An Israeli nongovernmental organization is working behind the scenes to provide a critical link between the Israeli military and international organizations with one goal in mind: Get humanitarian aid to Palestinian civilians.
‘We really became this informal connector and facilitator between the Israeli authorities and the humanitarian community,’ IsraAID CEO Yotam Polizer said.
IsraAID has worked in 64 countries and is currently the largest humanitarian organization based out of Israel.
Polizer says there is broad consensus now that a concerning humanitarian level was reached in Gaza with pockets of malnutrition across the strip. He notes that it isn’t only food that is needed by the civilian population, but also medicine, water and nutritional provisions.
‘When we reach severe malnutrition levels, we know that just rice and flour is not going to solve the problem,’ Polizer added. ‘We need nutritional supplements, we need people to get protein.’
For nearly five months, there was no consistent flow of aid. That has changed in recent weeks with thousands of trucks being distributed along with airdrops of supplies to civilians. Recently, the entry of commercial trucks was partially approved.
‘The declared policy of Israel for two and a half months after the ceasefire collapsed was that nothing comes in,’ Polizer said. ‘That was the policy because the plan was to pressure Hamas.’
The IsraAID CEO says the focus must be on saving lives, not on playing the ‘blame game.’ He urges the United Nations, the Israel Defense Forces, the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF) and all humanitarian organizations to work together and find solutions.
‘As a humanitarian organization, the concept of ‘do no harm’ is really our Bible,’ Polizer added.
A few months after the war started, IsraAID started to receive requests from global humanitarian organizations they had worked with in Afghanistan and Ukraine, asking for help to facilitate aid deliveries to Gaza.
These groups had issues with customs clearance and approval from the Israeli military to deliver supplies to Palestinians in Gaza. These were problems IsraAID could help solve.
Despite the political and cultural differences, Polizer said the Jewish community of the United States is stepping up to donate and support finding solutions for the hunger crisis in Gaza.
‘You can support the humanitarian crisis in Gaza, but it does not mean you are anti-Israel,’ he concluded.
An environmental advocacy group accused of trying to manipulate judges has removed and anonymized the names of jurists who worked with the activist network and praised its activities, following a Fox News Digital report exposing an online forum promoting climate litigation updates.
The Climate Judiciary Project (CJP), founded in 2018 by the left-wing Environmental Law Institute, describes itself as providing judges with ‘authoritative, objective, and trusted education on climate science, the impacts of climate change, and the ways climate science is arising in the law,’ according to its website.
The group has been accused by Republican lawmakers, such as Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas, of working to ‘train judges’ and ‘make them agreeable to creative climate litigation tactics.’ In July, Fox News Digital reported on CJP’s yearslong, nationwide forum where jurists privately exchanged climate-related legal updates and information alongside CJP leadership — a forum that was abruptly made private in May 2024.
CJP’s testimonial page boasting praise from jurists who participated in the program was overhauled this summer, including obliterating testimony from a judge identified in Fox News Digital’s July report. Fox Digital reviewed archived links to CJP’s testimonial page and found Judge Sam Scheele’s comments were still public on the site in May but were removed by the end of July following Fox Digital’s report.
‘It’s been truly a privilege. I am welcomely absorbing everything that has been brought to us and I look forward to carrying that forward and paying it forward,’ read a quote from Scheele when he served on Indiana’s Lake Superior Court’s Civil Division, according to an archived link of the website’s page from May.
At the end of July, another archived link showed that Scheele’s quote and name had been removed from CJP’s testimonial page, while four other quotes were attributed to anonymous ‘participating judges.’ One remaining quote was still attributed to the former president of the William & Flora Hewlett Foundation, a nonprofit that funds progressive causes in the U.S. It is unclear the exact day the changes were made to the testimonial page.
A spokesperson for the Environmental Law Institute told Fox Digital when asked about changes to the testimonial page that updates were made out of an effort to ‘protect privacy and prevent baseless criticism and harassment.’
‘Judges are encouraged, and many required, to participate in continuing education on topics relevant to emerging trends in the law – including those related to science. Recent changes to CJP’s website were made to protect privacy and prevent baseless criticism and harassment,’ the spokesperson said.
Scheele was among a handful of judges who communicated on CJP’s online forum that ran from September 2022 and maintained until May 2024, according to documents previously reviewed by Fox News Digital. While Scheele’s testimony was obliterated from the website’s testimonial page, two other favorable quotes from judges were anonymized and attributed to a ‘participating judge,’ while two other quotes remained unchanged and were both attributed to a ‘participating judge,’ Fox News Digital found.
Fox News Digital obtained the archived chat history of the now-defunct chat forum between CJP and jurists last month, which detailed numerous messages between at least five judges and CJP employees trading links on climate studies, congratulating one another on hosting recent environmental events, sharing updates on recent climate cases that were remanded to state courts, and encouraging each other to participate in other CJP meet-ups.
One message posted by Delaware Judge Travis Laster, vice chancellor of the Delaware Court of Chancery, features a YouTube video of a 2022 climate presentation delivered by a Delaware official and a Columbia University professor that focused on the onslaught of climate lawsuits since the mid-2000s.
It also included claims that such lawsuits could one day bankrupt the fuel industry.
Laster shared the video in the group with a disclaimer to others: ‘Because the link is of a judicial event that is otherwise not public, please do not forward or use without checking with me. I suspect that goes without saying, but the powers that be will be happier that I said it.’
Scheele was among a handful of other judges who responded to Laster’s video and message, praising it as ‘great work.’
‘This is great work/great stuff, Travis; congrats on a job well-done, & thank you so much for sharing this!,’ Scheele responded, according to documents obtained by Fox News Digital.
Scheele’s office did not respond to Fox Digital’s request for comment regarding why his name and testimony were removed from the website.
Scheele’s office did respond to Fox News Digital’s inquiry last month regarding his past participation in the forum, saying he first joined the 2022 National Judicial Conference on Climate Science more than two years before his appointment to the Indiana Court of Appeals.
‘At the last minute, when another appointed delegate was unexpectedly unable to attend, Judge Scheele was asked by Indiana’s state court administration to fill in as Indiana’s representative, and he accepted the invitation. As is normal in conferences attended by our judges, this conference addressed emerging, hot-button issues that might come before the courts,’ Scheele’s office said.
‘Judge Scheele does not recall any substantive communication on the ‘listserv’ mentioned. He, like all of our Court of Appeals of Indiana judges, is dedicated to the unbiased, apolitical administration of justice in the State. He, like all of our judges, educates himself on emergent topics in the law and applies his legal training to evaluate the legal issues before him,’ the office continued.
CJP told Fox News Digital of the now-defunct email list last month that it was created in September 2022 to help members of its Judicial Leaders in Climate Science program communicate and network with one another for the duration of the program.
The one-year program, established by CJP in coordination with the National Judicial College, ‘trains state court judges on judicial leadership skills integrated with consensus climate science and how it is arising in the law,’ the group told Fox News Digital.
CJP’s educational events are done ‘in partnership with leading national judicial education institutions and state judicial authorities, in accordance with their accepted standards,’ a spokesperson for the group said in an emailed statement. ‘Its curriculum is fact-based and science-first, grounded in consensus reports and developed with a robust peer review process that meets the highest scholarly standards.’
‘CJP’s work is no different than the work of other continuing judicial education organizations that address important complex topics, including medicine, tech and neuroscience,’ the spokesperson added.
News of the program’s outreach comes as the U.S. has seen a sharp uptick in climate-related lawsuits in recent years — including cases targeting oil giants Shell, BP and ExxonMobil for allegedly using ‘deceptive’ marketing and downplaying the risks of climate change, as well as lawsuits brought against state governments and federal agencies, including the Interior Department, for allegedly failing to address pollution risks or protect against the harms of climate change, according to the plaintiffs.
Sen. Cruz has repeatedly put CJP under the public’s microscope, including in June during a Senate subcommittee hearing, called ‘Enter the Dragon – China and the Left’s Lawfare Against American Energy Dominance,’ where the Texas Republican argued there is a ‘systematic campaign’ launched by the Chinese Communist Party and American left-wing activists to weaponize the court systems to ‘undermine American energy dominance.’
CJP, Cruz said, is a pivotal player in the ‘lawfare’ as it works to secure ‘judicial capture.’
Cruz said CJP’s claims of neutrality are bluster, and the group instead allegedly promotes ‘ex parte indoctrination, pressuring judges to set aside the rule of law, and rule instead according to a predetermined political narrative.’
CJP has denied Cruz’s accusations, and describes itself as ‘neutral, objective information to the judiciary about the science of climate change as it is understood by the expert scientific community and relevant to current and future litigation.’
Judges have previously landed in hot water over climate-related issues in group forums, including in 2019, when a federal judge hit ‘reply all’ to an email chain with 45 other judges and court staff regarding an invitation to a climate seminar for judges hosted by the Environmental Law Institute. The judge was subsequently chastised by colleagues for sharing ‘this nonsense’ and suggested it was an ethics violation, while others defended that flagging the event to others was not unethical.
Fox News Digital’s Breanne Deppisch and Andrew Mark Miller contributed to this report.
The U.S. State Department found that the human rights situation in South Africa has ‘significantly worsened’ over the past year, citing reports of ‘extrajudicial killings’ and repression against racial minorities.
The State Department conducts an annual review of the human rights situations in countries across the globe, and it targeted South Africa with new criticism in the 2025 report released Tuesday. The report, scheduled to be sent to Congress on Tuesday, pointed to the U.S. receiving several reports of the South African ‘government or its agents’ carrying out extrajudicial or arbitrary killings, as well as repression of Afrikaner minorities.
‘In July the provincial police commissioner confirmed that as of April, police shot and killed at least 40 criminal suspects in shoot-outs. On September 2, police reported six suspects wanted for homicide and extortion were shot and killed by Durban police in a shoot-out. According to Reuters, eight of the police officers involved were placed on administrative leave with full pay pending investigation,’ the report said.
‘Watchdog groups noted deaths in custody often resulted from physical abuse combined with a lack of subsequent medical treatment or neglect,’ it continued.
‘According to data compiled by Agence France-Presse, there were 447 murders on farms and smallholdings between October 2023 and September 2024. In recent years, extremist political party the Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) encouraged attacks on Afrikaner farmers, reviving the use of the song ‘Kill the Boer [Farmer]’ at its rallies and otherwise inciting violence,’ the report added.
The State Department went on to criticize wider repression tactics against Afrikaners, citing The Expropriation Bill of 2024, in particular. The legislation allows the government to seize land without compensation in some circumstances.
‘This act could enable the government to seize ethnic minority Afrikaners’ agricultural property without compensation, following countless government policies designed to dismantle equal opportunity in employment, education, and business, and extreme rhetoric and government actions fueling disproportionate violence against racially disfavored landowners,’ the report said.
President Donald Trump confronted South African President Cyril Ramaphosa at the White House during a state visit in May.
Trump has claimed that White Afrikaner South African farmers are being slaughtered and forced off their land. The Afrikaners are descendants of mostly Dutch settlers who first arrived in South Africa in 1652.
‘Now this is very bad. These are burial sites right here. Burial sites — over a thousand — of White farmers. And those cars are lined up to pay love on a Sunday morning. Each one of those white things you see is a cross. And there is approximately a thousand of them,’ Trump said at the time. ‘They’re all White farmers. The family of White farmers. And those cars aren’t, driving, they are stopped there to pay respects to their family member who was killed. And it’s a terrible sight. I’ve never seen anything like it. On both sides of the road, you have crosses. Those people are all killed.’
South Africa denies claims of genocide and harassment, as does its president.
‘I’m not going to be repeating what I’ve been saying,’ Ramaphosa said at the May visit. ‘I would say if there was Afrikaner farmer genocide, I can bet you these three gentlemen would not be here, including my Minister of Agriculture. He would not be with me.’
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has been sidelined from peace talks between President Donald Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin Friday because the Russian leader extended the invitation to meet, according to the White House.
‘The president is agreeing to this meeting, at the request of President Putin,’ White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt told reporters Tuesday. ‘And the goal of this meeting for the president is to walk away with a better understanding of how we can end this war.’
‘I think the president of the United States getting in the room with the president of Russia ,sitting face-to-face rather than speaking over the telephone will give this president the best indication of how to end this war and where this is headed,’ Leavitt said.
Meanwhile Zelenskyy has remained firm that any decisions to end the war made without Ukraine will prove futile.
‘Any decisions made against us, any decisions made without Ukraine — they are simultaneously decisions against peace,’ Zelenskyy said in a Saturday statement. ‘These are dead decisions; they will never work. And what we all need is a real, living peace, one that people will respect.’
Other European allies have Ukraine’s back. A group of European leaders issued a statement Saturday claiming that the ‘path to peace in Ukraine cannot be decided without Ukraine.’
Trump told reporters Monday that he predicted he’d know within minutes whether Putin was serious about hashing out a deal or not. He also acknowledged that Russia and Ukraine would have to navigate some ‘land swapping’ issues as part of an agreement.
Trump also said he would be in contact with Zelenskyy and other European leaders following the meeting with Putin.
‘If it’s a fair deal, I will reveal it to the European Union leaders and the NATO leaders and also to President Zelenskyy,’ Trump said. ‘I may say, ‘lots of luck, keep fighting,’ or I may say we can make a deal.’
When asked if the meeting would pave the way for a peace deal, or whether the meeting would simply serve as an opportunity for Trump to feel out if a deal was even possible, Leavitt said the administration wasn’t ruling out either option.
‘I think both can be true, right?’ Leavitt said. ‘The president has always said he wants a peace deal. He wants to see this war come to an end. But this bilateral meeting is a bilateral meeting between one party in this two party war. Right. You need both countries to agree to a deal. The president is accepting this bilateral meeting with Putin on Friday, and I will let him speak further to it after it concludes about how he felt it went.’
Trump and Putin are scheduled to meet in Anchorage, Alaska, Friday — despite the president’s comments in recent days that the two would meet in Russia.
‘There were many sites discussed, but of course, Alaska is a state within the United States of America,’ Leavitt said. ‘So the president is very honored and looks forward to hosting President Putin on American soil.’
Senate Democrats have undergone a steady tonal shift on Israel, with a recent vote to block arms sales to the Jewish State giving a glimpse at the evolution on the Hill.
More Democrats in the upper chamber than ever before voted alongside Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., to halt the $675 million sale of thousands of bombs and guidance kits for the bombs and to block the sale of automatic rifles to Israel.
Sanders’ push ultimately failed late last month, but over half of all Senate Democrats voted alongside him, with many voting with him for the first time. Meanwhile, all Senate Republicans voted against them.
‘The tide is turning,’ Sanders, who routinely caucuses with Democrats, said in a statement. ‘The American people do not want to spend billions to starve children in Gaza. The Democrats are moving forward on this issue, and I look forward to Republican support in the near future.’
Getting Republicans on board for future attempts, as Sanders hoped would happen, is a stretch at best.
‘Republicans stand with Israel,’ Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chair Jim Risch, R-Idaho, told Fox News Digital in a statement.
‘Senator Sanders’ resolution to block arms sales would have reinstated the failed policies of the Biden administration and would abandon America’s closest ally in the Middle East,’ he continued. ‘We can’t afford to go back there.’
But the change within the Democratic caucus was likely spurred by the release of photos of starving children in the Gaza Strip, which earned shocked reactions from both lawmakers and President Donald Trump.
Many Democrats have pinned the blame on Israel and argued that the Jewish state has put a chokehold on aid that is meant for civilians in Gaza, while Republicans contend that the terrorist organization Hamas is stealing the food.
‘What’s going on is unacceptable, and Israel has the power to fix it,’ Sen. Angus King, I-Maine, told Fox News Digital.
Like Sanders, King typically caucuses with Senate Democrats. But unlike his fellow Independent colleague, he has routinely stood firm in his support of Israel. But the photos and reports of widespread malnutrition prompted him to vote to block arms sales.
‘Israel’s the one that’s not letting the aid get in,’ he said. ‘The humanitarian response is entirely within Israel’s hands, and they’ve been blocking, slowing, starting and stopping, to the point where I just could no longer stand silent.’
And like King, Sen. Jean Shaheen, the top ranking Democrat on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, changed course and voted in favor of blocking arms sales out of concern that food aid was not making its way to Palestinians.
‘I think it’s important to send the message to Prime Minister [Benjamin] Netanyahu and his government that things need to change,’ the New Hampshire Democrat said in an interview with PBS Newshour.
But Republicans charged that it was not Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s fault that food aid was not making its way into Gaza, and instead believed that it was Hamas stealing the food.
Sen. John Kennedy, R-La., said that Israel wants to make sure that the food aid actually makes it to civilians in Hamas.
‘Israel and the US have cut out, cut off most of Hamas’ cash flow,’ Kennedy said. ‘And a lot of their cash flows depends on stealing the food and selling it, sometimes to their own people, absorbing the prices.’
And not every Senate Democrat is on the same page when it comes to their position on the Jewish State.
Sen. John Fetterman, D-Pa., has routinely slammed Democrats for criticizing Israel, and believed that his party was moving further away from his position.
‘What I really fundamentally believe, there’s been a wholesale shift, even within my party, to blame Israel for the situations and the circumstances overall,’ Fetterman told Fox News Digital. ‘And I don’t really understand. It’s like we’ve seen the same pictures and, of course, what’s happened in Gaza is devastating.’
