The Evening Blues - 9-28-26
Hey! Good Evening!
This evening's music features rockabilly singer Dale Hawkins. Enjoy!
Dale Hawkins (Roy Buchanan Guitar) - My Babe
"People ask me to predict the future, when all I want to do is prevent it. Better yet, build it. Predicting the future is much too easy, anyway. You look at the people around you, the street you stand on, the visible air you breathe, and predict more of the same. To hell with more. I want better."
-- Ray Bradbury
News and Opinion
Tech Plutocrats Cannot Lead Us Into A Healthy Future
Tech plutocrats are the high-budget expression of the “everyone is twelve now” theory. You wanna go to Mars? Of course you do, you’re twelve. You think you can merge your consciousness with machinery and unlock the key to immortality? Hell yeah my twelve year-old homie. You’re gonna invent an Artificial Superintelligence God who will solve all our problems? Bless your twelve year-old heart.
Their visions for the future of humanity are never particularly wise or intelligent. It’s just a bunch of drugged-up rich guys using their vast fortunes to chart a course for our species that would sound totally awesome to the average preadolescent boy.
You ever hear about Jeff Bezos’ vision for our future? He brings it up once in a while. He wants to ship most of humanity offworld and have us all living in these giant spinning space tubes called O’Neill cylinders while only a few lucky individuals get to remain on humanity’s home planet. It’s true, look it up.
This is the best these freaks can come up with. Transhumanism. Space colonization. Virtual reality. ASI. Immortality. These are all visions which revolve around escape. Escaping from the human condition. Escaping from our planet. Escaping from reality. Running, running, running away in a mad scramble to get anywhere but here.
These aren’t positive visions for the future, they’re signs of deep psychological immaturity. They’re the symptoms of an inability to be with what is. Whenever you hear these guys bloviating about transcending our humanity or colonizing space they’re just telling you they’ve got a lot of unresolved early childhood trauma which led them to construct an entire personality around avoidance and restlessness.
They don’t know how to be at peace. Not with themselves, and not with the world. These are very emotionally primitive individuals. They are not wise. They are not kind. They are not happy. They are not even especially smart. They just have a particular kind of cleverness which has enabled them to succeed as parasitic middle men siphoning wealth off of other people’s labor in the specific type of dystopia we happen to live in.
And yet these are the men we’re allowing to rule our world. These are the people to whom we have handed the steering wheel of human destiny. A bunch of emotionally stunted manchilds who are drowning in a nonstop internal deluge of shame and inadequacy and unresolved mommy issues.
These are the men who have become our kings, because capitalism elevates whoever is wounded enough to do whatever it takes to claw their way to the top.
You trust these guys to shepherd us into a healthy world? They can’t even be here now, at peace in their own skins. Mainstream culture worships these people because they have a lot of money, but they’re walking train wrecks.
This isn’t going to cut it. We can’t led these infantile narcissists lead humanity into the future. We’ve got to create a better system for ourselves.
Cancelling Billionaires Before They Cancel Us
IDF Liar CAUGHT RED HANDED by Glenn Greenwald and Norm Finkelstein
It took all day to clear a section of road in the Tel al-Hawa neighbourhood in Gaza City. At the end of it, Ahmed Alyan, a UN engineer, was exhausted, surrounded by mountains of rubble despite the day’s work. “I feel as if we are holding a spoon and trying to empty the sea,” Alyan said, beads of sweat trickling down his forehead after a long, hot summer day. Alyan is part of a World Food Programme (WFP) team who have been working on Beirut Street, once a busy main thoroughfare lined with shops, offices and homes and filled with traffic and people. But now it is virtually deserted.
The road was blocked by piles of rubble, stones and the wreckage of destroyed shops. Nearby, a tower stood tilted after some of its concrete foundations were damaged, while displaced families continued to live inside. In some parts of the road, sewage flowed from the ground after the drainage system was damaged and blocked by Israeli bombardment. The UN estimates that removing the bulk of the rubble in the Gaza Strip could take at least seven to 10 years and cost billions of dollars. That would make the removal of war debris in Gaza one of the largest rubble-clearance operations in modern history.
“The estimate of the total amount of rubble in Gaza is 61m tonnes. It is approximately 20 times the amount of rubble generated in all wars across the world over the last 18 years,” said Jaco Cilliers, the UN Development Programme’s special representative in Palestine. To make things more difficult, the Israeli authorities have banned the necessary equipment from entering Gaza on the grounds that almost any aid that is not food or medicine could be “dual-use” and could somehow benefit Hamas.
