Global
Electricity costs in PJM rose 56 percent in 2025
The burst of current and planned data center development in mid-Atlantic and Great Lakes states led to a 56 percent increase in overall wholesale electricity prices within the PJM operational territory, the region's market monitor reported last week.
PJM, is the electricity grid operator responsible for managing power distribution in 13 Mid-Atlantic and Midwestern states which include all of PA, OH, Virginia, West Virginia, NJ, MD, DE and parts of NC, KY, MI, IN, IL plus the District of Columbia,
Energy costs, which accounted for 60 percent of total costs in 2025, were up 51 percent year over year. Capacity costs -which are fees paid to generators to ensure power is available during peak demand periods - increased the most over that period — 262 percent — and accounted for about 16 percent of total costs last year. In 2024 capacity costs only accounted for 6.5 percent of wholesale energy prices. Transmission costs were up 4.5 percent and accounted for 22 percent of total costs in 2025.
BANGKOK, Thailand -- Immediately after parliament reelected Anutin Charnvirakul as prime minister last week, he focused on rescuing three Thai crewmen trapped on a Thai ship in the Strait of Hormuz and Thailand's economy which has worsened due to the U.S. and Israeli war against Iran.
"The [Iranian] attack on the Thai-flagged vessel was not appropriate," Mr. Anutin ("AN-oo-tin") said after the assault set ablaze and crippled the Thai cargo ship in the Strait of Hormuz on March 11.
"The safety of Thai citizens is the government's foremost priority," Prime Minister Anutin said.
Oman's navy rescued 20 crew members, but three more remained onboard unable to escape.
Thailand's foreign ministry summoned Iran's ambassador in Bangkok to receive a diplomatic protest and coordinate a rescue.
"Regardless of the captain's questionable judgement, the ship bears the flag of a country that has been a good friend of Iran," a Bangkok Post editorial said.
"Thailand has kept a neutral stance in the long-standing conflict between Iran and Israel, with successive governments cultivating good ties with both nations," it said.
How did the mullahs win? Even that flower child Jimmy Carter said the US must use military force to keep open the Strait of Hormuz, this outlet for the world’s flow of oil.
In his 1980 State of the Union, Carter said, “Let our position be absolutely clear: An attempt by any outside force to gain control of the Persian Gulf region will be regarded as an assault on the vital interests of the United States of America, and such an assault will be repelled by any means necessary, including military force.”
In fact, keeping the Strait of Hormuz clear is known as the Carter Doctrine. Donald, anyone who would dare stick their nose in Iran without preparing to act on the Carter doctrine, is what Iranians called, “a schmuck.” Next time, before you bomb a nation, may I suggest that you and Pete Hegseth look at Google maps.
Get the full story, read “Hormuz Blues” and listen to my commentary,
Iran ‘Gone Wild’ in Dimona: Is Tehran Using Israel-US Madman Doctrine?
The wording is familiar. The urgency is always absolute. The implication is unmistakable: Israel is not choosing war. It is forced into it.
For many, the claim is inherently contradictory. How can a state initiate war—and in Gaza’s case, sustain a genocide—while insisting that it is merely defending itself from annihilation? Yet within Israeli political discourse, and across much of Western media, this contradiction is rarely interrogated. It is normalized.
That normalization is not incidental. It is foundational.
Dimona is not an ordinary town. It lies adjacent to the Negev Nuclear Research Center, widely understood to be central to Israel’s nuclear weapons program.
Located deep in the Naqab desert, the facility has long been treated as one of Israel’s most sensitive strategic sites, associated with plutonium production and long-term weapons capability.
While the Department of Warmongering promises no more “stupid rules of engagement,” many MAGAs are disengaging from Isramerica’s war on Iran. Meanwhile judges are blocking magamoves in spades, but they have yet to tackle the gold-digging around the 250th anniv of our democracy, which ends next week.
I had thought the United States government had hit a new low point last week when the Federal Commission of Fine Arts approved a Semiquincentennial 250th anniversary commemorative 24 karat gold coin featuring President Donald J Trump leaning on his his desk with clenched fists and scowling but that was before Secretary of War Pete Hegseth demanded $200 billion from America’s taxpayers to continue to fight the war against Iran, saying “It takes money to kill bad guys!”
The United States and Israel entered the war with Iran on a critical strategic assumption—one closely associated with the confrontational and leader-centric worldview of Donald Trump: that the regime was sufficiently fragile that removing its leadership would trigger its collapse. This logic—commonly known as “decapitation”—holds that eliminating top political and military figures will fracture authority, paralyze decision-making, and potentially ignite internal revolt. To its proponents, the logic is not without appeal: centralized systems can appear vulnerable to leadership shocks, particularly under external pressure. Yet the theory has an established track record—and it has repeatedly failed. Decapitation promises control; in practice, it often accelerates the very instability it seeks to prevent.
On March 19, Ukrainian authorities in Kyiv illegally detained Yurii Sheliazhenko—a respected peace advocate, conscientious objector, and member of the Veterans For Peace Advisory Board.
He has presented at two Free Press salons in the past.
Yurii is also: