacks It: Launched in response to conservative unpreparedness during the 2016 election, Project 2025 is an initiative led by Heritage promoting pro-freedom and conservative principles in the next administration. The non-partisan initiative is not affiliated with President Donald Trump or his campaign. Trump himself has clarified he is not involved in Project 2025. “I have no idea who is behind it. I disagree with some of the things they're saying and some of the things they’re saying are absolutely ridiculous and abysmal,” the Republican candidate wrote on Truth Social earlier this month. This has not stopped Biden nor Harris from attempting to draw negative attention by suggesting it would mark a Trump-led arrival of the antichrist and the end of so-called democracy. This, of course, is demonstrably false as Biden has grossly misrepresented what the project is about. Fortunately, the attacks have been thus far unsuccessful. Enter Google. Biden’s negative characterization of Project 2025 is evident by the page of his campaign website highlighted by Google. “Project 2025 is the plan by Donald Trump’s MAGA Republican allies to give Trump more power over your daily life, gut democratic checks and balances…,” the site falsely claimed. Google’s Election Meddling Pattern: It isn’t immediately clear why the Harris campaign would appear first in the Google results. However, it adds yet another layer of controversy to the tech giant, as previous MRC studies have revealed that it has buried the campaign websites of Republicans while promoting those of Democrats. On Wednesday, amid the 2024 Republican National Convention, MRC released a study revealing that Google searches for Trump and Biden along with the words “presidential race 2024” resulted in blatant favoritism: Google did not show Trump’s campaign website in the first 100 results but listed the Biden-Harris’s as the very first result. This study followed an earlier MRC report showing Google buried Trump’s campaign ahead of the CNN presidential debate, where millions of Americans witnessed Biden’s cognitive decline, culminating in growing calls for him to step down from the 2024 race.  Following the debate, MRC released a third study that revealed Google News overwhelmingly featured leftist media outlets a day after the “bloodbath” debate.  (Click here for a complete list of MRC studies on censorship and Big Tech bias). Methodology: For this report, MRC Free Speech America analyzed the June 10 Google Search results for “Project 2025.” MRC Free Speech America created an algorithm to automate this process in a clean environment. A “clean environment” allows for an organic search to populate results without the influence of prior search history and tracking cookies. Conservatives are under attack. Contact Google at 650-253-0000 and demand it be held to account to mirror the First Amendment while providing transparency, clarity on so-called hate speech and equal footing for conservatives. If you have been censored, contact us using CensorTrack’s contact form, and help us hold Big Tech accountable.

Trying to write about "El Topo" took me by surprise. The short version is: The movies I admired in my 20s look and feel different to me now that I’m married and have kids. I guess I didn’t expect parenthood to change my worldview entirely, including my standards and expectations for art. So this week’s Wednesday Western is not about examining a film we all love. This is instead the story of a grown man looking back at the corduroy bell-bottoms he was famous for in college, back when the world was fundamentally different. Weirder than weird About a decade ago, filmmaker Alejandro Jodorowsky was a hero of mine. His 1973 film “The Holy Mountain” blew my mind. I watched it once a week, then branched into Jodorowsky’s other films, hoping to find another as beautifully strange. I was not disappointed. Soon I stumbled upon “El Topo” (Spanish for “The Mole”), which the BBC deemed “the weirdest Western ever made.” It quickly replaced "The Holy Mountain" as my favorite Jodorowsky film. Not only did the Chilean-born director write the script, he scored the soundtrack and played the starring role. Watching it today, however, I find plenty to be disappointed about. Be warned: This is the weirdest movie we’ve examined so far on Wednesday Western. It will not sit right with many of you. By the end of this article, you’ll be equipped with everything you need in order to make a decision: Should I even watch “El Topo,” which Jodorowsky himself described as “LSD without LSD”? Acid Western In a review of the film, the New Yorker coined the term "acid Western" to describe “El Topo.” The New York Times used the term “psychomagical realism.” Few directors have captured the possibilities of surrealism better than Alejandro Jodorowsky. "El Topo" has served as a license to be weird for many directors, writers, and actors, earning praise from an array of artists, including Frank Ocean, Marilyn Manson, David Lynch, Peter Gabriel, Peter Fonda, John Lennon, The Mighty Boosh, Bob Dylan, George Harrison, and Patton