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The day's news roundup + tonight's musical feature: Walter Jacobs Vinson

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Hey! Good Evening!

This evening's music features Memphis blues singer,.guitarist and cofounder of the Mississippi Sheiks, Walter Jacobs Vinson. Enjoy!

^{Walter Vinson & Leroy Carr - Can't Anybody Tell Me Blues}

"A state that denies its citizens their basic rights becomes a danger to its neighbors as well: internal arbitrary rule will be reflected in arbitrary external relations. The suppression of public opinion, the abolition of public competition for power and its public exercise opens the way for the state power to arm itself in any way it sees fit.... A state that does not hesitate to lie to its own people will not hesitate to lie to other states."

-- Vaclav Havel

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News and Opinion

They Feign Concern About Pro-Palestine Chants In Order To Shut Down Pro-Palestine Protests

It’s such an insult to our intelligence how Israel supporters pretend it’s the WAY pro-Palestine protests are happening that they object to, and not the protests themselves. Like if protesters were saying different chants they’d be totally cool with opposition to Israel’s crimes.

They’re like, “We’re not trying to suppress your free speech and stomp out criticism of Israel, we’re just concerned about slogans like ‘globalize the intifada’ and ‘from the river to the sea’! We’re worried that expressions of support for Hamas and Hezbollah and Iran that we’ve seen in some demonstrations are going to cause acts of terrorism!”

Bullshit. Lies. They’re fucking lying. If they weren’t concern-trolling about “globalize the intifada” they’d make up some other excuse to express their concern, and they know it. Their objection is to criticism of Israel, not to the way those criticisms are being expressed.

"I support your right to protest, just not the way you are doing it," said every defender of every oppressive power structure about every form of protest of any kind.

— Caitlin Johnstone (@caitoz) June 3, 2020

People who support the status quo always oppose protest groups on these same grounds. They dishonestly pretend it’s the manner in which the protesters express themselves that’s the problem, rather than the fact that protests are happening at all.

This has been going on for generations. As Martin Luther King Jr famously wrote all the way back in 1963:

“I have almost reached the regrettable conclusion that the Negro’s great stumbling block in his stride toward freedom is not the White Citizen’s Counciler or the Ku Klux Klanner, but the white moderate, who is more devoted to ‘order’ than to justice; who prefers a negative peace which is the absence of tension to a positive peace which is the presence of justice; who constantly says: ‘I agree with you in the goal you seek, but I cannot agree with your methods of direct action’.”

If you have loyalty to the establishment order of things, then obviously you’re never going to support efforts aimed at the upheaval of that order. If you support Israel and its western military backing, the only kind of protesting against the Zionist state that you’ll ever accept is protest that makes no difference and draws no attention to itself. You’ll make up excuses justifying your disdain for the protests against Israel, but you’ll be doing so after the fact. Your true objection is to the protest itself.

“this does not help your cause” - guy who hates you and your cause

— (@hotgirlhala) April 30, 2024

Nobody wants to be seen as a tyrant. Zionists don’t want people talking about the fact that Zionism is the single greatest threat to free speech in the western world today because of the way western governments and institutions have been aggressively stomping out criticism of Israel and anti-genocide activism since 2023 at the urging of Israel lobbyists.

So they make up fake reasons for each individual act of oppression.

No no we’re not trying to stomp out criticism of Israel in the UK, we just can’t have people breaking into military facilities and vandalizing British war planes like Palestine Action did. No no we’re not trying to stomp out criticism of Israel in Australia, we’re just trying to prevent the incitement of terrorist attacks. No no we’re not trying to stomp out criticism of Israel in the United States, we just need to make sure Jewish students feel safe on university campuses. No no we’re not trying to stomp out criticism of Israel online, we just can’t allow any expressions of support for proscribed terrorist groups and we don’t want people to be traumatized by seeing uncensored images of massacred children. Etc, etc, etc.

Over and over and over again we’re seeing measures put in place throughout the western world designed to crush speech that opposes Israel and the western empire’s facilitation of its crimes, and every single time there’s a narrative push to frame each individual authoritarian measure as its own separate act which has been put in place for reasons which have nothing whatsoever to do with suppressing speech that is critical of Israel.

