2026-03-05
Horseshit
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Whuppity Scoorie: the Scottish spring ritual bringing a town together
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Attorneys get majority of payouts from handicap-accessible website lawsuits
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Meat falls from the sky again 150 years later in Bath County
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Pregnant women's brains shed grey matter to prime them for motherhood
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Rhode Island Files First-in-Nation Single-Room Occupancy Model Legislation
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Painting that made Turner's name gets second public showing since 1799
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Ancient Greece's most famous oracle was just high on gas fumes
Epstein
Musk
Robot uprising / Humanioid Helpers
Edumacationalizing / Acedemia Nuts
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Medical journal says the case reports it has published for 25 years are fiction
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The one science reform we can all agree on, but we're too cowardly to do
We can satisfy both the scientists and the scalpel-wielding politicians by ridding ourselves of the one constituency that should not exist. Of all the crazy parts of our crazy system, the craziest part is where taxpayers pay for the research, then pay private companies to publish it, and then pay again so scientists can read it. We may not agree on much, but we can all agree on this: it is time, finally and forever, to get rid of for-profit scientific publishers.
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Liberal elitism fails American universities
Singh is entitled to his views, but the tone and substance of his argument reveals a deeper problem that goes beyond a single op-ed. His piece exemplifies the elitism that has become increasingly common in progressive academic spaces, where political disagreement is dismissed as evidence of moral or intellectual inferiority. Reducing nearly half the country to a deficiency in intelligence is not serious scholarship. It is arrogance that substitutes ridicule and mockery for intellectual debate. When disagreement is explained away as stupidity, discussion becomes unnecessary and democracy itself begins to look like an inconvenience rather than a shared project. More troubling, however, is what such claims imply about entire cultures, religions and communities. Social conservatism is not a fringe ideology invented in America.
Info Rental / ShowBiz / Advertising
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Chinese hackers exploiting Dell zero-day flaw since mid-2024
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Good Hygiene Starts on Day One, Not When You're Ready to Ship
Then I looked at what they used as demo data. All seven Harry Potter books as plain text files, hosted on Kaggle — a public dataset platform where anyone can upload and share data, no vetting required. Not excerpts. Not public domain text. The full copyrighted text of seven novels by an author who is, whatever else you think of her, famously litigious about her intellectual property. Uploaded to Kaggle by a random user, linked from an official Microsoft corporate blog, loaded into Azure Blob Storage, and used to build a Q&A system and a Harry Potter fan fiction generator.
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Doomscrollers despair after Oracle hiccup knocks TikTok offline in US
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People are selling your home address online. This privacy tool will help
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You Bought Zuck’s Ray-Bans. Now Someone in Nairobi Is Watching You Poop.
A joint investigation by Svenska Dagbladet and Göteborgs-Posten went to Nairobi, Kenya and talked to the human data annotators – the real human workers who label and review footage from Meta Ray-Ban glasses to train the AI. What they found is… you guessed it, super bad! Workers at Sama, one of Meta’s annotation subcontractors, describe reviewing video of people undressing, coming out of bathrooms naked, watching porn, having sex, and exposing bank card details. It’s all captured by someone wearing the glasses, often without the subject knowing they were on camera. One worker said: “We see everything — from living rooms to naked bodies.” Another noted there are no phones allowed in the office because the material is so sensitive it could trigger “enormous scandals” if anyone knew. Worth noting the company Sama, the Meta subcontractor is a Certified B Corp and part of the Clinton Global Initiative.
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Eight Sleep raises $50M at $1.5B valuation
- These folks: (Feb 2025) Removing Jeff Bezos From My Bed
What goes too far in my opinion, is allowing all of Eight Sleep’s engineers to remotely SSH into every customer’s bed and run arbitrary code that bypasses all forms of formal code review process. And yes, I found evidence that this is exactly what’s happening.
