The Clock Is Ticking On Trump’s Iran Decision
The radicals that run Iran have warned President Trump over and over again not to touch Pickaxe Mountain. Nobody outside of Iran has ever seen what is going on inside that mountain, and the Iranians have been determined to keep it a secret. Because the facility is so far underground, it would be very difficult for even the most advanced bunker-buster bombs to damage it.
That is why neither the U.S. nor Israel tried to bomb it during Iran War 1 or Iran War 2. But now Trump is telling the world that we will be bombing Pickaxe Mountain “probably pretty soon”. Is this an indication that he has decided to take the war against Iran to the next level?
On Tuesday, Axios reported that Trump was considering two primary options…
Option 1: Pursue a new 10-day ceasefire aimed at reopening the Strait of Hormuz.
Option 2: Launch a massive joint military campaign with Israel to force Tehran’s capitulation.
Choosing to bomb Pickaxe Mountain would mean that Trump has chosen door number two.
Needless to say, that would have enormous implications for the entire world.
According to the Wall Street Journal, Israeli intelligence is convinced that “thousands of uranium-enrichment centrifuges” were moved inside Pickaxe Mountain late last year…
Israeli intelligence believes Iran moved thousands of uranium-enrichment centrifuges into tunnels deep inside a mountain last fall, Israeli and U.S. officials say, a development that would heighten concerns that Tehran could reconstitute its nuclear program.
Israel passed along the intelligence findings to the U.S., saying the centrifuges were transferred to the Pickaxe Mountain site last fall after the 12-day war in June when American and Israeli strikes pummeled Iran’s three main nuclear sites.
The reason why Iran would have wanted to move those centrifuges is to get them out of the reach of U.S. and Israeli bombers.
We are being told that the facility inside Pickaxe Mountain “was carved to a depth of more than 100 meters below bedrock”…
Satellite imagery shows that the complex was carved to a depth of more than 100 meters below bedrock, making it deeper and more fortified than the Fordow enrichment facility, a highly fortified, underground uranium enrichment facility.
To put that in perspective, 100 meters is 328 feet.
That is extremely deep.
In fact, it is so deep that the facility is considered to be out of reach “even for the most advanced bunker-penetrating bombs”…
Reaching these depths is considered a complex task, even for the most advanced bunker-penetrating bombs in the US arsenal.
Tehran claimed that the site is intended solely as a factory for the production and assembly of advanced centrifuges, not as an active enrichment facility. Iranian authorities, however, are preventing International Atomic Energy Agency inspectors from entering the site.
But U.S. Secretary of War Pete Hegseth now appears to believe that we have weapons that can hit that facility.
On Tuesday, he made this claim to the Senate Appropriations Committee…
War Secretary Pete Hegseth said Tuesday the U.S. military has the capability to strike Iran’s underground Pickaxe Mountain nuclear facility.
Asked by lawmakers at the Senate Appropriations Committee hearing whether the U.S. could destroy whatever is beneath the mountain, Hegseth said he would not discuss specific capabilities.
“A lot of our capabilities are classified,” Hegseth said.
Personally, I am skeptical that there are any conventional weapons anywhere in the world that could do the job.
But President Trump would not order an operation unless he was convinced that it would succeed, and he just warned that the bombing of Pickaxe Mountain could happen “probably pretty soon”…
President Trump said the U.S. will be striking Pickaxe Mountain, an alleged nuclear storage facility, though he wouldn’t confirm whether they believe centrifuges have been moved to the location.
“It doesn’t mean anything unless they have the material,” Mr. Trump said. “They don’t have- we follow the material. That’s where the action is.”
“And we’ll be hitting that area very- probably pretty soon,” the president threatened.
That sounds rather ominous.
He also went on to say that there is “not a thing” that the Iranians can do about it…
He also said he wouldn’t usually warn Iran, but there was “not a thing they can do about it.”
“If I thought they could do something about it, I would never say that,” Mr. Trump said. “But we’ll be hitting that area pretty soon, and very heavily.”
To me, it sounds like he has made up his mind.
But with Trump you just never know until he actually pulls the trigger.