Initially, the WFP work was limited to removing debris from the roads and pushing it to the sides to create a passage for trucks. But the sheer quantity was overwhelming, and continuing Israeli bombardment during the nearly year-old ceasefire kept adding to the gargantuan task. Some roads had to be reopened several times. Meanwhile, the so-called yellow line, a demarcation established at the start of the ceasefire last October, keeps creeping forward as Israeli troops seize more of the territory. The area still accessible to people and aid workers is barely 30% of the whole Gaza Strip, making the problem of what to do with the rubble even more acute.
Seyed M. Marandi: Israel, Saudi Arabia and the US: All-in on War?
Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich has called for Israel to “go to war” in the Israeli-occupied West Bank in the same way it did in Gaza, as the Israeli military imposed a complete closure of the West Bank for one week, further restricting the movement of Palestinians.
When asked what he meant, Smotrich referenced an Israeli military campaign in the northern West Bank refugee camps of Jenin, Tulkarem, and Nur Shams that began in January 2025 and involved the forced displacement of more than 30,000 Palestinians from their homes. The refugee camps remain empty today as the residents haven’t been allowed to return, and many of the roads and buildings in the camps have been destroyed.
“We’ve already done it. There are three refugee camps there that are empty,” Smotrich said. He framed the forced evacuation as a way to “protect” the population, but Smotrich has been explicit about his desire for more Palestinian land and said in the interview that he wants to annex swathes of territory in Gaza and Lebanon.
Prof. Jeffrey Sachs : REACTION: Was Trump Bored at Meeting with Xi?
UN adds 61 firms to settlements blacklist over alleged human rights violations against Palestinians
The UN human rights office has added 61 more companies to a blacklist of firms that it says are involved in violating Palestinian human rights through business ties to Israeli settlements in the occupied West Bank. The vast majority of the total 214 companies, which are based in 11 countries, are Israeli. Five of the 158 companies listed last year were removed in the latest update.
The blacklist, first published in 2020, was born of a vote by the UN’s human rights council, which has no ability to force companies to act. Its main goal is to name and shame businesses with ties to the settlements. It is unclear how the inclusion on the list has affected the companies financially.
“This report is another reminder to companies that they have human rights responsibilities and are expected to conduct due diligence to ensure that they do not become involved in human rights violations or abuses,” said Volker Türk, the UN human rights chief, in a statement.
Pentagon Kept Iran Missile Strike on Marines Concealed
Battle Over Illegal E1 Settlement in Occupied West Bank Escalates a Month Before Israeli Election
Israel’s far-right finance minister and other settlers living in the illegally occupied West Bank fumed on Sunday after their country’s attorney general pushed a key deadline for the widely condemned E1 project until after the Israeli Knesset election.
Although the International Court of Justice, plus governments and human rights groups around the world, have concluded that all Israeli settlements in the occupied Palestinian territory violate international law, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government has charged ahead with expansion plans, granting final approval for the building of 3,401 housing units in the E1 area last year.
Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich had celebrated that decision, declaring that the project “buries the idea of a Palestinian state,” as it would split the West Bank in two by connecting Jerusalem and the settlement Ma’ale Adumim. While signing a related agreement a year ago, Netanyahu similarly said that “there will be no Palestinian state.”
Despite an ongoing legal challenge to the E1 plan from Bedouin Palestinians who live in the area and Israeli peace groups, Israel’s Ministry of Construction and Housing last month issued a tender to build seven residential compounds with 1,234 units, giving contractors until October 19—a week before the October 27 election—to submit bids.
“This is a last-minute maneuver that is part of the scorched-earth policy the government is pursuing at the end of its term to secure long years of conflict and bloodshed for Israel,” the Israeli watchdog Peace Now said at the time. “The government is trying to sign contracts with contractors before the elections so that it will be much harder for the next government to cancel the construction.”
The office of Israeli Attorney General Gali Baharav-Miara this week ordered a monthlong postponement of the deadline for bids, “so that it will fall after Election Day, thereby reducing the concern that the tender could be used for prohibited election propaganda.”
Smotrich on Sunday accused her of “trying to stop the construction in E1” and “interfering in the election campaign” to help Gadi Eisenkot, the Yashar party leader who could lead a coalition government that ousts Likud’s Netanyahu, depending on the results.
The finance minister called on Supreme Court Justice Noam Sohlberg, who chairs the Central Elections Committee (CEC), to intervene to “ensure that the attorney general and her people do not turn into active players in the election campaign in an attempt to back up the left, prevent the right from forming a government, and to enable the establishment of a Palestinian state that would endanger the existence of the state of Israel.”
