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Lobbyists close to Trump say their going rate to advocate for a pardon is $1 million

Lobbyists close to Trump say their going rate to advocate for a pardon is $1 million

The Wall Street Journal reports: President Trump had just awarded a posthumous Presidential Medal of Freedom for Charlie Kirk in October when his son ushered friends toward the Oval Office. As a string ensemble played in the background, Donald Trump Jr. walked up with lobbyist Ches McDowell to chat with the president. Trump Jr. at one point pulled McDowell forward to shake the president’s hand, according to a livestream broadcast. After they went inside, McDowell took the president aside to…

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‘It’s frightening’: How far right is infiltrating everyday culture

‘It’s frightening’: How far right is infiltrating everyday culture

The Guardian reports: The two men chop peppers, slice aubergines and giggle into the camera as they delve into the art of vegan cooking. Both are wearing ski masks and T-shirts bearing Nazi symbols. The German videos – titled Balaclava Kitchen – started in 2014 and ran for months before YouTube took down the channel for violating its guidelines. But it offered a glimpse of how far-right groups have seized on cultural production – from clothing brands to top 40…

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More than 20% of videos shown to new YouTube users are ‘AI slop’, study finds

More than 20% of videos shown to new YouTube users are ‘AI slop’, study finds

The Guardian reports: More than 20% of the videos that YouTube’s algorithm shows to new users are “AI slop” – low-quality AI-generated content designed to farm views, research has found. The video-editing company Kapwing surveyed 15,000 of the world’s most popular YouTube channels – the top 100 in every country – and found that 278 of them contain only AI slop. Together, these AI slop channels have amassed more than 63bn views and 221 million subscribers, generating about $117m (£90m)…

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The next scientific revolution won’t come from scientists

The next scientific revolution won’t come from scientists

Steve Fuller writes: The most influential work on the nature of science for at least the past fifty years has been The Structure of Scientific Revolutions, first published in 1962 by a young physicist-turned-historian, Thomas Kuhn. Although influential, the book has also been widely misunderstood. It is quite common to think—certainly based on the title—that Kuhn was providing a formula for producing scientific revolutions. On the contrary, he was arguing that revolutions only happen once scientists confront insurmountable obstacles in…

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America’s biggest oil field is turning into a pressure cooker creating a huge toxic mess

America’s biggest oil field is turning into a pressure cooker creating a huge toxic mess

The Wall Street Journal reports: Shale drillers have turned the biggest oil field in the U.S. into a pressure cooker that is literally bursting at the seams. Producers in the Permian Basin of West Texas and New Mexico extract roughly half of the U.S.’s crude. They also produce copious amounts of toxic, salty water, which they pump back into the ground. Now, some of the reservoirs that collect the fluids are overflowing—and the producers keep injecting more. It is creating…

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‘We ain’t seen nothing yet’ — Trump’s mass deportations expected to ‘scale up dramatically’ in 2026

‘We ain’t seen nothing yet’ — Trump’s mass deportations expected to ‘scale up dramatically’ in 2026

Wired reports: When Donald Trump won a second term as US president a year ago, members of violent militias and far-right extremist groups who had spent years boosting the lie that the 2020 election was rigged were ready to assist the president with delivering on one of his main campaign promises: mass deportations. “I’m willing to help,” Richard Mack, a former sheriff who founded the far-right Constitutional Sheriffs and Peace Officers Association, told WIRED at the time, claiming he was…

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How Trump upended the rules-based global order

How Trump upended the rules-based global order

Patrick Wintour writes: ‘The old world is dying,” Antonio Gramsci once wrote. “And the new world struggles to be born.” In such interregnums, the Italian Marxist philosopher suggested, “every act, even the smallest, may acquire decisive weight”. In 2025, western leaders appeared convinced they – and we – were living through one such transitional period, as the world of international relations established after the second world war crashed to a halt. During such eras, Gramsci more famously wrote, “morbid phenomena…