If Trump does pull the trigger, the Iranians are telling us that the response will be massive…
Iran’s top joint military command said Tuesday that all U.S. interests and those of its allies in the region would be targeted if Washington attacks Iran’s nuclear facilities, according to Iranian state media, Reuters reported.
Iran’s Khatam al-Anbiya Central Headquarters, the joint military command responsible for coordinating the country’s armed forces, also said any U.S. strike on Tehran’s nuclear or other sensitive sites would lead to an expansion of the war in the region, according to state media, as reported by Iran International.
The command warned that U.S. interests and its supporters would face a “powerful assault” if an attack were carried out.
In addition, the Iranians are reportedly also threatening to strike Israel if Pickaxe Mountain is attacked…
If Iran launches ballistic missiles at Israel, that will change everything.
One senior Israeli official is warning that in such a scenario his nation “will go all in”…
A senior Israeli official said Israel does not currently seek to join the direct confrontation between Washington and Tehran, but warned that any Iranian attack on Israel would trigger a broad response using the full range of Israel’s military capabilities.
“If Iran attacks us, we will go all in and strike them,” the official said. “We do not do half-measures.”
The official said Israel possesses a “very large target bank” and would use any broader confrontation to exploit additional opportunities across the region to damage Iran’s military capabilities and those of its proxies.
The Israelis don’t want to just bomb Iran for a few days.
If there is going to be a return to all-out war, they want to finish the job.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu held a six hour meeting with his security cabinet on Tuesday, and during that six hour meeting Netanyahu spoke directly with U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio…
Israel’s security cabinet reportedly held a six-hour meeting on Tuesday to discuss possible scenarios of escalation against Iran, as officials voice concern that Jerusalem could embark on a renewed military campaign only to then be pressed by Washington to halt it after several days
During the meeting, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu spoke with US Secretary of State Marco Rubio to coordinate on the various scenarios, and discuss respective American and Israeli interests, according to Channel 12, which cited Israeli officials.
Israel is waiting for Trump to make a decision.
If Pickaxe Mountain gets bombed, we will know what the decision is.
And then things will get really crazy in the Middle East.
We have reached an extraordinarily dangerous chapter in human history.
There are certain things that cannot be undone once they are done, and a single wrong move could set off a chain of events that nobody will be able to control.
Anthropic’s Job Openings Reveal the AI Threats Coming Next
In the Army, I learned that every operation begins with a hard look at the enemy. Before a commander approves a mission, the staff must explain the opposing force’s capabilities, intentions, and likely courses of action. Get the threat wrong, and everything that follows rests on a false assumption.
Corporations run their own version of that drill. They study competitors, anticipate emerging markets, and recruit the people tomorrow will require. A company’s payroll can reveal its real expectations more clearly than its public relations department.
That makes Anthropic’s current hiring spree more than a personnel matter. The company behind the Claude family of AI models is assembling teams to confront weapons proliferation, cyber conflict, foreign influence, surveillance, and economic upheaval — all fields it plainly expects to matter as AI capabilities advance.
History shows why hiring patterns matter. Bell Labs assembled about 4,000 scientists in 1925 to pursue research expected to shape communications; two decades later, its researchers produced the transistor. Volvo recruited Nils Bohlin as its first safety engineer in 1958.
Within a year, he developed the three-point seat belt, making safety central to Volvo’s identity. In 2002, Microsoft halted new work by 8,500 Windows Server developers and spent more than $200 million retraining them in security, hiring for the future it saw coming and building trust around the risks that future would bring.
Anthropic appears to be following all three patterns at once: developing systems that could create vast new markets, recruiting specialists to contain the dangers those systems may produce and building the trust needed to sell them to government and industry. Its openings amount to a corporate threat assessment, touching weapons of mass destruction, cyberwarfare, foreign influence, surveillance, model theft, and economic disruption.
Start with weapons. Consider the advertised Threat Intelligence Manager for CBRN-E and Advanced Weapons. CBRN-E is government shorthand for chemical, biological, radiological, nuclear, and explosive threats. Anthropic wants this manager to build a team detecting attempts to use its systems to develop, improve, or distribute such weapons, with backgrounds in counterproliferation and weapons-of-mass-destruction analysis preferred. An active Top Secret clearance is desirable, and the salary reaches $455,000 a year. Companies do not offer nearly half-million-dollar salaries to prepare for dangers they consider imaginary.