The E1 settlement plan is literally just a plan to progress the forced displacement and ethnic cleansing of Palestinians.
— American Muslims for Palestine (@AMPalestine) August 24, 2026
Ma’ale Adumim also challenged the attorney general’s move on Sunday, with a petition to the High Court of Justice. Mayor Guy Yifrach said that “if the claim is that continuing the tender is political, I say exactly the opposite: Stopping it now is an intervention with political implications.”
“The E1 plan is already facing heavy international pressure, and developers and contractors need certainty,” Yifrach added. “Is it not enough that outside Israel they are trying to deter them from the project, now we are adding uncertainty from within our home as well?”
Earlier this month, the United Kingdom, France, and Canada jointly announced bans on imports from illegal Israeli settlements, and partnered with nine other nations—Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Ireland, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Spain, and Sweden—for a statement that describes the situation in the West Bank as “rapidly deteriorating amid unprecedented levels of settler violence and settlement expansion, including the unacceptable decision to publish tenders for the E1 settlement project.”
Then, 19 US Senate Democrats on Wednesday introduced a bill to sanction people or companies that facilitate the construction for Israeli settlers in the E1 area, with Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), one of the lead co-sponsors, condemning the project as “a move towards de facto annexation of the West Bank.”
Sen. Chris Coons (D-Del.), another lead sponsor and longtime supporter of Israel, said on social media Friday that “the Netanyahu campaign to extinguish the possibility of a future Palestinian state by building Israeli settlements in the E1 area of the West Bank must end. I’m leading a new effort to sanction those involved in its development and preserve a future pathway for peace.”
Yes, it’s a big deal that Coons, in line to be SFRC chair/ranking member, is leading this.
Yes, these sanctions should’ve been imposed long ago.
Yes, sanctions should be imposed on all settlements in occupied territory, not just E1. They’re all illegal.
— Matt Duss (@mattduss) September 24, 2026
In addition to pushing for the expansion of settlements in the West Bank, since the Hamas-led October 7, 2023 attack on Israel, Netanyahu has overseen a genocidal war against Palestinians in the Gaza Strip. Despite a ceasefire agreement reached nearly a year ago, Israeli attacks continue, and the official death toll keeps rising, topping 74,000 on Sunday.
The bleak milestone came two days after The New York Times corroborated Haaretz’s recent reporting that in September 2023, United Arab Emirates President Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan warned Netanyahu about now-deceased Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar’s plans “for a major event” targeting Israel. The Israeli leader has denied those reports, and even threatened to sue Haaretz.
However, in a signal that Netanyahu and his allies are worried about the upcoming election, the CEC this week voted to disqualify all Arab-majority political parties from the election, while declining to take similar action against Smotrich’s Religious Zionism, far-right National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir’s Otzma Yehudit, and Zehut, founded by Moshe Feiglin, a former Likud member. The Supreme Court is set to review the disqualifications this week.
Meanwhile, Eisenkot suggested this weekend that the barred parties would not be part of any government he leads. As Haaretz summarized, he said that “all coalition partners would have to recognize Israel as a Jewish and democratic state, uphold the values of the Declaration of Independence, support mandatory military service, and recognize Hamas as a terrorist organization that must be destroyed.”
Yoav Segalovich from the United Arab List’s Knesset slate responded that anyone seeking to lead the country must “show leadership and not fold in the face of the Likud’s scare campaign,” adding: “Israel needs deep change and genuine partnership, through courageous leadership. Eisenkot will not have a government without the United Arab List.”
Col. Larry Wilkerson & Larry Johnson: Trump’s Rhetoric Crosses the Line— Nuclear War Now
New York Times Affirms Haaretz Report: Netanyahu Was Warned About Oct. 7
As Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu returned to Israel after using his United Nations speech “to repeat baseless lies meant to sanitize his genocide of Palestinians” in the Gaza Strip, The New York Times on Friday corroborated Haaretz’s recent reporting that the Israeli leader was warned about the Hamas-led October 7, 2023 attack that resulted in the war.
Haaretz reported earlier this month that during a September 2023 phone call, United Arab Emirates President Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan told Netanyahu about now-deceased Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar’s plans “for a major event” targeting Israel.
Netanyahu not only denied receiving that notice but also sent a “warning letter,” threatening to file a libel lawsuit against the Israeli newspaper and journalists Shlomi Eldar and Ruth Yuval. In response, Haaretz said that it stood by their work.
A trio of Times journalists backed up that exposé on Friday, reporting that “a person who said they had spoken with Sheikh Mohammed and another person who said they had been briefed by someone on the call between the two leaders told The New York Times that the Emirati leader had secretly reported to Mr. Netanyahu that Hamas was considering a major attack.”