And it’s a lie every time. The only common thread running through each of these assaults on free speech is that it makes it harder to express criticism of Israel. That’s the goal. Plainly.

BREAKING: Greta Thunberg arrested under the Terrorism Act for holding a sign which says "I support Palestine Action prisoners. I oppose genocide"

She was detained at the Prisoners for Palestine action at Aspen Insurance in London, insurers for Israeli weapons firm Elbit Systems. pic.twitter.com/3qBt3iRi9e

— Prisoners For Palestine (@Prisoners4Pal) December 23, 2025

You’ll see this dynamic play out everywhere from abusive nations to abusive households. If a downtrodden wife gets fed up with the way she’s been treated and yells at her spouse, the entire conversation from that point onward is going to be about the fact that she yelled and behaved inappropriately and not about the mistreatment she was objecting to. In reality there is no way she could have expressed her opposition to the status quo of the household that would have both (A) received attention and (B) been deemed an acceptable expression of discontent — because the goal of the abuser is to preserve the status quo.

That’s exactly what we’re seeing with all this fake concern trolling about anti-genocide protesters chanting inappropriate slogans or protesting in inappropriate ways or at inappropriate places or at inappropriate times. The goal isn’t to make sure the pro-Palestine protests are happening in a certain way, the goal is to shut down the protests.

Ignore their words and watch their actions. Don’t pay attention to their justifications for why this or that assault on free speech is necessary, look at the real intention behind that assault. Don’t look at what they say they’re doing, look at what they are actually doing. What they are actually doing is systematically strangling free expression to death wherever it is critical of the state of Israel. That’s the real story. That’s all this is ever actually about.

Seyed M. Marandi: Netanyahu in Washington - Pushing War with Iran

The Anti-Christ is coming to town...

Netanyahu to Press for ‘Another Round of War With Iran’ in Meeting With Trump This Week

As Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu heads to Mar-a-Lago to meet with US President Donald Trump on Monday, amid a growing rift with the president and his advisers, reports say he’ll seek to push the US back toward war with Iran.

Last week, NBC News reported that at the meeting, “Netanyahu is expected to make the case to Trump that Iran’s expansion of its ballistic missile program poses a threat that could necessitate swift action” and that “the Israeli leader is expected to present Trump with options for the US to join or assist in any new military operations.”

“Netanyahu plans to press Donald Trump for US backing for another round of war with Iran, now framed around Iran’s ballistic missile program,” said Sina Toossi, a senior fellow at the Center for International Policy. “Netanyahu’s pivot to missiles should therefore be read not as the discovery of a new threat, but as an effort to manufacture a replacement casus belli after the nuclear argument collapsed.”

He noted criticisms levied against Netanyahu by Yair Golan, chair of the Democrats, a center-left party in Israel, earlier this week: “How is it possible that last June, at the end of the war with Iran, Benjamin Netanyahu solemnly declared that ‘Israel had eliminated Iran’s nuclear threat and severely damaged its missile array’; and that this was a ‘historic victory’—and today, less than six months later, he is running to

He noted criticisms levied against Netanyahu by Yair Golan, chair of the Democrats, a center-left party in Israel, earlier this week: “How is it possible that last June, at the end of the war with Iran, Benjamin Netanyahu solemnly declared that ‘Israel had eliminated Iran’s nuclear threat and severely damaged its missile array’; and that this was a ‘historic victory’—and today, less than six months later, he is running to the president of the United States to beg for permission to attack Iran again?” Golan said.

Iran is just one of several areas the two will likely discuss on Monday. According to Israeli officials who spoke to the Washington Post, Netanyahu also reportedly wants Trump to “take a tougher stance on Gaza and require that Hamas disarm before Israeli troops further withdraw as part of the second phase of Trump’s 20-point peace plan.”

