House lawmakers and government watchdogs expressed skepticism Wednesday about the Defense Department’s ability to produce a clean financial audit by a Dec. 31, 2028, statutory deadline. The House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform held a hearing on the DoD years-long struggle to produce a clean financial audit despite claiming around half of the government’s discretionary spending.Congress passed a measure as part of the 2024 National Defense Authorization Act that requires the DoD to produce a clean audit by Dec. 31, 2028. “Clean” means a clear enough accounting of the military’s assets, what was budgeted and spent, along with evidence and documentation, so that the Government Accountability Office can make an accurate assessment of the entire federal government’s finances. The Marine Corps has been the only service to pass an audit since 2018, when it was first mandated to conduct a full audit. To date, the DoD has never passed a full, clean audit, according to the GAO.Over the course of Wednesday’s hearing, both the members of the subcommittee on government operations and some of the witnesses had some concern about the department’s ability to pull it off. “That’s a standard that every other large [government] agency is able to…

It’s Friday, the sun is blazing (it’s like 53 degrees), you can just feel summer starting to crank up and Screencaps gets rolling with news that one of our favorite biological females who rose to fame during the transG era, Sydney Thomas, IS BACK and now she’s playing poker against other celebrities. Thomas, 22, is still in that period of her career where she’s trying to find her place. Is it in modeling? Is it in acting? Can her agent get her placed in an Adam Sandler movie? Would she form an alliance with Sydney Sweeney and join the SYRN lingerie team?She’s already done the boxing ring girl thing. That wasn’t going to be an actual career. Thomas’ agent needs to place Sydney behind home plate at Dodgers games. Get her into suites at Rams games. She needs to be at the World Cup this summer. Sydney should throw out a first pitch at a Cubs game.I’m talking a playbook straight out of 2010 when Internet models throwing out first pitches at Cubs games was a rite of passage into pop culture fame.SYDNEY SWEENEY AND LIVVY DUNNE FORM ALLIANCE AS LINGERIE WAR WITH VICTORIA’S SECRET OFFICIALLY HEATS UPLast night, things…

This article was originally published by Justin M. Ptak at The Mises Institute.  There is something almost absurd about a government minting money at a loss. A coin—the most basic unit—becomes instead a confession, not just of inefficiency, but of a deeper fracture between what money is supposed to represent and what it has become. The American penny collapsed under that weight—3.69 cents for every penny minted. Thus, it cost multiples of its face value to produce—a financial contradiction sustained for years out of habit and political inertia. Now the nickel stands in the same position, costing far more to mint than it is worth. This is not a marginal accounting problem; it is a visible symptom of a system that no longer disciplines itself. In any private enterprise, producing goods at three times their sale price would be unsustainable. In public finance, it persists year after year. The losses are absorbed, diffused across taxpayers, and hidden within a monetary system capable of expanding to cover them. The question is not why it happens once, the question is why it continues. The answer leads directly to the structure of modern money and to the role of the Federal Reserve. Fiat…

NEWYou can now listen to Fox News articles! Podcaster Joe Rogan blamed TikTok and social media culture for widespread conspiracy thinking on Wednesday after discussing how many Americans believe at least one assassination attempt against President Donald Trump was staged.”This is TikTok. It’s f—ing ruined,” Rogan said during “The Joe Rogan Experience” while reacting to survey data showing many Americans either believe at least one attempt was staged or are unsure whether the attempts were authentic. “Rotting their f—ing brains out from inside their heads.””Meanwhile, you go on Chinese TikTok, it’s all like traditional dance and martial arts, science projects,” Rogan said. “It shuts down for kids after 10 p.m.”After Rogan read the survey findings, his guest, comedian Brendan Schaub, responded, “And that’s the problem.”WASHINGTON POST EDITORIAL CONNECTS MISINFORMATION BY BIDEN TO WHY PEOPLE BELIEVE CONSPIRACY THEORIES According to The Washington Post, “Roughly 1 in 3 Democratic respondents said they believed the [White House Correspondents’ Dinner shooting]  event was staged, compared with about 1 in 8 Republicans, according to a survey published Monday by NewsGuard, a company that rates the reliability of online news outlets. Respondents between the ages of 18 and 29 were also more likely than older people…

NEWYou can now listen to Fox News articles! Good morning and welcome to Fox News’ morning newsletter, Fox News First. And here’s what you need to know to start your day …TOP 31. Trump departs China after touting trade deals, agreement with Xi on Iran2. Trump says China’s Xi Jinping offered to help end Iran conflict 3. Demi Moore accused of spreading ‘fascist propaganda’MAJOR HEADLINESHUNTING GROUNDS — Criminal profiler reveals ‘extremely rare’ red flag in case of suspected serial killer migrant in Texas. Continue reading …’THUCYDIDES TRAP’ — Trump responds to Xi’s reported comments about America’s decline. Continue reading …FOLLOW THE MONEY — $1B leftist network behind coordinated global anti-Israel rallies exposed. Continue reading …DORM DANGER — America’s top party school rocked by reported sexual assault in campus housing. Continue reading …GOLDEN YEARS — How much money it takes to retire comfortably in every state in America. Continue reading …–POLITICSHOUSE DIVIDED — GOP can’t agree on key part of Trump’s housing affordability push as impasse continues. Continue reading …ISLAND TENSION — CIA chief tells Cuba the US ready to engage if regime makes major changes. Continue reading …WALLET SQUEEZE — Senate votes to throw its own paychecks into escrow during shutdowns.…