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Big Google Home update lets Gemini describe live camera feeds
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Google ends its 30 percent app store fee and welcomes third-party app stores
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Online ads just became the internet's biggest malware machine
Space / Boomy Zoomers / UFO
AI Will (Save | Destroy) The World
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Anthropic Nears $20B Revenue Run Rate Amid Pentagon Feud
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OpenAI doesn't get to choose how the military uses its technology
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Quit ChatGPT: Your subscription is bankrolling authoritarianism
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Anthropic's AI tool Claude central to U.S. campaign in Iran, amid a bitter feud
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Anthropic investors push to de-escalate Pentagon clash over AI safeguards
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Anthropic's investors don't have its back in its fight with The Pentagon
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Anthropic CEO calls OpenAI's messaging around military deal 'straight up lies'
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European Central Bank: AI may be creating instead of destroying jobs for now
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OpenAI in talks to deploy AI across NATO classified networks
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Today in “Things that ‘AI’ has ruined”: No, I won’t be able to show up to your book club’s online/offline gathering, and the reason for this is simple: I, and likely every other author you might care to name, am so inundated with “book club” spam that it’s become impractical and often impossible to suss out the solicitations by actual book clubs with actual humans, from the literally dozens of “AI”-generated spam book club emails I get daily.
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News Corp, Meta in AI Content Licensing Deal Worth Up to $50M a Year
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Chat at your own risk Data brokers are selling deeply personal bot transcripts
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AI escalated conflicts by threatening nuclear strikes in 95% of simulated crises
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Gemini Said They Could Only Be Together If He Killed Himself. Soon, He Was Dead
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Don Knuth wrote a paper thanking Claude for solving an open math problem
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US AI giants seem fine with their tech being used to spy on Europeans
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OpenAI, Anthropic turn to consultants to fight over the enterprise market
Neo Gambling / Crypto con games
Economicon / Business / Finance
Gubmint / Poilitcks / Law Making
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'Failed experiment:' Florida committee unanimously OKs plan to scrap HOAs
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Incumbent Rep. Dan Crenshaw loses Texas GOP primary race
President Trump did not endorse a candidate in the contest. Crenshaw was the only House Republican in Texas running for re-election that did not receive Trump’s seal of approval.
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A National Archives traveling exhibition bringing nine original Founding-era documents to eight U.S. cities in commemoration of America’s 250th anniversary in 2026. Inspired by the Bicentennial Freedom Train, the Freedom Plane National Tour will make documents fundamental to America’s founding accessible to Americans across the country.
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House Oversight Committee concludes Tim Walz' administration knew of fraud, failed to act
“Testimony obtained by the Committee reveals that Gov. Tim Walz and Attorney General Keith Ellison were aware of widespread fraud in social service programs, lied about their knowledge of the fraud, and retaliated against employees who dared to raise concerns,” Oversight Committee Chairman James Comer said in a statement. “Instead of protecting vulnerable Americans, they handed over billions in taxpayer dollars to fraudsters and threw their own state employees under the bus,” Comer added.
Trump
Democrats
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Although the official vote count has not been made final, Crockett trails at this hour to her competitor, TX state representative James Talarico. There’s already some legal back and forth, and courts are involved, so the final outcome may not be confirmed for days. Already, though, Crockett is blaming her poor performance on… election fraud.
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Pete Buttigieg in the Wilderness.
He has a beard, a splitting maul, and a house in Michigan. Is that enough to convince America that he’s a man of the people?
Buttigieg’s critics seem to fault him for the vaguest reasons, many of which come down to: he’s too perfect; he’s not authentic; he’s not a man of the people. It’s an odd line of attack. Is it possible to be too perfect? Is perfection a flaw? Social psychology has documented something known as the “pratfall effect”: the distrust of people deemed too perfect. It turns out that people like smart, charismatic types—but they really like smart, charismatic types who screw up now and then, and do not just ace every test and land every joke. This effect may also help explain the appeal of Trump, whose fans acknowledge that he is a flawed president, and whose flaws count in his favor.
