Expert: Tropical Storm Harvey Is Headed to These Areas Next

Tropical Storm Harvey has devastated Houston, flooded tens of thousands of homes and peaked as a Category 4 hurricane – and it’s not done yet.

“What we’re dealing with here is a storm that has plenty of time over warm water that appears to me is heading for the Virgin Islands and Puerto Rico,” Joe Bastardi of WeatherBELL.com said on radio Thursday.

He predicted the path of Tropical Storm Harvey, advising officials in those areas to stock up by airlifting in supplies and otherwise to prepare in case the storm hits the U.S. territories of Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands.

“We just saw a tremendous response in Texas, a reactive response, which was great,” Bastardi said. “But a proactive situation … would really be a way that you can show how good government can work with the right preparation.”

At least 31 people have died in the flood waters of Tropical Storm Harvey, according to local officials. Houston was drenched with more than 50 inches of rain, displacing people by the thousands as their homes flooded; a FEMA administrator told Fox News that at least 30,000 people are living in emergency shelters until the waters recede.

This article provided courtesy of TheBlaze.

GLENN: We welcome to the program, Joe Bastardi. He's from WeatherBELL.com. If you don't know Joe, he's been on with us several times over, you know, the last -- seems like couple of decades. Maybe three decades, Joe.

But Joe is one of the best weather guys out there, meteorologists. He is -- when it comes to hurricanes, this guy nails it. He has said recently that the -- the drought of hurricanes, if you will, these giant storms, this is the year they're going to come to an end. He is also -- his tracking of this hurricane was almost 100 percent correct, or close enough for people in my business at least.

And unfortunately, he is also calling for another hurricane that is now starting to form as a tropical storm. And he's here to tell us a little bit about that.

But first, Joe, welcome to the program. How are you, sir?

JOE: Well, I'm pretty good. I just want to call in for a couple reasons on Irma, okay? It's not a done deal that's hitting the United States.

GLENN: Sure.

JOE: It's Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands I'm very, very worried about. In fact, in looking at what I'm seeing, it has a classic look for a hurricane that should go to a major hurricane. But we look at these analogues of past patterns. For instance, Ike and Andrew. Where the path -- you see the path come up and bend. And when it bends off to the left like that, the hurricane starts intensifying. Because it means that the upper air ridge of high pressure to the north of it is backing west with it, to sort of escort it westward like that.

By the way, and I just want folks to understand, I learned that methodology in 1976 at Penn State University from Dr. John Lee, my tropical professor, who would point out countless storms, countless major storms. Because we did have major hurricanes back then. In fact, quite a few of them in the '30s, '40s, and '50, that when they came up and bent to the left, there would be rapid intensification that would follow over the next few days.

And so what we're dealing with here is a storm that has plenty of time over warm water that appears to me is heading for the Virgin Islands and Puerto Rico. This is very important. It's going to move slow. If we get a good handle on this by Sunday, if it's me and I'm the administration, I would start looking at this as to try to preemptively airlift supplies and get people ready. Because it may not come until Wednesday or Thursday, but if you're coming in Saturday or Sunday, even if it's a near-miss, it's a bad storm. If it's a direct hit, where the Category 4 or 5 hurricane coming through the Virgin Islands to Puerto Rico, look what you go did, right?

And we just saw a tremendous response in Texas, a reactive response which was great. A proactive situation, especially with Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands. Both US territories. We have to understand that. Would really be a way that -- you can show how good government can work with the right -- with the right preparation.

GLENN: Joe, what are the odds that that -- that comes a little farther up north.

JOE: What do you mean?

GLENN: And hits -- you know, it -- it slams into -- it misses Puerto Rico, the Virgin Islands, and it slams into the Carolinas. I guess it's not really north.

JOE: That's certainly in the realm of possibility. But what I do is I make a forecast. I think what this is going to do --

GLENN: Okay.

JOE: -- is come very close to Puerto Rico, just north of Hispaniola. And because -- I've got, you know, clients all in there.

GLENN: Yeah.

JOE: And, you know, we're getting the Bahamas sort of war footing. Getting them prepared. And then you have the southeast United States.

