End of an Era

[Editor's note: We have suspended our three decade long run of independent (muckraking) journalism and analysis and will let you know where we go from here. The 2024 lawsuit against founder/editor Dahn Shaulis (Chip Paucek and Pro Athlete Community v Dahn Shaulis) is pending. While the legal bill is enormous, we expect to win. In the meantime, please support independent voices like Richard Wolff, Roger Sollenberger, Julie K. Brown, and Troy Barile.  #veritas]

******************************************************

#accountability #adjunct #AI #AImeltdown #alienation #Ambow #anomie #anxiety #austerity #BDR #bot #boycott #BRICS #charliekirk #China #civilwar #climate #collegemania #collegemeltdown #crypto #CTE #democracy #divest #doomloop #edtech #edugrift #enshittification #epstein #epsteinfiles #FAFSA #fascism #genocide #greed #IDR #incel #India #jobless #kleptocracy #labor #medugrift #moralcapital #NCAA #neoliberal #nokings #nonviolence #Palantir #protest #PSLF #PXED #QOL #rehumanization #resistance #robocollege #robostudent #roboworker #Russia #solidarity #strikedebt #surveillance #temperance #TPUSA #transparency #Trump #value #veritas #virtue #WWIII

*********************************************************

On our last full day of operation, we extend our deepest gratitude to the many courageous voices who have contributed to the Higher Education Inquirer over the years. Through research, reporting, whistleblowing, analysis, and public service, you have exposed inequities, challenged powerful interests, and helped the public understand the realities of higher education.

Special thanks to:
Bryan Alexander (Future Trends Forum), J. J. Anselmi (author), Devarian Baldwin (Trinity College),  Lisa Bannon (Wall Street Journal), Joe Berry (Higher Education Labor United), Kate Bronfenbrenner (Cornell), Stephen Burd (New America), Ann Bowers (Debt Collective), James Michael Brodie (Black and Gold Project Foundation), Patrick Campbell (Vets Ed Brief), Richard Cannon (activist), Kirk Carapezza (WGBH), Kevin L. Clay (Rutgers), Randall Collins (UPenn), Marianne Dissard (activist), Cory Doctorow, William Domhoff (UC Santa Cruz), Ruxandra Dumitriu, Keil Dumsch, Garrett Fitzgerald (College Recon), Glen Ford (with the ancestors), Richard Fossey (Condemned to Debt), Erica Gallagher (2U Whistleblower), Cliff Gibson III (Gibson & Keith), Henry Giroux (McMaster University), Terri Givens (University of British Columbia), Luke Goldstein (The Lever),  Nathan Grawe (Carleton College), Michael Green (UNLV), Michael Hainline (Restore the GI Bill for Veterans), Debra Hale Shelton (Arkansas Times), Stephanie M. Hall (Protect Borrowers),  David Halperin (Republic Report), Bill Harrington (Croatan Institute), Phil Hill (On EdTech), Robert Jensen (UT Austin), Seth Kahn (WCUP), Hank Kalet (Rutgers), Ben Kaufman (Protect Borrowers), Robert Kelchen (University of Tennessee), Karen Kelsky (The Professor Is In), Neil Kraus (UWRF), LACCD Whistleblower, Michelle Lee (whistleblower), Wendy Lynne Lee (Bloomsburg University of PA), Emmanuel Legeard (whistleblower), Adam Looney (University of Utah), Alec MacGillis (ProPublica), Jon Marcus (Hechinger Report), Steven Mintz (University of Texas), John D. Murphy (Mission Forsaken), Annelise Orleck (Dartmouth), Margaret Kimberly (Black Agenda Report), Austin Longhorn (UT student loan debt whistleblower), Richard Pollock (journalist), Debbi Potts (whistleblower), Jack Metzger (Roosevelt University), Derek Newton (The Cheat Sheet), Jeff Pooley (Annenberg Center), Fahmi Quadir (Safkhet Capital), Chris Quintana (USA Today), Jennifer Reed (University of Akron), Kevin Richert (Idaho Education News), Gary Roth (Rutgers-Newark), Mark Salisbury (TuitionFit), Stephanie Saul (NY Times), Christopher Serbagi (Serbagi Law), Alex Shebanow  (Fail State), Bob Shireman (TCF), Bill Skimmyhorn (William & Mary), Peter Simi (Chapman University), Jeffrey Sonnenfeld (Yale), Gary Stocker (College Viability), Strelnikov (Wikipedia Sucks), Taylor Swaak (Chronicle of Higher Education), Theresa Sweet (Sweet v Cardona), Harry Targ (Purdue University), Moe Tkacik (American Prospect),  Kim Tran (activist), Mark Twain Jr. (business insider), Michael Vasquez (The Tributary), Marina Vujnovic (Monmouth), Richard Wolff (Economic Update), Todd Wolfson (Rutgers, AFT), Helena Worthen (Higher Ed Labor United), DW (South American Correspondent), Heidi Weber (Whistleblower Revolution), Michael Yates (Monthly Review), government officials who have supported transparency and accountability, and the countless other educators, researchers, whistleblowers, advocates, and public servants whose work strengthens our understanding of higher education.