Oswalt, the chubby little guy from the show "King of Queens." During an interview, Jodorowsky said, “I wanted to do an image that a person will never forget in his life, to create mental change. To reach a state of enlightenment.” The shadowy hero of this hallucination is the eponymous El Topo, whom we find wandering the desert on horseback with his naked son, Hijo, which is Spanish for “son.” They encounter a village that has just been ruthlessly gutted, the bodies of its citizens and animals lining the mud — Jodorowsky used actual dead horses. Where you can find it The easiest way to watch is probably via the Internet Archive or Vimeo. Amazon Prime: $4.09 to rent; AppleTV: $19.99 to buy (I do not recommend this). If none of those work, shoot me an email at kryan@blazemedia.com and I’ll get you sorted. Anti-Westerns The “El Topo” ratio is interesting: Most Western aficionados who aren’t as interested in other genres don’t like “El Topo,” if they’ve even heard of it. Meanwhile, “El Topo” is huge among movie snobs and eccentric cinephiles who don’t typically like Westerns. In this, it resembles "Brokeback Mountain," which I will not be covering. Compare this to, say, “The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance,” which is lauded by both groups, or “Heaven’s Gate,” which is largely reviled by both (more on this in an upcoming entry). Which brings us to another reason that "El Topo" may prove divisive for Wednesday Western readers: its status as an “anti-Western." This was a term coined by Robert Altman to describe his iconic "McCabe & Mrs. Miller," which Screen Rant's Ben Sherlock writes “subverts and upends just about every trope of the genre in the bleakest, most cynical way possible.” By now, you can guess where I stand on any movie or director whose goal is to “subvert and upend” a genre that, instead, should be enjoyed and preserved. The terminology strikes me as a bit silly and pretentious. The presupposition is that Westerns didn’t become rebellious — or authentic — until the postmodern geniuses waved their wands and created morally ambiguous movies. Budd Boetticher’s Ranown Cycle alone belies this claim. To make things worse ... As you may have gathered by now, Jodorowsky is a weirdo. In “El Topo,” he slaughtered a few dozen rabbits to use as set dressing. He also killed horses and sheep and at least one frog. He has since claimed that he killed all of the animals himself. If that weren’t enough to polarize us, there’s the rape scene. In his book “El Topo: A Book of the Film” (1972), Jodorowsky wrote: “I really raped her. And she screamed." In 2019, the story emerged, and New York's El Museo del Barrio canceled an exhibit devoted to Jordorowsky’s work. Jodorowsky waved away the controversy: These words: ‘I’ve raped my actress,’ was said fifty years ago by El Topo, a bandit dressed in black leather that nobody knew. They were words, not facts, Surrealist publicity in order to enter the world of cinema from a position of obscurity. I do not condone the act of rape, but exploited the shock value of the statement at the time, following years in the Panic Movement and other iterations of harnessing shock to motivate energetic release. In an interview with the New York Times, Jodorowsky’s wife, Pascale Montandon-Jodorowsky, insisted that her husband is a “respectful, generous, and deeply good man,” that he has “never raped anyone,” and that he’s the victim of “attacks, scandals, intimidations, threats, slanders.” To complicate the matter, Jodorowsky claims that his own mother is the child of a rape. "There are terrible fathers and mothers. I show that already in 'Santa Sangre.' I myself come from a crazy family of raped immigrants in misery. My mother's mother was raped by a Cossack. My mother was born from rape. And I was born in 1929, the year of crisis." Artist as jester of the universe During a 1973 interview, Jodorowsky loosened from talk of the movie he was promoting and, in his elegant yet broken English, defined the artist as the jester of the universe. When traversing Jordorowsky’s surreal and symbol-inundated imagery, this idea is helpful. The weirdness of his work is by nature playful. It is of course philosophical, spiritual, political, religious — all of those. But it functions clearest when appreciated as play. “El Topo” has done a lot not just for Westerns but for film overall. Criterion Collection detailed the four-decade career of Ben Barenholtz, beginning with the French "Les Enfants Terribles," followed by “Night of the Living Dead,” the original, in 1968. That year, he opened Elgin Cinema in New York City, where he began screening experimental movies at midnight. “El Topo” is responsible for making the midnight movie a staple of American cinema. Still, Jodorowsky’s prestige has waned in my little cinematic universe. Knowing the full story of "El Topo" — the animal cruelty, the accusation of rape — I couldn’t re-watch the movie that I once found so compelling. A father now, I have to wonder what kind of man would unearth pure evil and total death with the giddiness of a deranged scientist.