If this thing takes a further cell track over Puerto Rica and Hispaniola, it will not be able to rebuild major intensity before Florida.

GLENN: Okay.

JOE: If you look at the tracks of storms into Hispaniola, what happens is this, if there are major hurricanes and they're hit, the inside of them get hallowed out. And they can't get their core back together for two, three, four days.

You saw that with Ike. When Ike hit in there, it had to get back over the gulf for a while. So you have to understand that there is a way out here for the United States, or it recurves to the east of the United States.

But what we do is, look, we tell people options. And we say, this is our most likely forecast. And right now, the first place I'm worried about and the reason I called in was because Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands and the idea that, you know, if you're seeing something four or five days in advance, you would be able to get ready for it.

What happened with Harvey was, everybody was staring at the eclipse on Monday. I mean, I was amazed at the lack of attention to what was going on. It wasn't named. But it was -- and, you know, we were warning our clients saying, "You know, this is going to be a big deal." And we warned them -- that's not hind-sighting. It's what we were doing.

And as far as the preseason goes, I tell you, I put something on Twitter this morning that showed the pressure patterns when major hurricanes are going to hit the United States and the computer models. And what has happened over the last 12 years -- and it might be due to the fact that the globe is warmer. Okay?

Might argue over what causes that, but I don't argue that the globe is a bit warmer. Is it distorts the barometric pressure patterns during the hurricane season, which may make it less likely for hurricanes to hit. Now, what do we jump on this year? We knew this year would be different. Look at how cool it is across the eastern and central United States.

And when it's cool in the month of August and the ocean -- and you're in a warm cycle in the Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation, we are. Okay? Bang. It lights up the tropics. You saw that happen in 2004.

GLENN: Okay. So, Joe, you just brought up global warming. And all of Al Gore's nonsense of, you know, the world is going to all be underwater, you know, by 2016. And he talked about these great buildup of storms. We have just gone through an amazing quiet period of storms. And I would like to get your view. I don't know where you stand on global warming.

I am on record saying, I will look at the temperatures. And if the temperatures are up. That's great.

What you do about it, is what we need to actually be discussing. But for the people to start coming in and saying, "These storms are global warming. See, we told you." No, this is a cycle that has been quiet for a while and might come roaring to life.

JOE: Well, here's the thing, you know, I believe, first of all in Ecclesiastes 1:9: There's nothing new under the sun. You know, as man gets smarter, he observes things more and more.

The cycles in the ocean, what we call the meridional overturning circulation, centuries in the making. The way you see the oceans now is a product of back and forth for such a long time.

GLENN: Yeah.

JOE: So I believe that the cycle is largely warming. CO2's contribution is minute. It's only .04 percent of the atmosphere.

But, look, here's what starts happening: Let's say this becomes a big hurricane, but it stays out at sea. Well, that's weather. If it happens to come 100 miles further west and hits the United States, well, there's climate change right there. And that's what you see going on.

You take -- see, this is the thing about me -- I should probably be like a spy for the other side. I can give them examples where they could push their point. For instance, suppose this comes into the Bahamas as a major hurricane. That will be three major hurricanes in three years, right? Which is almost unprecedented in the Bahamas. Three major hurricanes in three years. My counter, then, to myself would be: Well, look at what happened '63, '64, '65, '66, around there, where you had major hurricanes. You had Anez (phonetic), Cleo, Betsy, Flora, all coming into the same spot.

And where was that? And that's the big thing. Why -- today is the anniversary of Hurricane Carol, folks, on the northeast coast. 1954. The wind gusted to 135 miles an hour at Block Island, Rhode Island. That happens to be stronger than the wind gusts at Aransas Pass with this past storm, which was 132 miles an hour. Now, one could argue, well, there were stronger winds with Harvey. But then again, with Carol, there may have been stronger winds too because they push 15 feet of water into Providence, Rhode Island.

GLENN: So, Joe --

JOE: So my point is this: That you are seeing an agenda. And they come out after the fact. It's Monday morning quarterbacking, and that's what I get all upset about. That, oh, these people didn't even know what was going on to happen in the preseason. They didn't get out there and hang their tail out to dry, like we did at our company. And then they tell me after the fact? That, oh, this is because of CO2.

