Browsed by
Author: From elsewhere

‘Israelis are frustrated, but do they want to stop the war? Not exactly’

‘Israelis are frustrated, but do they want to stop the war? Not exactly’

+972 Magazine reports: Nearly a year on from the deadliest attack in Israel’s history, the Israeli army continues to wage a devastating war in the Gaza Strip with no apparent end in sight. There is now abundant evidence that senior political and security figures failed to heed warnings in the lead-up to the Hamas-led October 7 attack, and the army has acknowledged that it was too slow to respond. Investigations have confirmed that senior commanders employed the infamous “Hannibal directive,” permitting Israeli forces to endanger the…

Read More Read More

Gov. Gavin Newsom has the chance to make AI history

Gov. Gavin Newsom has the chance to make AI history

Vox reports: Advocates say it is a modest law setting “clear, predictable, common-sense safety standards” for artificial intelligence. Opponents say it is a dangerous and arrogant step that will “stifle innovation.” In any event, SB 1047 — California state Sen. Scott Wiener’s proposal to regulate advanced AI models offered by companies doing business in the state — has now passed the California State Assembly by a margin of 48 to 16. Back in May, it passed the Senate by 32 to 1. Once the…

Read More Read More

The asteroid-in-spring hypothesis

The asteroid-in-spring hypothesis

Kerry Howley writes: It remains a matter of dispute when and where and with what antecedent Melanie During came up with the idea for determining the season the asteroid killed the dinosaurs. But the idea was this: Sturgeon bones grow like tree rings, and the bone cells grow thickest in summer, when food is most plentiful. A slice of bone, then, should reveal a succession of seasons. Months of plenty would be thicker, as the fish grew fat on plankton….

Read More Read More

Trump in damage-control mode over abortion backlash from the right

Trump in damage-control mode over abortion backlash from the right

NBC News reports: Former President Donald Trump is in damage control mode on abortion after telling NBC News that Florida’s six-week ban is “too short” and declining to take a clear stance on a state ballot measure that would expand access to the procedure. The backlash from anti-abortion advocates was fierce, with some warning that the Republican presidential nominee was risking losing support from a key bloc of the party’s base. Alarmed by what she saw, Marjorie Dannenfelser, president of…

Read More Read More

The GOP is making false claims about noncitizens voting. It’s affecting real voters

The GOP is making false claims about noncitizens voting. It’s affecting real voters

NPR reports: Earlier this month, Alabama voter William Pritchett received an unexpected letter from election officials telling him his voter registration was made inactive and was “on the path for removal from the statewide voter list.” He was among more than 3,200 people on the state’s voter rolls whose registrations had been flagged by Alabama Secretary of State Wes Allen as part of a new initiative to identify possible noncitizens. Yet Pritchett was born in Alabama and has always been…

Read More Read More

Ultrawealthy donors quietly push Harris to drop tax on ultrawealthy

Ultrawealthy donors quietly push Harris to drop tax on ultrawealthy

The New York Times reports: Donors to Vice President Kamala Harris’s campaign are pushing her to reconsider supporting a proposed tax on the wealthiest Americans, as some Wall Street and Silicon Valley executives try to reshape the Democratic nominee’s governing agenda. Ms. Harris’s campaign last week said she supported the tax increases included in President Biden’s latest White House budget proposal. One of those plans would require Americans worth at least $100 million to pay taxes on investment gains even…

Read More Read More

Top Brazilian judge orders suspension of X platform in Brazil amid feud with Musk

Top Brazilian judge orders suspension of X platform in Brazil amid feud with Musk

The Associated Press reports: A Brazilian Supreme Court justice on Friday ordered the suspension of Elon Musk’s social media giant X in Brazil after the tech billionaire refused to name a legal representative in the country, according to a copy of the decision seen by The Associated Press The move further escalates the monthslong feud between the two men over free speech, far-right accounts and misinformation. Justice Alexandre de Moraes had warned Musk on Wednesday night that X could be…

