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The day's news roundup + tonight's musical feature: William Clarke

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Hey! Good Evening!

This evening's music features west coast harmonica player William Clarke. Enjoy!

^{William Clarke - Blowin' The Family Jewels}

"Through clever and constant application of propaganda, people can be made to see paradise as hell, and also the other way round, to consider the most wretched sort of life as paradise."

-- Adolf Hitler

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News and Opinion

Either You Believe Israel Is Evil Or You Believe It’s All An Elaborate Conspiracy

Basically you have two choices: either you believe Israel is a genocidal state that is morally comparable to Nazi Germany, or you believe there’s a giant global conspiracy of mainstream western institutions and media outlets dedicated to making Israel look bad.

Believing the second option is the only way to get around believing the first. That’s the only way to believe mainstream outlets like The New York Times are committing antisemitic blood libel with their reporting on the systemic sexual torture of Palestinians in Israeli prisons. It’s the only way to dismiss the fact that every relevant human rights group on earth says Israel is guilty of genocide, while zero comparable human rights groups say it isn’t. You necessarily need to espouse a wild conspiracy theory. You need to believe the conspiracy goes all the way to the top, with its tentacles in mainstream institutions all across the globe.

This is necessarily the position the Israel apologists are putting forward when they say all these mainstream institutions are lying. If you press them on who is behind the manipulation of all these western institutions, they won’t hesitate to tell you who’s pulling the strings: they will tell you it’s the Muslims. They’ll say it’s Qatari influence operations and Hamas propaganda. They’ll say it’s New York Times reporters being duped by Palestinians who hate Israel, and human rights groups getting suckered by propaganda from Hamas, Hezbollah and Iran. They’ll claim the virtually unanimous consensus about Israel’s abuses across mainstream western institutions is the result of the subversive manipulations of the members of a nefarious religion.

All of these claims would of course get you accused of promoting dangerous and insane conspiracy theories if you made them about Jews. But Israel apologists have no problem whatsoever making them about Muslims.

It doesn’t take a genius to figure out that this is ridiculous. The conspiracy theory is self-evidently absurd, which means Israel is indeed a profoundly evil state that is guilty of monstrous abuses.

COL. Lawrence Wilkerson : Checkmate in Iran

BREAKING

Iran has granted dozens of Chinese ships permission to pass through the Strait of Hormuz

Over the past two days, more than 10 Chinese ships have been seen leaving the Strait of Hormuz

Xi Jinping can now tell Trump that his ships are crossing and the Strait is… pic.twitter.com/3xv84pqTRD

— Daily Iran News (@DailyIranNews) May 13, 2026

China Tough Stance In Trump Visit; Russia Biggest Strike; Kiev Shredded AD Collapses; Zelensky Panic

Trump lands in China for high-stakes summit with Xi Jinping, as Iran war looms over talks

Donald Trump has landed in Beijing, the first visit to China by a US president in nearly a decade, as he seeks to mend power and prestige weakened by the war in Iran. Trump pumped his fist, descended the stairs of Air Force One and walked a red carpet flanked by 300 young Chinese people wearing light blue and white, waving red flags and chanting welcome. He was greeted late on Wednesday by China’s vice-president, Han Zheng, the vice-minister of foreign affairs, Ma Zhaoxu, and a military band and honour guard.

Trump was accompanied by his son Eric and daughter-in-law Lara as well as tech leaders including Elon Musk of Tesla and Jensen Huang of the chip-maker Nvidia. The US president has plans for headline-grabbing deals and previously predicted that China’s leader, Xi Jinping, would “give me a big, fat hug when I get there”.

But the Middle East conflict that Trump started, and seems unable to finish, will cast a long shadow over two days of talks amid fears that he might be tempted to weaken US support for Taiwan, the self-governing democracy claimed by China, in return for Xi’s assistance. “I don’t think we need any help with Iran,” Trump said to reporters before departing the White House on Tuesday. “We’ll win it one way or the other – peacefully or otherwise.”

