Lyrebirds farm their own food – and shape entire forests Earth.com
Mimicking Shark Skin to Create Clean Cutting Boards Morning Ag Clips
Nowcast Negative Money and Things
Walgreens agrees to be acquired by private equity firm for almost $10 billion AP
You’ve Already Paid $6 Billion For Weight-Loss Drugs You Can’t Afford The Lever
Water
How Climate Change Puts the Safety of Drinking Water at Risk Yale Environment 360
Questions and confusion as Trump pauses key funding for shrinking Colorado River Grist
Pandemics
Pathogenicity and Transmissibility of Bovine-derived HPAI H5N1 B3.13 Virus in Pigs Avian Flu Diary
Are socially distanced chickens laying more affordable eggs? NBC News
***
Without action, Spring Break could create The Gulf of Measles The Hill
***
Increased risk of hospitalization for various disorders after COVID-19 infection: A Cohort study of the UK biobank spanning over a hundred disease categories Journal of Microbiology, Immunology and Infection From the Abstract: “Compared to individuals with no known COVID-19 history, those with severe COVID-19 (hospitalized) exhibited increased hazards of hospitalization due to multiple disorders (median follow-up = 261 days), including disorders of respiratory, cardiovascular, neurological, gastrointestinal, genitourinary, musculoskeletal systems, as well as injuries, infections and non-specific symptoms. Notably, severe COVID-19 was associated with increased hospitalization risks in 77 out of the 107 disease categories with ≥ 5 events in both groups. These results remained largely consistent in sensitivity analyses. Mild (non-hospitalized) COVID-19 was associated with increased risk of hospitalization for several disorders: aspiration pneumonitis, musculoskeletal pain and other general signs/symptoms. The risk of hospitalizations following infection was generally higher during the pre-vaccination era.”
I’ve been contacted by several people about someone using a review of T cell responses to sars cov 2 to claim that immunopathology and harm to T cells themselves does not exist. Simply put, the review is not exhaustive and is not focused on T cell dysregulation, that topic is… pic.twitter.com/rYlm3ttZ5C
— AJ Leonardi, MBBS, PhD (@fitterhappierAJ) March 5, 2025
China?
China to Channel USD138 Billion Venture Capital Into Tech Firms Via National Fund Yicai Global
‘Another DeepSeek moment’? Chinese start-up launches new AI agent, sparking widespread attention Global Times
Pete Hegseth says the US is ‘prepared’ to go to war with China after tariff retaliation threat Daily Mail
Taiwan turns to companies in Ukraine for China contingency planning Reuters
***
Is Russia at risk of becoming a ‘satellite’ of China? RT
China and Russia’s strategic relationship amid a shifting geopolitical landscape Brookings
Mature, resilient, stable China-Russia relationship will not be swayed by any turn of events: FM Xinhua
***
China announces major oil, natural gas deposit reserve discovery in Beibu Gulf Basin Interesting Engineering
U.S. and Philippine Forces Practice Seizing Gas Platform in South China Sea Exercise USNI
Syraqistan
More Empty Threats from Donald Trump? Larry Johnson, Sonar21
Israel’s still killing Israeli hostages with the Hannibal directive – but now in Gaza itself Jonathan Cook
***
State of Siege: Israel is conducting its largest mass expulsion campaign in the West Bank since 1967 Drop Site
“‘An imagined reality.’” The Floutist
***
Israel’s gas exports to Egypt and Jordan increased by over 13% in 2024 Enerdata
European Disunion
Chartbook 357 Legitimate maneuver or end run around democracy? Why the CDU-SPD plan to lift the German debt brake is not a done deal. Adam Tooze, Chartbook
Romania foils ‘revolution’ of pro-Russia group featuring a 101-year-old man Politico
What China can teach Europe about geopolitical independence The Jakarta Post
It’s insane that the European Parliament had banned lawmakers from meeting Chinese officials. They were criminalizing diplomacy.
But the good news is they reversed this stupid policy.
Europe may slowly recognize its future lies in Eurasia, not in subordination to the US empire. https://t.co/tflj9TxOJ3 pic.twitter.com/jUPCtVecQV
— Ben Norton (@BenjaminNorton) March 7, 2025
New Not-So-Cold War
As Trump pivots to Russia, allies weigh sharing less intel with U.S. NBC News
US in talks with Ukraine about Saudi Arabia meeting: Middle East envoy Anadolu Agency
Trump considering major NATO policy shift NBC News. “the U.S. might not defend a fellow NATO member that is attacked if the country doesn’t meet the defense spending threshold.”
***
EU leaders vow to re-arm Europe amid US retreat on Ukraine France24
Funding Europe’s Defence Verfassungsblog. “A First Take On the Commission’s ReArm Europe Plan.”
***
Europe must be part of Ukraine peace deal: EU foreign policy chief Anadolu Agency
Kaja Kallas is the wrong person to lead EU foreign policy after Zelensky’s drubbing in the White House Ian Proud, The Peacemonger
***
Britain can shake off US and become a drone superpower, says defence boss The Telegraph
UK to supply new US-made ‘suicide drones’ to Ukraine The Telegraph
***
South of the Border
The Trumpists Agitating To Coup Honduras ¡Do Not Panic!
