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The day's news roundup + tonight's musical feature: Johnny Adams

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Hey! Good Evening!

This evening's music features New Orleans blues singer Johnny Adams. Enjoy!

^{Johnny Adams – Walking On A Tightrope}

"The method of collective punishment so far has proved effective."

-- Moshe Dayan

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News and Opinion

The Onus Is On Israel And Its Allies To End The Genocide, Not Their Victims

It’s actually never legitimate to withhold aid from starving civilians. It was never legitimate at any time.

That’s one of the annoying things about having to discuss Israel’s ridiculous claim that Hamas is hoarding hostage corpses in order to achieve some kind of goal, and therefore justifies reducing aid into Gaza as punishment: the conversation skates right over the fact that it has never been legitimate for Israel to withhold humanitarian aid into Gaza. Debating whether Israel is right or wrong to withhold aid under these specific circumstances tacitly assumes that it could ever be right to withhold aid under any circumstances.

Listening to Israel’s justifications for why it needs to inflict monstrous abuses upon the Palestinians has the effect of assuming that there are circumstances under which those monstrous abuses could be acceptable. And there just aren’t.

It has never been legitimate to intentionally deprive civilians of humanitarian aid that they need to survive. You have to give them aid.

It has never been legitimate to shoot noncombatants because you decided they crossed some sort of line into a forbidden zone. It has never been legitimate to shoot noncombatants at all.

It has never been legitimate to commit genocide. Israel just needs to stop the genocide.

The onus for stopping a genocide is on the party committing the genocide. The onus is not on the victims of the genocide to end it by meeting certain conditions. This should not even need to be said.

It’s so obnoxious how everyone’s getting sucked into these debates about whether or not Israel might need to resume the genocide because Hamas refused to disarm or they didn’t get their hostage corpses back or this or that ceasefire demand wasn’t met or blah blah whatever. Israel has never needed to commit genocide. It needs to stop committing genocide.

The world shouldn’t be bending over backwards to ensure that the state which is committing genocide is happy with the terms by which the genocide is ended. The world should be aggressively punishing the state that is committing genocide until it stops. That would be true peace. What we are seeing now is just a bad joke.

And of course this true peace is not emerging because the powerful western states who’ve been backing the genocide this whole time are perfectly fine with it. Their weapons industries get to profit from the genocide. Their empire managers get to enjoy the domination of a critical geostrategic region. They sleep like babies at night, because they do not view the victims of the genocide as human beings.

So we find ourselves doing this ridiculous dance where we go “Okay well maybe the genocide could stop if the victims of the genocide agree to terms X, Y and Z and don’t make too much of a fuss about being killed in smaller numbers every day.”

This is madness. It’s the craziest thing you could possibly imagine. We live in a dystopian madhouse.

Jeremy Scahill speaks to Ali Abunimah about the State of the Gaza “Ceasefire”

Palestinian bodies returned by Israel show signs of torture and execution, say doctors

Many of the 90 bodies of Palestinians returned to Gaza by Israeli authorities under the ceasefire deal showed signs of torture and execution, including blindfolds, cuffed hands and bullet wounds in the head, according to doctors’ accounts. As part of the US-brokered truce, Hamas has handed over the bodies of some of the hostages who died during the course of the war, and Israel has transferred the bodies of two groups of 45 Palestinians killed during the fighting. The exchange was carried out through the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC).

Doctors at Nasser hospital in the southern Gaza city of Khan Younis, which received the Palestinian bodies from the ICRC, said on Wednesday there was substantial evidence of beatings and summary executions, and that none of the bodies were identifiable. “Almost all of them had been blindfolded, and had been bound up and they had gunshots between the eyes. Almost all of them had been executed,” said Dr Ahmed al-Farra, the head of Nasser hospital’s paediatric department.

“There were also scars and discoloured patches of skin showing they had been beaten before being killed. There were also signs that their bodies had been abused after they were killed.” Farra added that the bodies had been handed over by the Israeli authorities with no identification, and the hospitals in Gaza, heavily bombed over the course of two years of war, had no means of doing DNA analysis.