The US recently sanctioned several Chinese firms accused of assisting Iranian oil shipments and supplying satellite imagery allegedly used in Iranian military operations. China condemned the measures as “illegal unilateral sanctions” and invoked a rarely used blocking statute prohibiting Chinese entities from complying with them. Chinese officials have publicly called for stability while carefully avoiding overt alignment with Washington. The foreign minister, Wang Yi, last week hosted his Iranian counterpart, Abbas Araghchi, in Beijing, and defended Iran’s right to develop civilian nuclear energy.

Xi has also offered implicit criticism of the US over the war. He has said safeguarding international rule of law is paramount and “must not be selectively applied or disregarded”, nor should the world be allowed to revert “to the law of the jungle”.

Pepe Escobar : A Babe in the Woods in Beijing

Senate fails to curb Trump’s war on Iran even as Republican opposition grows

The Senate on Wednesday rejected the seventh attempt by Democrats to force an end to American involvement in the war on Iran, even as the ranks of Republicans opposed to Donald Trump’s strategy grew. The war powers resolution proposed by Jeff Merkley, a Democratic senator from Oregon, failed in a 49-50 vote. All Democrats with the exception of John Fetterman of Pennsylvania supported its advancement.

Since the conflict began in February, Democrats have repeatedly offered such resolutions, without success. But for the first time on Wednesday, Alaska’s Lisa Murkowski voted in favor, joining fellow Republicans Rand Paul of Kentucky and Susan Collins of Maine. All other Republicans in attendance voted against it.

In a statement released after her vote, Murkowski said that despite the Trump administration’s claim of a ceasefire in the conflict, US forces continue to be attacked in the region, while also enforcing a blockade of Iranian ports. She also noted that 60 days have passed since the conflict began, and Congress had yet to formally authorize continued US involvement, as the 1973 War Powers Act mandates.

“The administration’s own position removes any justification for keeping our servicemembers in harm’s way without congressional authorization,” Murkowski said.

Prof. Mohammad Marandi : FROM TEHRAN: Why Iran Stands Firm

Andrei Martyanov: Iran & Russia Just Changed War Forever – Here’s How

Benjamin Netanyahu says he made secret trip to UAE at height of Iran war

Benjamin Netanyahu has claimed he made a secret trip to the United Arab Emirates at the height of the Iran war to meet the president, Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan. “This visit has led to a historic breakthrough in relations between Israel and the UAE,” the Israeli prime minister’s office said on Wednesday night.

The two leaders met for several hours in Al Ain, an oasis city by the Oman border, on 26 March, Reuters reported. A source told the news agency that the Mossad director, David Barnea, made at least two visits to the UAE during the war with Iran to coordinate military actions. The intelligence chief’s visit was first reported by the Wall Street Journal.

The supposed visit would be the latest milestone in a rapidly developing Middle East alliance. On Tuesday, the US ambassador to Israel, Mike Huckabee, disclosed that Israel had shared its air defence system with the UAE, sending Iron Dome batteries and military specialists to operate them over the course of the war. “There’s an extraordinary relationship between the UAE and Israel,” Huckabee said.

But the United Arab Emirates’ foreign ministry denied the reports of Netanyahu’s visit to the country, saying such claims were “baseless”.

Deep Dive: Scott Ritter LIVE

Antisemitism Watchdog Rips ‘Blood Libel’ Smear Against NYT for Reporting Israeli Rape of Gazans

A Jewish-led organization dedicated to fighting antisemitism was among the groups and individuals who on Tuesday condemned attacks on The New York Times and one of its most prominent columnists, who published accounts by alleged Palestinian victims of sexual abuse perpetrated by Israeli soldiers and settlers.

Nicholas Kristof’s column, “The Silence That Meets the Rape of Palestinians,” combines interviews with 14 former Palestinian detainees and information from reports published by United Nations experts and human rights groups to highlight documented rape and other systemic sexual abuse of Palestinians jailed by Israel Defense Forces (IDF) troops, as well as sexual assaults and other abuses allegedly committed by Israeli settler-colonists. The column features the controversial claim by one former prisoner that he was raped by a dog unleashed upon him by Israeli soldiers.

The Israeli Foreign Ministry responded to the column in a social media post alleging that the Times “chose to publish one of the worst blood libels ever to appear in the modern press.”