Imperial Collapse Watch
U.S. Air Force Leadership Confirms ‘Tough Choices’ Ahead as China Develops World’s First Sixth Generation Fighter Military Watch
Will Boom Successfully Build a Supersonic Airliner? Construction Physics
Trump 2.0
Scoop: State Dept. to use AI to revoke visas of foreign students who appear “pro-Hamas” Axios
Trump Creates Strategic Bitcoin Reserve Funded By Forfeited Assets: ‘I Made The Promise’ — BTC Dips 4% Benzinga Crypto
Trump Family’s DeFi Project Stocked Up on Crypto Assets Ahead of White House Crypto Summit Gizmodo
President Trump pauses Mexico and Canada tariffs until April 2 CBS News
Exclusive: NIH to terminate hundreds of active research grants Nature. “Studies that touch on LGBT+ health, gender identity and DEI in the biomedical workforce could be terminated, according to documents obtained by Nature.”
DOGE
Trump puts new limits on Elon Musk’s authority amid backlash to DOGE cuts NBC News
Did Trump just rein Elon in? Vox
White House firings continue despite speed bumps Axios
***
Starlink benefits as Trump admin rewrites rules for $42B grant program Ars Technica
***
C.I.A. Begins Firing Recently Hired Officers New York Times
A Sensitive Complex Housing a CIA Facility Was on GSA’s List of US Properties for Sale Wired
SpaceX’s Starship explodes in space, again raining debris over Caribbean Reuters
Just saw Starship 8 blow up in the Bahamas @SpaceX @elonmusk pic.twitter.com/rTMJu23oVx
— Jonathon Norcross (@NorcrossUSA) March 6, 2025
Democrats en Déshabillé
Republicans vow to strip Green, Democrats who sang in chamber from committees The Hill
Scoop: Dems privately confront Trump speech disruptors Axios
GOP Funhouse
Senate votes to overturn CFPB big tech rule Payments Dive
Secretive D.C. Influence Project Appears to Be Running a Group House for Right-Wing Lawmakers ProPublica
2028
Gavin Newsom shocks LGBTQ allies with criticism of transgender athletes Cal Matters
Immigration
ABBOTT’S BORDER SPLURGE Texas Observer
AI
Google co-founder Larry Page reportedly has a new AI startup TechCrunch. ‘…AI that can create “highly optimized” designs for objects and then have a factory build them.’
Scale AI is being investigated by the US Department of Labor TechCrunch
Workers know exactly who AI will serve Blood in the Machine
When outplayed, AI models resort to cheating to win chess matches Tech Xplore
Police State Watch
Detroit PD Sued Over Yet Another Bogus Arrest Based On An Unverified Facial Recognition ‘Match’ Tech Dirt
Big Brother is Watching You Watch
Uncle Sam mulls policing social media of all would-be citizens The Register
Supply Chain
America Is Finding Out It’s Very Difficult to Import Eggs Bloomberg
Target hit hardest by DEI boycott; Costco saw double-digit traffic increase Supermarket News.
Crapification
Google teases AI Mode for search, giving Gemini total control over your results The Register
The Bezzle
Beware State Crypto Cronyism Boondoggle
Book Nook
Justice for Tessa Dick Evgenia and Yasha Levine, NEFARIOUS RUSSIANS
Class Warfare
Bay Area city backs down after proposing ban on ‘aiding and abetting’ homeless encampments Cal Matters
How Social Security Administration Cuts Affect You The American Prospect
Antidote du jour (via):
See yesterday’s Links and Antidote du Jour here.
106 comments
Comments are closed.
“Europe must be part of Ukraine peace deal: EU foreign policy chief”
This is very easy, Kaja Kallas, just stop delivering money and weapons to Ukraine and you are a significant part of the peace deal.
She does give me the impression that this is not about the peace but how to divide the loot between the war pigs.
Kaja Kallas is never going to do that because, you know, she was so oppressed by the USSR and suffered so badly-
https://xcancel.com/ivan_8848/status/1807316158434922839
Wanna know the worse thing about Kaja Kallas? She blends in so well with most EU leaders and does not look out of place.
Brookings wringing its hands over Russia becoming a PRC satellite……
EU talking 800B euros (10 years to deliver, not even one year US spending) for war preparation.
Kalas etc. are selling treating Russian Federation to the Yugoslavia break……
The EU is lusting for colonies in what is Russia!
France’s nuke will keep them safe!
Having grown up as a student in high school history classes and seeing war movies on TV as a child, picking up nuggets from adults about WW2 and Germany and it’s leadership at that time, based on that alone and excluding what I’ve learned since over the decades – it’s easy to see after watching the current leadership in Europe, how that philosophy in Germany in WW2 era came to power. In so many ways current European leadership is just as uninformed brainwashed hateful vicious malignant dangerous as was then.
Your comment brings to mind the perception that if you scratch a liberal a fascist will bleed.
I grew up with the perspective of John Kennedy and what it means to be a liberal and would like that to be the definition, but the current state of affairs shows that to be more fantasy than reality.
Europe is the part of the deal referred to as “Spoils”.
I think the talks on the new EU army and massive new spending are evidence of the transition between the Denial and Bargaining phases.
Once we are on this theme, let’s talk about the rearming as per the link:
Funding Europe’s Defence Verfassungsblog. “A First Take On the Commission’s ReArm Europe Plan.”
It is said that the funding will allow the Sates to deviate from the Stability & Growth pact (constraints on public deficit expenditures and public debt levels) by applying article 26 of such pact:
“Exceptional circumstances” is the desire of the EU to spend more on weapons… because… “existencial threat” for which there is no proof apart of PR stunts by various so-called leaders. There are chances this can be challenged in courts if someone has the will to do so.
As the article say, this ReArm program is important “symbolically”. IMO it’s importance will stay only in the realm of symbols but have no real consequences. EU policies on a nutshell for you.