The chief of Israel’s armed forces suggested earlier this week that its occupation of more than half of Gaza would be permanent, but walked those comments back after reported behind-the-scenes outrage in the White House. Meanwhile, Trump—invested in his image as a peacemaker—has reportedly balked at Israel’s routine violations of the ceasefire agreement he helped to broker in October.

Near-daily strikes have resulted in the death of at least 418 Palestinians, according to the Gaza Media Office. Meanwhile, Israel’s continued blockade of humanitarian aid has left hundreds of thousands of people—displaced from homes destroyed by Israeli bombing—to languish in the cold without tents. Desperately needed fuel, food, and medicine have entered the strip at far lower numbers than the ceasefire agreement required.

As Axios reported on Friday, Trump’s advisers increasingly fear that Netanyahu is intentionally slow-walking and undermining the peace process in hopes of resuming the war.

Netanyahu also seeks Trump’s continued backing of Israel’s territorial expansion in Syria. Earlier this month, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) pushed through a UN-monitored demilitarized zone between Israeli and Syrian-held positions in the Golan Heights, which Israel illegally occupies.

This push into southern Syria went against the wishes of the Trump administration, which feared it could destabilize the Western-backed government that rules in Damascus following the ouster of former President Bashar al-Assad.

Israel has also routinely struck Lebanon in violation of the US-brokered ceasefire it signed with Hezbollah in late 2024, with bombings becoming a near-daily occurrence in December. Last month, the UN reported that at least 127 civilians, including children, had been killed in Israeli strikes since the ceasefire began.

“Netanyahu’s visit unfolds against a backdrop of unresolved fronts, with widening disputes with Washington over the second phase of the Gaza ceasefire, including postwar governance, reconstruction, and Turkish involvement,” Toossi said. “At the same time, Israel is seeking greater latitude to escalate again against Hezbollah in Lebanon, an end to US accommodation of Syria’s new leadership, and firm assurances on expanded military aid.”

“Taken together, Netanyahu’s visit is less about resolving any single crisis than about postponing strategic reckoning,” he continued. “The outcome will signal whether Washington is prepared to continue underwriting open-ended escalation, or whether this meeting marks the beginning of clearer limits on Israel’s regional strategy.”

A German journalist has revealed that she was rap*/, while held in Israeli detention.

We spoke with Anna Liedtke, also an activist with Zora, who was arrested by Israeli forces while working as a journalist aboard a Freedom Flotilla Coalition vessel heading to Gaza. pic.twitter.com/nTg2aS56gJ

— comra (@comrawire) December 26, 2025

‘Free Them All’: One Year After Dr. Abu Safiya Abducted, Israel Urged to Release Gaza Health Workers

Ahead of Saturday’s one-year anniversary of Israel abducting Dr. Hussam Abu Safiya from the Gaza hospital he ran, advocates demanded the release the scores of health workers still imprisoned by Israeli occupation forces.

“One year ago, Dr. Hussam Abu Safiya was abducted by the Israeli military along with dozens of other medical staff during a horrific raid on the Kamal Adwan Hospital in Gaza,” Dr. Yipeng Ge, a member of Doctors Against Genocide, said Friday on social media. “Free Hussam Abu Safiya. Free them all.”

Activist Petra Schurenhofer said on “It’s been a year since Israel abducted and illegally detained Dr Hussam Abu Safiya. And since then he has been languishing in an Israeli jail, being subjected to cruel and inhumane treatment. Don’t forget him. And don’t stop calling for his release.”

Abu Safiya, the 52-year-old director of Kamal Adwan Hospital, was seized on December 27, 2024 as Israel Defense Forces (IDF) troops continued their yearlong siege and raids on the facility in Beit Lahia, northern Gaza. The IDF claimed without evidence that Kamal Adwan—the last major functioning hospital in northern Gaza at the time—was a Hamas command center.

During a previous Israeli attack on Kamal Adwan, Abu Safiya’s 15-year-old son was killed in a drone strike. Abu Safiya was seriously wounded in a separate drone attack that left six pieces of shrapnel in his leg.