“In an unfathomable inversion of reality, and through an endless stream of baseless lies, propagandist Nicholas Kristof turns the victim into the accused,” the ministry said.

Responding to the ministry’s post, the Nexus Project—a group “made up of individuals deeply committed to the fight against antisemitism”—said on Bluesky: “To weaponize the term ‘blood libel’ to dismiss Kristof’s thorough reporting is dangerous. It’s insulting to the term’s violent history and hinders our community’s ability to call out actual blood libels when they occur.”

“Kristof’s article is a challenging and important read,” the group added. “It takes courage and care to expose sexual violence.”

On Tuesday, the Israeli Foreign Ministry accused the Times of serving “a Hamas-driven narrative,” claiming the newspaper “deliberately timed its piece to undermine today’s horrific Civil Commission report documenting Hamas’ preplanned, systematic sexual atrocities on October 7, [2023] and against hostages thereafter—attempting to create false equivalence and belittle documented crimes.”

The Times refuted a claim by the ministry that the newspaper “said it was not interested” in reporting on Hamas sexual violence on and after the October 7 attack. In fact, the Times updated its earlier reporting on Hamas sex crimes after Israeli investigator called said critical details were “false.”

Critics of the column also cast aspersions upon the alleged Palestinian victims and rights groups that documented the sexual violence they suffered, linking them to Hamas. The Times and other US media have been accused of accepting Israeli claims at their word but treating Palestinian testimonies with skepticism or outright dismissal.

One of the most striking indictments of US news media made in the Kristof piece, unintentionally, is that we are given an incredible example of how the word of Israelis is taken without any shred of evidence while Palestinians must provide every detail imaginable of the violence… pic.twitter.com/X6CBAzPtnm

— Sana Saeed (@SanaSaeed) May 12, 2026

Numerous other pro-Israel accounts, including the American Jewish Committee and EndJewHatred, have either repeated the “blood libel” accusation against Kristof or amplified social media posts that did so.

Many—including the American Israel Public Affairs Committee—denied or questioned the veracity of Kristof, his sources, and the Times.

This, despite numerous reports by United Nations experts, as well as
Israeli and international human rights groups, of Israeli rape and sexual violence against Palestinian men, women, and children in both Gaza and the illegally occupied West Bank—a pattern that goes back to the Nakba ethnic cleansing of Palestine during the establishment of the modern state of Israel.

Senior Israeli officials including Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich and Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir have defended soldiers accused of gang-raping a Palestinian prisoner in an attack caught on camera at the notorious Sde Teiman prison. The IDF is investigating the deaths of dozens of Palestinians at Sde Teiman, including one man who died after allegedly being sodomized with an electric baton.

Right-wing Israeli politicians, pundits, and others publicly argued that IDF troops should have free rein to rape, torture, and murder Palestinians as revenge for the Hamas-led October 7, 2023 attack on Israel.

An August 2025 investigation by the Australian Broadcasting Corporation featured Palestinian boys kidnapped by Israeli occupation forces in Gaza who said they suffered or witnessed sexual torture committed by their jailers.

Last year, Israel blocked a request from UN sex crimes experts to probe alleged sexual violence perpetrated by Hamas fighters during the October 7, 2023 attack, reportedly to avoid attendant scrutiny of rapes and other abuses allegedly committed by Israeli forces against imprisoned Palestinians.

Other Israelis and their defenders expressed incredulity or proclaimed the impossibility of dogs being trained to rape people.

“My brain does not know how to process the fact that The New York Times—the paper I grew up worshiping and hoping to work for one day—published, on the front page, that Israelis are training dogs to rape Palestinian prisoners,” tech entrepreneur and anti-progressive commentator Michelle Tandler said Monday on X.

However, in addition to repeated Palestinian claims of such abuse, female Holocaust survivors have said they were assaulted by dogs specially trained by Nazi SS officer Klaus Barbie. Later, Ingrid Oderock, a Chilean raised in a Nazi colony in the South American country, became one of the most feared torturers during the dictatorship of Augusto Pinochet. Her specialty, as noted in the Academy Award-nominated animated short film Bestia, was training dogs to rape jailed female dissidents.