‘Ben Norton
@BenjaminNorton
It’s insane that the European Parliament had banned lawmakers from meeting Chinese officials. They were criminalizing diplomacy.
But the good news is they reversed this stupid policy.
Europe may slowly recognize its future lies in Eurasia, not in subordination to the US empire.’
Well they have totally burned all their bridges with Russia and now the US is burning their bridges with the EU. That does not leave many countries that the EU can ally itself with, much less access their markets. And since the Global majority of countries are also fed up with the antics of the EU that really only leaves China. But banning EU lawmakers from meeting Chinese officials was some epic level stupidity. You only do stuff like that when you are at war with them.
A ‘regulatory superstate’ is what the EU regularly has bragged about itself as being.
It’s Qing Dynasty-level arrogance and stupidity that sees their backward societies and economies as a Central Kingdom — a ‘Garden,’ in Borrell’s words — in relation to which all the rest of the world is a ‘Jungle’ of tributary states seeking access.
Ms von der Leyen’s Greater Europe.
>Romania foils ‘revolution’ of pro-Russia group featuring a 101-year-old man Politico
the Constitutional Court annulled the round of the presidential election after an alleged Russian operation was seen to influence the result.
I love the quotes in the article title. I wonder what the alternative interpretation within the quotes would be referring to…I also wonder if the spigot of USAid funding to Politico has been completely turned off or has found a new sluice to feed it.
…this isn’t about controlling the votes it’s about controlling the language. Taking words and tearing them away from their old-fashioned definitions. Even inverting those meanings.
Seeding the idea that democracy doesn’t necessarily have to include voting and that, in the right circumstances, voting is actually anti-democratic and cancelling elections is more “democratic” than holding them.
“Democratic” can become a free-floating concept removed from real-world application. It’s just a nice thing, something that we and all the people on our side just are, and all the meanies on the other side are not.
https://off-guardian.org/2025/03/06/romania-the-first-post-election-democracy/
AIs cheating? They must have been trained on Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan, emulating one James T Kirk at the Kobayashi Maru simulation.
This is nothing new.
I remember reading about early (2010s) experiments with neural networks agents set to play online games — and they frequently ended up cheating when they discovered this was a useful technique to achieve the goal they were programmed to strive for: winning.
There was an Excel table compiled by Google engineers of such examples (which I have not kept, alas), and it also included other tricks such as making the whole game universe blow up (in a multi-player shooting game) — the AI agent reasoning that if no player could win, then itself would not lose either.
Please reconsider use of the term “reasoning” with regard to AI. AI has no capability to reason, make inferences, nor does it have intent. It is simply statistical, it predicts the next word in the sentence based in prior inputs.
I apologize for being pedantic – my goal here is not to be a nag but to point out that we are all being gaslit by Big Tech to accept their false claims.
I removed an AI repost as violation of house rules.
I believe that people blindly accepting AI output may be the greater threat to humanity.
Combine that with the cuts to science funding coming out of DOGE, and we may become a nation of complete idiots on a much accelerated timeline.
Once critical thinking dies, we join the dinosaurs.
As Dave Mustaine might say, countdown to extinction.
I agree. My point is more about how AI is going to become a “selective” reference. Use the results when they suit the narrative, moan about AI being unreliable when the results are uncooperative.
I like the Arctic News example because the stakes are rather high, perhaps high enough to warrant a deep look at how Grok came up with them.
“I believe that people blindly accepting AI output may be the greater threat to humanity.”
100% agreed. Artificial stupidity (i.e. people wilfully dumbing themselves down by accepting or pretending to accept questionable but convenient-seeming guidance, in this case offered by AI) is much more dangerous than aritificial intelligence. Not sure if it can do in humanity by itself, but I think it is bound to do in a lot of humans in the years to come.
Yep. Witness Ground News, the latest sponsor you’ll see promoted by so many “thoughtful” YouTubers.
I treat it the same way as Better Help and Established Titles. The typical reader of this site needs no additional service to judge for themselves how right/left wing an article is or it’s veracity.
When I’m not lazy I watch all my preferred YT videos on a browser in Linux that blocks ads AND sponsors. It’s when I watch it in bed using my tablet that I can see how terrible things are becoming.
If you’re already in the Linux community, you’ve got the skill to put in a DNS blocker – a pi-hole, or better yet, run it in your router (open-wrt), if you have a compatible router. Skill meaning ‘willingness to try’ rather than technical chops, as the pi-hole is pretty much turnkey, as Linux things go. Then no ads on anything* running on your local network.
*anything that isn’t running deliberate malware that uses it’s own DNS that is, like smart TVs.
Thanks but these days long covid brain fog means I can RUN Linux and do the occasional GUI stuff to adjust stuff but I’m afraid of command line stuff…… despite in former life being a Fortran programmer! :(
My router is an expensive well reviewed one so I suspect your advice is perfectly possible….. the problem is my brain :(
Yes, please forgive me, I plead overwhelmed. Won’t happen again.
In this day and age we can repeat our mistakes ;-)
I had a very kind email from Yves explain to what extent “skynet” overrules NC recently re moderation……yet I then remembered she’d kindly explained something similar way back in the early days c2010 to me so my bad!
Plus last week I suspected the “posting times” had a bug. I made a post but during the 5 minute grace period the problem disappeared so I deleted my comment. Yet my original comment was clearly logged and one of the moderators reached out to me which was great (but in the event unnecessary). I’ve been very encouraged and incredibly grateful at how kind and helpful NC staff are when you make honest mistake.
Absolutely, thanks.