‘But so, for me, I blame Hamas and Iran,’ he continued. ‘And I don’t know why there’s not like a collective global outrage.’
In July 2025 the AIER Everyday Price Index (EPI) rose to 296.1, a rise of 0.10 percent. This is the eighth consecutive monthly increase in the index, which has risen 1.79 percent since January 2025. Fifteen of the twenty-four components of the index saw price increases, eight saw declines, and one was unchanged.
The largest price increases this month came in the categories of gardening and lawncare, fees for lessons or instructions, and postage and delivery services. In residential telephone services, motor fuel, and cable satellite and live streaming services, price declines were steepest.
AIER Everyday Price Index vs. US Consumer Price Index (NSA, 1987 = 100)
(Source: Bloomberg Finance, LP)
On August 12, 2025, the US Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) released its July 2025 Consumer Price Index (CPI) data. The month-to-month headline CPI rose 0.2 percent while the core month-to-month CPI number increased by 0.3 percent, both of which met forecasts.
July 2025 US CPI headline and core month-over-month (2015 – present)
(Source: Bloomberg Finance, LP)
The shelter index rose 0.2 percent in July, making it the primary contributor to the overall monthly gain. Food prices were unchanged, as a 0.3 percent increase in food away from home—driven by full-service meals (+0.5 percent) and limited-service meals (+0.1 percent)—offset a 0.1 percent decline in food at home. Within grocery categories, dairy products rose 0.7 percent, led by milk (+1.9 percent), and meats, poultry, fish, and eggs gained 0.2 percent, with beef up 1.5 percent but eggs down 3.9 percent. Offsetting declines included other food at home (-0.5 percent), nonalcoholic beverages (-0.5 percent, including a 1.3 percent drop in juices and drinks), and cereals and bakery products (-0.2 percent), while fruits and vegetables were unchanged.
The energy index fell 1.1 percent in July, reflecting a 2.2 percent drop in gasoline, a 0.9 percent decline in natural gas, and a 0.1 percent decrease in electricity. Excluding food and energy, the core index rose 0.3 percent after a 0.2 percent gain in June. Shelter components showed rent and owners’ equivalent rent both up 0.3 percent, while lodging away from home fell 1.0 percent. Medical care advanced 0.7 percent, with dental services surging 2.6 percent, hospital services up 0.4 percent, and physicians’ services up 0.2 percent, partially offset by a 0.2 percent decline in prescription drugs. Additional increases were seen in airline fares (+4.0 percent), recreation (+0.4 percent), household furnishings and operations (+0.4 percent), used cars and trucks (+0.5 percent), and personal care (+0.4 percent), while communication declined 0.3 percent and new vehicle prices were unchanged.
In the year-over-year data, the headline Consumer Price Index increased 2.7 percent in July 2025, slightly less than the 2.8 percent forecast. The year-over-year core index, however, was slightly hotter than anticipated, registering a 3.1 percent gain versus the expected 3.0 percent.
July 2025 US CPI headline and core year-over-year (2015 – present)
(Source: Bloomberg Finance, LP)
The food index increased 2.9 percent year-over-year, with food at home up 2.2 percent and notable gains in meats, poultry, fish, and eggs (+5.2 percent), including a 16.4 percent surge in eggs. Nonalcoholic beverages rose 3.6 percent, other food at home gained 1.2 percent, cereals and bakery products were up 1.0 percent, dairy products increased 1.5 percent, and fruits and vegetables edged 0.2 percent higher. Food away from home climbed 3.9 percent, led by full-service meals (+4.4 percent) and limited-service meals (+3.3 percent).
The energy index fell 1.6 percent over the year, with gasoline down 9.5 percent and fuel oil off 2.9 percent, partially offset by gains in electricity (+5.5 percent) and natural gas (+13.8 percent). Core services and goods continued to show upward pressure: shelter rose 3.7 percent year-over-year, medical care increased 3.5 percent, household furnishings and operations advanced 3.4 percent, motor vehicle insurance jumped 5.3 percent, and recreation gained 2.4 percent.
Core consumer price inflation accelerated in July to its fastest monthly pace since January, driven primarily by a rebound in services prices. Goods inflation remained subdued, with categories most exposed to tariffs showing moderated price pass-through. Interestingly, some tariff-exposed categories even posted declines (major appliances, personal computers, and apparel) while gains in items like infant apparel and photographic equipment rose substantially.
The slowdown in tariff pass-through is notable given that the US has now entered its third postponement of implementing new levies on China, potentially fostering complacency about their eventual inflationary impact. Firms appear to still be working through inventories stockpiled earlier in the year, giving them latitude to experiment with means of absorbing or mitigating tariff impacts rather than passing them directly on to consumers. Diffusion measures indicate broader core price pressures: the share of CPI components rising at an annualized pace above 4 percent climbed to 48 percent in July, up from 46 percent in June and 40 percent in May, while the share with outright declines in price fell to 27 percent from 33 percent last month. These dynamics highlight that lag effects remain a key factor — policy actions, whether interest rate changes or trade measures, filter through the economy unpredictably and with varying intensity across sectors.
Market reaction to the CPI release reflected both the firmness of the data and evolving macro risks. Fed funds futures now imply roughly 24 basis points of easing in September and a cumulative 62 basis points by year-end, undoubtedly incorporating the recent, massive downward revision to nonfarm payrolls into the calculus of the Fed’s decision-making. The persistence of service-sector inflation, even as goods prices cool, complicates Powell & Company’s path: while tariff-related pressures have moderated for now, the combination of broadening price gains, lagged policy effects, and a still-softening labor market leaves the timing, scale, and certainty of future rate cuts very much in play.
Rio Silver Inc. (‘Rio Silver’ or the ‘Company’) (TSX.V: RYO,OTC:RYOOD) (OTC: RYOOF) announces that, further to the announcements on March 26 and June 25, 2025 (collectively, the ‘Prior Announcements’), it has amended terms of the acquisition (the ‘Transaction’) from Peruvian Metals Corp. (‘Peruvian’) of the Maria Norte Project (the ‘Property’) located in the District of Huachocopla, Huancavelica Peru.