Together, you form a resilient network of knowledge, courage, and public service, showing that collective insight can illuminate even the most entrenched systems. Your dedication has been, and continues to be, invaluable.

Dahn Shaulis and Glen McGhee

Higher Education Inquirer nears 2 million views, with more than 1.5 million in 2025

As 2025 draws to a close, Higher Education Inquirer (HEI) is approaching a bittersweet milestone: nearly 2 million total page views since its founding, with more than 1.5 million of those views occurring in 2025 alone. At the same time, HEI will cease operations on January 6, 2026, bringing an end to one of the most independent and critical voices covering higher education in the United States.

The extraordinary growth in readership during 2025 came amid historic disruption across higher education. HEI documented the unraveling of federal oversight, the rise of hyper-deregulation, the expanding reach of for-profit colleges and private equity, and the worsening student debt crisis. These developments drove unprecedented interest from readers seeking analysis that challenged official narratives and corporate messaging.

HEI’s growing audience was fueled not only by comprehensive reporting, but by early warnings that were often ignored by institutions and policymakers. In August 2025, Higher Education Inquirer published a warning about escalating campus violence and political radicalization exactly one month before the Charlie Kirk investigation became public, underscoring the publication’s role as an early-warning system rather than a reactive outlet. That article was part of a broader series examining how extremist politics, lax security, and institutional denial were converging on U.S. campuses.

This foresight extended back further. In early 2024, HEI analyzed Project 2025, highlighting its implications for higher education, civil liberties, and democratic governance. At a time when much of the higher education press treated Project 2025 as speculative, HEI examined its explicit calls for mass deportations, the targeting of immigrants and international students, and the restructuring of federal agencies affecting education, labor, and research. Those warnings now read less like commentary and more like documentation.

HEI’s investigative work extended beyond reporting and analysis. Over the years, the publication submitted dozens of Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests to federal and state agencies, uncovering critical data about institutional misconduct, federal oversight failures, and the financialization of higher education. These FOIAs often revealed information that universities and regulators preferred to keep hidden, from financial irregularities to internal policy deliberations affecting students and staff.

Labor reporting was another cornerstone of HEI’s mission. The publication highlighted the struggles of underpaid and overworked faculty, staff, and healthcare workers connected to colleges, drawing attention to systemic exploitation across public and private institutions. Similarly, HEI closely tracked borrower defense to repayment claims, scrutinizing how the Department of Education and loan servicers handled student complaints, debt relief applications, and policy reversals—often exposing bureaucratic dysfunction that had direct consequences for tens of thousands of students.

HEI’s editorial record reflects a consistent effort to connect policy blueprints to real-world consequences before those consequences became headline news. Coverage spanned a vast array of topics, including predatory institutions like the University of Phoenix, Trump-era housing policies, climate change, militarization of campuses, labor exploitation, and the privatization of public institutions. Notable published articles from 2025 include:

• The Five Pillars of the College Meltdown (Dec. 15, 2025)

• Kleptocracy, Militarism, Colonialism: A Counterrecruiting Call for Students and Families (Dec. 7, 2025)

• Undervalued, Overworked, Underpaid: The Hidden Struggle of Healthcare Support Workers (Sep. 20, 2025)

• The War on Education: Reclaiming Critical Thought in an Age of Fascism by Henry Giroux (June 9, 2025)

Despite its growing influence, HEI’s independence came at a cost. The publication has never been backed by universities, education corporations, or major foundations. A lawsuit involving Chip Paucek became the final breaking point, imposing substantial legal fees that HEI could not absorb. While the publication stood by its reporting, the emotional toll of prolonged legal conflict made continued operations impossible.