GLENN: So, Joe, I have to ask you this question. And I know you have to run. You're a very busy man. And I appreciate your time.

JOE: Not really. I can hang out.

(laughter)

GLENN: I want to ask you this one question: And that is this. I have such respect for you because you really know your science. You know your craft. You know it.

But I'm listening to you, and I'm hearing the memorization of the dates and the storms and everything else. Did you -- like a lot of kids grew up, they memorized the names of the presidents. Did you grow up knowing you wanted to do this and memorizing the names of storms? When did you decide, my gosh, I'm passionate about this?

JOE: Well, at the age of three, my mom and dad had to keep an eye on me because I would lie on my back and stare at the sun and the cumulus clouds going in front of the sun because I would like to look at the outline of the clouds. My dad is a meteorologist. He's 88 now. He graduated out of A&M in '65, and he put me to bed, not with the three little bears, but the three big storms of '54. Carol --

(laughter)

JOE: No, listen, I've been through it. My son's like this. My great grandfather was a town weatherman in Bisignano, which is a town in Sicily. And it's in the blood. And it's in the passion.

You know what, we're probably a lot alike in our spiritual beliefs. God -- God gives you something, a passion like that, he's doing it for a reason.

GLENN: Yeah, he is.

JOE: Many people -- you know, I see the majesty, I see the majesty of the creation of God's hand in the weather every day. I simply marvel at it. I'm looking at it right now out my window. There's a cloud in one place. No cloud in the other. There has to be something different going on over that short period, that short area. How does that happen?

So you got to understand something, that this is all I've ever wanted to do since I was a little kid. I've been a geek all my life. I'm still a geek now. I can't help it.

And I'll tell you what's bad, it's a blessing and a curse, folks. Because you will see things quite far away, and then you can't sleep because you keep going over it. You keep looking at maps. Looking at maps.

And then what happens when they don't happen? You learn about being wrong, okay? And that's the problem I think that climatologists have: They should be made to forecast the weather for a year so they can see how the models go wrong and how they can be wrong. Because when you're just looking at stuff from behind and you get to come out and say, "Well, see, it's what we told you," it's a very, very different situation from being an operational forecaster, where your life is on the line.

GLENN: Joe Bastardi from WeatherBELL.com. WeatherBELL.com. Chief meteorologist, and really one of the most accurate guys when it comes to long-range forecasting and a friend of the program for a very long time. Joe, I appreciate it. God bless.

JOE: Hey, before I go, just remember, calm down. Everyone enjoy the weather. Because it's the only weather you've got. Most of the weather is nice across most of the world. Okay?

STU: Optimistic take.

GLENN: God bless you. Thanks, Joe. Yeah.

From Pharaoh to Hamas: The same spirit of evil, new disguise

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The drone footage out of Gaza isn’t just war propaganda — it’s a glimpse of the same darkness that once convinced men they were righteous for killing innocents.

Evil introduces itself subtly. It doesn’t announce, “Hi, I’m here to destroy you.” It whispers. It flatters. It borrows the language of justice, empathy, and freedom, twisting them until hatred sounds righteous and violence sounds brave.

We are watching that same deception unfold again — in the streets, on college campuses, and in the rhetoric of people who should know better. It’s the oldest story in the world, retold with new slogans.

Evil wins when good people mirror its rage.

A drone video surfaced this week showing Hamas terrorists staging the “discovery” of a hostage’s body. They pushed a corpse out of a window, dragged it into a hole, buried it, and then called in aid workers to “find” what they themselves had planted. It was theater — evil, disguised as victimhood. And it was caught entirely on camera.

That’s how evil operates. It never comes in through the front door. It sneaks in, often through manipulative pity. The same spirit animates the moral rot spreading through our institutions — from the halls of universities to the chambers of government.

Take Zohran Mamdani, a New York assemblyman who has praised jihadists and defended pro-Hamas agitators. His father, a Columbia University professor, wrote that America and al-Qaeda are morally equivalent — that suicide bombings shouldn’t be viewed as barbaric. Imagine thinking that way after watching 3,000 Americans die on 9/11. That’s not intellectualism. That’s indoctrination.