Subject to applicable regulatory and other approvals including that of the Exchange, the amended terms of the Transaction with Peruvian include: (1) the elimination of the net smelter royalty to Peruvian; (2) the adjusted number of payment securities to be issued to Peruvian, which are now 3,000,000 shares of Rio Silver and 1,000,000 share purchase warrants of Rio Silver (on account of the recent 5:1 consolidation of the shares of Rio Silver, completed on July 3, 2025), with each share purchase warrant exercisable at $0.15 per share for a period of two years from the date of Exchange approval; and (3) payment by Rio Silver to Peruvian in the amount of US$22,500, with all other terms of the Transaction remaining unchanged. For further clarity, the semiannual payments of US$25,000 to Peruvian in the aggregate amount of US$250,000 will remain as ‘Option Payments’, given the elimination of the net smelter royalty.
About Rio Silver
Rio Silver is a resource development company that has been selectively identifying and acquiring precious metal assets that are anticipated to produce near-term cashflow to best assist the Company’s exploration / development plans, in a non-dilutive, shareholder-friendly way. We remain ever impressed and optimistic by the resilience and ingenuity of our host country as Peru continues to endorse supportive mining policies and continued growth, as evident by the continuing investment being witnessed throughout Peru.
ON BEHALF OF THE BOARD OF DIRECTORS OF Rio Silver INC.
Chris Verrico
Director, President and Chief Executive Officer
Neither the TSX Venture Exchange nor its Regulation Services Provider accepts responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this release.
For further information,
Christopher Verrico, President, CEO
Tel: (604) 762-4448
Email: chris.verrico@riosilverinc.com
Website: www.riosilverinc.com
This news release includes forward-looking statements that are subject to risks and uncertainties. All statements within, other than statements of historical fact, are to be considered forward looking. Although the Company believes the expectations expressed in such forward-looking statements are based on reasonable assumptions, such statements are not guarantees of future performance and actual results or developments may differ materially from those in forward-looking statements. Factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from those in forward-looking statements include market prices, exploitation and exploration successes, continued availability of capital and financing, and general economic, market or business conditions. There can be no assurances that such statements will prove accurate and, therefore, readers are advised to rely on their own evaluation of such uncertainties. We do not assume any obligation to update any forward-looking statements except as required by applicable laws.
To those who know some economics, the phrase “Foundations of Economics” leads them to expect to hear about things like the rule of law, property rights, contracts, supply and demand, and so forth. These are indeed among the most foundational ideas in economics. Rest assured that this explainer series will cover them and more, with enthusiasm.
But cooperation is where the real story of economics actually begins.
It is by understanding the nature of cooperation that one can see how the evolution of all the other foundations of economics, and even the free market economy itself, was driven by the societal benefits from ever more effective cooperation. Yet cooperation’s basic logical structure and its central and continuing role in driving the development of free market institutions are largely underappreciated. Our free market economy is the most effective engine of cooperation ever achieved by humans. Every economist – indeed every citizen – should be able to clearly explain why. We’ll begin by exploring why human cooperation is so much more effective than in all other species.
What Makes Human Cooperation Different?
Cooperation is common in nature. Social insects such as ants and bees dominate our planet in number and biomass. They cooperate through almost perfectly coordinated behavior derived from genetically encoded “if-then” protocols. But while such cooperation is powerful, it is also very inflexible.
Suppose a fungus wiped out all the clover in a given area and a flower, whose nectar was perfectly good food for bees, replaced the clover. If the new flower’s scent is not recognized by the bees as an “if” predicate, so it can be followed by a “then” response to collect its nectar, most of the hives in the area will die.
Other species like wolves and orcas are able to cooperate in flexible ways that allow for behavioral adaptation to changing circumstances within the same generation. They are not effectively cooperating solely through genetically programmed coordination. They are consciously cooperating by thinking about what they do. But with the exception of humans, this kind of consciously rational cooperation only works for very small groups.
Humans also teach new behavioral responses to their neighbors and their children. New forms of behavior therefore don’t have to be relearned each generation. When Spaniards’ horses arrived on the American continent, Comanche parents didn’t just adapt behaviorally, devising new strategies for hunting and waging war. They also changed what they taught their children, developing an all-new culture of horsemanship and husbandry.
Unfortunately, the larger the group, the more likely individuals will be tempted to promote their welfare at the expense of the group. This is because in a large group, one individual’s opportunism (say, cheating on his taxes) can be so small relative to the group that the group is not noticeably harmed.
Obviously, if undetected, the individual gets 100 percent of the benefit from promoting his welfare at the expense of the group. But the larger the group, the more likely it is that the cost to any one individual is too small to notice.
The problem is that if all individuals think and act this way, it leads to disaster. If one individual cheats on his taxes, he benefits greatly, and society marches on because the effect on tax revenues is less than a rounding error. But when everyone cheats, the government will collapse.
This free-rider problem explains the tradeoff between flexibility and scale of cooperation: the more behaviorally flexible individuals are, the more opportunities to engage in opportunism. Such opportunism can end up destroying some or all of the gains from cooperation. This is a pervasive problem for species that live in large groups, as Garrett Hardin demonstrated in his memorable 1968 masterpiece The Tragedy of the Commons.
This tradeoff nearly always keeps species that have the ability to cooperate flexibly from being able to cooperate flexibly in large groups at the same time.
Consider this table:
LARGE GROUP
SMALL GROUP
FLEXIBLE
?
Wolves
INFLEXIBLE
Caribou
Wasps
Are there any species that can be put in the LARGE GROUP/FLEXIBLE category? The answer is yes, but only one – Sapiens.
Flexible large-group cooperation has existed for our species, Sapiens, for a long time. But while Sapiens cooperated in groups that were large compared to other flexibly cooperating species, they were not large compared to the groups humans frequently cooperate in today.