Writing the U.S. Constitution was a lengthy and delicate process. The framers exhaustively contemplated the structure of government from all angles. As debates rolled on, they strategically examined the glories and follies of human character to leverage gift against grift, repeatedly refining the document to ensure that it would securely guarantee individual liberty. As one of the authors of the Federalist Papers, James Madison offered significant contributions to the nation during this deeply reflective process.One of the most important principles in designing our American government was safeguarding minority rights against majority, or mob, rule. At the time of the founding, “minority” referred to the “less popular” perspective, not just race. The goal of a constitutional republican government was to protect freedom of conscience against violent coercion or outright destruction. The founders successfully implemented this principle of justice. The dangers of not building a just system remain as relevant today as they were over two centuries ago.How did we arrive at this national precipice where individual sovereignty and the rule of law are dissolving before our dazed and confused American eyes? James Madison warned us.Our system includes many protections against the terror campaigns historically spawned by majority rule. One safeguard cherished by James Madison was diversity. Today, the word has become superficial, often reduced to describing populations with different skin colors. Madison valued diversity of conscience as a chief blessing and protection of a free society. He addressed this in Federalist 51: “In the federal republic of the United States ... the society itself will be broken into so many parts, interests, and classes of citizens, that the rights of individuals, or the minority, will be in little danger from interested combinations of the majority.”“In a free government,” he added, “the security for civil rights must be the same as that for religious rights. It consists in one case in the multiplicity of interests, and in the other in the multiplicity of sects.”There have been some significant incursions against Madison’s principle in practice, including but by no means limited to:Restriction on free production in favor of a zero-sum controlled economy, per the U.S. Supreme Court in Wickard v. Filburn (1942);American taxpayer investment in ingenuity freely donated to researchers via the Bayh-Dole Act of 1980, many of whom offshored the intellectual property in private business agreements;Race-based discrimination in college admissions, which the Supreme Court authorized in Regents of the University of California v. Bakke (1978) and reversed in 2023 with Students for Fair Admissions v. University of North Carolina and Students for Fair Admissions v. Presidents and Fellows of Harvard College;The narrowing of American political thought and allegiance into a mere two dominant factions, despite George Washington’s parting admonition;Allowing specific budgetary appropriations without line-item vetoes from both houses of Congress impedes proper governance and transforms the legislative branch into direct purveyors of privilege.As these constitutional breaches steadily built an economic oligarchy, tilting the field of play, citizens outside the circle of access continued striving for the American dream as though on level ground. The gradual incline deceived most, despite increasing challenges and small-business failures.A less diverse economy reduces civic resources and engagement. More Americans find themselves deemed "non-essential," growing hopeless in the face of likely failure and feeling a general malaise regarding the worth of enterprise or ingenuity. Focusing solely on technical education further diminishes diversity of conscience.When our survival no longer encompasses the breadth of our being, our greatness narrows accordingly. At the political level, minority and majority factions appear to most Americans to have representation. However, the increasing popularity of terms like “the swamp,” “the uniparty,” and the “deep state” indicates that something fundamental has shifted.The horrific assassination attempt on Donald Trump reeks of the swamp. Although the Trump family and the nation were spared the loss of a patriarch, a family exercising the fundamental right to freedom of association at Trump’s rally was tragically not so fortunate. The morally bankrupt media constructed a new lie around these events, defending the right to continue hating fellow Americans. This strategy has been used for years to justify drug violence, open borders, government overreach, suspension of the rule of law, human trafficking, COVID tyranny, medical experiments on children, and the ideology of diversity, equity, and inclusion.How did we arrive at this national precipice where individual sovereignty and the rule of law are dissolving before our dazed and confused American eyes? James Madison warned us: “If a majority be united by a common interest, the rights of the minority will be insecure. ... In a society under the forms of which the stronger faction can readily