Israel has repeatedly attempted to neutralize criticism of its crimes during the Gaza onslaught—from the deadly famine that’s claimed at least hundreds of lives, to the apparently deliberate shooting of children, to attacks on aid workers and civilian “safe zones,” to the torture of Palestinian prisoners—by smearing those who expose them with accusations of blood libel.

Responding to the common Israeli smear, socialist author Owen Jones said on Bluesky: “Israel’s crimes are not a ‘blood libel.’ They are documented truth.”

Lt. Col. Anthony Aguilar: Israel’s Defeat BEGINS: Hezbollah & Yemen Just Hit HARD

Israel’s ruling coalition proposes early elections amid ultra-Orthodox anger at Netanyahu

Israel’s ruling coalition has submitted a proposal to dissolve parliament to pave the way for early elections as the prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, came under mounting pressure from ultra-Orthodox parties. The move, initiated by Netanyahu’s rightwing Likud party, came as Netanyahu appeared to be facing a possible collapse of his fractious coalition. If the bill is approved it would automatically trigger elections to be held after 90 days.

According to Israeli media reports, the bill could be put to a vote on 20 May. Its passage is widely seen as a foregone conclusion. Elections could therefore be held from the third week of August, about two months before the original scheduled end of the legislative term on 27 October.

Ultra-Orthodox parties accuse Netanyahu of failing to deliver on his promise to pass a law that would permanently exempt young men from their community studying in yeshivas, or religious seminaries, from compulsory military service. Sensing an opportunity amid the turmoil, several opposition parties announced on Tuesday that they intended to introduce their own bill to dissolve the Knesset.

Netanyahu, a political survivor often described as the phoenix of Israeli politics, is 76 years old and recently revealed that he had undergone surgery for prostate cancer. He has already confirmed that he intends to run for office again.

A political poll by Israel’s public broadcaster Kan published on Tuesday put Likud in first place in voting intentions, with a narrow lead over Beyahad – the joint list of Lapid and Bennett. However, neither bloc appears capable of forming a government, given the fragmented electorate.

While April CPI inflation rose to 3.8%, inflation is much higher in many basic necessities:

1. Energy Commodity Inflation: +29.2%
2. Gasoline Inflation: +28.4%
3. Airfare Inflation: +20.7%
4. Energy Inflation: +17.9%
5. Electricity Inflation: +6.1%
6. Fruits and Vegetables…

— The Kobeissi Letter (@KobeissiLetter) May 12, 2026

US Senate confirms Kevin Warsh as Federal Reserve chair, replacing Jerome Powell

The US Senate confirmed Kevin Warsh as chair of the Federal Reserve, one of the most powerful roles in the federal government that holds enormous sway over the economy. The 54-45 Senate vote on Wednesday was split along party lines, with the exception of the Democratic senator John Fetterman from Pennsylvania, who joined the Republican majority. It was most divisive confirmation vote for the position in history.

Warsh was confirmed for a four-year term as chair and a 14-year appointment on the Fed’s rate-setting board. Warsh will officially step into the role on 14 May, when the term of outgoing Fed chair, Jerome Powell, ends. He is taking over leadership of the Fed at a time when the central bank faces immense pressure from the Trump administration to lower rates, even as inflation climbs and war in the Middle East continues.

Warsh has echoed Donald Trump’s calls to lower rates, but must convince the other members on the Fed’s 12-member voting board to do so. With inflation rising to 3.8%, that could be a hard case to make. Before Warsh, the most divisive Fed chair confirmation was in 2010, when Ben Bernanke was confirmed by a 70-30 vote.

An Ivy League economist and former Wall Street banker, Warsh previously served as a Fed governor from 2006 to 2011. During his time on the board, he was known as an “inflation hawk” – advocating for higher interest rates to combat high inflation. He left the Fed board in 2011 due in part to disagreements over the Fed’s post-financial crisis stimulus package.