After his capture, Abu Safiya was first jailed at the notorious Sde Teiman prison in Israel’s Negev Desert—where dozens of detainees have died and where torture, rape, and other abuses have been reported—and then Ofer Prison in the illegally occupied West Bank.

Abu Safiya said he has endured torture by his captors—including beatings with batons and electric shocks—and suffered severe weight loss, broken ribs, and other injuries, for which he was allegedly denied adequate medical care.

A year has passed since the detention of my father,
In this white coat, he walked alone amidst death, destruction, and in front of tanks—not because he was fearless, but because his oath and his humanity were greater than any fear. He refused to abandon the children and the… pic.twitter.com/8NtuIGBeYf

— Dr. Hussam Abu Safiya (@HussamAbuSafiya) December 26, 2025

Israeli authorities deny these accusations. However, there have been many documented and otherwise credible reports of health and medical workers being tortured by Israeli forces—sometimes fatally, as in the case of Dr. Adnan al-Bursh, who headed the orthopedic department at al-Shifa Hospital in Gaza City.

According to Francesca Albanese, the United Nations special rapporteur on the occupied Palestinian territories, al-Bursh was “likely raped to death,” a fate allegedly suffered by multiple Palestinians imprisoned by Israel.

Abu Safiya remains in Israeli custody, despite having not been charged with any crimes. Israeli courts have extended his detention multiple times under so-called “unlawful combatant” legal provisions.

In January, Abu Safiya’s mother died of a heart attack that MedGlobal, the Illinois-based nonprofit for which Abu Safiya worked as lead Gaza physician, attributed to “severe sadness” over her son’s plight.

According to United Nations agencies and other experts, Israeli forces have destroyed or damaged nearly all of Gaza’s hospitals in hundreds of attacks since the Hamas-led October 7, 2023 attack on Israel. More than 1,500 Palestinian health workers have been killed.

Last year, an independent United Nations commission found that “Israel has perpetrated a concerted policy to destroy Gaza’s healthcare system as part of a broader assault on Gaza, committing war crimes and the crime against humanity of extermination with relentless and deliberate attacks on medical personnel and facilities.”

Albina Abu Safiya, the imprisoned doctor’s wife, pleaded last week: “Save my husband before it is too late. His only ‘crime’ was saving the wounded and tending to the wounds of children.”

Greta Thunberg arrested in London over ‘Palestine Action prisoners’ placard

Greta Thunberg has been arrested in London after taking part in a protest holding a sign expressing support for Palestine Action-affiliated hunger strikers. The Swedish activist, 22, arrived after a protest had begun outside the offices of an insurance company in London. She sat down with a sign saying “I support the Palestine Action prisoners. I oppose genocide.”

Two other activists are said to have earlier used repurposed fire extinguishers to cover the front of the building used by Aspen Insurance with red paint before locking themselves to it. The campaign group Prisoners for Palestine said Aspen, a global speciality insurer and reinsurer, was targeted because it provided services to Elbit Systems UK, a subsidiary of an Israeli weapons maker.

Prisoners for Palestine said the action was also carried out in solidarity with prisoners who have been on hunger strike while awaiting trial for alleged offences relating to Palestine Action before the group was banned. Eight prisoners had been on hunger strike. The two to begin the protest are now on their 52nd day and at a critical stage for their health. Three of the eight have stopped because of severe risk.

While thousands of people have been arrested over the past year at protests for holding placards saying “I support Palestine Action”, campaigners questioned why the wording of Thunberg’s sign had led to her being arrested under counter-terrorism legislation.

The demands of the hunger strikers include the granting of immediate bail, ending the ban on Palestine Action and stopping restrictions on their communications. Thunberg said in a statement: “It is up to the state to intervene and put an end to this by meeting these reasonable demands that pave the way for the freedom of all those who choose to use their rights trying to stop a genocide, something the British state has failed to do themselves.”

