In the latest Earthling, the weekend edition of @nonzeronews.bsky.social, I discuss 'conflict entrepreneurs,' people who exploit or inflame conflict to gain power or status or money.

Is Trump’s bombing of Venezuelan boats that allegedly carry drugs really about drugs?

The assassination of conservative activist Charlie Kirk has galvanized right-wing movements worldwide, with leaders from Germany to South Korea describing it as evidence of an existential threat from leftist forces, the Wall Street Journal reports.

"Whether you choose violence or not, violence is coming to you—you either fight back or you die.” – Elon Musk, speaking remotely to a gathering of conservative nationalists in Britain. More below:

In this week’s Earthling, the weekend edition of @nonzeronews.bsky.social, I compare JD Vance’s demagoguery with Utah Governor Spencer Cox’s plea for restraint after the Kirk assassination.

The hallucination problem may not subside soon. But at least LLMs aren’t mainly used for tasks that require accuracy, like practical guidance or seeking information…

This week Israel’s finance minister, Bezalel Smotrich, described Gaza as a “real estate bonanza” and said talks have begun with the Trump administration over how to divvy up the proceeds, the Israeli newspaper Ynet reported. More below:

Israel has begun its ground offensive into Gaza City, whose hundreds of thousands of residents constitute the largest concentration of not-yet-displaced Palestinians in Gaza. More below:

NEW: Spencer Cox for President? Plus: Chatbot homewreckers; Slippery Palantir; Gaza’s grim climax; Trump’s fake Caribbean drug war; Conflict entrepreneurs; and more! buff.ly/5Bh1WnH

I had a predictably illuminating chat with Glenn Loury about what the Kirk assassination says about the state of the nation and where we go from here.

Tribalism and the Charlie Kirk Killing | @robertwrighter.bsky.social and Glenn Loury discuss the assassination of the conservative activist—and the role of political polarization in leading to it and in shaping the aftermath.

It would be an exaggeration to say that JD Vance and Stephen Miller are trying to turn Kirk's death into the burning of the Reichstag, but I wish it was more of an exaggeration than it is. Things could get very bad very fast if people of principle on the right don't speak out.

In this week’s Earthling—the weekend edition of @nonzeronews.bsky.social: A note on the blowback from 9/11, and a reminder that we have the agency to handle 9/10 with more wisdom.

If the current direction of the country is to be turned around, the energy will have to come from people and groups not on most radar screens. More from @robertwrighter.bsky.social on the aftermath of Kirk's assassination below:

Wisdom didn’t come from the top after 9/11, and it’s not likely to come from the top after Kirk's assassination on 9/10. If pivotal agency is to materialize, it will probably have to emerge from the bottom up.

Will the first superpower to achieve artificial superintelligence enjoy overwhelming military dominance, as some have suggested? Probably not, here's why:

Lots of nations like the United Nations! Even in the US, whose current government is deeply hostile to the UN, most people have a favorable view of the institution.

Trump said that Kirk was “an advocate of nonviolence” and “that’s the way I’d like to see people respond.”

NEW – After the Kirk Killing Plus: South Park genius; AI vs. MAD; UN widely beloved! And more!

Trump’s Epstein Problem and His Authoritarian Slide | @robertwrighter.bsky.social and Nikita Petrov discuss Trump's birthday greeting to Epstein and what the broader story says about the media and US democracy. Plus: Trumpism vs Putinism, South Park, and more.

Following his designation of cartels as terrorist organizations, Trump ordered a US strike on a Venezuelan boat in international waters, killing 11. Legal scholars consulted by WSJ say he exceeded his authority. More below:

“Let it go. Stop kidding yourself. Stop talking as if you’re serious about preserving US primacy and doing nothing about it. It’s extremely dangerous. It provokes without deterring.” —Hugh White on the 80,000 Hours podcast, advising the blob to accept multipolarity.

GPT-4.1 provided detailed bomb-making instructions, advice on venue vulnerabilities, and tips for evading detection—all in response to prompts featuring flimsy pretexts like "security planning," The Guardian reports.

CREEPY QUOTE OF THE WEEK “You gotta break some eggs to make an omelet.” —White House AI Czar David Sacks on the All-In podcast, defending the thuggish tactics Trump used to extract financial concessions from Intel’s CEO, Lip-Bu Tan.