The worry is not that a chatbot decides on its own to build a bioweapon. The nearer danger is that capable systems could shrink the expertise, manpower, and time a terrorist group or technically skilled individual needs to attempt something previously out of reach. The same system that accelerates drug development may help a malicious user navigate a dangerous chemical or biological problem. Anthropic profits by making its systems more capable, yet cannot sell those capabilities unless customers believe they can be controlled. Safety becomes a requirement for growth, not just a moral obligation.
The same pattern shows up in cybersecurity. Anthropic is standing up a new team under a Frontier Red Team cyber lead. The posting says frontier models will have “dramatic impacts” on cybersecurity and that significant portions of the field may have to be fundamentally reconsidered, including the use of autonomous systems to find and repair vulnerabilities and simulations pitting machine defenders against machine attackers.
We are moving from tools that merely advise a hacker toward systems that search for vulnerabilities, write code, test attacks, and run multistep operations with less human supervision. The same tools sold to developers rely on capabilities also sought by spies, criminals, and foreign militaries. The industry may end up selling both the engine of automation and the armor required to survive it.
Political warfare offers another warning. Anthropic wants a Threat Intelligence Manager for Influence Operations and Surveillance to build a team investigating state-linked manipulation, coordinated false identities, commercial spyware, and surveillance conducted for authoritarian governments. The company specifically seeks experience with Chinese, Russian, and Iranian state-sponsored operations.
Propaganda once addressed the crowd. Artificial intelligence can whisper separately into every ear. Such a system could generate thousands of convincing identities, speak local languages, study individual users, and tailor arguments to their fears and desires, cultivating a relationship for months without tiring or breaking character. That is more than spreading false information. It is manipulation at a personal scale, striking at the freedom of conscience on which responsible citizenship depends.
Anthropic is also seeking a Transformative AI Research Economist to model economic conditions that may have no historical precedent, examining growth, employment, income distribution, and economic governance under different scenarios. That posting tells us Anthropic is not preparing merely to make office workers a little more efficient. It is preparing for a technology capable of restructuring labor markets and concentrating enormous wealth and influence.
This should matter especially to Christians. Work gives structure to daily life and a meaningful avenue for service and stewardship. Human dignity, however, does not depend upon economic productivity; it comes from being made in God’s image, as Genesis 1:27 declares. An economy that treats people as inefficient production costs misunderstands both work and the worker.
Anthropic’s strategy carries a troubling paradox. The company may sincerely want to prevent catastrophe; its Responsible Scaling Policy acknowledges that dangerous capabilities not present today could emerge quickly as AI systems advance. Yet Anthropic also needs governments, customers, and the public to trust it enough to keep developing the systems producing those concerns.
In my new book, “The Final Algorithm,” I warn that societies court disaster by trusting systems they built more than the One who built them. A corporation grading its own safety exam is no exception.
Safety can become a competitive advantage, securing government partnerships and setting Claude apart from rivals, while expensive compliance favors large corporations and raises the barrier for smaller ones. The same corporation builds the capability, defines the danger, tests the product, judges its own safeguards, and profits when deployment proceeds. The public bears the consequences if that judgment proves wrong. Good intentions are not a system of checks and balances.
Congress should treat these openings as an early warning, not an employment curiosity.
America needs independent testing of frontier systems, stronger protection against model theft, clear liability for foreseeable damage, and firm limits on delegating lethal force, surveillance, or critical infrastructure to AI systems. Above all, human responsibility must remain clear. No executive, programmer, or official should get to blame “the algorithm” for decisions that harm people.
Scripture assigns real accountability to the one who spots danger and stays silent. Ezekiel 33:6 warns that when a watchman sees the sword coming and fails to sound the alarm, God says “his blood I will require at the watchman’s hand.” Anthropic has sounded its trumpet. The rest of us have no excuse for not listening.
Anthropic sees danger ahead. Its help-wanted page is more than a list of vacancies. It is a warning order from one of the corporations building the future. The rest of us would be foolish not to conduct a threat assessment of our own.