Reaching nearly 2 million views—most of them in a single year—is not merely a metric of success; it is evidence that HEI’s work mattered to a wide and engaged audience. As Higher Education Inquirer prepares to shut down, its legacy remains in the thousands of articles that documented institutional abuse, policy failure, and human cost within higher education.

HEI ends not because its mission was fulfilled, but because the structural forces it scrutinized proved difficult to survive. The readership growth of 2025 suggests that the need for independent, adversarial higher education journalism is greater than ever—even as one of its most persistent voices is forced to fall silent.

Higher Education Without Illusions

In 2025, the landscape of higher education is dominated by contradictions, crises, and the relentless churn of what might be called “collegemania.” Underneath the polished veneer of university marketing—the glossy brochures, viral TikToks, and celebrity endorsements—lurks a network of systemic pressures that students, faculty, and society at large must navigate. The hashtags trending below the masthead of Higher Education Without Illusions capture the full spectrum of these pressures: #accountability, #adjunct, #AI, #AImeltdown, #algo, #alienation, #anomie, #anxiety, #austerity, #BDR, #bot, #boycott, #BRICS, #climate, #collegemania, #collegemeltdown, #crypto, #divest, #doomloop, #edugrift, #enshittification, #FAFSA, #greed, #incel, #jobless, #kleptocracy, #medugrift, #moralcapital, #nokings, #nonviolence, #PSLF, #QOL, #rehumanization, #resistance, #robocollege, #robostudent, #roboworker, #solidarity, #strikedebt, #surveillance, #temperance, #TPUSA, #transparency, #Trump, #veritas.

Taken together, these words map the terrain of higher education as it exists today: a fragile ecosystem strained by debt, automation, political polarization, and climate urgency. Students are increasingly treated as commodities (#robostudent, #strikedebt), faculty are underpaid and precarious (#adjunct, #medugrift), and universities themselves are subjected to the whims of markets and algorithms (#algo, #AImeltdown, #robocollege).

Financial pressures are unrelenting. The FAFSA system, once intended as a bridge to opportunity, now functions as a tool of surveillance and debt management (#FAFSA, #BDR). Public service loan forgiveness (#PSLF) continues to be delayed or denied, leaving graduates to navigate the twin anxieties of indebtedness and joblessness (#jobless, #doomloop). Meanwhile, austerity measures squeeze institutional budgets, often at the expense of research, mental health support, and academic freedom (#austerity, #anomie, #anxiety).

Automation and artificial intelligence are now central to the higher education ecosystem. AI grading tools, predictive enrollment algorithms, and administrative bots promise efficiency but often produce alienation and ethical dilemmas (#AI, #AImeltdown, #roboworker, #bot). In this context, “robocollege” is not a metaphor but a lived reality for many students navigating hyper-digitized classrooms where human mentorship is increasingly rare.

Political and cultural currents further complicate the picture. From the influence of conservative campus organizations (#TPUSA, #Trump) to global shifts in power (#BRICS), universities are battlegrounds for ideological and material stakes. Moral capital—the credibility and legitimacy of an institution—is increasingly intertwined with corporate sponsorships, divestment movements, and climate commitments (#moralcapital, #divest, #climate). At the same time, greed and kleptocracy (#greed, #kleptocracy) permeate administration and policy decisions, eroding trust in higher education’s social mission.

Yet amid this bleakness, there are threads of resistance and rehumanization. Student debt strikes, faculty solidarity networks, and advocacy for transparency (#strikedebt, #solidarity, #transparency, #rehumanization) reveal a persistent desire to reclaim the university as a space of collective flourishing rather than pure financial extraction. Nonviolence (#nonviolence), temperance (#temperance), and boycotts (#boycott) reflect strategic, principled responses to systemic crises, even as anxiety and alienation persist.

Ultimately, higher education without illusions demands that we confront both the structural and human dimensions of its crises. Universities are not just engines of credentialing and profit—they are social institutions embedded in broader networks of power, ideology, and technology. A recognition of #veritas and #QOL (quality of life) alongside the demands of #collegemania and #enshittification is essential for any hope of reform.

The hashtags are more than social media markers—they are diagnostics. They chart a system in flux, exposing the frictions between automation and humanity, austerity and access, greed and moral responsibility. They call on all of us—students, educators, policymakers, and citizens—to act with accountability, solidarity, and courage.