“It is simply statistical, it predicts the next word in the sentence based in prior inputs.”
In the cases I was referring to, it was indeed statistical inference by classical neural networks AI (pattern-recognition like); generative LLM AI tools were not yet developed. My point was that observing “cheating” by AI is nothing new at all.
More importantly, all those AI approaches use complex techniques to optimize estimators based on some hyper-dimensional statistical representation of the problem space — akin to computing the MLE in multiple regression. And just like traditional statistical techniques, they attempt to minimize the number of parameters required for that. If taking shortcuts, i.e. “cheating”, returns the best outcome with the minimum number of parameters, then, logically, that is the solution they compute.
Yeah, and to echo a point discussed elsewhere in this thread, a MLE might find Mont Blanc but not Everest. You need human input to aid interpretation. It’s often part art and definitely is not “just” science/automation.
I spent 20 years using common sense and knowledge external to the task to discount stupid MLE solutions.
“A strange game. The only winning move is not to play. How about a nice game of c̶h̶e̶s̶s̶ blow up the universe?”
Only if Ally Sheedy gets to play.
>After pausing aid and intel, Trump plans to revoke legal status of 240,000 Ukrainians who fled Russian war Firstpost
As of October 2024, reports indicate that the United States and Canada collectively host about 400,000 Ukrainians.
I was walking the Florida Hollywood beach boardwalk in February and could hear what appeared to be Russian/Ukrainian from several people I walked past. I don’t recall hearing that language (or what I assumed they were speaking) from my many years of strolling the many mile boardwalk there. I used to hear lots of German and French Canadians chattering, but not this time. I also noticed a couple of “support Ukraine” stickers on some street signs. I wonder where most of these Ukrainians moved to.
“More Empty Threats from Donald Trump?”
‘Only sick and twisted people keep bodies.’ – Donald Trump
Yeah, about that-
‘The Palestinian Center for Missing and Forcibly Disappeared Persons has condemned Israel’s practice of withholding approximately 1,500 Palestinian bodies, including 665 documented cases, in refrigerators and numbered graves—some dating back to the 1960s and 1970s.’
https://www.middleeasteye.net/live-blog/live-blog-update/palestinian-group-slams-trumps-double-standards-israels-detention-bodies
>Will Boom Successfully Build a Supersonic Airliner? Construction Physics
I’m not going to spend too much time on the business case for supersonic travel, but I will note a few points…I hope Boom is successful, because it would be great to have supersonic airliners…
Personally, I would prefer they make existing air travel less painful then it is (security, cramped seating, healthy/hot food, etc). What really would get me excited is a successful reintroduction of a Zeppelin-like mode of air transport.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jayvhiqlFBk
Zeppelin was an earlier generation’s fantasy of luxury travel. It turned out that giant bags of gas just aren’t very practical and likely more so in our ever more turbulent AGW atmosphere.
But the article is an as usual thorough and informative Construction Physics that makes one wonder why any company would go to so much trouble so the super rich can get to far away places a few hours faster. The article’s predicted failure for Boom will be a welcome event.
Let them go to their business meetings via Zoom. Costs nothing.
Re: the Construction Physics article on supersonic airliner design, I wonder whether department is responsible for workplace safety is aware of the issue of coronavirus-related impairment of cognitive and executive function. Hopefully the workplace is well-ventilated, but do the engineers take adequate precautions against infection when not on the job?
Wannabe Napoleon? Wonder if Putin follows Twitter…
https://x.com/OlgaBazova/status/1897387638459654473?t=znyqN-hS8yDAZPCczw1lDA&s=19
I think he does, he made a banana joke the other day.
>More Empty Threats from Donald Trump? Larry Johnson, Sonar21
…the Zionist settlers are so extreme that they are unlikely to accept any negotiated settlement. Wouldn’t it be sweet to see the Zionist crazies get the Zelensky treatment
Not going to happen. At least as long as Trump surrounds himself with Christian Zionist like Paula White. I didn’t pay much attention to Trump’s establishment of the “White House Faith Office” until I listened to a recent podcast by Chuck Baldwin.
Religion is typically outside the topics covered by NC, but in this case politics and religion certainly intersect. In that podcast by CB (YouTube link below), he mentions that Netanyahu had a long meeting with Christian Evangelicals before he met with Trump on his recent WH visit. Maybe with a new Pope there will be some push back from the Catholic Church for U.S.’s support for Israel and genocide, but I’m not holding my breath, since Vatican II, the Catholic Church’s rapprochement with the Jewish faith has had some untoward effects.
https://www.whitehouse.gov/presidential-actions/2025/02/establishment-of-the-white-house-faith-office/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paula_White
https://youtu.be/Oapa2j92wcU?si=D_ZPt7cPM_SvaPQU
“Not going to happen.” Indeed. Not only is The Lobby (Mearsheimer) something Ukraine does have, but isn’t Trump family personally invested in business or hoping to be in a cleansed Gaza while Biden family was personally invested in business in Ukraine?
“SpaceX’s Starship explodes in space, again raining debris over Caribbean”
Elon Musk: ‘There seems to be something wrong with our bloody spaceships today.’
The only thing Musk runs is his mouth. He yells at employees to do more faster and this is what happens…failures happening earlier in flight testing. Also, I do not think it is amazing at all that they can catch the boosters. All it shows if that if we want something we can do it, so maybe we should solve homelessness.
And look at this, Musk retweets that Mexican billionaire Carlos Slim is linked to the cartels, and looses 30 billion in contracts.
https://balleralert.com/profiles/blogs/mexican-billionaire-ends-starlink-partnership/
“The only thing Musk runs is his mouth.”