Alabama woman sues alleging she gave birth on prison floor as guards watched

An Alabama woman has filed a federal lawsuit claiming that her civil rights and those of her infant daughter were violated after jail staff where she was incarcerated allegedly left her to labor alone for more than a day. Tiffany McElroy, now 28, was booked into an Alabama jail in May 2024. Three days after arriving, she said she felt her water break weeks before she was expected to give birth. McElroy, who was being held on charges stemming from an allegation of substance use during pregnancy, later discovered she had suffered a pregnancy complication that could have progressed into sepsis. According to the lawsuit, she informed a guard that her water had broken and believed she would be taken to a hospital for treatment.

Instead, the complaint states that another guard who checked on her later that morning accused her of wetting herself and instructed her to return to her cell. The lawsuit says that over the following 24 hours, McElroy repeatedly asked jail employees to call 911, but they never did – even as other inmates pounded on cell windows and tables while pleading for assistance. The lawsuit, filed by Pregnancy Justice on behalf of McElroy and her daughter, further claims that medical staff gave her only a diaper and Tylenol while she endured severe pain and worried about the safety of her baby.

According to the complaint, another inmate eventually assisted McElroy in delivering a baby girl who was not breathing when she was born on the prison floor, as prison guards watched. The filing says two women housed in the same pod attempted to revive the newborn by removing mucus from her mouth and rubbing her until she finally cried. The complaint also alleges that, after the delivery, a guard told the women: “Y’all should’ve pushed that motherfucking baby back in” and punished the women on the cell block, prohibiting them from going outside and to religious services, and revoking phone privileges.

Kathy Youngblood, a former deputy at the jail who is also a defendant in the lawsuit, described the incident as “barbaric” in an interview with NBC News. “I tried to help her, but I was told I was going to be fired if I did help her, so I could not assist,” Youngblood told the outlet.

Another Alabama woman who claimed she was forced to give birth without any medical help in a jail shower settled a federal civil rights lawsuit against the county last year. Pregnancy Justice, who also handled that case, said it showed “a disturbing pattern of inhumane treatment” for pregnant women in the state who are held on Chemical Endangerment of a Child charges for alleged drug use. Pregnancy Justice previously found that Alabama has led other states in prosecuting pregnant women for drug-related charges since the US supreme court overturned Roe v Wade in 2022. While states claim that such prosecutions are meant to protect pregnancies, reproductive rights advocates say they are part of a broader pattern to grant rights to fetuses that compete with those of the people carrying them.

JD Vance threatens health funding to states that don’t comply with White House anti-fraud effort

JD Vance has threatened to “turn off” federal funding for government health insurance programs in states that refuse to comply with the Trump administration’s crackdown on suspected fraud. States which fail to “get serious” about fraud would lose Medicaid and Medicare funding, the US vice-president announced on Wednesday, sparking fresh accusations that Trump officials are using unfounded allegations to punish political rivals.

Hospices and home health agencies are also halted from new Medicare enrollment for six months while the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) investigates potential fraud alongside Vance’s anti-fraud taskforce, the agency announced on Wednesday. The administration will review anti-fraud funding for states that it deems to have failed to tackle fraud, Vance said. “And if we continue to find problems, we can turn off other resources within their state Medicaid programs as well.

“We want to protect Medicaid. We want to protect Medicare. But we can’t do that if the states that are administering those programs are allowing those programs to be fleeced by fraudsters.”

The news follows a crackdown on Minnesota and three other Democratic states, as well as a freeze on new medical suppliers for Medicare. Donald Trump signed an executive order in March to create a taskforce on eliminating fraud.

Amusing?

They are openly performing Masonic-Luciferian idol worship in front of the world.

MAGA evangelical “leaders” gathered at Mar-a-Lago and conducted a full public golden calf ritual blessing and dedicating a literal gold statue of Donald Trump as if he were a divine figure.

This… https://t.co/epbHaAFY42 pic.twitter.com/OYOUTqf9Aa

— Aprajita Nafs Nefes Ancient Believer (@aprajitanefes) May 9, 2026

Howard Lutnick said he had three ‘inconsequential’ meetings with Epstein

The US commerce secretary, Howard Lutnick, told lawmakers in a closed-door interview earlier this month that he met Jeffrey Epstein only three times and had no “personal or professional relationship” with the disgraced financier, according to a newly released transcript of the meeting. “I unequivocally condemn the conduct attributed to Jeffrey Epstein and everyone who participated in his illegal activities,” Lutnick said in his opening statement before the House oversight and reform committee.