“They know the identity of these bodies but they want the families to suffer even more about these victims,” the doctor said. Nasser hospital authorities said the bodies, which had been kept in refrigerators in Israel, were returned with numbered labels but no names. Doctors said they were asking relatives of missing Palestinian men to help identify the bodies.

"Taken Hostage by the Israeli Military": Freed Palestinian Prisoners Describe Widespread Torture

Palestinian leader Marwan Barghouti assaulted by Israeli prison guards, son says

Palestine’s most popular leader, Marwan Barghouti, was beaten unconscious by Israeli prison guards and his family fears for his life, his son has said, citing evidence given by former Palestinian detainees released this week as part of the ceasefire deal. Arab Barghouti said his 66-year-old father was assaulted by eight guards on 14 September as he was being transferred between Ganot and Megiddo prisons.

Barghouti said that five of the Palestinian prisoners released and deported to Egypt by the Israeli authorities on Monday had heard the Palestinian leader’s account of his treatment when he arrived in Megiddo prison. “What we know is that while they were transferring my father, they stopped along the way and eight security guards within the prison authority that worked for the prison authority started beating my father up in different ways, by kicking him, by [throwing] him on the ground, by punching him, focusing on the head area, chest area and legs as well,” he said, adding that his father later told fellow prisoners he lost consciousness as a result of the attack.

“The released detainees say that when he came to Megiddo he could barely walk for days.” Barghouti said it was the fourth time his father had been beaten over the past two years. The Palestinian leader has been held in solitary confinement since the Hamas attack on Israel in October 2023, which ignited the Gaza war. Barghouti is a member of the Fatah party, a bitter rival of Hamas.

The alleged beating followed a prison visit to Marwan Barghouti by the Israeli national security minister, Itamar Ben Gvir in August. Ben Gvir, a member of an extreme right party who has past convictions from Israeli courts for incitement to racism and support for a terrorist organisation, taunted Barghouti in a video clip published at the time.

John Mearsheimer WARNS Israel Lobby Will Kill Ceasefire

Hamas says all reachable hostage bodies recovered amid Israel threat to resume Gaza fighting

Hamas has announced that the remains of all the deceased Israeli hostages that it can reach have been handed back and it would need specialist recovery equipment to retrieve the rest from Gaza’s ruins, amid threats from Israel to resume fighting if the terms of ceasefire are not honoured. Two further bodies were handed over late on Wednesday, after Hamas had already returned the remains of seven of 28 known deceased hostages – along with an eighth body which Israel said was not that of a former hostage.

Soon after, the Ezzedine Al-Qassam Brigades said in a statement on social media that the group had “fulfilled its commitment to the agreement by handing over all living Israeli prisoners in its custody, as well as the corpses it could access … as for the remaining corpses, it requires extensive efforts and special equipment for their retrieval and extraction.”

Israel’s defence minister threatened on Wednesday to resume fighting if Hamas does not honour the continuing terms of the deal. ... Seeking to keep the pressure on Hamas, Trump said he would consider allowing Israeli forces to resume fighting in Gaza if Hamas fails to uphold its end of the ceasefire deal that he brokered. “Israel will return to those streets as soon as I say the word. If Israel could go in and knock the crap of them, they’d do that,” Trump was quoted as saying to CNN in a brief telephone call when asked what would happen if Hamas refused to disarm.

After the threat from Katz, senior US advisers briefed the media late on Wednesday that Hamas was aiming to stick to its pledge to return the bodies of dead hostages. Retrieving the bodies from Gaza was difficult because it had been “pulverised,” the advisers said, adding “here was a lot of disappointment and outrage when only four bodies were returned, and they could have just said, you know, we’re moving on … But they returned bodies the next day and then the next day, as quickly as we give them intelligence.”

The US and other mediators were looking at a program of rewards for people helping locate the bodies of dead hostages, he said. Turkey, one of the key mediators in the deal, was meanwhile in talks to provide experts on body retrieval to send to Gaza, the adviser added.