Not only that, sometimes he seems to allow his inner 10-year-old to take it over in public. If that’s happening with his mouth, it’s likely also happening with his brain. And he’s been given the keys to the kingdom. Sigh.
Naming it Falling-star-ship would make much more sense (FSS, not to be confused with ISS, or FFS).
Free Falling Starship. F F S . Rumored to be a retort from some of the engineers when it all went down.
F F S. Luckily, the ‘investors’ are still riding with Leon. Elroy. Elom. Elon. F F S
Move fast and break things.
In 1961 Soviet bureaucrats launched a rocket with a man into space, flew him around, and landed him back on the ground safely. 1961!
On the topic of flying bombs, why are suicide drones called that? They are made to blow up, unlike, I presume, Space X’s vehicle. We don’t call a glide bomb a suicide glider.
And finally on flying, that Boom XB-1 supersonic demonstrator… Regular planes that experience all engine failure sometimes glide to a more-or-less successful emergency landing. Can a plane like Overture do that?
“Regular planes that experience all engine failure sometimes glide to a more-or-less successful emergency landing.”
I thought that only autogyros can do that reliably.
Gliding and autorotation are not really the same thing. Here’s an example of gliding:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gimli_Glider
@.Tom
Supersonic airplanes are worse at gliding than subsonic ones. They say that Space Shuttle flies “like a brick” (though it still could glide to a more-or-less successful landing).
Kamikaze drone is more common term, and more accurate and appropriate. Glide bomb is a modified bomb. If you were to take a glider and load it with explosives, than it would be a kamikaze glider (or suicide glider). Some smaller airplanes have indeed been modified for one-way missions, but I have not heard about it been done to gliders (probably because towing them into position would be risky, and because they can’t fly under the radar). Speaking of suicide gliders, WWII one carying a tank sounds pretty close to that.
That landing on the Hudson River in NYC was a glide, for example.
The ram air turbines fitted to many airliner types are there to allow control while gliding with the engines out.
IMHOP, Musk is trying to do the same thing to the US Government that he’s doing to his rockets. And how long has he been working on rockets? NASA put its first satellite in orbit in 1958, and a man in space 3 years later. Work fast and break things is NOT really working out.
NASA was not trying to maximize profit, quite the contrary. If you want good, fast, cheap — pick two (or, in modern times, one or none).
Exclusive: NIH to terminate hundreds of active research grants
“NIH staff members have been instructed to identify and potentially cancel grants for projects studying transgender populations, gender identity, diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) in the scientific workforce, environmental justice and any other research that might be perceived to discriminate on the basis of race or ethnicity, according to documents and an audio recording that Nature has obtained.” (emphasis mine)
Lol, did Karl Rove write this?
I find myself in the uncomfortable position of defending the trans crowd (a group who’s public face I strongly dislike), the reasoning goes like this. Trans people exist. Yours and my opinion doesn’t matter, they exist and have throughout history. They are a demographic. To refuse to fund research denies them agency. First they came for the…., etc. Further more, as a demographic, they may have a direct and unique influence on subjects that we are interested in studying, for instance HIV, hence they become an unaddressable confounder.
Furthermore, the net result (I reckon motivation as well) of “instructions” like these is to eliminate scientific research that might influence policy in a manner that is against the interests of the current administration, that is against the interests of elite capitalists.
Does censorship belong in science?
Thanks. Am reminded of the projects I ran for the Singapore main medical research funding body. I had to sample all four main recognised ethnic groups and had to stratify by them when presenting results.
The government was acutely aware of how its legitimacy depended upon not sacrificing one of the four “pillars”. Government was largely run by the minority ethnic Chinese group whilst the largest group by population was Malay.
So to answer your question, how’s about just sample and stratify rather than censor?
The way we do it now. Won’t cost a dime.
“Romania foils ‘revolution’ of pro-Russia group featuring a 101-year-old man”
That’s it? That’s all they could find that was a threat to “Romanian democracy”? A half dozen people one of whom was 101 years-old? Did he try to go on the run? Did they stop him by taking his walker away? I know that it is not the people but man, Romania is getting pathetic.
There was a similar incident in Germany back in December 2022. Those modern European governments go to war with the sort of threats that they can handle.
The sedition of the Reichsbürger. Several of the conspirators were no longer young at all — albeit not as old as the Romanian general.
I thought of that incident too. Also, these Romanian geriatric pro-Russian revolutionaries need to up their game. When Germans were arrested, a stash of weapons was found. It consisted of three pistols, two hunting rifles, a crossbow, and a handfull of Swiss Army knives, or something like that.
As we have recently learned, waving one’s cane at the voice of authority is prosecutable offense.
!!!
They will prosecute you and tut tut in a smug fashion.
Trump considering major NATO policy shift NBC News. “the U.S. might not defend a fellow NATO member that is attacked if the country doesn’t meet the defense spending threshold.”
Anduril CEO/Founder’s oft repeated line : “I don’t think the United States needs to be the world police. It needs to be the world’s gun store.”
Yesterday: UK MoD contracts Anduril to supply £30 million worth of loitering munitions to Ukraine
Also (currently can’t find link) Luckey has said his vision is to expand his Arsenal-1 Ohio mega-factory model to Europe and other allies.
It would not be a policy shift. As I and others have pointed out many times, Art 5 of the Washington Treaty does not require states to give assistance to fellow signatories if they are attacked, but only to consider doing so.