TRUMP CAN'T KILL HIS WAY OUT OF VENEZUELA / Lt Col Daniel Davis & Larry Johnson

Trump says Ukraine peace deal ‘closer than ever’ after meeting with Zelenskyy in Florida

Donald Trump has said a deal to end the war in Ukraine is “closer than ever” but has admitted that “thorny” questions over the future of the eastern Donbas region have yet to be resolved, after a two-hour meeting on Sunday with Volodymyr Zelenskyy in Florida. Trump said a draft agreement to end the war was nearly “95% done”. “I really think we are closer than ever with both sides,” he said, adding that the Russian president, Vladimir Putin, also wants to “see it happen”.

The US president acknowledged there were “one or two tough” outstanding issues, over territory and how the war might end and expressed sympathy with Russia not wanting a ceasefire. “You have to understand the other side,” he said. He also offered to travel to Kyiv to address Ukraine’s parliament ahead of a possible vote on a peace plan, saying he thought this would probably not be necessary. “You are welcome always,” Zelenskyy interjected.

Zelenskyy repeatedly thanked Trump and paid tribute to his US team, including the president’s envoy Steve Witkoff and son-in-law Jared Kushner.

Despite the positive optics, there were few signs that a genuine agreement was imminent. When asked about the status of the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power station – occupied since the start of Russia’s 2022 full-scale invasion – Trump gave a confused answer and said Putin was no longer bombing it. The meeting took place just hours after Trump held a lengthy phone call with Russia’s president.

Writing on Truth Social before the meeting, Trump described his one-hour-15-minute call with Putin as “good and very productive”. Asked if Putin was serious about peace, Trump replied: “I think he is.” There were no signs, however, that Russia was willing to drop any of its maximalist demands. According to Kremlin adviser Yuri Ushakov, Trump “listened carefully” on Sunday to Russia’s assessment of the conflict. Both sides agreed that a ceasefire proposed by Ukraine and Europe would only prolong the fighting “and is fraught with renewed hostilities”, Ushakov said.

Funny that the wanton genocidal slaughter of Palestinian Christians by Jewish terrorists doesn't seem to bother the Trumpsters.

US strikes on Nigeria and Syria are ‘consistent’ with policy to combat IS, Republican says

A senior Republican on the US House armed services committee has said that the country’s recent military strikes in Nigeria and Syria are consistent with American foreign policy to combat Islamic extremism that have existed across Donald Trump’s two presidential terms. Mike Turner, an Ohio congressman, said on Sunday that the strikes are a “continuation of our conflict with [the Islamic State]”.

“It’s been, you know, around the world, Iraq, Syria. You’re seeing it now in Nigeria,” Turner said. Turner denied that the strikes represent a different second-term approach to military force. With respect to the Islamic State (IS), he told ABC’s This Week, US policy is “very consistent” in defeating it whether in Iraq, Syria or “here in Nigeria”. Turner said the US is “seeing that [IS] around the world has not been defeated but will continue to be a target and something that, with our allies, we’re going to have to continue to respond to or they’re going to continue to be a threat”.

His comments came three days after the Pentagon launched a cruise missile strike on terrorist camps in north-western Nigeria during what Trump later called a “Christmas present” for IS militants in Nigeria. ...

US defense secretary Pete Hegseth said on X that Trump had made it clear that “the killing of innocent Christians in Nigeria (and elsewhere) must end”. He added that the defense department, which the Trump administration has rebranded the war department, “is always ready, so [IS] found out tonight – on Christmas. More to come.”

Mutual Aid or Mutual Assured Destruction

Pentagon Fails 8th Consecutive Audit

Two days after the U.S. Senate voted on a bipartisan basis to authorize just over $900 billion in military spending for the coming fiscal year, the chief recipient of that taxpayer money — the Department of Defense — announced it failed an audit of its books for the eighth consecutive year.

The now-predictable audit result was announced Friday by the Pentagon’s Office of Inspector General (OIG) after an examination of the agency’s roughly $4.6 trillion in assets. The OIG said it identified 26 “material weaknesses” — major flaws in internal controls over financial reports — in the Pentagon’s accounting.

Auditors also uncovered “five instances of noncompliance with laws, regulations, contracts, and grant agreements,” OIG said.

