Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth routinely receives formal objections from senior military leaders and moves forward regardless, Pentagon spokesman Sean Parnell said, pushing back on a Washington Post report detailing four generals and admirals who advised against extending the Iran war.

Parnell posted on social media: "Of course, we demand candid military advice. Non-concurs are standard. The Secretary sees them constantly. That's how you run a real military."

Notably, Parnell did not dispute that the objections were filed or that this kind of internal pushback happens regularly under Hegseth's leadership.

According to the Post, four senior officers, the Navy's top admiral and the commanders of European Command, Southern Command and Indo-Pacific Command, filed formal "non-concur" objections to extended troop deployments across the Middle East.

The Pentagon has kept more than 50,000 troops on alert in the region for months, with some assignments now set to run through September and others potentially into 2027.

Chief of Naval Operations Adm. Daryl Caudle reportedly warned that the fleet cannot sustain its current level of commitment given the absence of a defined end date for the operation. Adm. Samuel Paparo, head of Indo-Pacific Command, objected to ongoing demands for an aircraft carrier strike group and destroyers under his command.

Leaders at European Command and Southern Command said redirecting ships and surveillance aircraft toward Central Command has weakened their ability to fulfill homeland-defense responsibilities. The Army and Air Force reportedly agreed to extend their own deployments but flagged significant risks in doing so.

In a statement provided to the Post ahead of publication, Parnell said troop-commitment decisions are "based on the current threat assessment, strategic priorities established by the President, and the advice" of military leadership. He added that the department does not discuss "internal operational processes" or confirm specific non-concurrences.

Laura Loomer, a woman who was banned from Uber, Lyft, Twitter, Facebook, PayPal and GoFundMe for violating their terms of service regarding hate speech, now wants surveillance cameras outside every mosque in America and, preferably, inside them too.

"I want a Flock Camera outside of every mosque in America," she posted on X on August 27. "I am pro-Flock."

In a follow-up, she went further. "I would love to have cameras pointed at every mosque and preferably inside as well."

Flock Safety runs the largest license plate reader network in the country, more than 120,000 cameras under contracts with 7,000 law enforcement agencies, feeding a searchable database police can query with no warrant required.

The same technology has been used to track immigrants and trace a woman who crossed state lines for an abortion. More than fifty cities dropped Flock in 2026.

Loomer has described herself as a "proud Islamophobe" and called Islam a "cancer on humanity." She is also a far-right activist with direct access to the president.

Ex co-vice chair of the Democratic National Committee, David Hogg, responded to Loomer's X post, saying, "If a senior advisor to the President of the United States said this about any other religious group they would be rightfully fired the same day. But because of the disgusting normalization of Islamophobia there's little to no coverage of this in the national media."

Loomer built her brand around being surveilled and silenced. She is now volunteering to point the cameras at a house of worship.

The Pentagon has secretly placed conservative military veterans with massive social media followings into government positions, and officials refuse to say what those jobs actually are, according to a Washington Post investigation. People familiar with the matter say at least some of these influencers have been assigned to civilian roles that could shape defense policy itself.

Two people have been identified: Rob Maness, a retired Air Force colonel, and Kurt Schlichter, a retired Army colonel. Pentagon records reviewed by WP show both hold active government email addresses with a ".civ" suffix, meaning they are officially classified as civilian employees rather than military personnel or contractors.

Both are assigned to the office of Anthony Tata, the undersecretary of defense for personnel and readiness. A third figure, retired Army colonel Thomas Anderson, was listed earlier this year with the same kind of civilian email address in Tata's office, though people familiar with the matter say he was no longer listed in Pentagon records as of last week.

Maness has more than 135,000 followers on the social media platform X, and Schlichter has nearly 620,000. Since retiring from the military, both have built careers as conservative commentators who amplify Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth's viewpoints and attack people who scrutinize the Trump administration.

This secrecy comes even as the Trump administration has claimed it is running the most transparent Defense Department in history. Older Americans who value institutional accountability should ask a basic question: if these are legitimate government jobs paid for by taxpayers, why won't the Pentagon say what they are or who is doing them?