Higher education without illusions is not pessimism; it is clarity. Only by naming the pressures and contradictions can we begin to imagine institutions that serve human flourishing rather than perpetuate cycles of debt, alienation, and social inequality.

Sources & Further Reading:

• An American Sickness, Elisabeth Rosenthal

• Medical Apartheid, Harriet Washington

• Body and Soul, Alondra Nelson

• HEI coverage of student debt, adjunct labor, and AI in higher education

U.S. Interventions in the Americas: A Historical Pattern of Force, Profit, and Human Cost

From the mid‑19th century to today, U.S. interventions in Latin America and the Caribbean have consistently combined military force, political influence, and economic pressure. Across this long arc, millions of lives have been shaped—often shattered—by policies that prioritize strategic advantage over human flourishing. Today’s geopolitical tensions with Venezuela are the latest flashpoint in a historical pattern that rewards elites while exacting profound human costs.

Note on Timing: This article is intentionally posted on Christmas Day 2025, a day traditionally associated with peace, goodwill, and reflection, to underscore the contrast between those ideals and the ongoing human toll of U.S. militarism and intervention abroad. The symbolic timing is a reminder that while many celebrate, others suffer the consequences of policies driven by power, profit, and geopolitics.

---

A Critical Warning for Students and Young People

As Higher Education Inquirer has repeatedly argued, the United States’ military footprint—its wars, recruitment programs, and entanglements with higher education—has deep consequences not just abroad but at home. ROTC programs and military enlistment are often marketed as pathways to education and economic stability, but they also funnel young people into systems with long‑term obligations, moral hazards, and psychological risk. Prospective enlistees and their families should think twice before committing to military pathways that may bind them to morally questionable conflicts and institutional control.

Moreover, U.S. higher education has become deeply entwined with kleptocracy, militarism, and colonialism, supporting war economies and benefiting from federal research contracts with defense and intelligence partners that obscure the real human costs of empire. These warnings are especially salient in the context of Venezuela and similar interventions, where human toll and geopolitical stakes demand deeper scrutiny.

---

Smedley Butler: War Is a Racket and the Business Plot

Major General Smedley D. Butler, among the most decorated U.S. Marines, became one of the U.S. military’s most outspoken critics. In his 1935 War Is a Racket, Butler rejected romantic notions of military glory and exposed the economic motives behind many interventions:

“War is a racket. It always has been. It is possibly the oldest, easily the most profitable, surely the most vicious.”

“I spent 33 years and four months in active military service… being a high‑class muscle man for Big Business, for Wall Street and for the bankers. In short, I was a racketeer for capitalism.”

“Only a small inside group knows what it is about. It is conducted for the benefit of the very few at the expense of the masses.”

Butler’s warnings were not abstract. In 1933, he was approached to lead a coup against President Franklin D. Roosevelt, known as the Business Plot, which he publicly exposed. His testimony before Congress revealed how elite interests sought to use military power to overthrow democratic government, an episode that underscores his critique of war as a tool for entrenched interests at the expense of ordinary people.

---

Historical Interventions and Their Toll

Below is a timeline of major U.S. interventions in the Americas, with estimated deaths, showing the human cost of policies that often served strategic or economic interests over humanitarian ones:

Period	Location	Event / Nature of Intervention	Estimated Deaths
1846–1848	Mexico	Mexican-American War: Territorial conquest	~25,000 Mexicans
1898	Cuba/P.R.	Spanish-American War: U.S. seized P.R.; Cuba protectorate	~15,000–60,000 (90% disease)
1914	Mexico	Occupation of Veracruz: U.S. port seizure	~300 Mexicans
1915–1934	Haiti	Military Occupation: Suppression of rebellions	~3,000–15,000
1916–1924	Dominican Rep.	Marine Occupation: Control of customs/finance	~4,000
1954	Guatemala	Op. PBSuccess: CIA coup against Árbenz; led to civil war	150,000–250,000*
1965	Dominican Rep.	Op. Power Pack: U.S. intervention during civil war	~3,000
1973–1990	Chile	U.S.-backed Coup/Regime: Pinochet dictatorship	3,000–28,000*
1975–1983	S. America	Operation Condor: CIA-supported intelligence network	~60,000*
1976–1983	Argentina	Dirty War: U.S.-supported military junta and coup	~30,000*
1979–1992	El Salvador	Civil War: Massive military aid to govt forces	35,000–75,000*
1981–1990	Nicaragua	Iran-Contra Affair: Covert support for Contras	~30,000–50,000*
1989	Panama	Operation Just Cause: Invasion to remove Noriega	500–3,000
2025	Venezuela	Naval Blockade: Active maritime strikes and standoff	100+ (to date)

*Estimates include civilian casualties and deaths indirectly caused by U.S.-supported interventions.