This manner of politics, where flaws count more than virtues, has come to dominate. In some ways Buttigieg is a perfect candidate, and in some ways he feels like a candidate perfect for an era that has slipped away. He does not curse; he does not sleep with porn stars; he does not abandon his progeny or spouse; he does not resort to low blows.
- Stop trying to make 'Fetch' happen.
Left Angst
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The Supreme Court just seized the most dangerous power in US law, in Mirabelli v. Bonta
The Supreme Court’s Republican majority just did the legal equivalent of grabbing J.R.R. Tolkien’s One Ring, placing it on their collective fingers, and dancing around singing, “I just can’t wait to become a Nazgûl.” The immediate impact of Mirabelli is that California public school teachers must out transgender students to their parents, even if the students wish to keep their gender identity secret from their family.
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After a lawsuit, USDA agrees to share climate risk data with farmers
Law Breaking / Police / Internal Security
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Father of suspect in 2024 Georgia shooting is found guilty of 2nd-degree murder after giving son gun
The father of the suspect in a 2024 Georgia high school shooting was found guilty on Tuesday of second-degree murder after giving his son a gun for Christmas. Colin Gray was convicted of second-degree murder and involuntary manslaughter, after the jury deliberated for less than two hours, The Associated Press reported. The charges are related to the September 2024 shooting at Apalachee High School in Winder, Georgia, northeast of Atlanta.
Prosecutors argued that Gray gave his son the gun as a Christmas gift and allowed him to access it and ammunition despite the boy’s declining mental health. They said that Gray had “sufficient warning that Colt Gray would harm and endanger” other people. Colt Gray, who was 14 at the time of the shooting, has pleaded not guilty to a total of 55 counts, including murder. A status hearing in his case has been set for mid-March.
External Security / Militaria / Diplomania
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US troops were told war on Iran was 'all part of God's divine plan'
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US launches military operations in Ecuador
U.S. forces have launched military operations with Ecuador against “designated terrorist organizations” inside the South American country, Southern Command said Tuesday. The military released no details on the operations but suggested in a statement that it was an extension of strikes carried out by the Trump administration against suspected drug trafficking organizations in the region.
World
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The next era of social media: built and run in Europe, ruled by our laws
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Toyota and Stellantis exit Tesla's EU regulatory pool for 2026 – Ford remains
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Why Europe needs a payment system independent of Mastercard and Visa
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EU proposes "Made in EU" rules for strategic sectors to limit China reliance
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Mexico Mandates Biometric SIM Registration for All Phone Numbers
Iran / Houthi
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Ayatollah Khamenei's son is frontrunner to succeed dad as Iran's new supreme leader: report
Mojtaba Khamenei, 56, is currently favored to take control of Iran by the country’s Assembly of Experts, a powerful body of clerics that makes the decision, the New York Times reported while citing sources close to the deliberations. Other outlets – including Israeli media and Iranian opposition channels – were reporting early Tuesday that Mojtaba had already been selected, though Iranian state media has not confirmed anything. Motjaba — the ayatollah’s second-oldest son — has been known for his staunch adherence to his father’s hardline conservatism and has close ties to Iran’s notoriously brutal Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps military body, according to CNN.
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Al Jazeera investigation: Iran girls' school targeting likely 'deliberate'
This clip clearly shows two separate columns of thick black smoke rising simultaneously: The first from deep inside the military base, and the second from the geographically independent site of the girls’ school. The visible distance between the two columns matches the distance separating the two areas as shown by the satellite imagery. This refutes any claim that the damage to the school was caused by shrapnel flying from the adjacent base, and strongly indicates that the school building was subjected to a direct, separate strike.
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Matches the image i saw showing what appeared to be a launch from that base that didn't go very far before it went down again. smoke trail is a "U" in that picture. this here is the first mention I've seen of shrapnel.