America First AIPAC Ad CONTROVERSY

Israel resumes killing Palestinians in first phase of Trump’s “peace plan”

On Monday and Tuesday, Israeli forces killed at least seven Palestinians in Gaza, following the announcement of a “ceasefire” last week. Medical sources confirmed to Al Jazeera that Israeli snipers fatally shot five people in Gaza City’s Shejaiya neighborhood on Tuesday, claiming they were “neutralizing a threat” as Palestinians approached the boundary known as the “yellow line” which is part of the ceasefire agreement. According to multiple sources, the yellow line is not Gaza’s border but a line drawn inside the territory that permits Israel to maintain military control over roughly half of Gaza, including strategically significant areas like the Philadelphi Corridor, much of Rafah, and parts of Khan Younis and northern Gaza.

According to the ceasefire plan, Israeli military forces are required to withdraw to the yellow line in the first phase of the plan. This arrangement means that after the hostages were released, Israeli troops are positioned behind this yellow line, retaining dominance over key population centers and crucial transit routes. ... The Israeli military claimed the individuals killed were “suspects” who “crossed the yellow line,” directly contradicting the supposed withdrawal of troops stipulated in the peace agreement. ...

The fact that the Israeli military has begun firing on and killing Palestinians before the first phase of the cease fire is even complete exposes Trump’s agreement as a sham designed to maintain imperialist domination of Gaza and to deny Palestinians their fundamental rights. The killings in Gaza are undeniable proof that the Trump-brokered “peace agreement” is not worth the paper it is printed on. The shootings in Shejaiya and Khan Yunis, right after the ceasefire supposedly went into effect, reveal how the entire arrangement does nothing to restrain Israeli violence.

Eyewitnesses interviewed by hospital staff and the local press described scenes of chaos and arbitrary violence. “The Israeli soldiers began firing without warning,” a survivor told reporters outside al-Ahli Arab Hospital in Gaza City. Another local, Amal al-Saqqa, said, “We heard the ceasefire was in place, so we tried to go back to our homes. The shooting began before we could even reach the yellow line.”

Israel frees some Gaza medical staff, but a prominent hospital chief remains imprisoned

Under Gaza’s ceasefire deal, Israel freed dozens of doctors, nurses, paramedics and other medical personnel seized during raids on hospitals. But more than 100 remain in Israeli prisons, including Dr. Hossam Abu Safiya, a hospital director who became the face of the struggle to keep treating patients under Israeli siege and bombardment.

Despite widespread calls for his release, Abu Safiya was not among the hundreds of Palestinian detainees and prisoners freed Monday in exchange for 20 hostages held by Hamas. Abu Safiya, director of Kamal Adwan Hospital in northern Gaza, has been imprisoned without charge by Israel for nearly 10 months.

Health Workers Watch, which documents detentions from Gaza, said 55 medical workers — including 31 doctors and nurses — were on lists of detainees from Gaza being freed Monday, though it could not immediately be confirmed all were released. The group said at least 115 medical workers remain in custody, as well as the remains of four who died while in Israeli prisons, where rights groups and witnesses have reported frequent abuse.

Moscow Tough Response As US Sends Tomahawks; India Refutes Trump Russia Oil Claim; China Rare Earths

Pepe Escobar: China Just Declared War on Trump & WON, Putin Arms Iran with SU-35s

Trump says he authorized covert CIA operations in Venezuela

Donald Trump said on Wednesday he had authorized the CIA to carry out covert operations in Venezuela, marking a sharp escalation in his administration’s pressure campaign against Nicolás Maduro’s regime. Trump further suggested he was considering strikes on Venezuelan territory, a dramatic step that would go beyond a series of recent lethal attacks on boats in the Caribbean, which Democrats and United Nations experts have forcefully condemned as unlawful.

The president’s remarks about the CIA confirmed an earlier story from the New York Times, which had reported on a classified directive about the secretive operation in Venezuela. Trump said his administration was “looking at land” as it considers continued strikes in the region, but declined to answer when pressed on whether the CIA had the authority to execute Maduro. “I think Venezuela is feeling heat,” the president added.

Trump justified the CIA’s intervention by repeating his claims that Venezuela had been releasing prisoners into the US, including individuals from mental health facilities – echoing baseless assertions that became one of his common refrains on the campaign trail last year. He also claimed that Venezuela was bringing large volumes of drugs into the US by sea.

Experts have repeatedly cast doubts on some of the president’s claims about the threats Venezuelans pose in the US.

Richard D. Wolff & Michael Hudson: Trump Is Blowing It All Up — Total Collapse Ahead!