In the latest @nonzeronews.bsky.social: How Republican and Democratic presidents have both failed to provide the kind of global leadership the world actually wants.

Activists are using AI to identify ICE agents, notwithstanding the masks they wear during raids, Politico reports. More below:

A “new reality” is taking hold: global power is shifting from the US toward China, according to The Economist.

At the SCO’s “Year of Sustainable Development” summit, China promised to boost renewables across member states. @ember_energy data shows that China knows a thing or two about developing renewable energy:

What is it about rich, powerful men and immortality? (1/7)

In this week's Earthling, the weekend edition of @nonzeronews.bsky.social: A good example of how the New York Times, like other mainstream US media, engages in China threat inflation.

Activists are using AI to identify ICE agents, notwithstanding the masks they wear during raids, Politico reports. More below:

ChatGPT will tell you how to blow up a stadium if you ask nicely enough.

US immigration agents will soon have the tools to hack into cellphones, track their location, and use their microphones as secret recording devices. More below:

NEW – The Week in China Freakouts. Plus: ICE agents outed; Michael McFaul squirms; Trump’s maritime mayhem; Low-tech immortality; and more in this week's Earthling. www.nonzero.org/p/the-week-i...

Epstein, AI, and the Xi-Putin Path to Immortality | @robertwrighter.bsky.social and psychologist @paulbloomatyale.bsky.social discuss what the Ghislaine interview really revealed—via Mickey Kaus' analysis. Plus: AI vs indoor plumbing, the Xi-Putin summit, and more.

America's Military Death Squads #VetsResist #ResistanceUnited

I had a great chat with Seth Harp about his important & engrossing book The Fort Bragg Cartel: Drug Trafficking and Murder in the Special Forces. The blowback from US foreign policy it documents is mindblowing.

American Death Squads | @robertwrighter.bsky.social interviews Seth Harp, journalist and author of the NYT bestseller "The Fort Bragg Cartel," about drugs and mayhem in the US Army’s secretive Delta Force and the unforeseen consequences of military interventions.

I had a great conversation with Nikita Petrov, who offered a Russian perspective on Trump’s authoritarian tendencies, how they compare to Putin’s, and the current state of US democracy.

Is Trump Becoming Putin? | @robertwrighter.bsky.social and Nikita Petrov compare and contrast the two leaders in light of the US president's second term.

The MAGA Case Against AI Accelerationism | @robertwrighter.bsky.social and Joe Allen, tech editor on Steve Bannon’s War Room podcast, discuss AI, transhumanism, Palantir, the noosphere, China, and more.

"This is a very complicated situation. It would be hard for the Kissingers of the world to pull off." @robertwrighter.bsky.social highlights the gap between the complexity of Russia–Ukraine negotiations and the limitations of Trump’s hollowed-out foreign policy apparatus.

Pakistan secured a comparatively low 19% tariff after its officials launched a charm offensive that included collaboration on a Trump family crypto venture, a pledge to nominate Trump for the Nobel Peace Prize, and the enlistment of lobbyists close to Trump.

An MIT study found that 95 percent of corporate AI pilot programs have failed to increase profits. More below:

The new Earthling (weekend edition of @nonzeronews.bsky.social) gets into Israel’s one-state drive—more settlements, more ethnic cleansing by settlers, talk of relocating Gazans to South Sudan, etc. Also: the latest in Trump suckup tactics, AI news and, of course, the black-market ant trade.

AI could hollow out New York and San Francisco even more dramatically than deindustrialization depopulated Pittsburgh and Detroit, argues Oxford economist @carlbfrey.bsky.social in NYT.

“For everything that happened on October 7th, for every person on October 7, fifty Palestinians must die. It doesn’t matter now if they are children,” said retired Israeli general Aharon Halevi in a leaked recording. More below:

Flattery from Zelensky and other European leaders seems to have helped nudge Trump toward supporting security guarantees for Ukraine, though he remained wary of any commitments involving American boots on the ground. More below:

Despite rising temperatures, the melting of Arctic sea ice has dramatically slowed since 2005, the Guardian reports. Scientists say warming trends are “probably” being counterbalanced by natural ocean current variability but that melting is likely to rise again in 5 to 10 years.