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UN calls for investigation into deadly strike on school in Iran
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Iran Strikes U.S. Military Communication Infrastructure in Mideast
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CIA working to arm Kurdish forces to spark uprising in Iran, sources say
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Wikipedia articles on the Iran war are being rewritten in real time
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Israel Is Blowing Up Iran's Police State to Clear the Way for a Revolt
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Iran war wreaking havoc on shipping and air cargo, could create global delays
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AWS says drones hit two of its datacenters in UAE, urges users to move resources
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Iranian strikes on Amazon data centers highlight industry's vulnerability
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The Iran War's Most Precious Commodity Isn't Oil, It's Desalinated Water
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US escort offer met with skepticism as traffic trickle through Strait of Hormuz
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The US is using repurposed Iranian drone technology to attack Iran
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Thousands of Kurdish fighters have launched a ground invasion in Iran, according to a US official. The Kurdish militias, based across the border in Iraq, began the offensive in northwestern Iran on Wednesday. President Donald Trump on Sunday night spoke with the heads of Kurdish militant groups in Iraq to discuss the situation in Iran.
The CIA was exploring plans to arm the Kurdish forces with the aim of sparking a popular uprising, CNN reported Tuesday. The Kurdish groups are widely seen as the most well-organized faction of the fragmented Iranian opposition and are believed to have thousands of battle-hardened fighters. Their entry into the war could pose a significant challenge to the besieged authorities in Tehran and could also risk pulling Iraq further into the conflict. Asked about Kurdish involvement, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth told reporters: 'None of our objectives are premised on the support or the arming of any particular force. 'So, what other entities may be doing, we're aware of, but our objectives aren't centered on that.'
Israel
Russia Bad / Ukraine War
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Russia blames Ukraine for attacking tanker that sank in the Mediterranean | AP News
A Russian-flagged tanker carrying liquefied natural gas exploded and erupted in flames before sinking in the Mediterranean Sea off the coast of Libya, authorities in the North African country said Wednesday, and Russia blamed the sinking on an attack by Ukrainian sea drones. According to the Libyan Maritime Authority, there were “sudden explosions, followed by a massive fire” on the Arctic Metagaz on Tuesday, while the LNG carrier was about 240 kilometers (150 miles) off the coast of the Libyan city of Sirte.
Health / Medicine
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What Alexis de Tocqueville taught me about recovering from a brain injury
Modern medicine still often assumes an older, more hierarchical model in a world where a physician’s authority is uncontested and a patient’s role is to comply. But actual patients behave differently, especially in the digital age. They arrive with their own research, Google-driven theories, and “expert” advice generated by artifical intelligence. When medical guidance feels rushed, impersonal, or dismissive, patients instinctively turn toward the people de Tocqueville said they trust most: their peers. This is not a rebellion against medicine. It is a democratic reflex.
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FDA sends warning to 30 telehealth companies selling 'illegal' GLP-1s
Pox / COVID / BioTerror AgitProp
Environment / Climate / Green Propaganda
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Sea level much higher than assumed in most coastal hazard assessments
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Study finds 77% of US national parks are highly vulnerable to climate change
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Solar in poor countries is creating a lead hazard
poorly regulated recycling of lead-acid batteries (the kind used to start cars, motorcycles, and other vehicles) is a much bigger problem than was previously realized. The solar issue is worth paying attention to not just for the irony that a green technology is contributing to extreme environmental harm, but precisely because decentralized solar is such a fundamentally promising technology for poor countries. It’s plausible that African solar generation will go vertical over the next few years, which would be great — except if it also means a huge increase in unsafe recycling of lead batteries, then that would be terrible. The world desperately needs to get ahead of this problem.
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Record Number of Objects Launched into Space Last Year
Some 4,510 objects were launched in 2025, far surpassing the 2,903 objects launched in 2023, the previous high, according to U.N. data. Since the dawn of the Space Age, roughly 25,000 objects have been sent into space.