'So Much for America First': Trump Admin Says Argentina Bailout Doubling to $40 Billion

Reality once again clashed uncomfortably with Argentinian President Javier Milei's so-called "libertarian revolution" Wednesday as the Trump administration said it is working to double a $20 billion private sector bailout to prop up the South American nation's moribund currency amid enduring high poverty and inflation and broader economic fragility.

US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent told reporters in Washington, DC Wednesday that the $20 billion currency swap—essentially a loan—for Argentina announced last month "would be a total of $40 billion," with funding coming from banks and sovereign wealth funds to enable the country to pay off its more than $300 billion in external debt.

The bailout is aimed at boosting Argentina's flagging peso, which has fallen by nearly one-quarter against the US dollar this year. A decade ago, $1 was equal to 18 pesos. Today, a single dollar will buy 1,361 pesos. That's a loss of more than 99% in value over the past 10 years.

Although poverty in Argentina has fallen significantly from over 50% shortly after Milei's election, around 30% of Argentinians remain poor and prices and inflation are again rising significantly. While Milei has drastically slashed inflation, the reduction has come via the devaluation of the peso and massive cuts in government spending, including the evisceration of social programs resulting in more expensive housing, healthcare, and education.

Bessent's announcement comes ahead of Argentina's October 26 midterm elections that will test the mandate for Milei—an admirer and close ally of President Donald Trump—to continue with his slash-and-burn approach to streamlining government.

While meeting with Milei at the White House Tuesday, Trump said the bailout is contingent upon the Argentine president remaining in power.

“If he loses, we are not going to be generous with Argentina,” Trump told reporters. “I think he’s going to win, and if he wins, we’re staying with him, and if he doesn’t win, we’re gone.”

The combination of fiscal austerity, gutting of government agencies, dangerous deregulation, inflation, and currency devaluation have caused Milei's unfavorability rating to soar to over 60% in some polls, it's highest level ever.

Milei—a self-described anarcho-capitalist who was elected in November 2023 on a wave of populist revulsion at the status quo—campaigned on a platform of repairing the moribund economy, tackling inflation, reducing poverty, and dismantling the state. He made wild promises including dollarizing Argentina’s economy and abolishing the central bank.

However, the realities of leading South America’s second-largest economy have forced Milei’s administration to abandon or significantly curtail key agenda items, leading to accusations of neoliberalism and betrayal from the right, and hypocrisy and rank incompetence from the left.

“Let’s not get confused: Milei went to beg for money and a photo of Trump because his economic plan failed," Argentine lawmaker Emilio Monzó said Tuesday.

Another lawmaker, Margarita Stolbizer, said on social media Tuesday that "freedom is crawling."

"Trump tells us Argentines that if we don't vote for Milei, we'll be punished," she added. "The interference is absolute, the libertarian surrender is total. Let's have confidence in the pride of our people: We are millions who don't want to be told what we have to do."

US singer and political commentator Blakeley Bartley skewered Milei, "the based anarcho-capitalist conservative," in a social media post on Wednesday."

Remember how conservatives all pushed Javier Milei as a BASED DOGE conservative?

Now corrupt Trump is helping corrupt Milei in $20 BILLION BAILOUT with American taxpayer money.

Conservative economics continue to be a proven failure throughout the world. pic.twitter.com/s23F4onwXR

— B L A K E L E Y LLC (@_iamblakeley) October 15, 2025

"He was gonna get in power, cut government spending," Bartley continued. "Remember, all your favorite right-wingers and American media said, 'You gotta support him, man, he's a based conservative that's gonna save Argentina."

"What's that?" Bartley added. "Oh, that's right, he drove the economy into the fucking ground and now he needs a welfare check from Daddy America."

Others—ranging from progressives angry over tens of billions of dollars being spent on foreign bailouts while so many people are struggling and suffering in the US to hardcore MAGA supporters—are asking, how is bailing out Argentina "America First?"

"Trump wants to DOUBLE Argentina's bailout to $40 billion to save his political ally," Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) said on social media. "Yet he is doing nothing to prevent 15 million Americans from losing their healthcare and 20 million from seeing a doubling in their premiums. Is this what Trump means by America first?"

Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) said: "Apparently $20 billion of our taxpayer money wasn't enough to bail out Argentina. Now Trump wants US banks to divert ANOTHER $20 billion away from lending to American businesses, farmers, and families to prop up Milei's corrupt presidency and failing economy."

Yet, they never have the funds for health care coverage for all. https://t.co/ORwkBxFTGr

— Rashida Tlaib (@RashidaTlaib) October 15, 2025

John Bartam, a soybean farmer from Illinois, slammed the bailout in a Tuesday interview with the Daily Beast, noting that Trump’s $20 billion lifeline enabled Milei to lower his country's export tax, leading to China buying seven million tons of Argentinian soybeans at the expense of the US. This, as American soybean farmers reel from Trump's tariff war with China, which until recently was the world's leading buyer of the top US export crop.

“MAGA," Bartam said, "now means Make Argentina Great Again."

Why Is Trump Bailing Out Argentina's President Milei While Firing Thousands of Workers in U.S.?

Judge temporarily blocks firings by Trump administration during shutdown

A federal court has granted a temporary injunction blocking the Trump administration’s firings of federal employees during the government shutdown. The ruling by Judge Susan Illston of the US district court’s northern district of California came in response to a lawsuit filed by labor unions representing federal workers.

“I am inclined to grant the plaintiff’s motion,” said Illston during a court hearing on the injunction request. “The evidence suggests that the office of management and budget, OMB, and the office of personnel management, OPM, have taken advantage of the lapse in government spending, in government functioning to assume that all bets are off, that the laws don’t apply to them any more, and that they can impose the structures that they like on the government situation that they don’t like, and I find, I believe, that the plaintiffs will demonstrate, ultimately, that what’s being done here is both illegal and is in excess of authority and is arbitrary and capricious.”

Justice department attorney Elizabeth Hedges said she was not prepared to discuss the merits of the case. “As of now, the [temporary restraining order] is in effect,” Illston said.

The ruling comes as Russ Vought, the White House OMB director, said on The Charlie Kirk Show that more cuts were coming, claiming the firings could be “north of 10,000” workers. On Friday, the Trump administration announced “reductions in force” across seven federal agencies, with at least 4,100 workers affected, citing the shutdown as justification for the firings.

'Terrifying Escalation' as Trump's Federal Troops Bring War-Like Scenes and Chaos to Chicago

Federal immigration enforcement officials have been ramping up operations in Chicago in recent days, including in a violent confrontation on Tuesday in a neighborhood in which agents deployed smoke grenades, pepper balls, and tear gas against local demonstrators.

As reported by the Chicago Sun-Times, the confrontation began when federal agents deliberately rammed into a car that they had been pursuing on the Southeast Side of Chicago.

The collision with the vehicle forced the car's two occupants to exit the vehicle and flee from law enforcement officials on foot. Shortly after this, a crowd of local residents came out of their homes and began protesting against the actions of the immigration agents.

According to the Sun-Times, "a large number of armed Customs and Border Protection (CBP) agents responded to the crowd by hurling smoke grenades, shooting pepper balls and deploying at least three rounds of tear gas over the area, even with children and seniors in the area." By the end of the confrontation, four protesters were placed under arrest, as were the two men who were targeted for arrest by immigration enforcement officials.

Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker expressed outrage over the incident and demanded accountability from Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem over what he described in a social media post as "unchecked attacks on Chicago residents."

"[Immigration and Customs Enforcement] is an out-of-control danger to our peaceful communities," he added.

Andre Vasquez, a Chicago City Council member, told The New York Times in an interview that federal immigration officials are causing chaos throughout the city.

"Chicago’s been doing just fine, and then these guys showed up," he said. "There is big concern about what these unidentified, masked men are doing in this city without accountability. Chicagoans are just trying to live their life. We’re not going to tolerate unconstitutional authoritarianism."

Oscar Sanchez, who volunteers for a local rapid response network that tracks immigration enforcement activities, told the Sun-Times that the latest actions by CBP agents mark a significant escalation in law enforcement aggression.

“When you’re using these tactics, you are asking people to be hospitalized,” he said. “You see elderly folks on the [ground], so you just ask yourself, what is this for? Why is the aggression needed? Why are these elevated tactics even being used?”