---

Venezuela and the Global Politics of Intervention

Venezuela’s 2025 crisis is the latest in a long history of U.S. pressure in the hemisphere. A naval blockade—accompanied by maritime strikes and political isolation—has already produced more than 100 confirmed deaths. Historically, interventions like this have often prioritized U.S. strategic or economic interests over local welfare.

The situation is further complicated by global geopolitics. Former President Donald Trump, who recently pardoned key figures involved in controversial interventions, including Iran‑Contra actors, also maintains strategic ties with China and Russia, highlighting how interventions are entangled with global power plays that affect universities, recruitment pipelines, and domestic politics alike.

---

A Call to Rethink Intervention and Recruitment

Smedley Butler’s critique remains urgent: to “smash the racket,” profit must be removed from war, military force should be strictly defensive, and decisions about war must rest with those who bear its consequences. From Mexico to Venezuela—and including covert operations like Iran‑Contra—the historical record shows how interventions serve a narrow elite while imposing massive human costs.

HEI’s warnings underscore that higher education, ROTC programs, and military recruitment pipelines are not neutral pathways but deeply embedded parts of systems that reproduce extraction, militarism, and inequality. Students, educators, and families must critically evaluate the incentives and promises of military pathways and demand institutions that serve learning, opportunity, and justice rather than empire.

---

Sources

1. Butler, Smedley D. War Is a Racket. Round Table Press, 1935.

2. U.S. Congressional Record and Butler testimony on the Business Plot, 1934.

3. Kinzer, Stephen. Overthrow: America’s Century of Regime Change from Hawaii to Iraq.

4. Scott, Peter Dale. Cocaine Politics: Drugs, Armies, and the CIA in Central America.

5. Reporting on Trump pardons, Iran‑Contra participants, and global alliances (2020–2025).

6. Higher Education Inquirer, “Kleptocracy, Militarism, Colonialism: A Counterrecruiting Call for Students and Families,” December 7, 2025. (link)

7. Higher Education Inquirer, “The Hidden Costs of ROTC — and the Military Path,” November 28, 2025. (link)

8. Historical records on U.S. interventions: Mexican‑American War, Spanish‑American War, Guatemala (1954), Chile (1973), Argentina (1976–1983), El Salvador, Nicaragua, Panama, Venezuela (2025).

Kleptocracy, Militarism, Colonialism: A Counterrecruiting Call for Students and Families

The United States has long framed itself as a beacon of democracy and upward mobility, yet students stepping onto college campuses in 2025 are inheriting a system that looks less like a healthy republic and more like a sophisticated kleptocracy entwined with militarism, colonial extraction, and digital exploitation. The entanglement of higher education with these forces has deep roots, but its modern shape is especially alarming for those considering military enlistment or ROTC programs as pathways to opportunity. 

The decision to publish on December 7th is deliberate. In 1941, Americans were engaged in a clearly defined struggle against fascism, a moral fight that demanded national sacrifice. The world in 2025 is far murkier. U.S. militarism now often serves corporate profit, global influence, and the security of allied autocracies rather than clear moral or defensive imperatives.

This is an article for students, future students, and the parents who want something better for their children. It is also a call to pause and critically examine the systems asking for young people’s allegiance and labor.

Higher education has become a lucrative extraction point for political and financial elites. Universities now operate as hybrid corporations, prioritizing endowment growth, real-estate expansion, donor influence, and federal cash flows over public service or student welfare. Tuition continues to rise as administrative bloat accelerates. Private equity quietly moves into student housing, online program management, education technology, and even institutional governance. The result is a funnel: taxpayers support institutions; institutions support billionaires; students carry the debt. Meanwhile, federal and state funds flow through universities with minimal oversight, especially through research partnerships with defense contractors and weapons manufacturers. What looks like innovation is often simply public money being laundered into private hands.