unite and oppress the weaker, anarchy may as truly be said to reign as in a state of nature, where the weaker individual is not secured against the violence of the stronger.”We have reached Madison’s worst-case scenario. The multiplicity of interests have melded into an increasingly tyrannical true majority faction with a single common interest: Destroy Donald Trump. This entire oligarchy, consisting of elites in both the Democratic and Republican Parties, tech oligarchs, bureaucrats, unions, Big Pharma, media, and most left-of-center voters, has tacitly agreed to suspend the rule of law and the Constitution until Trump is gone, or maybe a bit later.These tenuous allies foolishly imagine they will return to the prior stability of exploiting the American people while arguing vehemently over such indulgences as the alleged right to freedom from pregnancy — as if prospective parents are unaware of the birds and the bees, should such responsibility be unwanted. Meanwhile, our enemies know very well there will be no such recovery.To protect the people and the country, the other majority faction — all those who love liberty, honor the U.S. Constitution and the flag, and are humble enough to play fair — must unite with a single common interest. Here’s how to fight! fight! fight! until we win:Seek federal court orders to force states to follow the law in the 2024 election process, based on millions of examples of misconduct within their own official data, with meaningful remedies that can be implemented even days before the election starts;File federal civil rights lawsuits and charges against all who refuse to comply;Obtain permanent orders against the certification of noncompliant elections;File federal lawsuits against rogue states.Only United Sovereign Americans is taking this fight all the way down to the root source across our great country. We are taking our legal authority back to control our representatives, our government, and our law. The risk is real, but James Madison is pulling for us. And let’s face it, the swamp is not going to drain itself.

Black Lives Matter, an organization notorious for fomenting racial division and apparently facilitating violent protests, has now called out members of the Democratic Party for "installing" Kamala Harris as their presumptive nominee for president after a series of process changes in 2024 that often circumvented voters and their concerns.On Tuesday, BLM posted lengthy statements to its website and X account hinting that the Democratic Party has recently become a threat to democracy because of the party's seeming attempts to box out voters during the entire nomination process.'We do not live in a dictatorship. Delegates are not oligarchs.'BLM alleged that Democrats first fixed the primary system by refusing to host primary debates, thus concealing from the public "the decline of Joe Biden in 2023." The organization also accused the DNC of rearranging the 2024 primary schedule in such a way as to assure that Biden won the nomination, having "made it almost impossible for non-Biden candidates to appear on the ballot." Then, after practically guaranteeing Biden's victory, the DNC turned around and forced him out, using his debate performance as a pretext, the group said.BLM characterized such tactics as bullying and insisted that they were incompatible with the precepts of democracy since they sidestep voters. "While Joe Biden wasn’t our preferred candidate, we cannot ignore the troubling actions of the Democratic Party," BLM said.In addition to criticizing the treatment of Biden, BLM also took issue with the speed with which Harris has been designated the heir apparent. "A 24-hour process of talking to party bosses is not democratic, nor is it a process Democrats should be proud of," the group said on X. "We do not live in a dictatorship. Delegates are not oligarchs." — (@) Instead, BLM called for "a transparent and fair virtual snap primary" before the convention to ensure that voters have a say. The group did not, however, explain how such a primary could realistically take place on a national scale on such short notice."Democratic Party elites and billionaire donors are attempting to manipulate Black voters by anointing Kamala Harris and an unknown vice president as the new Democratic ticket without a primary vote by the public. This blatant disregard for democratic principles is unacceptable. While the potential outcome of a Harris presidency may be historic, the process to achieve it must align with true democratic values," the group claimed.Finally, BLM acknowledged that the Democratic Party has taken advantage of the loyalty of black voters by ranting about "democracy" during election season to ensure a high voter turnout without ever fulfilling campaign promises to black communities."This is not just about Biden or Harris; it is about demanding a political system that genuinely represents us and upholds democracy."The DNC and the Harris campaign did not respond to Reuters' request for comment.Like Blaze News? Bypass the censors, sign up for our newsletters, and get stories like this direct to your inbox. Sign up here!