The Danger Of Reshaping Christianity To Fit Culture: A Letter To James Talarico
Evangelical pastor Jeff Mullen recently posted this open letter to Texas State Rep. James Talarico, who is running for U.S. Senate in the state of Texas. Mullen’s letter addresses fundamental problems with the way Talarico and others interpret Scripture, and he calls Talarico and all of us to come under the authority of God’s Word instead of redefining it to fit our wishes:
Dear Rep. Talarico,
My name is Jeff Mullen. As a pastor who spent 30 years shepherding God’s people, I have learned that what we believe about God shapes everything else. That is why I am writing this letter.
I do not write as a political opponent, but as a fellow citizen concerned about the growing confusion surrounding faith, truth and Scripture. Because you frequently speak about Christianity, quote the Bible and present your views as expressions of Christian conviction, I believe those claims deserve to be examined in light of God’s Word.
One of my greatest concerns is that many people know you are currently pursuing a master of divinity degree at Austin Presbyterian Theological Seminary while serving as a Texas state representative and working toward ordination in the Presbyterian Church (USA). As a result, many people understandably assume that your theological conclusions represent historic Biblical Christianity. Your words, therefore, carry weight far beyond politics.
When theological claims are presented in the Name of Christ, people naturally assume they are hearing Biblical truth. My concern is that some of the positions you advocate may lead sincere people away from the clear teaching of Scripture and toward a version of Christianity that reflects the spirit of the age more than the Word of God.
In over 30 years of ministry, I have sat beside hospital beds, preached funerals, counseled struggling families and watched countless people wrestle with questions of faith. One lesson stands above the rest: When we drift from Scripture, confusion always follows.
James warns that those who teach will be judged more strictly (James 3:1). That reality has humbled me throughout my ministry, and it should humble anyone who publicly speaks in the Name of Christ.
For that reason, I offer these thoughts—not as an attack, but as a pastoral appeal for Biblical clarity and faithfulness.
1. Concerning Your Statement that God Is Non-Binary
God is spirit and transcends human limitations. Christians agree on that. The question, however, is not how modern culture categorizes God but how God has chosen to reveal Himself. Throughout Scripture, God consistently reveals Himself as Father. Jesus taught His disciples to pray, “Our Father in heaven” (Matthew 6:9). Christ is the Son, and the Church is His Bride. These are not accidental descriptions but part of God’s self-revelation.
Every generation faces the temptation to reshape God according to its own values. Ancient cultures carved idols from stone. Modern cultures often carve them from ideology. Faithful Christianity begins by allowing God to define Himself rather than redefining Him according to cultural preferences. We do not improve upon divine revelation; we submit to it.
2. Concerning Your Statement That Other Religions Are Circling the Same Truth
Respect for people of different faiths is a Christian virtue. Surrendering truth is not. The suggestion that multiple religions ultimately lead to the same God stands in direct conflict with the words of Jesus Himself.
Jesus declared, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me” (John 14:6). Peter echoed that truth when he proclaimed, “There is salvation in no one else” (Acts 4:12). Christianity does not teach that all roads lead to God. It teaches that God has provided one Savior for the world. We can love our neighbors of every faith while remaining faithful to the exclusive claims of Christ.
3. Concerning Your Statement That the Bible Is Silent on Abortion
While Scripture does not use the modern term abortion, it speaks clearly about life in the womb. David wrote, “You knit me together in my mother’s womb” (Psalm 139:13). God told Jeremiah, “Before I formed you in the womb I knew you” (Jeremiah 1:5). John the Baptist responded to Christ while still in his mother’s womb (Luke 1:41).
The consistent testimony of Scripture is that unborn children are known by God, created by God and valued by God. The question is not whether the word abortion appears in the Bible. The question is whether the child in the womb is a human life bearing God’s image. Scripture answers that question repeatedly and clearly. Christians have historically defended the unborn not because of politics, but because every human life belongs to God.
4. Concerning Your Use of Mary’s Consent to Defend Abortion Rights
Mary’s response to Gabriel was not an assertion of autonomy but an expression of surrender. When told of God’s plan, she replied, “I am the servant of the Lord; let it be to me according to your word” (Luke 1:38).