“The warning from the Emirati leader, however, never reached the leaders of Israel’s security establishment, according to five former senior Israeli officials. Mr. Netanyahu gathered his security chiefs days later, on October 1, 2023, for a meeting about the situation in the Gaza Strip, and never mentioned the warning,” reported the US-based paper, which reviewed meeting minutes.
The minutes show that Netanyahu “pushed back when some security officials said that Israel should consider military strikes against senior Hamas leaders in Gaza who were overseeing attacks against Israelis in the West Bank,” and suggested such action “might sabotage the prospect of Saudi Arabia establishing diplomatic relations with Israel,” according to the Times.
While the Emirati foreign ministry and Netanyahu’s office did not respond to the Times’ requests for comment, the paper also revealed that months after the reported September 2023 phone call, the UAE’s president told then-Central Intelligence Agency Director William Burns that “he had spoken to Mr. Netanyahu about a looming threat of violence in the West Bank or the Gaza Strip carried out by Hamas,” according to someone familiar with that discussion. The paper’s sources were granted anonymity.
The Times’ reporting came just days after an Emirati source commented on the Haaretz article. As the Israeli paper detailed:
“UAE discusses security matters with other countries through the relevant entities, and does not discuss such details at the level of national leaders,” the source told UAE state-owned newspaper The National. He did not deny that the two leaders spoke, nor did he refute Haaretz’s report.
In 2024, the Financial Times reported that The National is owned by Sheikh Mansour bin Zayed Al Nahyan, the UAE’s vice president and the president’s brother. It also reported that the site aligns with the government’s position and practices self-censorship on issues deemed sensitive or problematic by the authorities.
Noting that Netanyahu reportedly declined to pass the warning along to his intelligence agencies, investigative journalist Eli Clifton, a co-founder and senior adviser at the US-based Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft, asked: “Why? Did he welcome the attack as an opportunity to wage war?”
The New York Times is now confirming @haaretz’s reports that Netanyahu was warned of an impending Hamas attack before Oct 7 but didn’t pass along the intelligence.
Why?
Did he welcome the attack as an opportunity to wage war? https://t.co/0N17weHXD9
— Eli Clifton (@EliClifton) September 25, 2026
Mehdi Hasan, who founded the outlet Zeteo, similarly wrote “wonder why” on social media.
Journalist Zaid Jilani declared that “Netanyahu not only has unleashed vicious crimes onto Palestinians, but he failed his own people.”
Israel’s next parliamentary elections are scheduled for October 27.
Ryan Bohl, a senior Middle East and North Africa analyst at risk intelligence firm RANE, said that it is “as close to an October surprise as one gets in Israel. If I was a betting man, I’d be betting against Netanyahu being next PM.”
In a series of decisions seen as signs that Netanyahu and his allies are worried about holding on to power, Israel’s Central Elections Committee—which is chaired by a Supreme Court justice but dominated by members of the Knesset’s governing coalition—just disqualified all Arab-majority political parties and multiple candidates, while rejecting similar petitions for right-wing parties.
Israel’s Supreme Court is set to review those decisions next week, and may overturn some or all of them before the elections.
While Netanyahu’s allies on the committee tried to bar potential challengers from running, the prime minister briefly traveled to New York City to speak at the UN General Assembly—despite being the subject of a 2024 International Criminal Court arrest warrant issued over Israel’s decimation of Gaza, which human rights groups and scholars have denounced as genocide.
As Netanyahu claimed in his speech that “Israel didn’t commit genocide,” but rather “prevented genocide,” at least hundreds of protesters filled New York’s streets and argued that the Israeli leader “needs to be tried in The Hague.”
Iran Says Ready For 'DOOMSDAY' War, REJECTING Trump Negotiation
UN ambassador Waltz says Iran was not negotiating ‘in good faith’ to end war
The Trump administration’s ambassador to the United Nations said the US rejected Iran’s proposal to end the ongoing war there because Iranian negotiators “were asking for everything up front”. Echoing comments by Donald Trump on Saturday, the president’s UN ambassador Mike Waltz told CNN’s State of the Union on Sunday that Iran had asked for relief “from billions and billions of sanctions that are going into place” as part of an economic blockade on Iran. The blockade is aimed at putting pressure on Iran to stop its attacks on vessels in the strait of Hormuz.