This is the third time in three presidential elections that the Democratic Party elites have subverted democracy to choose a presidential candidate.A report on Friday indicated that Joe Biden would withdraw from the presidential election on Sunday. That came as news to the White House and the Biden campaign, which denied the rumors as late as Saturday night. In fact, before the post on X went up Sunday, nobody in the White House knew for certain what Biden would do. The current matchup of Donald Trump versus Kamala Harris won’t be the last word in this wild election year.The Democratic Party elites claim Biden dropped out because of poor polling and a lack of money. They say Biden’s continuation as the Democratic Party’s nominee would wipe out the Democratic Party, staff, friends, and donors, all of whom have already abandoned him. I don't think that’s why Biden dropped out. Why did they announce on Friday that a message would be coming from the White House and that he would withdraw or perhaps resign? Why didn't Joe Biden publicly announce his resignation on that day? Something definitely smells rank about this.Here’s what bothers me. When you do something this dramatic, when you become the first president in American history to drop out in the middle of a presidential race, you wouldn’t just spring it on everyone. You would give a public speech. Yet in this bizarre public statement on X announcing that he is stepping down as the Democratic nominee, Biden said he would address it publicly this week. Why? Why didn’t he wait to address it from the Oval Office like all other presidents? Why would he delay a public statement regarding a decision of this magnitude?My guess is there was another gun waiting to go off. Someone — or some people — told Biden, “You have until 2:00 p.m. on Sunday to withdraw.” Or what? What did Joe Biden get in return for dropping his candidacy? Were there promises made to Biden that he would not be held responsible for any crimes he might have committed?Did they say, “Look, Joe, we know there is some really compelling evidence that you’re selling out your country. We will make sure that goes away and you and your family will be pardoned. But you have until 2:00 p.m. on Sunday.” That feels like speculation, but it’s not unimaginable or out of the question.There was also the fact that they could pardon him if he stepped down from the presidency entirely. I don’t think he’s going to be president through the end of the year, let alone next January 20. But the powers that be can pardon him if he’s not the president, and they’ll spin it by saying that they just had to pardon the Bidens to protect them against Trump’s ruthless quest for revenge. They'll say Trump would just put all the Bidens in jail out of political spite, and they simply couldn’t let that happen. That will be good enough, apparently, for a lot of Democrats.I believe former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi was the driving force behind all of this. Don't you just love how over the last few weeks, the California Democrat kept saying, “We want Joe Biden to make the decision himself”? Then Joe would say, "I made the decision, and I'm staying." Yeah, right. She already had made that decision, and she put the gun to Biden's head to make him comply.Alex Soros previously said he would not endorse Kamala Harris. Yet he did nearly immediately on Monday. A lot of Democrats seem to be getting in line behind Harris, albeit reluctantly. Yet Barack and Michelle Obama strangely have not endorsed her yet. That furthers my suspicions that Harris won’t be the candidate in the end. I did make a bet with my co-host Stu Burguiere earlier this year that Michelle Obama would be the Democratic nominee. This is another lingering question: Why didn't Biden step down as president of the United States altogether? If he is not capable of running a campaign, he is certainly not capable of running the White House.The 25th Amendment may have been the gun that was about to go off: “We are either going to take you out of the Oval Office, or we will leave you as president so you can finish your term. We will have parades for you, and you will be remembered as one of the greatest presidents of all time. People will remember you like George Washington, stepping aside for the good of the country and the good of the party. Otherwise, we will invoke the 25th.” That is a possible gun that could have gone off.But if this man is not fit enough to run for re-election, then I don’t want him in a room with Vladimir Putin or Xi Jinping, either. I don't want him on the telephone with anybody for that matter. He is a walking national security risk. There is more going on behind the scenes, and I doubt that the current matchup of Donald Trump versus Kamala Harris will be the last word in this wild election year.Want more from Glenn Beck? Get Glenn's FREE email newsletter with his latest insights, top stories, show prep and more delivered to your inbox.

The president’s court historian shows once more how proximity to power has corrupted his professional mission.

FBI Director's Answers About Trump Rally Gunman's Drone and Encryption Raise Even MORE Questions

Vile Pro Palestine Youth Protestors Release Maggots and Crickets into Netanyahu's DC Hotel