The entire story of the incarnation celebrates the acceptance and protection of life within the womb. God Himself entered humanity through the womb of a woman. Mary’s example is not about the right to end life but the willingness to trust God with it. To use the incarnation as support for abortion requires reversing the very message the story proclaims.
5. Concerning Your Statement that Jesus Was a Radical Feminist
Jesus elevated the dignity of women in ways that challenged the culture of His day. He taught women, ministered to women, welcomed them among His followers and entrusted women with proclaiming His resurrection.
Yet calling Jesus a radical feminist places a modern political label on One who transcends every political movement. Jesus did not come to advance an ideology; He came to save sinners and establish the Kingdom of God. Every political movement must ultimately be measured against Christ—not Christ against a political movement.
6. Concerning Your Statements About Biological Sex
Conversations about sex and gender involve real people and often deep personal struggles. Christians should approach them with compassion and humility. Yet compassion cannot require the abandonment of truth.
Scripture teaches that humanity was intentionally created as male and female. Genesis declares, “Male and female He created them” (Genesis 1:27), and Jesus reaffirmed that truth (Matthew 19:4). The Christian understanding of sex is rooted not in cultural tradition but in God’s design. Our identity is not ultimately discovered through self-definition but through submission to the One who created us. God’s design is not restrictive; it is wise and good.
7. Concerning Your Support for Same-Sex Marriage and the Reinterpretation of Biblical Sexual Ethics
Few issues create more tension in modern Christianity than sexuality and marriage. The temptation is either to compromise truth in the name of love or to abandon love in the name of truth. Scripture calls us to neither.
From Genesis to Revelation, marriage is presented as a covenant between one man and one woman. Jesus affirmed this design when He quoted Genesis and declared that the two become one flesh (Matthew 19:4-6). The New Testament consistently teaches that sexual intimacy belongs within that covenant.
These teachings are not expressions of fear or hostility. They are expressions of God’s design for human flourishing. The call of discipleship is not the affirmation of every desire but the surrender of every area of life to the Lordship of Christ.
8. Concerning the Danger of Reshaping Christianity to Fit Culture
The deeper concern behind these issues is the temptation to reshape Christianity so it aligns more comfortably with the values of the age. The Church has faced this pressure for 2,000 years. The source changes; the temptation remains the same.
Paul warned Timothy that a time would come when people would seek teachers who tell them what they want to hear rather than what God has said (2 Timothy 4:3-4). The role of Christian leaders is not to make Scripture acceptable to the culture. It is to faithfully proclaim Scripture, whether the culture applauds or rejects it.
During my years in ministry, I learned that God does not call pastors to make Scripture popular. He calls us to make it plain.
When culture becomes the lens through which we interpret Scripture, truth is eventually replaced by preference. The question for every generation is not whether the Bible aligns with the culture, but whether we are willing to align ourselves with the Bible.
The Biblical Responsibility of Leaders
Representative Talarico, politics is temporary. Elections are temporary. Legislative victories are temporary. Souls are not.
Scripture teaches that those who influence others bear a greater responsibility before God. James warns that teachers will be judged more strictly. Jesus warns against leading others astray. These truths should humble every pastor, teacher, author, influencer and public servant who speaks in God’s Name.
They certainly humble me.
For 30 years, I stood behind a pulpit knowing that one day I would answer to God for every sermon I preached and every truth I taught. The same is true for anyone who publicly speaks about faith and Scripture.
The older I get, the less interested I am in winning arguments and the more concerned I am about whether people know the truth.
My concern is not your political party. My concern is whether the Jesus being presented to the public is the Jesus revealed in Scripture or a version reshaped by the spirit of the age.
America does not need progressive Christianity or conservative Christianity. America needs Biblical Christianity—faithful to God’s Word, centered on Christ and unafraid to proclaim truth in love.
My prayer for you is the same prayer I pray for myself: that every belief, every ambition, and every public statement would be brought under the authority of Scripture. Because one day neither of us will stand before voters, political parties, commentators or public opinion.
We will stand before God and give an account.