NEWYou can now listen to Fox News articles! Air Force One lifted off after U.S. President Donald Trump wrapped up his visit to China where he met with Chinese President Xi Jinping this week.The visit between the two leaders occurred amid the ongoing U.S. conflict with Iran, as America continues to conduct a blockade against the Islamic Republic.A White House release about a meeting between Xi and Trump read, in part, “The two sides agreed that the Strait of Hormuz must remain open to support the free flow of energy. President Xi also made clear China’s opposition to the militarization of the Strait and any effort to charge a toll for its use, and he expressed interest in purchasing more American oil to reduce China’s dependence on the Strait in the future. Both countries agreed that Iran can never have a nuclear weapon.”This is a developing story. Please check back for updates. Read the full article here

RIGA, Latvia — Exercising in Latvia’s dense pine and birch forests this week, local troops found themselves in an unfair fight against a new enemy: unmanned ground vehicles.As NATO tries to keep pace with fast-changing drone warfare, the alliance used Latvia’s Crystal Arrow exercise to test unmanned ground combat, equipping opposing forces with wheeled robots. The systems gave the red team an element of surprise over a blue team relying only on aerial drones, said Lt. Col. Andris Brūveris, the Latvian battalion commander leading the opposing side.“They are force multipliers, and they are here to stay,” said Brūveris, who commands Latvia’s 2nd Mechanized Infantry Battalion, in a briefing with reporters at the Sēlija training area in central Latvia on Monday, during a press trip organized by NATO.“We are a little bit behind because we’ve been using only the air drones,” he added. “I hope we will move forward with this at a quick pace.”Ukraine reshaped aerial drone warfare, and now appears poised to do the same for unmanned ground vehicles, with plans to buy 25,000 UGVs by the end of June. For Crystal Arrow, Brūveris relied on Ukrainian veterans for training and tactics, using wheeled robots for gathering intelligence, attacking…

NEWYou can now listen to Fox News articles! Critical minerals quietly power every aspect of modern American life. As you pour your morning coffee, you are relying on copper wiring and silicon chips working behind the scenes inside your coffee maker. When you grab milk from the refrigerator, you are depending on metal components, copper wiring, and electronic controls to keep everything cold. Turn on the TV to another round of bickering politicians on cable news, and you are looking at a screen built with indium, lithium, and rare earth phosphors. Flip off the lights, hop in your car, connect your phone to Bluetooth, and turn on your favorite podcast for the drive to work. That everyday routine depends on copper, lithium, and a whole host of other critical minerals that power batteries, speakers, navigation systems, electric motors, and modern communications technology. These materials are so deeply embedded into our daily lives that most Americans would never think twice about them. But they should. TRUMP ADMINISTRATION WORKS TO BREAK CHINA’S RARE EARTH MINERAL STRANGLEHOLD ON AFRICABeijing certainly has. The Chinese Communist Party has spent decades and hundreds of billions of dollars cornering the market on critical minerals, from mining to processing and refining. Today,…

NEWYou can now listen to Fox News articles! A New York man was convicted Wednesday of helping operate a secret Chinese government-linked police station in Manhattan used to monitor dissidents, federal prosecutors said.Lu Jianwang, 64, a U.S. citizen also known as “Harry Lu” from the Bronx, was convicted by a jury on two counts related to operating an overseas police station in New York City on behalf of China’s Ministry of Public Security (MPS), as well as obstruction of justice for destroying evidence.According to prosecutors, Lu and his co-defendant, Chen Jinping, acted as illegal agents of the Chinese government beginning in 2022 and established what authorities described as the first known overseas Chinese police station in the United States.Chen pleaded guilty in 2024 to conspiring to act as an agent of the People’s Republic of China in connection with the operation.CALIFORNIA MAYOR ACCUSED OF SECRETLY WORKING FOR CHINA, SPREADING PROPAGANDA WHILE IN OFFICE: FEDS Prosecutors said the station operated out of an office building in Lower Manhattan, where investigators found a blue banner reading: “Fuzhou Police Overseas Service Station, New York, USA.”U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of New York Joseph Nocella Jr. said the conviction disrupted a Chinese government…

The NFL schedule release has turned into an arms race among teams’ social media departments to see who can get the most attention.I don’t care about that.All I care about is that the Indianapolis Colts just threw down the greatest schedule release of all time. And I’m not just saying that as a die-hard fan of “The Simpsons.” I mean, I am, but that’s not the only reason I’m saying it.For the 2026 season, the Colts’ cromulent, Simpsonized schedule release video was kind of a two-parter.The first part was a reworking of the long-running primetime sitcom’s iconic opening sequence that was jammed full of very funny NFL Easter eggs, starting with a classic Bart Simpson chalkboard gag that reads, “WE WILL NOT INCLUDE TYREEK HILL IN THESE VIDEOS.”CLICK HERE FOR MORE OUTKICK SPORTS COVERAGEThen, the second part was the actual schedule reveal, and that was where this went from being cool to being brilliant. Each game was introduced with a clip from the show that fits it perfectly, starting with the Colts’ Week 1 date with the Baltimore Ravens.That one used a clip of “The Simpsons'” adaptation of Edgar Allan Poe’s “The Raven” from Season 2’s “Treehouse of Horror.” Pour…