Often, that indoctrination comes from hostile foreign actors, peddled by complicit pawns on our own soil. The pro-Hamas protests that erupted across campuses last year, for example, were funded by Iran — a regime that murders its own citizens for speaking freely.

Ancient evil, new clothes

But the deeper danger isn’t foreign money. It’s the spiritual blindness that lets good people believe resentment is justice and envy is discernment. Scripture talks about the spirit of Amalek — the eternal enemy of God’s people, who attacks the weak from behind while the strong look away. Amalek never dies; it just changes its vocabulary and form with the times.

Today, Amalek tweets. He speaks through professors who defend terrorism as “anti-colonial resistance.” He preaches from pulpits that call violence “solidarity.” And he recruits through algorithms, whispering that the Jews control everything, that America had it coming, that chaos is freedom. Those are ancient lies wearing new clothes.

When nations embrace those lies, it’s not the Jews who perish first. It’s the nations themselves. The soul dies long before the body. The ovens of Auschwitz didn’t start with smoke; they started with silence and slogans.

Andrew Harnik / Staff | Getty Images

A time for choosing

So what do we do? We speak truth — calmly, firmly, without venom. Because hatred can’t kill hatred; it only feeds it. Truth, compassion, and courage starve it to death.

Evil wins when good people mirror its rage. That’s how Amalek survives — by making you fight him with his own weapons. The only victory that lasts is moral clarity without malice, courage without cruelty.

The war we’re fighting isn’t new. It’s the same battle between remembrance and amnesia, covenant and chaos, humility and pride. The same spirit that whispered to Pharaoh, to Hitler, and to every mob that thought hatred could heal the world is whispering again now — on your screens, in your classrooms, in your churches.

Will you join it, or will you stand against it?

This article originally appeared on TheBlaze.com.

Bill Gates ends climate fear campaign, declares AI the future ruler

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The Big Tech billionaire once said humanity must change or perish. Now he claims we’ll survive — just as elites prepare total surveillance.

For decades, Americans have been told that climate change is an imminent apocalypse — the existential threat that justifies every intrusion into our lives, from banning gas stoves to rationing energy to tracking personal “carbon scores.”

Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates helped lead that charge. He warned repeatedly that the “climate disaster” would be the greatest crisis humanity would ever face. He invested billions in green technology and demanded the world reach net-zero emissions by 2050 “to avoid catastrophe.”

The global contest is no longer over barrels and pipelines — it is over who gets to flip the digital switch.

Now, suddenly, he wants everyone to relax: Climate change “will not lead to humanity’s demise” after all.

Gates was making less of a scientific statement and more of a strategic pivot. When elites retire a crisis, it’s never because the threat is gone — it’s because a better one has replaced it. And something else has indeed arrived — something the ruling class finds more useful than fear of the weather.The same day Gates downshifted the doomsday rhetoric, Amazon announced it would pay warehouse workers $30 an hour — while laying off 30,000 people because artificial intelligence will soon do their jobs.

Climate panic was the warm-up. AI control is the main event.

The new currency of power

The world once revolved around oil and gas. Today, it revolves around the electricity demanded by server farms, the chips that power machine learning, and the data that can be used to manipulate or silence entire populations. The global contest is no longer over barrels and pipelines — it is over who gets to flip the digital switch. Whoever controls energy now controls information. And whoever controls information controls civilization.

Climate alarmism gave elites a pretext to centralize power over energy. Artificial intelligence gives them a mechanism to centralize power over people. The future battles will not be about carbon — they will be about control.

Two futures — both ending in tyranny

Americans are already being pushed into what look like two opposing movements, but both leave the individual powerless.

The first is the technocratic empire being constructed in the name of innovation. In its vision, human work will be replaced by machines, and digital permissions will subsume personal autonomy.

Government and corporations merge into a single authority. Your identity, finances, medical decisions, and speech rights become access points monitored by biometric scanners and enforced by automated gatekeepers. Every step, purchase, and opinion is tracked under the noble banner of “efficiency.”

The second is the green de-growth utopia being marketed as “compassion.” In this vision, prosperity itself becomes immoral. You will own less because “the planet” requires it. Elites will redesign cities so life cannot extend beyond a 15-minute walking radius, restrict movement to save the Earth, and ration resources to curb “excess.” It promises community and simplicity, but ultimately delivers enforced scarcity. Freedom withers when surviving becomes a collective permission rather than an individual right.