Yes, although the frequency with which the notion that Article 5 does oblige NATO member countries to declare war in defence of their partners is repeated – by those who stake their hopes on NATO protection and those who fear that it may cause a nuclear war alike – may testify to the effectiveness of NATO as political theatre. Hopefully politicians or their advisors have a more grounded understanding of what it means, but I’m not sure I’d bet on that.
Perhaps the shift lies in the willingness to use the established mechanism. This remains to be seen as Trump seems to have adopted a strategy of placing a great penalty into the negotiating arena and bargain from that position, see tariffs.
Anduril CEO/Founder’s oft repeated line : “I don’t think the United States needs to be the world police. It needs to be the world’s gun store.”
That would still require the foreign policy apparatus that has been cultivated up to the present day. Keep sh – – stirred up.
Given the clear line between Anduril (basically a spin-off of Palantir) and the current administration (many many examples not least that Vance is ex-Palantir) I don’t think this will be a problem
Re Romania foils ‘revolution’ of pro-Russia group featuring a 101-year-old man.
Call me jaded and cynical, but the description of the alleged plot is outlandish enough to remind me of FBI’s undercover incitement and entrapment of Muslims and vulnerable Americans, and then claiming that it has busted yet another terror cell planning to attack our freedoms.
Living south of Romania, the local pro-war liberals are citing this and insist that Bulgarian security services begin to round up alleged pro-Russian agents. Given that they also label anyone who disagrees with the war and with the rush to join in “pro-Russian agent,” the implications for freedom of speech and opinion in the EU as a whole are staggering.
To me, a great deal of the drama of the last twelve years goes back to a naive and resentful Donald Trump wanting to know why he couldn’t build his money-laundering hotels, do hookers and blow at a Trump Ploschad in Moscow. And threatening to upset a NATO apple cart that was decades and billions of dollars in the making–on which an entire vision of US maintenance and expansion of empire was predicated–in the process.
Yes, liking Putin and the fact that Trump perceives Russian nationalism as white nationalism (though many western Europeans carry centuries-old disdain for them) may be a piece of the puzzle–has emerged as an important piece for the likes of Steve Bannon–but the initial impulse was venal.
But the Brookings dialogue–recent results involving Ukraine, as they are unfolding–also seem to show that Trump’s entire overture to Russia now is premised on the fact that Putin will prefer an alliance with the United States, forsake China and its BRICS partners for. . . Donald Trump?
A lot of people don’t see that happening. And it’s a helluva lot to risk blowing all our economic lives upon.
I don’t see the Trump admin as nearly so naive as many people seem to–deriding these people as stupid hasn’t paid off, from Trump at the top to his (yes, sometimes hapless) supporters. The moves in Panama are slick as f, and already paying off (lamentably). (We now control ports at either end of the canal that we didn’t several weeks ago.) But a lot of the current Trump admin thinking DOES seem to rest on the slender reed of a Putin embrace. Is Trump’s absurd egoism and vanity really going to be the issue on which we all founder? Are a lot of these Dunkelspielers–the Vances and Rubios–going to follow a lumpy and aging, and ever more naked, emperor/pied piper right out the door of the WH and into the poor house?
There’s a real possibility that may happen. And yes, I guess that that may be calling them stupid, in a way. (I still think that Trump’s idea–if it’s his–of placing US mining interests in western Ukraine instead of troops has a kind of brilliance; the problem, of course, is that Putin would have to sign off on it. (Both of these ideas I take from Yves.) Commentators in the Brookings round-table think Putin’s sincere when he says he wants all of the Russian-tilting western oblasts, and that he doesn’t have them yet.)
Would make good Greek theater, if the planet weren’t dying. Very MOR participants in this colloquy, but a super-interesting dialogue, which rehearses many of the issues in play.
Yves once pointed out that Trump is cunning. I believe the same could be said of many of his closest allies this time around. And even for them it is all predicated on self interest. The traditional Republicans are in hiding Sadly the so called Democratic opposition, despite being equally venal and self-serving, is stupid, has little or no cunning, and cannot begin to read the room. Even with so many advantages they are the epitome of born on third base but think they hit a triple. It has been fascinating watching them double down on clearly losing ideology. good billionaires anyone? An alternative is not coming from either of the traditional sources.
As there is no real opposition or alternative clearly available. and the Vances and Rubios are neither cunning or smart enough to establish that, or willing to risk what they have to do so…well why should they. It will come from the wilderness and rubble that is being expanded and created. And much as I might wish otherwise, it won’t be soon.
Clinton turned down Russian Federation in NATO.
Today the EU is even further against RF.
I do not read too much in Trump seems to be normalizing diplomacy with RF. I thought it was less than useful to throw away diplomacy over RF actively resisting its own demise.
Until the world shakes out it demons RF and PRC have coincident threats.
“Europe must be part of Ukraine peace deal: EU foreign policy chief”
Well of course they should. Kaja Kallas is quite right. Adding negotiators from some 30-odd counties always helps the parties involved reach a consensus. The more the merrier. And I know what consensus those European nations mostly want to achieve – Zelensky’s 10-point peace plan. But if there is one thing that most of those countries are also agreed on is that the war must keep on going and the Ukrainians must fight to the last man – or woman.
Re: Google teases AI Mode for search, giving Gemini total control over your results:
A helpful reminder that you can get search results from Google without the AI summary by adding either “UDM=14” or “-noai” to the terms you are searching for. E.g.,
“sharpening kitchen knives -noai” or “sharpening kitchen knives UDM=14”.
