Horrific reporting from the AP on the Myanmar families watching their kids starve to death from Trump and Musk’s aid cuts apnews.com/article/myan...

When the AI bubble pops no one will be able to say we couldn’t see it coming. on.ft.com/4q1WeX1

open.substack.com/pub/pauloffi... In the midst of a measles epidemic that killed 3 people, RFK Jr. reminds us that vaccines don't save lives.

Heaven have mercy on us all—Presbyterians and Pagans alike—for we are all somehow dreadfully cracked about the head, and sadly need mending

I have been trying to get this published as an op-ed, but I am going to post it here since I think it is timely in light of the "consent" extortion events. Deafening Quiet from the Scientific Establishment jeremymberg.github.io/jeremyberg.g... 1/14

Claim: 10 cars rammed ICE Truth: No cars rammed ICE Claim: She boxed ICE in Truth: ICE boxed her in Claim: She shot a rifle at ICE Truth: She did not have a rifle Claim: ICE returned fire Truth: Only ICE fired Claim: She drove herself to the hospital Truth: Paramedics found her

Some more random Weiss lore since she’s an official government propagandist now: we probably have her to thank for the mainstreaming of Vinay Prasad, and he probably owes her for his current job bc she facilitated his official transition to the Right mediasphere.

1. Federal agents from ICE and other agencies are wrongly detaining U.S. citizens, sometimes detaining them for days, on suspicion that they are undocumented immigrants. The raids are done without search warrants or other procedures designed to protect civil liberties.

Every TRO against this admin comes from a hearing where the judge says “what the fuck are you people doing” and the DOJ just kind of shrugs, get ruled against, and then the admin regroups to find some other way to ignore or get around the order and then Congress does exactly nothing

I think “the White House is directing the military to treat broad swaths of the public as terrorist threats and inciting terroristic political violence against branches of govt that would defy it” would be a good time to have a serious conversation about whether or not this is a Country

Time to repost a classic. clarkesworldmagazine.com/kim_02_24/

Greta Thunberg says she is being detained by Israel in cell ‘infested with bedbugs’

Even though it's crisis #192308 in our current time, I don't think it's sufficiently sunk in with ppl in the academic community that getting federal funding for your research will primarily depend on whether Trump political appointees find you and your work useful kffhealthnews.org/news/article...

A WILD ONE: A man broke his leg during an arrest by ICE at a car wash south of L.A. ICE has held him under 24/7 guard at a hospital, registering him under a pseudonym, for *37 days* without telling him why. A judge has ordered his immediate release. storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.us...

"Not surprising but devastating" seems to be the general sentiment from 4 former NIH IC directors formally fired this week, 2 who were tenured senior investigators with active labs. www.science.org/content/arti...

Why doesn't the US have a general strike? Well you can point to culture or whatever but I think structure is of not immediate use here: does the US have organizations and institutions it can use to network, organize and mobilize a general strike? No.

I only ever heard second-hand from my German relatives what the 1930s were like but it sounded like this. You see the story, it feels wrong, but everyone else around you is just carrying on, shopping, working, going to the cinema. So you do the same. Keep your head down, maybe this is fine? Normal?

Getting played by Milei is literally losing checkers to a dog

this is wild: while Stephen Miller's guy was in Minnesota for his uncle's funeral, somebody was able to see his entire phone and take pictures of his Signal group chats talking about military deployments to Portland, and brought them to the Strib (gift link: www.startribune.com/trump-offici...)

"This is extortion, plain and simple.... The only solution is solidarity and collective action against this effort at federal control over higher education." A sobering analysis of the illegality of the administration's "compact" and its stakes for higher ed. 🎁🔗 www.nytimes.com/2025/10/02/o...

Trump's higher ed ransom note is here - everyone would have to acquiesce to their unprecedented demands or not be "given priority for grants," plus they can demand "reimbursement" for "violations" www.wsj.com/us-news/educ... A mechanism to enforce fealty. An attack on academic freedom and democracy

I’m fine with undocumented people getting healthcare. They should get the same healthcare billionaires get. I think it would be good, actually.