The Military Times reported that “among the shortcomings were omissions in the Joint Strike Fighter Program, the Pentagon’s multifaceted effort to develop an affordable strike aircraft for the Air Force, Marine Corps, Navy, and allied nations.”

“Auditors determined the Pentagon failed to report assets in the program’s Global Spares Pool, and did not accurately record the property,” the outlet noted.

Jules W. Hurst III, the Pentagon’s chief financial officer, said in response to the findings that the department is “committed to resolving its critical issues and achieving an unmodified audit opinion by 2028.”

The Pentagon remains the only U.S. federal agency that has yet to pass an independent, department-wide audit, as required by law. But its repeated failures to return a clean audit haven’t deterred Congress from adding to its coffers each year.

With the passage of the 2026 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), which President Donald Trump signed into law last week, Congress has backed over $1 trillion in military spending this year.

“Congress cannot continue funneling hundreds of billions of dollars to a completely unaccountable agency while American families can’t afford food or healthcare,” said Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-Wash.), who voted against the NDAA.

Trump urges Republicans to ditch filibuster rule in US Senate

Donald Trump has floated the idea of ending the filibuster – a procedural technique in Congress that allows a minority of senators to block legislation from passing – which would make pushing through his political agenda in 2026 much easier.

In an interview with Politico, the president urged Republicans in the Senate to scrap the filibuster, saying it had become an obstacle to effective governing and removing it would prevent another government shutdown and pave the way for his party to push through its legislative priorities. “The filibuster is hurting the Republican Party,” Trump told Politico. He called on Republican lawmakers to eliminate it “without question”.

If Congress were to get rid of the filibuster, Trump added, “you can do everything. You can do great health care if you get rid of the filibuster. We can do everything we want.” Scrapping the arcane-sounding legislative device is sometimes favored by the party with a majority in the Senate, but opposed by the other because it allows them to use their minority status to block legislation from passing.

Senators typically back off from proposals to end it, because they don’t want to get steamrolled by a simple majority when the balance of power shifts again. Centrists in both parties typically oppose ending the filibuster as a way to defend against partisan political excesses.

For Trump, who has 10 months before the midterm elections to push the Republican agenda along, including requiring voters to present identification, raising the issue has a more immediate purpose: preventing another government shutdown. “If you get rid of the filibuster, you’re not going to have a shutdown,” he told the outlet.

Elon Musk warns of impact of record silver prices before China limits exports

A surge in the price of silver to record highs this month has prompted a warning from Elon Musk that manufacturers could suffer the consequences. Silver has risen sharply during December, part of a precious metals rally that also pushed gold and platinum to record levels on Boxing Day.

Analysts have attributed the jump in prices to expectations of US interest rate cuts by the Federal Reserve in 2026, leading to increased demand for hard assets that protect against inflation and currency debasement.

New restrictions on silver exports from China, which begin on 1 January, have created supply fears while geopolitical worries have lifted demand for safe-haven assets. Silver hit $79 (£58) an ounce for the first time last Friday, a new peak, up from $56 at the start of December, and just $29 an ounce at the start of 2025.

“This is not good. Silver is needed in many industrial processes,” Musk posted on X. Uses for the metal include in electrification, solar power panels, electric vehicles and data centres, all areas in which demand has been rising, eating into silver inventories.

Khanna Hits Back as Silicon Valley Oligarchs Threaten Primary Challenge Over California Billionaires Tax

US Rep. Ro Khanna defended California’s proposed tax on extreme wealth Saturday after a pair of prominent Silicon Valley venture capitalists threatened to launch a primary bid for his California House seat.

The proposal, which advocates are gathering signatures to place on the ballot in 2026, would impose a one-time 5% tax on those with net worths over $1 billion to recoup about $90 billion in Medicaid funds stripped from the state by this year’s Republican budget law. The roughly 200 billionaires affected would have five years to pay the tax.

While higher taxes on the superrich are overwhelmingly popular with Americans, the proposal has rankled many of California’s wealthiest residents, as well as California’s Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom, who said earlier this month that he’s “adamantly” against the measure.