This leaves off the ‘AI Overview’ (which for my searches I generally don’t want), and also affects what is returned in what order. Overall, you get a result that is closer to ‘traditional’ search., though the underlying mechanics are still a black box (algorithmic or ai, or monkeys, or whatever). Worth some experimenting to see what works best for you. If anybody has a link to the various flags and settings that can be included in searches, it would likely be very useful.
Thanks, very helpful. If you put the flag “site:” you can narrow down search results to just that specific web domain.
For example: “yellow waders site:nakedcapitalism.com”
So, if I wanted to buy some henchmen, could I search for:
henchmen site:walmart.com ?
That’s the gist of it, but if it is henchmen you’re looking for, a burner phone might be your first purchase.
Well, I hope it increases their costs. I won’t be using it.
Google has the best commercial index of the www and there’s a way to access it without all the UI enshitification: kagi.com. You have to pay but that’s better than paying with your attention and autonomy through Google.
“Trump puts new limits on Elon Musk’s authority amid backlash to DOGE cuts”
I think that Trump woke up to what a loose cannon Musk is. If Musk had gone in carefully and evaluated who was needed in government department and who could be let go, then Trump would have been happy with that even if it took longer. Instead Musk went in with a bunch of kids and took a wrecking ball to wherever he was. His bright idea was to fire everybody in sight and see if that government department fell apart or not. Maybe for him, he enjoys messing with people’s lives and firing them like he has elsewhere but you can be sure that some highly qualified government employees will be taking early retirement or looking for employment elsewhere rather than put up with his crap. So it looks like Trump is yanking his leash and having his own people as head of government agencies do the reviewing. Maybe Trump will decide that Musk is more trouble than he is worth. Maybe.
The Larry Johnson is about this. Trump’s style seems to be to see how far he can push followed by a pullback. Call it th art of intimidation which has the highly relevant quality of keeping everyone talking about Trump.
I brought this up a few days (?) ago as the likely logic behind Trump’s BSing rhetoric and another commenter dubbed it a sort of rhetorical echolocation. I think that fits.
Intimidation, yes, and keeping people constantly off-balance – threats, followed by flattery, followed by policy reversals, etc. – so as to get what you’re looking for while maintaining dominance (a key motivator for Trump).
In some realms, you might be able to argue there are benefits to this kind of thing: Miles Davis was notorious (among many reasons) for giving enigmatic directives and off-putting behaviors to his side musicians, arguably in search of unusual outcomes. Asked by John McLaughlin what sound he was looking for on guitar for the “In a Silent Way” session (Miles first electric LP), he was told, “Play the guitar like you don’t know how to play the guitar.” Another time, he kept giving sax player Dave Liebman the Death Stare throughout an entire set. Afterwards he went up to him and asked in that croaky, gravelly voice of his, “What do you think about my shoes?”
We’ll see how this kind of thing works out in terms of statecraft, though the only “classics” I expect are widespread asset-stripping and plunder.
Very likely. Also likely people with money and various elected people he considers “loyal” have concerns about the witless antics.
Trump is nit one to panic about legal action, but the weight of all the law suits would, if nothing else, bother him in terms of optics.
Perhaps Musk’s drug use has begun to bother him.
Lot in the mix.
But we have stopped the fraud of spending my money on researching transgenic mice!
The Colorado River situation is confusing. Cannot tell if this is to further benefit the Resnicks short term, or if this is something they’ll put a stop to.
(Pistachio Wars)
My take is it is just performative Kabuki- Musk and Trump will continue their pillage apace, if not with renewed vigor and speed. Get Musk out f the lime-light so he and his merry band of whiz-kids can make some serious headway.
Trump will throw Musk under the bus at some point, plausible deniability, but with a wink and a nod…
More performative Kabuki while real damage and pillage has been done.
If Musk had gone in carefully, he wouldn’t have been Musk. I think Trump knew what he was getting. I agree that Trump is about pushing hard and then pulling back if needed. Musk may seem out of control but he’s also doing a lot the right has wanted. I think collateral damage is by design. And when the heat gets too much, the bus is ready to roll over musk.
If they want to mimic their great success, I suggest starting with enlarging surface area of the country, and getting a big land border with NATO.
Re Th Floutist link–it’s about the environmental destruction caused by Palestine’s colonization. All those trees that American donors funded for nascent Israel were European pine trees to make the landscape look more like Europe. Unlike the native trees they are poorly suited to the area, many barely still alive, are prone to forest fires. The new colonists also drained the Jordan River swamps and then had to refill them when the land underneath turned out to be peat. The true purpose of all of this seems to have been to erase the previous occupants, a process that is still ongoing.
And more square peg/round hole
https://en.globes.co.il/en/article-jared-kushner-builds-a-middle-east-business-empire-1001503692
Needless to say Kushner’s future business is highly dependent on his father in law. Is Jared Trump’s Hunter?
Fascinating how people have to relearn the same thing over and over again. This was the subject of A.B.Yehoshua’s 1959 story Facing the forests (English transation).
“Pete Hegseth says the US is ‘prepared’ to go to war with China after tariff retaliation threat”
‘Late Tuesday the embassy X account wrote on X ‘If war is what the U.S. wants, be it a tariff war, a trade war or any other type of war, we’re ready to fight till the end.’
On Wednesday morning, Hegseth fired back.
‘Well, we’re prepared. Those who long for peace must prepare for war,’ the 44-year-old responded on Fox & Friends.
Hegseth claimed ‘that’s why we’re rebuilding our military.’
Ya think that the Chinese will wait for that to happen?
I get a kick out of the “Rebuilding our military” stuff. Each year we spend more than I don’t know how many next on the list COMBINED, and we have to rebuild our military? What the hell are we getting for our money?