For decades, the U.S. military has relied on higher education to supply officers and legitimacy. ROTC programs sit comfortably on campuses while recruiters visit high schools and community colleges with promises of financial aid, job training, and escape from economic insecurity. But the military’s pitch obscures the broader structure. The United States spends more on its military than the next several nations combined, maintaining hundreds of foreign bases and intervening across the globe. American forces are involved, directly or indirectly, in conflicts ranging from Palestine to Venezuela to Ukraine, and through support of allies such as Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, often supplying weapons used in devastating campaigns. This is not national defense. It is a permanent war economy, one that treats young Americans as fuel.

At the same time, Russian cybercriminal networks have infiltrated U.S. institutions, targeting critical infrastructure, education networks, and private industry. Reports show that the U.S. government has frequently failed to hold these actors accountable and, in some cases, appears to prioritize intelligence or geopolitical advantage over domestic security, allowing cybercrime to flourish while ordinary Americans bear the consequences. This environment adds another layer of risk for students and families, showing how interconnected digital vulnerabilities are with global power games and domestic exploitation.

For those who enlist hoping to fund an education, the GI Bill frequently underdelivers. For-profit colleges disproportionately target veterans, consuming their benefits with low-quality, high-cost programs. Even public institutions have learned to treat veterans as revenue streams. U.S. universities have always been entwined with colonial projects, from land-grant colleges built on seized Indigenous land to research that supported Cold War interventions and overseas resource extraction. Today these legacies persist in subtler forms. Study-abroad programs and global campuses often mirror corporate imperialism. Research partnerships with authoritarian regimes proceed when profitable. University police departments are increasingly stocked with military-grade equipment, and curricula frequently erase Indigenous, Black, and Global South perspectives unless students actively seek them out. The university presents itself as a space of liberation while quietly reaffirming colonial hierarchies, militarized enforcement of U.S. interests worldwide, and even complicity in digital threats.

For many young people, enlistment is not a choice—it is an economic survival strategy in a country that refuses to guarantee healthcare, housing, or affordable education. Yet the military’s promise of stability is fragile and often deceptive. Students and parents should understand that young Americans are being recruited for geopolitics, not opportunity. Wars in Ukraine, Palestine, and Venezuela, along with arms support to Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, rarely protect ordinary citizens—they protect corporations, elites, and global influence. A person’s body and future become government property. ROTC contracts and enlistments are binding in ways that most eighteen-year-olds do not fully understand, and penalties for leaving are severe. Trauma is a predictable outcome, not an anomaly. The military’s mental health crisis, suicide rates, and disability system failures are well documented. Education benefits are conditional and often disappointing. The idea that enlistment is a reliable pathway to college has long been more marketing than truth, especially in a higher-education landscape dominated by predatory schools. Young people deserve more than being used as leverage in someone else’s empire.

A non-militarized route to opportunity requires acknowledging how much talent, energy, and potential is lost to endless war, endless debt, and the growing digital threats that go unaddressed at the highest levels. It requires demanding that federal and state governments invest in free or affordable public higher education, universal healthcare, and stronger civilian service programs rather than military pipelines. Students can resist by refusing enlistment and ROTC recruitment pitches, advocating for demilitarized campuses, supporting labor unions, student governments, and anti-war coalitions, and demanding transparency about university ties to weapons manufacturers, foreign governments, and cybersecurity vulnerabilities. Parents can resist by rejecting the false choice presented to their children between military service and crippling debt, and by supporting movements pushing for tuition reform, debt cancellation, and public investment in youth.

It is possible to build a higher-education system that serves learning rather than empire, but it will not happen unless students and families refuse to feed the machinery that exploits them. America’s kleptocracy, militarism, colonial legacies, and complicity in global digital crime are deeply embedded in universities and the workforce pipelines that flow through them. Yet young people—and the people who care about them—still hold power in their decisions. Choosing not to enlist, not to sign an ROTC contract, and not to hand over your future to systems that see you as expendable is one form of reclaiming that power. Hope is limited but not lost.

Sources

1. U.S. Department of Defense. Defense Budget Overview Fiscal Year 2025. 2024.

2. Amnesty International. “Saudi Arabia and UAE Arms Transfers and Human Rights Violations.” 2024.

3. Human Rights Watch. “Conflicts in Ukraine, Venezuela, and Palestine.” 2024.

4. FBI and CISA reports on Russian cybercrime and critical infrastructure infiltration. 2023–2025.

5. Cybersecurity & Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA). National Cybersecurity Annual Review. 2024.