After Malcolm Gladwell discussed his work in the bestselling book The Tipping Point, anthropologist and evolutionary psychologist Robin Dunbar became an international scientific celebrity for his finding that human groups function best at around 150 people.
Luckily for us, culture, in the form of knowledge passed from generation to generation by teaching and learning, provided a way of overcoming this tradeoff. Because humans are uniquely gifted at teaching and learning, we were able to use our extraordinary capacity for culture to stretch flexible cooperation far beyond Dunbar’s number.
For many important behaviors, where consistency is paramount, culture also gave us a means of encoding behavior that provided regularity, as we see with social insects. But since behavioral responses aren’t hardwired, it still allows for flexibility, like being able to teach your children differently than how you were taught.
Our pre-Sapiens ancestors competed intensely with each other. They became locked in a kind of arms race of improved ability to culturally encode behavior to improve cooperation. Traits that supported the ability to do this were reinforced in the gene pool until modern humans prevailed.
The link between the evolution of the traits that support culture and those that support cooperation is so strong that there is now a consensus among anthropologists and evolutionary psychologists that the genes that make us unique arose from the evolutionary payoff of using culture rather than genes to facilitate cooperation.
A Tale From a Fishing Village
Picture a fishing village on the banks of a small river about 25,000 years ago. One morning, two cousins were spearfishing about 100 yards apart on the river. They stood perfectly still, waiting for a fish to swim by. If a fish was big enough and close enough, they threw their spear. In this way, they normally speared about three fish per hour.
The younger of the two cousins threw at a fish that was too far away, so his spear skipped across the water and was now floating downstream. He waded out to get it, but he could barely keep up with the current. Meanwhile, his cousin was now spearing fish after fish.
Later, they conjectured that while wading after his spear, the younger cousin was herding fish toward the older one, dramatically improving his odds.
The next day, they took turns herding and spearing and got 12 fish per hour! This is twice as many fish per person per hour! Doubling the productivity of fish spearing in a village whose way of life depends on eating fish is an incredible thing. They became the talk of the tribe. Almost immediately, others began copying them. By fishing in this cooperative fashion, many more fish were harvested for the group.
This is a wonderful outcome, but it also presents new challenges. (In a future explainer, we’ll employ the argument Garrett Hardin made in The Tragedy of the Commons to explore how humans were able to use culture, institutions, and government to protect the growing benefits of cooperation from the growing temptation to be opportunistic.)
How Cooperation Works
Suppose that, working alone, I make 10 units of something, and you can, too. But by cooperating we can make 26 units. Not 20, which is what your mind was expecting, but 26. This is because when we cooperate, we are more effective than when we work alone.
Think about making birdhouses. Having two people work together makes it possible to divide the tasks. Adam Smith called this specialization through the division of labor. As he explained in 1776 in his masterpiece The Wealth of Nations, dividing up tasks can dramatically increase output per person. As a child, you may have built a fort in the woods with your friends. The first thing you and your friends did was to divide up the tasks because it was so obvious that doing so would be more effective.
Smith then argued that the larger the group, the more finely labor can be divided. He argued that this should increase output per person even more. Smith was indeed the first to precisely understand why large group cooperation is so much more effective.
Returning to our first example, the main point is that the value of the whole, 26, is clearly greater than the value of the sum of the parts (10 + 10). This difference of 6 is so important that we give it a name. We call it the cooperative surplus.
The cooperative surplus is the key to it all. It’s how humans create exponentially more value together than they could alone—so that everyone benefits at the same time. And since having more per person is the first step to increasing general prosperity, it follows that cooperation is what ultimately makes societies prosper.
Even a toddler understands that he can make himself better off by taking what someone else has, but that obviously makes the other person worse off. This sows the seeds of hate, conflict, and revenge. But when we cooperate, we do better than toddlers. With cooperation, there’s a cooperative surplus that can be divided among cooperators, making it possible for everyone to benefit—so no one has to lose. This sows the seeds of friendship, harmony, and peace.
The cooperative surplus is the key to all cooperation. Countless books and studies explore cooperation, but none of it matters without a cooperative surplus. Because without one, there’s no real advantage to cooperating at all.
Dividing Output
Some ideas are simple yet powerful. Cooperation is one of them. Another is the idea of opportunity cost from economic theory.
The opportunity cost of doing something is everything that must be given up to do it. So the opportunity cost of going on a date is not just the cost of dinner and a movie. It also includes the cost of gas and even the money you won’t earn because someone else covers your shift at work.
People who are good at thinking in terms of opportunity cost do a better job of imagining all the possible costs of taking actions. This leads to better decision-making.
So what does opportunity cost have to do with cooperation?
It’s the first step to understanding how to divide the fruits of cooperation. That might seem obvious at first—especially in simple examples where the answer feels intuitive. But be patient.
Soon we’ll be able to use this procedure to understand how to divide output in more complicated settings in which the best way to divide output is often far from obvious.
Before we begin, let’s be clear: we’re not talking about coerced cooperation. We’re assuming that everyone involved is genuinely free to decide whether or not to cooperate.
So, how should the final 26 units from our example be divided? Your gut might say “split them evenly”—and in this case, you’d be right. But chances are, you’d be right for the wrong reason. And not understanding why an equal split is correct can lead to mistakes with devastating consequences for free societies.
So what’s the right way to think about it? First, both you and I must receive at least 10 units each. Why?
Because we can each produce 10 units on our own if we choose not to cooperate. That makes 10 the opportunity cost of cooperation for both of us. And since we’re free to walk away, it follows that neither of us would agree to cooperate for less than our opportunity cost.
So of the 26 units to be divided, 20 are already spoken for in a free society. That leaves 6 units—the cooperative surplus.
These 6 units wouldn’t exist without cooperation, so they belong to neither of us individually. They are, in fact, ours. And because neither of us has a stronger claim to them, the only fair way to divide them is equally.