On Friday, the New York Times reported that two of the valley’s biggest powerbrokers—venture capitalist and top Trump administration ally Peter Thiel and Google co-founder Larry Page—were threatening to reduce their ties to California in response to the tax proposal.

This has been a common refrain from elites faced with proposed tax increases, though data suggests they rarely follow through on their threats to bail on cities and states, even when those hikes are implemented. Meanwhile, the American Prospect has pointed out that the one-time tax would still apply to those who moved out of the Golden State.

Khanna (D-Calif.), who is both a member of the House’s progressive faction and a longtime darling of the tech sector, has increasingly sparred with industry leaders in recent years over their reactionary stances on labor rights, regulation, and taxation.

In a post on X, the congressman reacted with derision at the threats of billionaire flight: “Peter Thiel is leaving California if we pass a 1% tax on billionaires for five years to pay for healthcare for the working class facing steep Medicaid cuts. I echo what [former President Franklin D. Roosevelt] said with sarcasm of economic royalists when they threatened to leave, ‘I will miss them very much.’”

Casado, who donated to Khanna’s 2024 reelection campaign according to OpenSecrets, complained that “Ro has done a speed run, alienating every moderate I know who has supported him, including myself.”

“Beyond being totally out of touch with [the moderate] faction of his base, he’s devolved into an obnoxious jerk,” Casado continued. “At least that makes voting him the fuck out all the more gratifying.”

Casado’s post received a reply from another former Khanna donor, Garry Tan, the CEO of the tech startup accelerator Y Combinator.

“Time to primary him,” Tan said of Khanna.

Tan, a self-described centrist Democrat, has never run for office before. But he is notorious for his social media tirades against local progressives in San Francisco and was one of the top financial backers of the corporate-led push to oust the city’s liberal former district attorney, Chesa Boudin, in 2022.

Casado replied: “Count me in. Happy to be involved at any level.”

Progressive commentator Krystal Ball marveled that “Tech oligarchs are now openly conspiring against Ro Khanna because he dared to back a modest wealth tax.”

So far, neither Casado nor Tan has hinted at any concrete plans to challenge Khanna in 2026. If they did, defeating him would likely be a tall order—since his sophomore election in 2018, a primary challenger has never come within 30 points of unseating him.

But Khanna still felt the need to respond to the brooding tech royals. He noted that he has “supported a modest wealth tax since the day I ran in 2016,” which prompted another angry retort from Casado, who accused the congressman of “antagonizing the people who made your district the amazing place it is” with a tax on billionaires.

Khanna hit back at his critics with a lengthy defense of not just the wealth tax, but his conception of what he calls “pro-innovation progressivism.”

“My district is $18 trillion, nearly one-third of the US stock market in a 50-mile radius. We have five companies with a market cap over $1 trillion,” Khanna said. “If I can stand up for a billionaire tax, this is not a hard position for 434 other [House] members or 100 senators.”

“The seminal innovation in tech is done by thousands, often with public funds,” Khanna continued. “Yes, we need entrepreneurs to commercialize disruptive innovation... But the idea that they would not start companies to make billions, or take advantage of an innovation cluster, if there is a 1-2% tax on their staggering wealth defies common sense and economic theory.”

“We cannot have a nation with extreme concentration of wealth in a few places, but where 70% of Americans believe the American dream is dead and healthcare, childcare, housing, education is unaffordable,” he concluded. “What will stifle American innovation, what will make us fall behind China, is if we see further political dysfunction and social unrest, if we fail to cultivate the talent in every American and in every city and town... So, yes, a billionaire tax is good for American innovation, which depends on a strong and thriving American democracy.”

Bernie Sanders criticizes AI as ‘the most consequential technology in humanity’

US senator Bernie Sanders amplified his recent criticism of artificial intelligence on Sunday, explicitly linking the financial ambition of “the richest people in the world” to economic insecurity for millions of Americans – and calling for a potential moratorium on new datacenters.

Sanders, a Vermont independent who caucuses with the Democratic party, said on CNN’s State of the Union that he was “fearful of a lot” when it came to AI. And the senator called it “the most consequential technology in the history of humanity” that will “transform” the US and the world in ways that had not been fully discussed.