“They were asking for everything up front with a promise that they would then talk,” Waltz said on State of the Union. “The president is just not confident that the Iranians are coming in good faith and that we will truly negotiate the end of their nuclear program.” Trump said on Saturday that he had rejected Iran’s peace plan, proposed at the recent UN general assembly in New York, arguing that desperation was driving the Iranians’ push for an agreement on the key waterway. “They want to make a deal to open the Hormuz strait immediately because they’re losing so badly,” Trump said.
Trump said the US was “winning tremendously” and had “total control of the Hormuz strait”. In comments to Axios on Sunday, Trump said he expected more talks with Iran during the upcoming week. “They want to make a deal, but it is not the deal that I want to make,” the outlet quoted the president as saying. “It is what we would have maybe agreed to a year ago. They overplayed their hand.”
Iran on Sunday insisted that only diplomacy can solve its conflict with the US and Israel. “Our conditions are clear, and any move toward reopening the strait of Hormuz is contingent on these conditions being met,” the Iranian foreign minister, Abbas Araghchi, posted on social media. “Only a negotiated solution can get them out of this deadlock.” Araghchi also appeared on NBC’s Meet the Press on Sunday, saying his country is prepared to resume fighting with the US but has not yet abandoned diplomacy after Trump rejected Iran’s peace proposal. “We are fully prepared for the war to be resumed,” Araghchi said. “We stand firm in the face of any new aggression, even if it comes to a doomsday war. At the same time, we stand ready for diplomacy. It is up to President Trump to choose.”
Dr. Trita Parsi : Trump's Threats Strengthen Iran
Trump’s ICE Wasted Millions of Dollars on Deadly Immigrant Detention Drive: Audit
The Trump administration’s deadly immigration crackdown has not only resulted in widespread abuse of detained immigrants, it has also wasted millions of dollars on facilities and services that were never used, were quickly abandoned, or were far more expensive than necessary, according to an audit published Thursday by the Government Accountability Office.
The nonpartisan congressional watchdog found that US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) has poured billions of dollars into six detention expansion initiatives since January 2025 without the comprehensive planning needed to determine whether the investments were necessary, affordable, or capable of meeting federal detention standards.
“ICE pursued this and the other initiatives without necessary analysis and planning,” the GAO said, concluding that the agency’s approach has already resulted in “millions of dollars of waste.”
NEW: A government watchdog report says ICE spent more than $20M on costs it can’t recover after buying warehouses for detention space without the necessary analysis and planning.
A new GAO report says ICE bought 11 warehouses for roughly $1.07 BILLION between January and April 2026 as it rapidly expanded detention capacity—but now intends to sell seven of them.
Those seven warehouses cost roughly $707M to purchase. GAO says ICE also spent more than $20M on costs it can’t recover, including security and other expenses associated with the properties.
And the warehouses are just one example highlighted by investigators.
GAO says DOD spent $2.85M assembling 5,000 tent beds at Guantanamo Bay that were dismantled without ever housing detainees after DHS determined they didn’t meet detention standards.
At Camp East Montana/Fort Bliss, ICE also paid about $7.1M for meals it didn’t need.
The spending came amid a massive expansion of immigration detention: ICE’s detained population increased 71%—from 39,314 people on Jan. 20, 2025 to 67,180 on July 30, 2026.
GAO says ICE pursued six detention-expansion initiatives without the necessary analysis and planning—and had already scaled back four of them by July.
GAO says ICE needs to develop a comprehensive strategic plan for expanding detention capacity—including analyzing costs, needs and alternatives before committing taxpayer dollars to future projects.
— Ali Bradley (@AliBradleyTV) September 24, 2026
The report contends that “urgent planning” is “needed to avoid further waste of taxpayer dollars.”
Heather MacLeod, director of Homeland Security and Justice at GAO, said Friday that “we just saw a real lack of planning overall.”
“The lack of planning has really led to stops and starts which have ultimately resulted in waste,” she added.
Among the most striking examples highlighted in the report is the administration’s purchase of 11 warehouses for roughly $1.07 billion, with plans to convert them into detention centers. ICE subsequently decided to sell seven of the properties. More than $20 million had already been spent on costs—including security and zoning assessments—that cannot be recovered.
In May, More Perfect Union detailed how members of Trump’s inner circle were cashing in on the warehouse-buying spree.
The GAO also exposed spending for almost no apparent use at Guantánamo Bay. For example, after Trump ordered officials to expand immigration detention capacity at the US military base in Cuba, the Pentagon assembled tents intended to accommodate thousands of people. However, DHS subsequently determined that the tents failed to meet ICE detention standards and they were dismantled, costing approximately $2.85 million.