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America’s trade dominance may soon begin to crack

America’s trade dominance may soon begin to crack

Cory Doctorow writes: In 2026, the leaders of America’s (former) trading partners are going to have to grapple with the political consequences of tit-for-tat tariffs. A tariff is a tax paid by consumers, and if there’s one thing the past four years have taught us, it’s that the public will not forgive a politician who presides over a period of rising prices, no matter what the cause. Luckily for the political fortunes of the world’s leaders, there is a better…

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War on Christmas: Trump announces wave of airstrikes targeting ISIS militants in Nigeria

War on Christmas: Trump announces wave of airstrikes targeting ISIS militants in Nigeria

The Intercept reports: President Donald Trump said the U.S. launched airstrikes in northwest Nigeria on Christmas night targeting ISIS militants and warning future attacks may follow. “Tonight, at my direction as Commander in Chief, the United States launched a powerful and deadly strike against ISIS Terrorist Scum in Northwest Nigeria, who have been targeting and viciously killing, primarily, innocent Christians, at levels not seen for many years, and even Centuries!” Trump wrote Thursday on Truth Social. Africa Command conducted the…

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Trump officials move to screen visa applicants’ social media posts for ‘anti-American’ speech

Trump officials move to screen visa applicants’ social media posts for ‘anti-American’ speech

The Washington Post reports: The Trump administration is widening efforts to screen visa applicants for online speech considered dangerous and “anti-American” as the government moves to restrict legal migration and remove people from places the president has called “garbage.” The State Department earlier this month expanded new regulations requiring foreign students and people on academic and cultural exchange programs to disclose five years of their social media histories and make all of their posts public. All applicants for H-1B employment…

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Musk drops ‘sustainable’ from Tesla’s mission while promoting a fantasy of ‘abundance’

Musk drops ‘sustainable’ from Tesla’s mission while promoting a fantasy of ‘abundance’

Fred Lambert writes: It’s official. The word “sustainable” is gone from Tesla’s mission statement. For over a decade, Tesla’s guiding star was arguably the most impactful corporate mission statement of the 21st century. But over the last few years, we have watched the company slowly drift away from its environmental roots. Now, Elon Musk has confirmed the final step in that divorce, rebranding the company’s goal from “Sustainable Abundance” to simply “Amazing Abundance.” The evolution of Tesla’s mission statement tells…

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Echoes of Eichmann: The industrialization of mass deportation

Echoes of Eichmann: The industrialization of mass deportation

The Washington Post reports: The Trump administration is seeking contractors to help it overhaul the United States’ immigrant detention system in a plan that includes renovating industrial warehouses to hold more than 80,000 immigrant detainees at a time, according to a draft solicitation reviewed by The Washington Post. Rather than shuttling detainees around the country to wherever detention space is available, as happens now, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement aims to speed up deportations by establishing a deliberate feeder system,…

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Trump’s immigration nightmare is going to get much, much worse

Trump’s immigration nightmare is going to get much, much worse

Radley Balko writes: With astonishing speed, the administration has toppled the most cherished pillars of a free society. Masked secret police now tear-gas entire city streets, jump out from unmarked vehicles to abduct and detain suspected undocumented people, and demand that foreign-looking people (mostly Latino) produce papers on demand. These deportation forces have been told by the president and his advisers to cast a wide net, that immigrants are “animals,” that the activists defending them are “domestic terrorists,” and that…

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Chasing an economic boom, White House dismisses multiple risks of AI

Chasing an economic boom, White House dismisses multiple risks of AI

The New York Times reports: It was early November, and the stock market had grown jittery as investors recoiled anew over the enormous bets the nation’s largest technology companies had placed on artificial intelligence. But the skittishness playing out on Wall Street that day barely registered at the White House. Asked whether he harbored any fears about an emerging bubble, one that could damage the economy if it were to pop, President Trump brushed aside all doubts. “No,” he quickly…

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