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What happens when an AG dares to investigate Leonard Leo’s network

What happens when an AG dares to investigate Leonard Leo’s network

Politico reports: Allies of Leonard Leo have mounted a monthslong offensive against the man investigating the judicial activist’s network: Washington, D.C., Attorney General Brian Schwalb. Since news of the probe broke last August, the GOP chairs of powerful congressional committees launched their own investigation of Schwalb’s investigation; conservative media wrote articles criticizing Schwalb on unrelated crime issues — based on a social media post from a top Leo lieutenant; and a group of his Republican law enforcement peers sent letters…

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DOJ’s sweeping Apple antitrust lawsuit draws expert praise

DOJ’s sweeping Apple antitrust lawsuit draws expert praise

The Verge reports: The Department of Justice’s antitrust division has come into its own, having filed its third tech monopoly lawsuit in four years. The accumulated experience shows up in the complaint, according to antitrust experts who spoke with The Verge about the complaint filed Thursday accusing Apple of violating antitrust law. The DOJ describes a sweeping arc of behaviors by Apple, arguing that it adds up to a pattern of illegal monopoly maintenance. Rather than focusing on two or…

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The last time a Trump company went public it didn’t go well for investors

The last time a Trump company went public it didn’t go well for investors

NBC News reports: Donald Trump’s social media company could go public as soon as next week, paving the way for a potentially huge windfall for a former president who raked in tens of millions of dollars the last time one of his companies was listed on a stock exchange. That previous, decades-ago experience, however, did not end well for the company or its investors. While a 2016 Washington Post review found that Trump made over $44 million, the company —…

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How chain-of-thought reasoning helps neural networks compute

How chain-of-thought reasoning helps neural networks compute

Ben Brubaker writes: Your grade school teacher probably didn’t show you how to add 20-digit numbers. But if you know how to add smaller numbers, all you need is paper and pencil and a bit of patience. Start with the ones place and work leftward step by step, and soon you’ll be stacking up quintillions with ease. Problems like this are easy for humans, but only if we approach them in the right way. “How we humans solve these problems…

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UNICEF official tells of ‘utter annihilation’ after travelling length of Gaza

UNICEF official tells of ‘utter annihilation’ after travelling length of Gaza

The Guardian reports: An aid official who travelled the length of Gaza this week has described scenes of “utter annihilation”, with “nothing left” of what were once thriving and crowded cities in the territory. “The depth of the horror surpasses our ability to describe it,” said James Elder, a spokesperson with the United Nations Children’s Fund (Unicef). “As soon as you drive through the north, you get that universal gesture of hunger of people putting their hands to their mouths….

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What did U.S. Gaza ‘ceasefire’ resolution say and why did Russia and China veto it?

What did U.S. Gaza ‘ceasefire’ resolution say and why did Russia and China veto it?

Patrick Wintour writes: After months of vetoing other UN security council resolutions in an effort to defend Israel’s military campaign in Gaza, the US has in recent weeks gone on to the diplomatic front foot in New York, drafting and tabling its own resolution that was put to a vote on Friday before being vetoed by Russia and China. The US secretary of state, Antony Blinken, said the resolution would send “a strong signal”. But what was that signal precisely?…

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Doctors, back from Gaza hospitals, tell Washington of horrors and press for immediate ceasefire

Doctors, back from Gaza hospitals, tell Washington of horrors and press for immediate ceasefire

The New York Times reports: The memories are indelible. Screaming families carrying bloodied loved ones through the doors of an overcrowded hospital. A boy trying to resuscitate a child who looked not much older than himself. A 12-year-old with shrapnel wounds to his head and abdomen being intubated on the ground. What he saw that January day at the Nasser Hospital in Khan Younis in southern Gaza — after a missile strike on an aid distribution site — has haunted…

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More young Americans favor Palestinians than Israelis, while half of Americans are ignorant about the death toll in Gaza

More young Americans favor Palestinians than Israelis, while half of Americans are ignorant about the death toll in Gaza

Middle East Eye reports: More young Americans have favourable views of Palestinians than they do of Israelis in the current war in Gaza, while about half of the US population doesn’t know which side has a higher death toll, according to a new poll by Pew Research Center. The poll is the latest research conducted on American attitudes toward Israel’s war, which began in October. It found that 60 percent of Americans between the ages of 18-29 expressed favourable views…

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U.S. says ISIS was responsible for deadly Moscow concert hall attack

U.S. says ISIS was responsible for deadly Moscow concert hall attack

The New York Times reports: A branch of the Islamic State claimed responsibility on Friday for the attack in Moscow that killed at least 40 people and injured about 100 others, and U.S. officials confirmed the claim shortly afterward. The United States collected intelligence in March that Islamic State-Khorasan, known as ISIS-K, the branch of the group based in Afghanistan, had been planning an attack on Moscow, according to officials. ISIS members have been active in Russia, one U.S. official…

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Inside Garland’s effort to prosecute Trump

Inside Garland’s effort to prosecute Trump

The New York Times reports: After being sworn in as attorney general in March 2021, Merrick B. Garland gathered his closest aides to discuss a topic too sensitive to broach in bigger groups: the possibility that evidence from the far-ranging Jan. 6 investigation could quickly lead to former President Donald J. Trump and his inner circle. At the time, some in the Justice Department were pushing for the chance to look at ties between pro-Trump rioters who assaulted the Capitol…

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How microbes influence our brain health

How microbes influence our brain health

Anthony King writes: You feel tension in the pit of your stomach as you begin your big public talk. You get butterflies as you wait for exam results. A mentor tells you to trust your gut feelings on a career decision. It’s no wonder ancient thinkers viewed the gut as the seat of emotions, or that a medieval physician even proposed that perception and our soul resided in our digestive organs. ‘Back in history we used to think the gut…

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‘Man-made famine’ charge against Israel is backed by mounting body of evidence

‘Man-made famine’ charge against Israel is backed by mounting body of evidence

Peter Beaumont writes: The accusation by the UN and other humanitarians that Israel may be committing a war crime by deliberately starving Gaza’s population is likely to significantly increase the prospect of legal culpability for the country, including at the international court of justice. Amid reports that the Israel Defense Forces are hiring dozens of lawyers to defend against anticipated cases and legal challenges, the charge that Israel has triggered a “man-made famine” by deliberately obstructing the entry of aid…

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U.S. calls for immediate Gaza ceasefire and hostage deal in draft UN resolution

U.S. calls for immediate Gaza ceasefire and hostage deal in draft UN resolution

The Guardian reports: The US has drafted a new UN security council resolution calling for an “immediate ceasefire” and hostage deal in Gaza, amid mounting pressure on Israel to halt its military campaign and allow the delivery of substantial amounts of humanitarian aid into the Palestinian territory. The CIA and Mossad spy chiefs, William Burns and David Barnea, were expected to arrive in Qatar on Friday in the hope of clinching an elusive truce-for-hostages deal between Israel and Hamas. Speaking…

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We are about to witness in Gaza the most intense famine since World War Two

We are about to witness in Gaza the most intense famine since World War Two

Alex de Waal writes: Gaza is already the most intense starvation catastrophe of recent decades. The death toll from hunger and disease may soon surpass the body count from bombs and bullets. The Famine Review Committee reported this week that Gaza is facing “imminent famine”. The Integrated Phase Classification (IPC) system, set up 20 years ago, provides the most authoritative assessments of humanitarian crises. Its figures for Gaza are the worst ever by any metric. It estimates that 677,000 people,…

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