The comments came during a closed-door interview before the House oversight and reform committee earlier this month, during which lawmakers questioned Lutnick for several hours about his previous ties to Epstein and his past statements about their interactions.

According to the transcript, released on Wednesday afternoon, Lutnick said he met Epstein, whom he said lived “adjacent to my New York City home”, on only three occasions. Lutnick said that the first meeting occurred in 2005, when he and his wife were invited for coffee at Epstein’s home. The second was in 2011, when he said he briefly visited Epstein’s home to discuss “scaffolding”, and the third, Lutnick said, was in 2012, when Epstein invited him, his family and friends to lunch on his private island.

“To the best of my recollection, those were the only three occasions in which I interacted with Epstein in person,” Lutnick said. “Each and every one was meaningless and inconsequential. I had no personal or professional relationship with this individual, despite the proximity of our addresses,” he added. “Further, at no time during these limited interactions did I witness any conduct, let alone the type of illegal conduct of which we have since become aware.”

Lutnick agreed to sit for the transcribed interview with the committee in March, after the justice department released millions of documents related to Epstein, including documents showing that Lutnick continued correspondence with Epstein after the disgraced financier’s 2008 conviction of soliciting prostitution from a minor. The revelation also contradicted a previous claim Lutnick made on a podcast last year that he and his wife had severed ties with Epstein in 2005 after visiting his home.

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Georgia’s Republican governor calls for special session to redraw electoral maps

The Republican governor of Georgia called a special session for next month to redraw electoral maps, the latest southern state to initiate new map-making after the US supreme court’s dismantling of the Voting Rights Act.

Brian Kemp announced the special session, which will start on 17 June, on Wednesday. It will focus on “enacting, revising, repealing, or amending” district lines for the state legislature and congressional district, in light of the supreme court’s decision in Louisiana v Callais.

Kemp, whose term ends next January, has said that the state will not redraw its boundaries for this year’s elections. The state’s primaries are set for next Tuesday. Instead, the redistricting special session will seek to lock in Republican-leaning maps while the party still holds power in the legislature and governor’s office.

The Republicans could seek to draw the Democratic representative Sanford Bishop, a Black member of Congress who has served since 1993, out of his seat, the Atlanta Journal Constitution noted. Other districts are less clear and could risk a “dummymander”, where an aggressive redraw backfires on the majority party.

Raphael Warnock, a Democratic US senator from Georgia, said of the push for new maps: “I will fight this with everything I have. There is an extreme movement in this country that will stop at nothing to hold on to power, even if it means stripping representation away from millions,” Warnock wrote on Twitter.

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‘Irresponsible’: backlash as Utah approves datacenter twice the size of Manhattan

A plan to create one of the world’s largest datacenters, a gargantuan project spanning an area more than twice the size of Manhattan, has provoked a furious public backlash in Utah amid concerns over its vast energy use and impact upon the state’s stressed water supplies. The Stratos artificial intelligence datacenter footprint will cover more than 40,000 acres (62 sq miles) over three sites in Box Elder county in north-western Utah. The facility will require about 9GW of power, which is more than the entire state of Utah currently consumes, and suck up a significant amount of water in an area that has been hit by severe drought in recent years.

Last week, the project was approved by the county’s commissioners, despite thousands of objections lodged by Utah residents. Environmentalists have warned that Stratos could imperil the Great Salt Lake ecosystem, including a critical migratory bird habitat, which is already under severe stress. The lake is shrinking due to water diverted for agriculture and the impact of the climate crisis, placing inhabitants of the nearby Salt Lake City at possible risk of toxic dust clouds as the lake bed dries up.

“At a time when the Great Salt Lake is already in crisis, approving a project that will consume water and energy at this scale is irresponsible and dangerous,” said Franque Bains, director of the Sierra Club’s Utah chapter. “Utahns want to see the Great Salt Lake restored, not stripped.” The proposed project is backed by Kevin O’Leary, the venture capitalist who appears on the TV show Shark Tank and recently played a villainous tycoon in the movie Marty Supreme. O’Leary has claimed Stratos will deliver thousands of jobs and help the US compete with China in the burgeoning AI industry.

