The Free Press · October 13, 2026

News briefs: Iran War Cost per Household Near $2,000, Prediction-Market Poll

• The Iran war has cost the average U.S. household nearly $2,000 since the conflict began on February 28, according to Mark Zandi, chief economist at Moody’s; the digest attributes the cost to higher energy prices, higher interest rates, and the billions needed to pay for military operations.
• British prime minister Andy Burnham said yesterday that Iran’s Revolutionary Guard corps were “almost certainly” responsible for a suspected plot to attack an air force base in the UK where U.S. bombers were located; the announcement followed the arrest of several dual British-Iranian citizens suspected of planning an attack on the base last month, and the evacuation of a dozen B-1 bombers from the base following an intelligence warning of a possible Iranian drone attack.
• Russia struck at least six Ukrainian energy infrastructure targets despite President Trump’s announcement that the two countries had agreed not to bomb each other’s energy systems; Ukraine retaliated with drone strikes on at least two Russian data centers.
• A Reuters/Ipsos poll released yesterday found most Americans oppose betting on U.S. elections, military actions, and other government policy decisions using prediction markets; 69 percent of Democrats and 61 percent of Republicans said they opposed the use of prediction markets to bet on elections.
• Two paintings by Pierre-Auguste Renoir, stolen from a museum in southern France last month, have been recovered, prosecutors said on Monday; the works were hidden behind a cinder block wall in a home in Clermont-l’Hérault, and the discovery led to the arrest of six people, Marseille prosecutor Nicolas Bessone told reporters.
• An ad buyer accidentally spent nearly $25,000 on ads for Maine senator Susan Collins in Portland, Oregon, rather than Portland, Maine, NBC reported on Monday; Cross Screen Media said the error was its mistake and that it had refunded the GOP super PAC that paid for the ads.

Roundup format: the bullets above distill the news briefs in the October 13 Front Page edition, as cited there (Moody’s via Mark Zandi; Reuters/Ipsos poll figures; NBC for the ad-buy report). The edition’s lead stories — the livestreamed-execution column, the African-immigration column, the prep-school report, and the Carlos the Jackal piece — already have standalone cards on this page and were not re-distilled. Original headline: "Don’t Livestream the Death Penalty. Plus. . .".