Meanwhile, an average of just 16 immigrants per day were detained at Guantánamo during fiscal year 2026. Pentagon and State Department inspectors general had previously found that roughly $68 million had been committed for immigration detention there between October 2024 and May 2026, while ICE separately committed approximately $43 million through June 2026.
The report also highlights the now-shuttered Florida facility commonly known as Alligator Alcatraz. The Federal Emergency Management Agency awarded Florida a $608.4 million detention support grant, even though there was no agreement or contract authorizing the facility to detain immigrants, according to senators who requested an investigation into the matter.
The GAO’s findings came after Congress approved an unprecedented $45 billion for ICE detention expansion under Trump’s so-called One Big Beautiful Bill Act, a boon for the private prison industry. Yet the agency still lacks a comprehensive strategic plan governing how many beds it needs, where they should be located, or how to account for detainees’ medical and other needs.
This, as more than 50 people have died in ICE custody during Trump’s second term.
ICE has also failed to adequately consider long-term affordability, according to the new report. As of July, the agency had spent $2.5 billion purchasing warehouses and detention facilities but had only estimated operating costs for the first three years—even though some of the funding supporting the expansion expires after fiscal year 2029.
A separate GAO investigation published in June found millions in waste and serious safety and operational deficiencies at Camp East Montana at Fort Bliss in El Paso, Texas. The nation’s largest immigrant detention facility opened last year under a $1.3 billion contract.
Responding Friday to the new GAO report, a DHS spokesperson told CBS News that ICE is “working at turbo speed on cost-effective and innovative ways to deliver on the American people’s mandate for mass deportations of criminal illegal aliens.”
Senate Minority Whip Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) said on social media in response to the GAO revelations: “Remember when Donald Trump promised to get rid of ‘waste, fraud, and abuse’ in Washington? Well, GAO continues to uncover incompetence and waste at the highest levels of ICE.”
“Americans are outraged at ill-conceived immigration detention projects,” he added, “and it’s time to hold DHS and ICE responsible.”
OpenAI halts training of latest models as reports mount of AI agents going rogue
OpenAI said it has paused training of its latest artificial intelligence models as reports of AI agents going rogue mount. The decision to halt development came just hours after the company disclosed Friday that it was reviewing several incidents from the summer in which OpenAI agents searching federal government websites acted in unexpected ways beyond what was asked of them while gathering and distributing information.
Separately, the AI evaluator Transluce said agents that appeared to come from OpenAI tried unsuccessfully to hack into a US Department of Education website, a detail that OpenAI has not confirmed. OpenAI said in a statement that it will resume training “only when we are confident that we have additional safeguards” in place, adding that it expects it will have to “hit pause” again as AI develops and other issues emerge.
Last week Australia’s prime minister, Anthony Albanese, revealed an OpenAI agent had breached the government’s national healthcare system – but said no sensitive information had been compromised. AI labs are facing pressure from lawmakers and tech experts to slow development so they can build guardrails to stop agents from acting on their own, hacking websites and disclosing nonpublic information. The heads of both OpenAI and rival Anthropic have called for a slowdown too.
The latest OpenAI incidents did not appear to involve the disclosure of any nonpublic information but were concerning enough for the company to warn the federal agencies involved. In the education department incident, OpenAI agents found API “developer keys” to access government data, though ultimately only publicly available information was gathered. In another case involving the securities and exchange commission, agents found information freely available to all but then posted it elsewhere on the internet, an act that went beyond what they were instructed to do.
Blanche defends Trump’s White House media ban: ‘It is a privilege, not a right’
Donald Trump’s attorney general Todd Blanche argued on Sunday that the administration was permitted to ban three news outlets from the White House because “it is a privilege and not a right to be there”. Appearing on the ABC News program This Week during the second week of the White House’s dispute over press credentialing and access, Blanche also said that the administration took the decision to ban CNN, MS Now and Politico beginning on 19 September because the president was “sick and tired” of what he considered to be those media outlets’ inaccurate reporting.
Blanche offered no evidence for his claim that the outlets’ reporting was inaccurate, rather than simply unflattering to the president. Pressed by the interviewer, Martha Raddatz, to point to a report the administration objected to, Blanche seemed to suggest that any negative reporting about Trump must be inaccurate. “Wait, give you an example of when CNN doesn’t report accurately? You cannot be asking me that,” Blanche replied. “There’s not even a real dispute that the information coming out of CNN and some of these other networks is wholly and completely, almost 100 percent negative toward the president.”
On Thursday, a judge issued a temporary restraining order requiring the White House to temporarily restore the credentials of affected journalists, and they were allowed entry to the executive complex. But on Saturday, CNN said its journalists were barred from joining the press pool traveling with the president on Air Force One. “The president hasn’t denied access,” Blanche told ABC. “That’s not the right way to describe it.”
