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The national average for regular gas sits at $4.34 a gallon this morning, up from $2.98 back on February 28 when Operation Epic Fury began. Brent crude is hovering near $106 and West Texas Intermediate around $93 after supertankers began diverting from Persian Gulf routes. Trump insists prices will "drop like a rock" once the conflict ends — the futures market hasn't agreed yet.
The Justice Department's Antitrust Division is investigating whether ABC, CBS, NBC, CNN and Fox News violated the Sherman Act when they jointly halted White House television pool coverage on September 21. The networks have been asked to hand over internal communications about the decision, which came after Trump barred CNN, MS NOW and Politico from the building on September 18. A DOJ official framed it bluntly: "Group boycotts among commercial competitors can violate the Sherman Act."
With the November 3 midterms closing in, RealClearPolitics averages show Democrats leading in North Carolina by eight, Minnesota by four, and Texas and Ohio by three. Republicans have clawed back ground in Maine, Alaska and Minnesota, but face newly competitive fights in Iowa, Kansas and Nebraska. Susan Collins and Democrat Troy Jackson square off today in the first of four scheduled debates in what may be the tightest race on the board.
At a sprawling Tennessee rally opened by Kid Rock, the president touted manufacturing investment and crime crackdowns while campaigning for Senator Bill Hagerty and gubernatorial candidate Marsha Blackburn. He called Iranian leaders "crazy," then pitched renaming the Atlantic or Pacific the "Trump Ocean" or "Ocean of the Americas." It's a sequel to the Gulf of America rebrand, and the crowd ate it up.
Iran-backed Houthi missile and drone attacks on Riyadh have killed at least 20 people, including one American, and badly damaged King Khalid International Airport, now shut through October 17 and stranding roughly 700 daily flights. The Saudi-led coalition intercepted three more ballistic missiles overnight aimed at Riyadh and Khamis Mushait. Houthi officials are promising a "swift and painful" response against US interests if Washington joins the Saudi strikes, and have told Saudi oil workers to clear out.
Brussels adopted nearly 1,600 new designations on October 12 — 743 individuals and 826 companies — targeting the mid-tier suppliers that form the backbone of Russia's military-industrial complex. Foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas said more than half are tied to the ballistic missile production chain, including the Iskander-M program, rocket propulsion and submarine construction. The listed firms represent at least 20 billion euros in annual turnover and over 250,000 workers.
Pyongyang launched several ballistic missiles toward the sea off its east coast, with one flying more than 900 kilometers after lifting off near the capital. It extends a testing streak that included an October 3 hypersonic intermediate-range launch designed to beat missile defenses in South Korea and Japan. Kim Yo Jong rejected Seoul's latest dialogue offer outright, saying the North will "never allow the slightest space or margin for any contact."
A Nature Astronomy study points to the first known "second-generation" planet — a gas giant orbiting the white dwarf HS 0209+0832, about 270 light-years out. The tell was niobium in the star's atmosphere at more than a thousand times solar levels, alongside zinc and copper but almost no silicon or iron. NASA's TESS clocked brightness variations suggesting the planet orbits just 3.7 million miles out, far tighter than Mercury circles our Sun.
Researchers led by Lige Leng at Xiamen University found that falling levels of Menin in the hypothalamus track with inflammation, cognitive decline, weaker bones and thinner skin in mice. Restoring the protein reversed memory, balance, bone mass and skin thickness problems in just 30 days. Supplementing the amino acid D-serine also improved learning — though none of this has been shown in humans yet.
Defending Main Street, a Republican-aligned super PAC, ran an attack ad against Maine Democrat Troy Jackson — and placed roughly $25,000 of it in the Portland, Oregon media market instead of Portland, Maine. That's about 2,500 miles off target, in a state with no competitive Senate race. The group blamed its media vendor, which refunded the full amount.