Both futures demand that citizens become manageable — either automated out of society or tightly regulated within it. The ruling class will embrace whichever version gives them the most leverage in any given moment.

Climate panic was losing its grip. AI dependency — and the obedience it creates — is far more potent.

The forgotten way

A third path exists, but it is the one today’s elites fear most: the path laid out in our Constitution. The founders built a system that assumes human beings are not subjects to be monitored or managed, but moral agents equipped by God with rights no government — and no algorithm — can override.

Hesham Elsherif / Stringer | Getty Images

That idea remains the most “disruptive technology” in history. It shattered the belief that people need kings or experts or global committees telling them how to live. No wonder elites want it erased.

Soon, you will be told you must choose: Live in a world run by machines or in a world stripped down for planetary salvation. Digital tyranny or rationed equality. Innovation without liberty or simplicity without dignity.

Both are traps.

The only way

The only future worth choosing is the one grounded in ordered liberty — where prosperity and progress exist alongside moral responsibility and personal freedom and human beings are treated as image-bearers of God — not climate liabilities, not data profiles, not replaceable hardware components.

Bill Gates can change his tune. The media can change the script. But the agenda remains the same.

They no longer want to save the planet. They want to run it, and they expect you to obey.

This article originally appeared on TheBlaze.com.

Why the White House restoration sent the left Into panic mode

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Presidents have altered the White House for decades, yet only Donald Trump is treated as a vandal for privately funding the East Wing’s restoration.

Every time a president so much as changes the color of the White House drapes, the press clutches its pearls. Unless the name on the stationery is Barack Obama’s, even routine restoration becomes a national outrage.

President Donald Trump’s decision to privately fund upgrades to the White House — including a new state ballroom — has been met with the usual chorus of gasps and sneers. You’d think he bulldozed Monticello.

If a Republican preserves beauty, it’s vandalism. If a Democrat does the same, it’s ‘visionary.’

The irony is that presidents have altered and expanded the White House for more than a century. President Franklin D. Roosevelt added the East and West Wings in the middle of the Great Depression. Newspapers accused him of building a palace while Americans stood in breadlines. History now calls it “vision.”

First lady Nancy Reagan faced the same hysteria. Headlines accused her of spending taxpayer money on new china “while Americans starved.” In truth, she raised private funds after learning that the White House didn’t have enough matching plates for state dinners. She took the ridicule and refused to pass blame.

“I’m a big girl,” she told her staff. “This comes with the job.” That was dignity — something the press no longer recognizes.

A restoration, not a renovation

Trump’s project is different in every way that should matter. It costs taxpayers nothing. Not a cent. The president and a few friends privately fund the work. There’s no private pool or tennis court, no personal perks. The additions won’t even be completed until after he leaves office.

What’s being built is not indulgence — it’s stewardship. A restoration of aging rooms, worn fixtures, and century-old bathrooms that no longer function properly in the people’s house. Trump has paid for cast brass doorknobs engraved with the presidential seal, restored the carpets and moldings, and ensured that the architecture remains faithful to history.

The media’s response was mockery and accusations of vanity. They call it “grotesque excess,” while celebrating billion-dollar “climate art” projects and funneling hundreds of millions into activist causes like the No Kings movement. They lecture America on restraint while living off the largesse of billionaires.

The selective guardians of history

Where was this sudden reverence for history when rioters torched St. John’s Church — the same church where every president since James Madison has worshipped? The press called it an “expression of grief.”

Where was that reverence when mobs toppled statues of Washington, Jefferson, and Grant? Or when first lady Melania Trump replaced the Rose Garden’s lawn with a patio but otherwise followed Jackie Kennedy’s original 1962 plans in the garden’s restoration? They called that “desecration.”

If a Republican preserves beauty, it’s vandalism. If a Democrat does the same, it’s “visionary.”

The real desecration

The people shrieking about “historic preservation” care nothing for history. They hate the idea that something lasting and beautiful might be built by hands they despise. They mock craftsmanship because it exposes their own cultural decay.