The continuing dispute between the administration and the White House press corps had appeared to be resolving before CNN was again blocked from providing pool TV coverage of Trump on Saturday. That was after outlets stood in solidarity with CNN, MS Now and Politico by briefly refusing to provide any pool TV feeds of the president. On ABC, Blanche said it wasn’t unusual for a news outlet to not be allowed on to the president’s plane. “The White House routinely decides who can go on Air Force One,” Blanche said. “This wasn’t a one-time denial of CNN. There’s all kinds of times when certain reporters are not flying or are flying. It’s not unusual, and as a matter of fact, it’s common every time the president travels that he and his team decide which reporters get to travel with the president.”
What Blanche did not explain is that, before Trump’s second term, the choice of which correspondents were part of the pool covering presidential travel was left to the White House Correspondents’ Association and the broadcast networks that take turns providing camera crews. After Trump returned to office last year, the White House took control of which outlets would be permitted in the Oval Office, or on Air Force One, leading to increased access for partisan, pro-Trump journalists. Blanche repeated the administration’s position that the affected three outlets’ reporting amounted to a “national security problem”. Raddatz reminded Blanche that Trump himself said ha had banned CNN, MS Now and Politico, because, he said, “they purposely write negative news, and they do that because they want to diminish the Republicans and a Republican administration”.
Trump GASLIGHTS With Anti War Midterm Ad
Trump allies could use midterms ‘counting window’ to disrupt results, experts warn
Election experts have warned Donald Trump’s administration could use the crucial hours and days after November’s midterm elections to disrupt the results after struggling to enforce a crackdown on voting. With less than six weeks remaining until polls close, and control of US Congress in the balance, the post-election “counting window” is seen as as a particularly vulnerable moment by former US federal government officials.
While the US president’s bid to impose sweeping restrictions on mail-in ballots was rejected by the supreme court earlier this month, there is apprehension that Trump and his allies could use the period while votes are counted to amplify unfounded allegations in a bid to challenge results that don’t go their way.
“I think because the administration has lost so many of their attempts to disrupt the normal process in court, that they are going to use the claim of foreign interference at the end of voting days to either seize equipment or to seize ballots, whether they’re legally justified to do so or not,” Caitlin Durkovich, a former deputy homeland security adviser for resilience and response on the national security council, told a briefing staged by the Brennan Center for Justice earlier this week.
Some states take days – even weeks, in California’s case – to complete a count of votes after an election. Control of the House of Representatives and Senate may hinge on results in states with a delayed result. “That period, that waiting time, is where doubt begins to surface,” Durkovich said on Tuesday. “And when it is then amplified by foreign actors and, frankly, by domestic actors, it starts to cause distrust in the integrity of the process.”
Datacenter developers accused of skirting key US pollution rules
Datacenter developers are manipulating the EPA’s air pollution permitting process to avoid emission controls and scrutiny of their projects, environmental advocates allege. Companies need federal permits to emit a range of pollutants. In their permit applications, some in big tech are avoiding “major” reviews by dividing their emissions sources into separate, multiple “minor” sources that require less regulatory oversight, the advocates say. This helps datacenters avoid public scrutiny, and permit applications are typically approved much faster. It also likely saves tech companies money, and avoids the hassle and cost of potential pollution controls, advocates say. Datacenters can be significant sources of nitrogen oxide, ozone, heavy metals, particulate matter, greenhouse gas and other dangerous air pollutants.
In North Carolina, Amazon and utility giant Duke Energy are installing 649 diesel generators to back up a new hyperscale center. They submitted two permits, and avoided a major review despite being in a low income area that already suffers from high levels of air pollution. In New Mexico, the Project Jupiter datacenter developers attempted to circumvent a major review by proposing two natural gas “microgrids” for either side of the facility and submitting two “minor” permits. The overall project would have released enough pollution to trigger a major review.
In Frederick, Maryland, four datacenters with separate minor permits, including one by Amazon, operate on a single campus with a master developer, regulatory documents show. In other instances, data center developers have staggered minor permit requests over months that cumulatively emit as much pollution as a major source, advocates say.
These regulatory maneuvers make it less clear how much pollution residents living near the facilities are exposed to, and the move amounts to “lego permitting”, said Michael Koerber, a retired deputy director of the EPA’s Office of Air Quality Planning and Standards, which worked on permitting. “They want to fly under the radar,” said Koerber, who now volunteers with the Environmental Protection Network nonprofit. “The more attention they have, the more difficult it gets to get the permit. They have consultants who are very good and know where the shortcuts are.”