If, for example, I got 4 and you got 2, you could reasonably ask: “Why do you get more than me, when your claim is no stronger than mine?” By sheer logic, we arrive at the conclusion: each of us should get 3 of the surplus.
So I get 10 for my opportunity cost and 3 as my share of the surplus—13 in total. The same goes for you. Since 13 + 13 = 26, this division is both fair and efficient. It accounts for every unit of output and doesn’t waste anything.
Your first reaction might be: “That’s just splitting 26 in half—so why go through all these steps?” And you’re right that in this simple example, the result is the same as an even split.
But in the next explainer, we’ll see that when the example becomes just a bit more complex, this method no longer yields an even split. That happens when two principles we deeply value remain true:
Everyone is free to cooperate however they choose, as long as they don’t coerce anyone.
Everyone is treated equally.
References
Boyd, Robert, and Richerson, Peter J. 1985. Culture and the Evolutionary Process. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Dunbar, Robin I.M. (2016). Human Evolution. New York: Oxford University Press.
Gladwell, Malcolm. 2000. The Tipping Point. Little, Brown and Company.
Harari, Yuval Noah. 2015. Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind. New York: HarperCollins Publishers.
Hardin, Garrett. 1968. The Tragedy of the Commons. Science, 162(3859), December 1968, 1243-1248.
Henrich, Joseph. 2007. Why Humans Cooperate: A Cultural and Evolutionary Explanation. Oxford University Press.
Henrich, Joseph. 2017. The Secret of Our Success: How Culture Is Driving Human Evolution, Domesticating Our Species, and Making Us Smarter. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.
Price, Michael. 2017. “True Altruism seen in chimpanzees, giving clues to evolution of human cooperation.” Science, June 19, 2017.
Ridley, Matt. 1998. The Origins of Virtue: Human instincts and the evolution of cooperation. Penguin Books.
Rose, David C. 2019. Why Culture Matters Most. Oxford University Press.
Rose, David C. 2000. “Teams, Firms, and the Evolution of Profit Seeking Behavior.” Journal of Bioeconomics, Volume 2, Number 1, 25-39.
Smith, Adam. 1776. An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations. Book 1, Chapter 1: https://www.rrojasdatabank.info/Wealth-Nations.pdf
Unearthed emails as part of a FOIA request show Biden administration agencies scrapping a plan to visit a vessel at an event because it would have required then-President Joe Biden to take too many steps.
Records show, as part of a FOIA request by Protect the Public’s Trust obtained by Fox News Digital, that Biden was set to visit a National Security Multi-Mission Vessel (NSMV) while touring a Philadelphia shipyard in July 2023.
However, according to the emails, that visit to the vessel was scrapped because of ‘how many steps were involved to get on the ship.’
The emails show that the U.S. Maritime Administration (MARAD) was engaged in a major project at the Philadelphia shipyard at the time that Biden was planning to visit to tout offshore wind and clean energy jobs.
A MARAD official emailed members of the Office of Secure Transportation, with the Department of Transportation cc’d, on July 17, 2023, that said, ‘No visit to the NSMV vessel is planned after the WH realized how many steps were involved to get on the ship. {True – lots of steps on grating}.’
The email exchanges also show a lack of coordination between the White House and MARAD, an agency of the DOT, as the next day an email between DOT officials said, ‘MARAD hasn’t had anyone reach out to them from WH. All info they have received has been from Philly shipyard. S2 team reached out to WH Advance, and that is how we confirmed the visit was scheduled. Nothing else heard and no further call made or received on this event that I am aware of.’
The decision to skip visiting the vessel in the shipyard came a little more than a month after Biden faced questions over his mental and physical sharpness when he stumbled and fell on stage at an Air Force Academy graduation ceremony in Colorado Springs, Colorado, on June 1, 2023.
The White House said at the time that the president tripped over a sandbag and that he was not injured by the fall.
Around the same time, White House officials were rejecting concerns from conservatives about Biden’s health and insisting he was able to perform his duties at a high level.
Roughly a week after the event in Philadelphia, then-White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre bristled at a question about Biden’s age and whether the White House could assure people there was nothing to be concerned about by outlining the president’s accomplishments.
‘Look, we’ve been asked this question multiple times,’ Jean-Pierre said. ‘And you have a president who — I just went through his Unity Agenda — what we’ve been able to do in a bipartisan way as it relates to issues that really matter to the American people — right? — the Cancer Moonshot, which is actually going to make a difference with people and family — fam- — Americans who have family members dealing with cancer. That is something that this president has been able to do.’
Fox News Digital reached out to Biden’s office and the Philadelphia shipyard for comment.
‘There’s an awful lot wrong here, beginning with the White House planning a presidential visit to one of the most important shipyards in the nation without bothering to give a heads-up to the Department of Transportation, which has major ongoing projects there,’ Protect the Public’s Trust Director Michael Chamberlain told Fox News Digital.
‘That’s amateurish. Second and far more critical, the president’s staff was proscribing events he couldn’t physically handle more than a year before he dropped out of the re-election race, all while lambasting anyone who claimed he wasn’t fit enough to complete the Ironman Competition. I realize there’s an elevator down to the White House Situation Room, but most voters would like to think they’re pulling the lever for a president who could take the stairs in an emergency.’
A former Biden aide pushed back on that narrative, saying that it is ‘ironic that an organization called ‘Protect the Public Trust’ is more interested in how many steps the former president took than the current president’s cost-raising agenda and close relationship with Jeffrey Epstein.’
‘The group is presenting a deceptive story with this ‘don’t look at Epstein’ bait based on a single email with no context and they know it.’
A former Biden administration official reached by Fox News Digital referenced the massive size of the shipyard and that the size would be considered when planning events like this, adding that the email references steps and not stairs specifically.
The former official also pushed back on the person sending the email not having spoken directly with someone at the White House and explained that several teams are involved in arranging events like the one at the shipyard, considering accessibility, security risks, visuals and other factors.