“If there are no jobs and humans won’t be needed for most things, how do people get an income to feed their families, to get healthcare or to pay the rent?” Sanders said. “There’s not been one serious word of discussion in the Congress about that reality.”

Days from being scheduled to help swear New York mayor-elect and democratic socialist Zohran Mamdani into office, Sanders said “the richest people in the world” were pushing the technology. He singled out tech moguls Elon Musk, Mark Zuckerberg, Jeff Bezos and Peter Thiel while questioning their motives.

“You think they’re staying up nights worrying about working people and how this technology will impact those people?” Sanders said. “They are not. They are doing it to get richer and even more powerful.”

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US voters linking climate crisis to rising bills despite Trump’s ‘green scam’ claims

Most Americans now connect the worsening climate crisis with their cost of living pressures, with clear majorities also disagreeing with moves by the Trump administration to gut climate research and halt windfarms, new polling has found. About 65% of registered voters in the US think that global heating is affecting the cost of living, according to the polling by Yale University.

Extreme weather events such as floods, droughts, storms and heatwaves, exacerbated by the climate crisis, are taking a toll on food production, with recent spikes in the cost of coffee and chocolate blamed by experts, at least in part, on global heating. Meanwhile, many Americans have faced rising home electricity costs and steep increases in home insurance premiums, with both of these areas also influenced by the climate crisis and the Trump administration’s decision to choke off solar and wind power, often the cheapest source of energy.

There has also been a broad backlash in many communities against new datacenters, which have been championed by the administration and the tech industry for advancing artificial intelligence but attacked by critics for causing planet-heating emissions and raising power bills.

Since taking office, the Trump administration has set about dismantling key environmental rules, firing federal scientists, removing public information on the climate crisis and explicitly backing the fossil fuel industry over cleaner forms of energy. The president has said that renewables are a “con job” and a “scam” and has attempted to ban certain solar and wind farms. This agenda is deeply unpopular with a clear majority of Americans, the Yale polling suggests, with nearly eight in 10 registered voters opposing restrictions on climate information and research, while the same proportion of voters reject Trump’s demand that the Federal Emergency Management Agency (Fema) be eliminated. A further 65% of voters disagree with Trump’s move to block new offshore windfarms.

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Also of Interest

Here are some articles of interest, some which defied fair-use abstraction.

Israeli Army Pushes Deeper into Gaza’s ‘Yellow Line,’ Displacing Civilians

Israeli Police Release Settler Filmed Running ATV Over Praying Palestinian in West Bank

Israeli Defense Minister Vows Permanent Israeli Occupation of Gaza, Establishment of Settlements

Epstein, Israel, and the CIA: How the Iran-Contra Planes Landed at Les Wexner's Base

“What changed with the German Minister of Defense, and why did it change so fast?”

Facts Clash With Trump Claim of Hitting ISIS and Shielding Nigerian Christians

US strikes on IS targets in Nigeria may only fan the flames of insurgent violence

US Missiles Hit Two Nigerian Villages Far From Intended Target: Nigerian Government

Status of the US Dollar as Global Reserve Currency: USD Share Drops to Lowest Since 1994

The 2025 US economy – in charts: rising prices, hiring slowdown, rollercoaster growth

Kennedy Center president demands $1m from musician who canceled Christmas Eve show

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A Little Night Music

Walter Vinson - Your Friends Gonna Use It Too - Part 1

Walter Vinson - Overtime Blues

Walter Vinson - Mad Dog Blues

Walter Vinson - Sheiks Special

Walter Vinson - Black Widow Spider

Walter Vinson - When The Breath Bids The Body Goodbye

Walter Vinson - I Ain't Gonna Have It

Walter Vinson - Rats Been On My Cheese

Walter Vinson - Every Dog Must Have His Day

Bo Carter & Walter Vinson - Times Is Tight Like That

Doc & Merle Watson with Michael Coleman - Sitting on Top of the World (W Vinson & L Chatmon)

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