Robert Mortimer lost more than a pet the night his home was burgled, and for years he thought that loss was permanent.

Thieves broke into his family home in Bradford in 2017, taking a laptop, garden equipment, and his African grey parrot, Barney.

Robert searched for months, put up posters, and offered a reward, but eventually the trail went cold.

He never replaced Barney because, as far as he was concerned, no other bird could compare. So he kept the old cage tucked away at a relative’s house, just in case.

Nine years later, a phone call brought news he never expected. A police officer told Robert that Barney had been found alive.

And this was all because a stranger happened to search “Barney” and “Bradford” online. She found an old news article and helped track him down.

Within days, Robert and Barney were together again, and the cage he never let go of finally had its bird back.

Shark Tank host, Kevin O'Leary, has recently claimed that he still buys his clothes from Walmart.

Despite being worth around $400 million, O'Leary explained that he buys most of his clothes from Walmart as he hates wasting money.

While some have agreed with O'Leary's quote, many others have pointed out that the same man who 'hates wasting money' also likes to wear a lot of designer clothes and expensive watches.

O'Leary is no stranger to controversy. Just a few months ago another quote of his went viral online when he slammed young people for spending their money on $30 lunches which prompted a fair share of backlash.

Specifically his quote read: "I can't stand when I see kids making $70,000 a year spending $28 for lunch. I mean, that's just stupid... Is there anything you can buy for $28 that tastes as good as 28 years of compounding at 10%?"

A retired senior Border Patrol official who spent months as one of the most visible enforcers of President Donald Trump's deportation campaign is now suggesting the administration he served might want him de*d.

Greg Bovino, who served as the Border Patrol's commander-at-large before retiring earlier this year, made the claim in an interview with Tucker Carlson.

Asked whether the Trump administration wanted him to have security, Bovino did not hedge. "Do I think they want me de*d at this point? Yes," he said. He also indicated he believes the administration wants him silenced. "I'm in a running battle every time I go out," he said.

Pressed on who was responsible for stripping him of that security, Bovino pointed to U.S. Customs and Border Protection Commissioner Rodney Scott, saying border czar Tom Homan was present when it happened. "I think Rodney Scott, he's the one that took my security detail away with with Homan there," Bovino said.

Bovino's break with his former colleagues has been building for months. He led aggressive, controversial enforcement operations in Los Angeles, Chicago and Minneapolis before being pulled from his post following the fatal sh*otings of two Minneapolis residents, Renee Good and Alex Pretti, by federal agents under his command.

Since leaving government, he has repeatedly and publicly attacked border czar Tom Homan, accusing him of "saying nothing" and doing nothing in the aftermath of enforcement-related de*ths.

What's notable is who is making this accusation: not an outside critic, but a man who was, until recently, one of the administration's own enforcers.

President Donald Trump signed an executive order this week declaring a national emergency over foreign-made equipment used in America's bulk power system, the network of transformers, generators, and transmission lines that keeps the lights on nationwide.

The order, invoked under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act and the National Emergencies Act, restricts certain foreign-produced electric equipment, along with the software and digital systems built into it, when officials determine the technology could enable sabotage, unauthorized access, or major disruption. The Energy Department will now have authority to identify risky equipment, place conditions on gear already installed, and write new rules for future purchases. Facilities that only handle local electricity distribution are exempt.

Notably, the White House fact sheet did not name the countries or companies the restrictions target, leaving key enforcement details undefined even as the administration invokes sweeping emergency powers. This is not the first time Trump has reached for a national emergency declaration to address foreign technology concerns: he issued a nearly identical bulk-power-system order in 2020, which was later suspended and unwound under Joe Biden, used similar authority in 2019 over telecom equipment, and signed an earlier grid-security order in April 2025.

Millions of Americans, including older adults who rely on electricity for medical equipment, home heating, and cooling, depend on a stable power grid every day. How the Energy Department implements this order, and how transparently, will determine whether it strengthens that reliability or simply expands executive authority with little public accounting.