Zohran Mamdani, New York City’s Democratic mayoral nominee, continued his ‘Five Boroughs Against Trump’ tour in Brooklyn on Tuesday, as President Donald Trump’s agenda continues to take center stage on the New York City campaign trail.
Speaking at the Flatbush Gardens Community Center, Mamdani’s second anti-Trump event of the week was focused on housing, a hot-button issue in the New York City mayoral race as former Gov. Andrew Cuomo has spent days criticizing Mamdani’s rent-stabilized apartment in Astoria.
‘We must remember that Andrew Cuomo has spent more time talking about my apartment than asking why so many New Yorkers are being forced out of theirs. He has spent more time criticizing me than he has in criticizing the legislation that Donald Trump has passed,’ Mamdani said on Tuesday.
Mamdani began his week-long tour alongside Rep. Jerry Nadler, D-N.Y., in Manhattan on Monday morning. After visiting Brooklyn on Tuesday, Mamdani will travel to Staten Island on Wednesday, the Bronx on Thursday and Queens on Friday, Fox News confirmed.
The 33-year-old self-described socialist’s tour is a rejection of the Trump administration’s sweeping second-term agenda and his so-called ‘authoritarian’ attack on working New Yorkers, with Tuesday’s event focused on housing.
‘While housing experts are ringing the alarm, Andrew Cuomo is ringing Donald Trump,’ Mamdani said.
During Mamdani’s events on Monday and Tuesday, reporters peppered the 33-year-old socialist candidate with questions about Cuomo’s latest policy proposal – ‘Zohran’s law.’
The former governor, who lost the Democratic mayoral primary to Mamdani in June, began trolling the assemblyman over the weekend with an edited video of Mamdani admitting he pays ‘$2,300 for my one bedroom in Astoria.’
‘Rent-stabilized apartments when they’re vacant should only be rented to people who need affordable housing, not people like Zohran Mamdani,’ Cuomo told reporters in a video posted on social media.
Cuomo said ‘Zohran’s law’ was designed to prevent high-income individuals from occupying rent-stabilized apartments.
But Mamdani fired back at Cuomo’s criticism on Tuesday, telling reporters, ‘It pains me to say that in our disgraced former Governor Andrew Cuomo’s mind, these units, these buildings, these tenants are but a political pawn.’
Chief among Mamdani’s now-infamous progressive policy proposals is his commitment to freezing rents.
‘As Mayor, Zohran will immediately freeze the rent for all stabilized tenants, and use every available resource to build the housing New Yorkers need and bring down the rent,’ according to Mamdani’s campaign website.
Mamdani has accused incumbent Mayor Eric Adams of appointing Rent Guidelines Board members to raise rents on stabilized apartments. While landlords and advocates argue the freeze would be illegal, Mamdani can accomplish this goal by appointing members to the board who wouldn’t vote to increase the rent.
Former Mayor Bill de Blasio’s board voted to freeze the rent three times during his tenure.
Cuomo had previously called the democratic socialist’s plan to freeze rent a ‘politically convenient posture,’ and said such a move would hurt landlords who would be ‘unable to maintain their buildings.’
As Cuomo’s fiery social media posts about Mamdani’s rent-controlled apartment made the rounds, de Blasio – who has yet to endorse a candidate in the race to run the nation’s most populous city – fired back at his former governor.
‘I did a rent freeze and almost 2 million hard-working New Yorkers benefited. @ZohranKMamdani wants to do a rent freeze. You know who doesn’t want to do a rent freeze? @andrewcuomo, and he thinks he can trick us into forgetting that,’ de Blasio trolled on X.
During the first stop on his anti-Trump tour on Monday, Mamdani responded to Cuomo’s freshly proposed law ‘that will keep the rich out of New York’s affordable housing.’
‘What do we know about this policy proposal beyond the fact that it seeks to evict me from my apartment?’ Mamdani questioned on Monday.
‘Like so much of Andrew Cuomo’s politics, it is characterized by a petty vindictiveness. It leaves far more questions than it has answers. How many New Yorkers would this apply to? How many New Yorkers would be evicted from their apartments? How many New Yorkers would have their lives upended by a former governor who is responding to the fact that he was handily beaten by a tenant of a rent-stabilized apartment?’ Mamdani asked.
‘I live rent-free in his head,’ Mamdani trolled Cuomo, arguing that he had many years to implement such policies as governor but is now only focused on trying to reckon with a ‘political defeat.’
Soon after Mamdani’s criticism, the Cuomo campaign unveiled his proposal to protect rent-stabilized apartments from being occupied by high-income individuals.
‘Under Cuomo’s proposal, when a rent-stabilized apartment becomes vacant, the incoming individual income would be capped so that the annual rent makes up at least 30 percent of that income. For example, if an apartment rents for $2,500 a month ($30,000 per year), the new tenant’s income could not exceed $100,000,’ according to the plan.
The Cuomo campaign also clarified that ‘Zohran’s law’ would only apply to vacant apartments.
Mamdani poured cold water on Cuomo’s plan during the press conference on Tuesday, telling reporters, ‘What is so absurd to me about Andrew Cuomo’s proposal is that it wouldn’t even apply to me. The way that he has put forward this language does not actually apply to me, and yet he uses my name in it.’
When reached for comment regarding Mamdani’s anti-Trump tour, White House spokeswoman, Abigail Jackson, told Fox News Digital, ‘Comrade Mamdani is the American people’s worst nightmare. His communist policies will crater our economy, increase crime, crowd out Americans with free health care for illegal immigrants, and defund the brave men and women of law enforcement who keep us safe.’
The White House added that ‘Mamdani’s idea of ‘immigration reform’ is no borders and amnesty for all the violent criminal illegal aliens that Joe Biden released into our country. The American people have repeatedly rejected this Communist agenda and the more Mamdani shares his radical policies, the more the American people will recoil.’
Fox News’ Marly Carroll and Bryan Llenas contributed to this report.