The White House ballroom is not a scandal — it’s a mirror. And what it reflects is the media’s own pettiness. The ruling class that ridicules restoration is the same class that cheered as America’s monuments fell. Its members sneer at permanence because permanence condemns them.

Julia Beverly / Contributor | Getty Images

Trump’s improvements are an act of faith — in the nation’s symbols, its endurance, and its worth. The outrage over a privately funded renovation says less about him than it does about the journalists who mistake destruction for progress.

The real desecration isn’t happening in the East Wing. It’s happening in the newsrooms that long ago tore up their own foundation — truth — and never bothered to rebuild it.

This article originally appeared on TheBlaze.com.

Trump’s secret war in the Caribbean EXPOSED — It’s not about drugs

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The president’s moves in Venezuela, Guyana, and Colombia aren’t about drugs. They’re about re-establishing America’s sovereignty across the Western Hemisphere.

For decades, we’ve been told America’s wars are about drugs, democracy, or “defending freedom.” But look closer at what’s unfolding off the coast of Venezuela, and you’ll see something far more strategic taking shape. Donald Trump’s so-called drug war isn’t about fentanyl or cocaine. It’s about control — and a rebirth of American sovereignty.

The aim of Trump’s ‘drug war’ is to keep the hemisphere’s oil, minerals, and manufacturing within the Western family and out of Beijing’s hands.

The president understands something the foreign policy class forgot long ago: The world doesn’t respect apologies. It respects strength.

While the global elites in Davos tout the Great Reset, Trump is building something entirely different — a new architecture of power based on regional independence, not global dependence. His quiet campaign in the Western Hemisphere may one day be remembered as the second Monroe Doctrine.

Venezuela sits at the center of it all. It holds the world’s largest crude oil reserves — oil perfectly suited for America’s Gulf refineries. For years, China and Russia have treated Venezuela like a pawn on their chessboard, offering predatory loans in exchange for control of those resources. The result has been a corrupt, communist state sitting in our own back yard. For too long, Washington shrugged. Not any more.The naval exercises in the Caribbean, the sanctions, the patrols — they’re not about drug smugglers. They’re about evicting China from our hemisphere.

Trump is using the old “drug war” playbook to wage a new kind of war — an economic and strategic one — without firing a shot at our actual enemies. The goal is simple: Keep the hemisphere’s oil, minerals, and manufacturing within the Western family and out of Beijing’s hands.

Beyond Venezuela

Just east of Venezuela lies Guyana, a country most Americans couldn’t find on a map a year ago. Then ExxonMobil struck oil, and suddenly Guyana became the newest front in a quiet geopolitical contest. Washington is helping defend those offshore platforms, build radar systems, and secure undersea cables — not for charity, but for strategy. Control energy, data, and shipping lanes, and you control the future.

Moreover, Colombia — a country once defined by cartels — is now positioned as the hinge between two oceans and two continents. It guards the Panama Canal and sits atop rare-earth minerals every modern economy needs. Decades of American presence there weren’t just about cocaine interdiction; they were about maintaining leverage over the arteries of global trade. Trump sees that clearly.

PEDRO MATTEY / Contributor | Getty Images

All of these recent news items — from the military drills in the Caribbean to the trade negotiations — reflect a new vision of American power. Not global policing. Not endless nation-building. It’s about strategic sovereignty.

It’s the same philosophy driving Trump’s approach to NATO, the Middle East, and Asia. We’ll stand with you — but you’ll stand on your own two feet. The days of American taxpayers funding global security while our own borders collapse are over.

Trump’s Monroe Doctrine

Critics will call it “isolationism.” It isn’t. It’s realism. It’s recognizing that America’s strength comes not from fighting other people’s wars but from securing our own energy, our own supply lines, our own hemisphere. The first Monroe Doctrine warned foreign powers to stay out of the Americas. The second one — Trump’s — says we’ll defend them, but we’ll no longer be their bank or their babysitter.

Historians may one day mark this moment as the start of a new era — when America stopped apologizing for its own interests and started rebuilding its sovereignty, one barrel, one chip, and one border at a time.

This article originally appeared on TheBlaze.com.