Year: 2026

Mystery Bettor Made $400k on Maduro’s Ouster

Buck Banks

$400,000

“Less than five hours before nighttime explosions rocked the Venezuelan capital of Caracas, an unknown trader doubled down on bets that Nicolás Maduro would soon be out as the country’s leader,” the Wall Street Journal reports. “The wagers on Polymarket, a popular crypto-based betting platform, netted the trader more than $400,000, a 12-fold return on investment—and fueled suspicions that someone used inside knowledge of the closely held U.S. operation to make a quick profit.”

The Profound Pettiness of Our President

Buck Banks

“If she had turned it down and said, ‘I can’t accept it because it’s Donald Trump’s,’ she’d be the president of Venezuela today.”

— A person close to the White House, quoted by the Washington Post, saying Trump is refusing to support Venezuelan opposition leader María Corina Machado because she accepted the Nobel Peace Prize.

A U.S. Attack on Greenland Would End NATO

Buck Banks

“I believe one should take the American president seriously when he says that he wants Greenland. But I will also make it clear that if the U.S. chooses to attack another NATO country militarily, then everything stops, including NATO and thus the security that has been established since the end of the Second World War.”

— “Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen said that if Donald Trump were to attack the Danish island of Greenland that would mean the end of the NATO alliance,” Bloomberg reports.

We Don’t Want This War

Buck Banks

70%

A CBS News poll last month found that 70% of Americans oppose U.S. military action in Venezuela and that only 13% believe the country is a major threat to the United States. A YouGov poll found that only 20% of American adults support using military force to overthrow Nicolas Maduro. And an important point from Dan Pfeiffer: “Trump’s biggest political problem isn’t just that this war is unpopular. It’s that it’s yet another massive, time-consuming distraction from the thing he was elected to do: lower the cost of living.”

Next Up — Cuba?

Buck Banks

“I think Cuba is going to be something we’ll end up talking about, because Cuba is a failing nation right now, very badly failing nation. It’s very similar to Venezuela in the sense that we want to help the people in Cuba, but we want to also help the people that were forced out of Cuba and living in this country.”

— President Trump said his administration will likely discuss the situation in Cuba, which he described as a “failing” nation, the Miami Herald reports.