Read More Read More

‘Sowing the seeds for more hatred’ – UN’s top Gaza official speaks to Mehdi Hasan

‘Sowing the seeds for more hatred’ – UN’s top Gaza official speaks to Mehdi Hasan

  In this episode of “Mehdi Unfiltered,” a discussion about the threats facing Palestinians in Gaza in an exclusive interview with the Commissioner-General of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency, Philippe Lazzarini. Mehdi also explores why U.S. news organizations can’t get their coverage of Donald Trump right in a conversation with author Wajahat Ali and James Fallows, former chief speechwriter to President Jimmy Carter. The episode also looks into the situation for women and minorities in Afghanistan with Ali…

Read More Read More

How U.S. universities are trying to muzzle pro-Palestine protests before they restart

How U.S. universities are trying to muzzle pro-Palestine protests before they restart

Middle East Eye reports: The academic semester has kicked off at many US universities this week, and schools are working in a myriad of ways to tamp out the pro-Palestinian and student-led demonstrations that roiled the country this past spring. As students make their way back to campus, familiarising themselves with class schedules and reconnecting with university life, administrations have been working – often in conjunction with the police – to weed out the possibility of a repeat of last…

Read More Read More

Humanity’s newest brain gains are most at risk from ageing

Humanity’s newest brain gains are most at risk from ageing

Nature reports:In the more than six million years since people and chimpanzees split from their common ancestor, human brains have rapidly amassed tissue that helps decision-making and self-control. But the same regions are also the most at risk of deterioration during ageing, finds a study that compared images of chimp brains with scans of human brains. Previous studies have shown that regions of the human brain that are the last to mature, such as parts of the frontal lobe, are…

Read More Read More

‘It is not the job of the pro-life movement to vote for President Trump,’ says leading anti-abortion activist

‘It is not the job of the pro-life movement to vote for President Trump,’ says leading anti-abortion activist

Politico reports: For years, the anti-abortion activist Lila Rose has pushed the GOP to curtail access to abortion. But now, as Donald Trump and his running mate JD Vance conspicuously soften their abortion message ahead of the November election, Rose — who leads the prominent anti-abortion group Live Action — is embracing a more radical strategy: Urging her followers not to vote for Trump unless he changes course. That position — which she teased in a series of social media posts earlier this week — defies both Democratic…

Read More Read More

U.S. Army rebukes Trump campaign for incident at Arlington National Cemetery

U.S. Army rebukes Trump campaign for incident at Arlington National Cemetery

CNN reports: The US Army issued a stark rebuke of former President Donald Trump’s presidential campaign over the incident on Monday at Arlington National Cemetery, saying in a statement on Thursday that participants in the ceremony “were made aware of federal laws” regarding political activity at the cemetery, and “abruptly pushed aside” an employee of the cemetery. “Participants in the August 26th ceremony and the subsequent Section 60 visit were made aware of federal laws, Army regulations and DoD policies,…

Read More Read More

Decision on Georgia election board threatens Kemp’s détente with Trump

Decision on Georgia election board threatens Kemp’s détente with Trump

The Washington Post reports: Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp (R) has enjoyed an unusually friendly public rapport in recent days with former president Donald Trump. After years of heaping insults on Kemp for refusing to help reverse Joe Biden’s 2020 victory in the state, Trump praised the governor on Truth Social this month for his “help and support.” On Thursday, Kemp plans to attend a fundraiser in Atlanta for the Republican presidential nominee, who is locked in a virtual tie with…

Read More Read More

Trump threatens to jail Mark Zuckerberg for life

Trump threatens to jail Mark Zuckerberg for life

Politico reports: Former President Donald Trump writes in a new book set to be published next week that Mark Zuckerberg plotted against him during the 2020 election and said the Meta chief executive would “spend the rest of his life in prison” if he did it again. It represents Trump’s most recent attack on Zuckerberg, who he has repeatedly accused of intervening in the last presidential election. And it comes as Meta has taken steps to assure conservatives it will…

Read More Read More