Sanchez's words were echoed by six Chicago activists who took part in 1960s demonstrations against the Vietnam War, and who wrote an editorial for the Sun-Times in which they described the tactics being used by law enforcement as a "terrifying escalation" beyond anything used by law enforcement officials during the famous anti-war demonstrations outside the 1968 Democratic National Convention.

After describing the actions taken by the Chicago Police Department and the Illinois National Guard during the 1968 protests—including "clubbing, corralling, gassing protesters, dragging many of us into patrol wagons"—they said that what the Trump administration is doing today is even worse.

"Flouting the Constitution, President Donald Trump has declared war on the very people he was elected to serve," they wrote. "The Trump administration, weaponizing the Department of Homeland Security against ordinary Americans, is occupying Los Angeles, Washington, DC, Memphis, Chicago, and Portland, deploying military tactics to stifle free speech, staging performative raids under the pretext of pursuing dangerous criminals, and subverting democratic norms without accountability."

The end goal of these operations, the activists warned, is "a brazen attempt to instill fear in and demand obedience of all Americans."

Oregon judge extends order preventing Trump from deploying national guard

A federal judge in Oregon on Wednesday extended two temporary restraining orders that block the Trump administration from federalizing and deploying national guard troops to Portland.

The US district court judge, Karin Immergut, extended by 14 days the orders which had been set to expire later this week, as a three-judge panel of the San Francisco-based ninth US circuit court of appeals considers a government request to lift her first order, which said the president did not have the legal authority to take control of the Oregon national guard.

The extension maintains the status quo on the ground as Donald Trump’s administration and the state of Oregon wait for a ruling from the appeals court panel. Two judges on the panel were nominated by the president.

Immergut, who was nominated to the bench by Trump in his first term, ruled earlier this month Trump’s false claims about conditions in Portland resembling those in a war zone due to a small protest against immigration raids were “simply untethered to the facts”.

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Newsom, Booker SHORT CIRCUIT On AIPAC

SCOTUS Set to Hand Republicans MASSIVE Gains

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Record leap in CO2 fuels fears of accelerating global heating

Levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere soared by a record amount in 2024 to hit another high, UN data shows, deepening the climate crisis that is already taking lives and livelihoods across the world. Scientists are worried that the natural land and ocean “sinks” that remove CO₂ from the air are weakening as a result of global heating, which could form a vicious circle and drive temperatures up even faster.

The global average concentration of the gas surged by 3.5 parts per million to 424ppm in 2024, the largest increase since modern measurements started in 1957, according to the report by the World Meteorological Organization.

Several factors contributed to the leap in CO₂, including another year of unrelenting fossil fuel burning despite a pledge by the world’s countries in 2023 to “transition away” from coal, oil and gas. Another factor was an upsurge in wildfires in conditions made hotter and drier by global heating. Wildfire emissions in the Americas reached historic levels in 2024, which was the hottest year yet recorded.

However, scientists are concerned about a third factor: the possibility that the planet’s carbon sinks are beginning to fail. About half of all CO2 emissions every year are taken back out of the atmosphere by being dissolved in the ocean or being sucked up by growing trees and plants. But the oceans are getting hotter and can therefore absorb less CO2 while on land hotter and drier conditions and more wildfires mean less plant growth.

Carbon sinks were already known to be less effective in El Niño years such as 2023 and 2024, when changes in Pacific winds and ocean currents lead to higher global air temperatures. But human-caused global heating has already raised the average world temperatures by about 1.3C and researchers, who recorded an “unprecedented failure of the land sink” in 2023 and 2024, fear this may be weakening the sinks.

‘The city that draws the line’: one Arizona community’s fight against a huge datacenter

A company’s opaque plan to build a huge datacenter outside Tucson, Arizona has roiled the desert city over the past few months, the latest US community to push back as tech companies aggressively seek to build out infrastructure for cloud computing and to power the AI boom. The proposed datacenter, known as Project Blue, would span 290 acres in Pima county, and become the biggest development ever in the county, or anywhere in the southern part of the state.