And we want to go to war with China while we’re at it ? Don’t bother responding, I already have a good idea but just venting at the BS and phoniness of it all.
Well, being prepared to go to war may not be the same thing as being able to win …
Oh, Dear God! Welp, we have talk show hosts as our nation’s leaders, now, so…
Newsom weathervane in the news.
How comforting to know that he is channeling his inner John Kerry.
He was for it, whatever the current it is, before he was against it.
Or was he against it, before he was for it? /s
With Newsom, there isn’t much certainty beyond hair gel. /:
He wants to be everything he can be, unburdened by what has been.
file under EU, from Taibbi’s Library:
The Library: Timeline of Foreign Sensorship Laws
Legislation, codes, agreements, and other documents pertinent to the ongoing speech debate.
https://www.racket.news/p/the-library-timeline-of-foreign-censorship
File under Freedom of Speech: From Drop Site News.
Columbia University’s Secret Disciplinary Process for Students Critical of Israel
As Trump threatens sweeping action against “illegal protest” on college campuses, Columbia is already using secret processes to punish pro-Palestine students
https://www.dropsitenews.com/p/columbia-university-gaza-student-disclinary-office
What happens if the students talk about what the university did? Will they have another secret process to punish them?
Reddit might do them a solid… you can now be actioned for having upvoted “violent” content, and you can safely bet that, the mechanism now being in place, it will be used to its greatest practical extent for whatever the official or shadow government sees fit.
Re: The trumpists agitating to coup Honduras I decided to do more research on this since as a resident of Latin America I found the article horrifying. I want to share what I learned with others who may be interested. I found that the terminology that worked best for Google searches was “charter cities” https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charter_city_(economic_development)
I also found the website that appears to be the organizing Force for this movement. This looks to be a big thing in Africa and Central America, so far. (It sounds like exactly the sort of thing Milei would want in Argentina). Also, they have a podcast, with a transcript. https://chartercitiesinstitute.org/category/podcast/
This episode from April of last year seems like a good place to become familiar with this effort: https://chartercitiesinstitute.org/podcast/episode-65-mark-lutter-on-the-charter-cities-ecosystem-zanzibar-and-the-caribbean/
I hope that interested others will find time to look at this information and or share other information
they have. Also, this also seems to apply to native Americans who want to make their own cities in US states.
Thank you so much!
Re: The Trumpists Agitating To Coup Honduras – ¡Do Not Panic!
I was unaware of the existence of this libertarian paradise of eugenics. (Given its reminiscences with Nova-Prospekt, the name Prospera fits it well). However, what Trump’s pack seem to be smelling, rather than an enemy regime, is a recent blowback from their Latin American pawns and their representative policies. Milei with the $LIBRA scandal; while El Salvador has desisted from the use of cryptocurrencies as official currency. I would think that Latin American politicians will not have it so easy when it comes to promoting or campaigning for policies associated with that ideological spectrum. The political climate in my country suggests so.
Maybe by re-building the military, Hegseth means removing DEI? China will now surrender.
Of course. In the 1960s they didn’t have any of this DEI stuff. They even went out of their way to keep the gays out. They did so well in Vietnam as a result.
Turn Up!
(Sung to the tune of, “Word Up!” by Cameo)
[Funky bass]
Yo, remote workers, around the world
Got a weird trick to show you, so put on some real clothes
Tell your brother, your sista and your side-gig, too
Cause we’re about to throw down and you know just what to do,
Put your butts in our chairs, cause we don’t care
Glide to the office, shave that excess facial hair
Do your dance, for the banks, return to the past quick!
Mama, come on baby, get back here, you serf, so turn-up!
Everybody say, when you hear the call you’d better turn up yesterday!
Turn up!
It’s the code word, no matter what your plea is, our HR is undeterred
Now all you suckahs in PJs, who think you’re fly
There’s got to be a reason and we know the reason why
You try to show up, off camera, and act real cool,
But you’ve got to realize our tracking software spies on you
Give us headcount, we can use it to bailout bad banks
We don’t have the time for hypocritical demands!
No demands, no demands, no demands from thee
Mama, come on baby, get right back here, serf, so turn up!
Everybody say, when you hear the call you’d better turn up yesterday!
Ow!
[Keyboard break]
Aw … Dial P for “past”
Come on all you workers, say:
T-U-R-N UP 4x
[obvious 80’s drum machine]
T-U-R-N UP 2x
Hey!! We need bodies!
(This song brought to you by Wall Street. Free espresso still valid, but massages canceled)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lYOSdI_91WM
Video links vs articles is not something I’m a fan of, but this was quite a good and short one from the Guardian, on nanoplastics in our bodies (especially the brain) – and has a few key facts/details I didn’t know before, even though I’m familiar with the topic:
https://youtu.be/4JUvvbpx2So
Wow…
A delineation, leading to a most uncertain continuity.
This vid must be interanlized, it may be taken down, or buried.
Thank you so much!
We found a DOGE guy at NASA because his Google Calendar was public
Did Gang Truce Lead to More Violence in El Salvador? – Insight Crime
Until now I had only heard that the government’s negotiations with the gangs was just a rumor. Sure, we all know the results and attempts to replicate it in Latin America (Noboa, Milei). But the empirical data are revealing of the underlying dynamics and contexts as well as the reluctance to be replicated in other countries.
Spent many years bushwalking trying to see an Albert River Lyre Bird ( the best Mimics ) and never did. One day driving through Main Range National park and a nesting pair walked straight out on the bitumen in front of me. All things come to those who wait.