"Could the next Scarlett Johansson or Natalie Portman be an AI avatar?" I don't know, could a peanut butter sandwich somehow turn into the next Jeep Wrangler? Could a cellphone magically turn into a tiny bird and fly away with my wallet? Could a family of large opossums replace the government?

ER wait times will get worse because more people are under or uninsured and Medicaid cuts will cause many hospitals to close, funneling more demand to the ones that remain.

A grad student who had previously been in an IDF intelligence unit was asked to drop a course on Palestine for recording without anyone’s consent following repeated complaints from classmates. The professor teaching the course was suspended from teaching and accused of antisemitism.

the president of the united states wants to use the american military to kill american citizens on american soil. that's the whole story!

1. The $20 billion taxpayer-funded rescue package for Argentina, announced last week by the Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, delivers an enormous windfall to hedge fund billionaire Rob Citrone. Citrone has a longstanding personal and professional relationship with Bessent.

Most of the political and pundit class lined up the past two weeks as Trump pushed to label everyone on the Left as "domestic terrorists." Now in the wake of a day of horrific and deadly mass shootings by a Trump supporter and a conspiracy theorist, total crickets.

In which a top US Border Patrol official, incredibly, tells my tall and Anglo colleague @chipmitchell1.bsky.social that he's not the type they're looking for as they go about downtown Chicago arresting people based on "how they look" chicago.suntimes.com/immigration/...

I literally believe that he typed “how can I improve US healthcare if I’m the president” into an AI video generator

Translation: "I arrived in Bogotá. I no longer have a visa to travel to the USA. I don't care," responded the Colombian president. "The seat of the United Nations cannot continue in New York," he added.

just allow trump to invade every American city until only Orlando Florida is left and THEN Hakeem Jeffries gonna spit fire

*taps sign* www.kgw.com/article/news...

RFK cherry picking ACIP didn’t work out the way they wanted to, controlling all of the institutions and levers of power isn’t working the way they wanted it to, so now we’re just getting RFK ventriloquizing through the president’s social media account.

Assata Shakur has "died in Havana, Cuba, as a result of health conditions and her advanced age." She was 78.

The Event that consumed us 2 weeks ago is already fading from public memory, replaced by an Escalator Crisis. The right’s rank-and-file—despite blaring, fireworks and spectacle ornamented instructions from the Party to seize the moment—are so conspiracy-addled they are mostly arguing w themselves

You’d get the impression from the past 8 months that telling Congress the truth was punishable by death

20$ says he’s fixated on doing the ballroom right now and was shocked that the Indonesian cabinetry was cheaper than the US-made option.

I think this is a fascinating and creative way to think about budget cuts to NIH and what they would mean for all of our health: www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...

Every day we approach this reality:

Microsoft will no longer allow Israel to use its cloud services to enable its mass surveillance of occupied Palestinians – "the first known case of a US technology company withdrawing services provided to the Israeli military since the beginning of its war on Gaza"

just saying: it's possible that "I'm gonna dramatically constrict my state capacity while plotting dramatic imperial expansion, and expanding my set of internal enemies while alienating most of my foreign allies" is the beginning of a world-historical masterstroke. but also possible that it isn't

BREAKING: A federal judge has ordered the University of South Dakota to reinstate a professor who posted criticism of Charlie Kirk on his Facebook page the day of the shooting, finding the action likely violated the First Amendment. storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.us...

I also want to point out that this is a very effective rhetorical tactic—adding some anodyne comments (whole foods are preferable in general to “ultraprocessed” foods as nutrition for kids) to go along with the objectionable ones. It’s meant to get people to lower their guard and be credulous.

This is significant evidence, already in good company, that Thiel fundamentally does not understand the religion he pretends to be a part of. Christendom eagerly awaits the fulfillment of prophecy! This is an argument *for* fearing and regulating AI.

I had to see it with my own eyes to believe it. Incredible.