On the eve of the U.S. midterms, the dominant thread was a run of legal setbacks for the administration. The Supreme Court rejected a request to stop California from counting ballots the administration alleges were cast by non-citizens ¹. The full Court denied the Solicitor General's roughly 20-page emergency application within about seven hours, without calling for a response ². Separately, a federal judge dismissed the administration's suit for Harvard admissions records ³, and a federal judge in Alaska dismissed a preemptive administration lawsuit challenging Senate election results . Politically, Republicans are privately resigned to losing the House, and the Iran war and the gas and diesel price spike it brought are a major liability for their Senate nominees ⁴. Prediction markets put Democratic Senate control at 75% ⁵, and Oversight Democrat Robert Garcia previewed day-one subpoenas of administration officials if Democrats win the House ⁶. That war escalated on the same day. U.S. officials said American forces struck Iran's Qeshm Island on Monday, even as Trump said he was in no rush to resume strikes ⁷. Officials also said smaller-scale attacks on Iranian targets have been under way for weeks ⁸. Oil rose on the report ^9,10, though Brent was trending toward $106 and WTI below $100 on diplomacy hopes, with Qatari mediation reportedly progressing toward a draft agreement . The war's costs are reaching consumers: Hopper puts the average domestic Thanksgiving fare at $402, up 31%, and attributes much of that rise to jet fuel prices tied to the war ¹¹. In Ukraine, Russian strikes on an aid distribution centre in Komyshuvakha, Zaporizhzhia, killed at least 26 people ¹², hours after the longest ceasefire ended ¹³. Envoy Steve Witkoff said the U.S. will mediate working-level Ukraine-Russia talks in Abu Dhabi on November 10–11 ¹⁴, with Jared Kushner helping lead the U.S. delegation ; these are the first such talks since February ¹⁵. In China, the PBOC will raise the reserve ratio on foreign-exchange deposits by 2 points to 6% from November 15 ¹⁶, and the offshore yuan headed for its first decline in almost three weeks ¹⁷. In corporate news, Apple forecast a holiday-quarter margin drop on rising memory costs ¹⁸ in its first report under Ternus ¹⁹. Palantir posted record 96% revenue growth to $2.3 billion, but its shares fell 3.6% after hours ²⁰ as its outlook signalled a slowdown ²¹. Oracle is near a $10 billion share sale at an 11% discount ²², and OpenAI hired former Army Secretary Dan Driscoll as senior counselor for national security modernization ²³. The batch's many insider filings were routine.