Under the Clean Air Act, companies building a project that will be a “major” source of air pollution, like some hyperscale data centers, are typically supposed to undergo a more stringent air emissions review. Among other protections, it is supposed to ensure that the pollution the facility would add to the local airshed would not violate air quality limits when combined with the air pollution already in the region. This process can be lengthy, may require pre-construction monitoring, and, if the proposed data center is found to violate limits, may require companies to take steps to limit their pollution, like adding scrubbers to their smokestacks.
New Jersey datacenter fined $1.1m after visual investigation showed dozens of unpermitted generators
New Jersey regulators issued their largest-ever fine against a datacenter on Tuesday following a recent Floodlight investigation with the Guardian that found DataOne’s facility in Vineland operating at least 45 gas-powered generators without a state permit. The New Jersey department of environmental protection’s $1.07m fine against DataOne “sends a clear message that these facilities will not be constructed or operated with impunity in this state”, said the department’s commissioner, Ed Potosnak, in a press release.
DataOne, a Microsoft-linked AI datacenter, has stirred controversy since it broke ground in 2025 due to consistent noise complaints, unpermitted construction and a combative zoning process. The site lies roughly 40 miles (64km) outside Philadelphia and is slated to provide AI computing power to Microsoft as part of a $17bn deal with Nebius, a Dutch AI infrastructure giant. The press release release from the New Jersey department of environmental protection (NJDEP) says the tractor-trailer-sized machines “were not observed” during the agency’s previous site inspection in December – but they were this past July.
Last month, Floodlight flew a thermal drone alongside the facility and found the site operating 45 of the site’s 62 generators. The NJDEP then confirmed to Floodlight that it had never issued permits for the machines, which emit substantial amounts of health-harming air pollution linked to asthma, heart attacks and even premature death. At the time, a former Environmental Protection Agency Air enforcement chief, Bruce Buckheit, said that DataOne’s actions “violate federal law” and the company should immediately stop operating the generators.
The state is mandating DataOne apply for and obtain the required permits or cease operations, but is giving the company 45 days to do so, according to a NJDEP spokesperson. During that time, regulators are allowing the facility to continue running the generators. “I suspect the company is breathing a sigh of relief at being allowed to continue,” Buckheit told Floodlight after reviewing the order. Environmental groups have questioned whether the NJDEP’s actions go far enough.
Also of Interest
Here are some articles of interest, some of which defied fair-use abstraction.
The Psychology Of Elite Depravity
Iran War: Iran Opens Fire in the Strait, World Braces for US Response or Another TACO
Israel accidentally exposes Gaza military bases and widespread destruction on official map
NAZA film-makers address threats at documentary’s New York City premiere
Britain knew about the Holocaust as it happened. A new exhibition reckons with that truth
Families Demand Answers on Israel Killing UK Citizens
Jonathan Cook: Media Can Make Us Believe Anything
Republican senator criticizes White House for taxpayer-funded Trump ads
Kamala Harris is belatedly courting progressives. Is it too little, too late?
British celebrities beat AI companies lobbying to get free use of their work
A Little Night Music
Dale Hawkins - Ain't That Lovin' You Baby
Dale Hawkins - Little Pig
Dale Hawkins - Tornado
Dale Hawkins - Yea-Yea
Dale Hawkins - Lulu
Dale Hawkins - Mrs. Merguitory's Daughter
Dale Hawkins - Back To School Blues
Dale Hawkins - Four Letter Word (Rock)
Dale Hawkins - Baby Baby
Dale Hawkins - Number Nine Train
Dale Hawkins - Wildcat Tamer
Dale Hawkins - Susie-Q
Comments
A wealth tax sounds like a good solution
to the expanding wealth divide we are experiencing today
thanks for posting it here.
Zionism is a social disease
evening qms...
i think that it could be at least part of a solution, perhaps along with rolling back many of the tax breaks for upper brackets, a reconsideration of the capital gains rate, greater inheritance taxes on extra-large estates and some changes in the way that corporate taxes are accounted for, charged (i'm looking at you "net operating loss") and enforced.
The wealth tax vid was excellent!
And inheritance tx should also be considered. 40 years ago, it was incumbent upon me to do whatever I could on a decedent's inventory to minimize an inheritance to keep it under
$30mil. It hasn't mattered in maybe 25 or more years.
"We'll know our disinformation program is complete when everything the American public believes is false." ---- William Casey, CIA Director, 1981
evening otc...
heh, that video popped up in my feed after lunch and i thought it would go well with caitlin's article.
have a great evening!