The $3.6bn project wasn’t on most Tucsonans’ radar until 17 June, when the county board of supervisors narrowly agreed to sell and rezone a parcel of land just south-east of town to the developer Beale Infrastructure. The San Francisco-based company hoped to get the project annexed by the city, a necessary step for it to be supplied by the public utility, Tucson Water. But since the parcel sale agreement, the proposed center has faced stiff pushback from a community upset over the enormous amounts of water and electricity it would require, and the lack of transparency with which the developers and some in local government have pursued the project. ...

The episode in Tucson illustrates the secretiveness and tenacity with which developers are rushing to build datacenters throughout the US, and the emotionally charged mix of issues that confront communities, weighing sometimes murky promises of economic incentives and jobs against effects on the environment and natural resources.

In Memphis, Elon Musk’s xAI built one of the world’s biggest supercomputers, bringing in tax revenue to an economically depressed area, while also setting off a battle over air quality concerns related to the development’s methane turbines. Phoenix has one of the nation’s largest concentrations of datacenters, which keeps expanding, encouraged by tax incentives and local business leaders; local opposition and ordinances around noise pollution and water use are also on the rise. High-profile projects have been postponed or cancelled due to local pushback in recent months in northern Virginia, the nation’s biggest datacenter hub; in St Charles, Missouri; and in several towns in Indiana. But in even more locations, datacenters are moving forward, often under a cloud of secrecy.

Judge dismisses suit by young climate activists against Trump’s pro-fossil fuel policies

A federal judge has dismissed a lawsuit filed by young climate activists that aimed to halt Donald Trump’s pro-fossil fuel executive orders. The dismissal by US district judge Dana Christensen on Wednesday came after 22 plaintiffs, ages seven to 25 and from five states, sought to block three of the president’s executive orders, including those declaring a “national energy emergency” and seeking to “unleash American energy” – as well as one aimed at “reinvigorating” the US’s production of coal.

According to the plaintiffs, the executive orders amount to unlawful executive overreach and breach the state-created danger doctrine – a legal principle designed to prevent government officials from causing harm to their citizens.

Among the plaintiffs were also several young individuals who had previously been part of the landmark 2023 Held v Montana case – the first constitutional climate trial in the United States. In that case, a judge ruled in favor of the youth plaintiffs who argued that the Montana state government had violated their constitutional right to a healthy environment.

In Wednesday’s ruling, Christensen said that the plaintiffs presented “overwhelming evidence that the climate is changing at a staggering pace, and that this change stems from the rise in atmospheric carbon dioxide, caused by the production and burning of fossil fuels”. However, Christensen said: “Yet while this court is certainly troubled by the very real harms presented by climate change and the challenged [executive orders’] effect on carbon dioxide emissions, this concern does not automatically confer upon it the power to act.”

He added: “Granting plaintiffs’ injunction would require the defendant agencies, and – ultimately – this court, to scrutinize every climate-related agency action taken since” the start of Trump’s second presidency on 20 January 2025. “In other words, this court would be required to monitor an untold number of federal agency actions to determine whether they contravene its injunction. This is, quite simply, an unworkable request for which plaintiffs provide no precedent,” Christensen continued.

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Also of Interest

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

Craig Murray: A Warning from Lebanon

Jonathan Cook: Freedoms We Took for Granted in Britain

New Report Details Western Repression of Anti-Genocide Dissent

EU Leaders Determined To Win “Most Supine Slave Award”: Nexperia Edition

Nobel War Prize

Israeli Soldier Accidentally Reveals The REAL Reason They Love Trump

Andrei Martyanov: it's OVER! Iran & Russia Go ALL IN

What Won't Israel Do? (w/ Max Blumenthal)

China To Trump: YOU WILL FOLD After Market Crash

Marjorie Taylor Greene Easily OUT-LEFTS The Democrats!

Col. Macgregor: Putin Gives Trump a REALITY CHECK on Tomahawks for Ukraine

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A Little Night Music

Johnny Adams – Oh, So Nice

Johnny Adams – (Oh Why) I Won’t Cry

Johnny Adams – Snap Your Fingers

Johnny Adams – The Hunt Is On

Johnny Adams – Life Is A Struggle

Johnny Adams – Dancing Man

Johnny Adams – You're In For A Big Surprise

Johnny Adams – I Owe You

Johnny Adams – Room With A View

Johnny Adams – A Losing Battle

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