“I don’t think there’s a bigger site in the world than this,” O’Leary told Fox News. “It shows the Chinese and the rest of the world we are not messing around, we are going to get this done, move it forward and provide the compute power to our AI companies that defend the country.” In an X post, O’Leary added: “We’re not gonna drain the Great Salt Lake. That’s ridiculous. We are gonna create incremental jobs.”

But these jobs will not outweigh the longer-term impacts to Utah and beyond, critics argue. Stratos is expected to raise the state’s planet-heating pollution by about 50% by consuming a huge amount of energy and water to power and cool itself, according to one impact analysis. The network of industrial-scale fans needed to cool the datacenter’s hot pipes will result in so much waste heat that it could raise daytime temperatures in the surrounding Hansel valley by 2F to 5F (1.1C to 2.7C) and night-time temperatures by 8F to 12F (4.4C to 6.6C), according to an analysis by Rob Davies, a physics professor at Utah State University. “The thermal load from the proposed Stratos project is extreme,” Davies said. “Of course it has effects. One of those effects is this: this facility imposes substantial drying on a watershed and ecosystem already in active collapse.”

Datacentres using 6% of electricity supply in UK and US

Datacentres are consuming 6% of electricity in the UK and US, with the growing strain of AI on energy supplies prompting community resistance, according to research. The proportion of electricity used by vast warehouses stacked with microchips to power AI and the internet has risen 15% worldwide in the past two years as annual global investment in datacentres approaches $1tn (£740bn) – nearly 1% of the global economy, according to the International Data Center Authority (IDCA).

The figures come amid energy shortages in the UK and datacentre developers reporting waits of several years for national grid connections. The IDCA said rising power usage globally was “sparking societal and political concerns” and called on tech companies to become more transparent about their plans for new datacentres to tackle “community frustration”.

The Guardian this week reported that developers working for Google significantly misstated how much carbon two proposed AI datacentres would contribute to the UK’s total emissions. “Significant community and political pushback starts to occur in nations once their datacentre footprints have reached the 5% consumption level of national grids,” the IDCA research concludes.

The UK, where 5.9% of electricity is used by datacentres, and the US, where the figure is 6%, are well above the global average of 2%. Tech use in Singapore and Lithuania is placing an even heavier burden on power supplies with 19% and 11% respectively of these countries’ national grid energy now consumed by datacentres. Responding to the rising power use, Greenpeace UK warned that an “unchecked AI boom” would mean higher energy bills, more stress on water supplies and “a new lifeline for fossil fuels”.

Doug Parr, the campaign group’s chief scientist, said: “Before being swept along by the enthusiasm of tech billionaires whose profits depend on this expansion, we should pause and ask ourselves whether it’s worth the price. “We need more transparency about the amount of water and energy used by data centres, proper environmental impact assessments, and a ban on new polluting plants being built to power AI.”

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Also of Interest

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

Iran War: Iran Escalates With Threat of Even Higher Level of Enrichment, Assertion of Larger Gulf Control Area as US Revealed to Have Lost 39 Planes and Press Gives Ever More Coverage to Economic Damage; Israel Political Meltdown Could Stymie Further Attacks; Trump More Visibly Losing His Mind

War On Iran: – U.S. Experiencing Price Increases

Europe’s Pro-Israel Consensus Is Fraying

Craig Murray: Zionism Poisons UK’s Central Nervous System

The Oreshnik

Trump on Verge of ‘Largest Single Act of Grand Larceny in American History’

Cartel corruption claims push US-Mexico relations to breaking point

Beware what you tell your AI chatbot. It’s not a shrink – it’s a snitch

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A Little Night Music

William Clarke – She's Dynamite

William Clarke – Daddy Pinnochio

William Clarke – Chromatic Jump

William Clarke – Lollipop Mama

William Clarke – Boogie Woogie Woman

William Clarke – Bite Again, Bite Again

William Clarke – A Good Girl Is Hard To Find

William Clarke – Drinkin Beer

William Clarke - Driving My Life Away

William Clarke - Must Be Jelly

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