United States

Last week the Republican party was at arms after Axios reported that Steve Bannon was said to be pushing president Trump to raise taxes on the wealthiest Americans. According to the website, Trump’s chief strategist was urging to raise the top tax rate on individuals, with Axios saying the former Breitbart CEO looking for the top rate to have “a 4 in front of it” (currently, the highest income-tax bracket in the US is 39.6% for individuals earning more than $414,000 a year).

Following North Korea’s first confirmed test of a medium-range ICBM earlier this week, the hermit kingdom and the US have continued to trade provocations and threats, with the North warning on Sunday that the bombing drill led by two US B-1B Lancers in South Korea on Saturday risked sparking an all-out nuclear conflict on the peninsula.

A U.S.-Russian brokered ceasefire in southwest Syria was holding several hours after it took effect according to Reuters, the latest international attempt to restore peace in the six-year Syrian war. The truce, which took effect across southwest Syria on Sunday at noon Damascus time (09:00 GMT), extends to Syrian government forces and rebel groups in the provinces of Deraa, Quneitra, and Sweida where western-backed rebels control swathes of territory and form a center of the insurgency south of the capital Damascus.

Following the first meeting between President Trump and President Putin, in which the issue of cybersecurity and Russian "interference" in the US election was a prominent topic, there was one unanswered question: did Trump accept Russia's "assertions" that it did not interfere in the voting process.

Authored by Jeremiah Johnson (nom de plume of a retired Green Beret of the United States Army Special Forces (Airborne)) via SHTFplan.com,

In the days following the 241st anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence, the country is in an even more precarious position than it was in 1776.