Trump-whisperer Laura Loomer sharpens her knives for Pam Bondi

Trump-whisperer Laura Loomer sharpens her knives for Pam Bondi

Politico reports: MAGA activist Laura Loomer has set her sights on ousting Attorney General Pam Bondi, as the White House fends off fury from the president’s base over its handling of the investigation into Jeffrey Epstein’s criminal case and death. Loomer called on FBI Director Kash Patel and Deputy Director Dan Bongino to ask for Bondi’s public resignation Friday morning, writing on social media that Patel and Bongino had clashed with Bondi over the investigation. Loomer also claimed that Bongino…

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Metadata shows the FBI’s ‘raw’ Jeffrey Epstein prison video wasn’t raw

Metadata shows the FBI’s ‘raw’ Jeffrey Epstein prison video wasn’t raw

Wired reports: The United States Department of Justice this week released nearly 11 hours of what it described as “full raw” surveillance footage from a camera positioned near Jeffrey Epstein’s prison cell the night before he was found dead. The release was intended to address conspiracy theories about Epstein’s apparent suicide in federal custody. But instead of putting those suspicions to rest, it may fuel them further. Metadata embedded in the video and analyzed by WIRED and independent video forensics…

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Grok 4 seems to parrot Elon Musk when answering controversial questions

Grok 4 seems to parrot Elon Musk when answering controversial questions

TechCrunch reports: During xAI’s launch of Grok 4 on Wednesday night, Elon Musk said — while livestreaming the event on his social media platform, X — that his AI company’s ultimate goal was to develop a “maximally truth-seeking AI.” But where exactly does Grok 4 seek out the truth when trying to answer controversial questions? The newest AI model from xAI seems to consult social media posts from Musk’s X account when answering questions about the Israel and Palestine conflict,…

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No life without water: How Israel’s actions in Gaza echo other genocides

No life without water: How Israel’s actions in Gaza echo other genocides

Mark Zeitoun, Laurence Boisson de Chazournes, Ghassan Abu-Sittah, Danilo Türk, and Reem Abu Shomar write: Of all the many forms of deprivation imposed on Palestinians, Israel’s strategic control and denial of water stand out as particularly insidious. Taken alongside the denial of entry of life-saving aid, dismantlement of medical services, and imposed hunger, Israel’s long-term disruption of water services in Gaza redefines the limits of acceptable suffering of civilians. This weaponization of water echoes historical genocides and threatens to normalize violations of humanitarian standards. Depriving…

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In Brazil, Trump challenges a country — and a leader — ready for a fight

In Brazil, Trump challenges a country — and a leader — ready for a fight

The Washington Post reports: Since returning to the White House, President Donald Trump has used trade as a cudgel to exert concessions from smaller nations. But Brazil, his newest tariff target, is a much more formidable adversary, analysts said, and is less likely to bend to pressure from Washington. Latin America’s largest nation has a relatively closed economy, more insulated than many of its peers from fluctuations in global trade. China, not the United States, is now Brazil’s leading trade…

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Why a dedicated Justice Department lawyer became a whistle-blower

Why a dedicated Justice Department lawyer became a whistle-blower

Ruth Marcus writes: In the early days of the first Trump Administration, Erez Reuveni, a lawyer for the Department of Justice, went to court to defend the new President’s travel ban on foreign nationals from seven predominantly Muslim countries. He told the federal judge hearing the case to ignore the unpleasant fact that, as a candidate, Donald Trump had argued for a travel ban on Muslims; those statements, he said, didn’t justify interfering with Trump’s authority to take actions that…

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Trump finally realizes that ‘Putin is playing him and the United States for fools’

Trump finally realizes that ‘Putin is playing him and the United States for fools’

Susan B Glasser writes: Donald Trump finally called “bullshit” on Vladimir Putin this week, though nobody seems to quite know what it means. One explanation, and perhaps the best one, is that Trump, belatedly, recognized what has long been apparent to the rest of us: that Putin has been playing him, pretending to talk peace while escalating Russia’s war of aggression on Ukraine. On Monday, Trump announced that he was “not happy with President Putin at all” and overruled his…

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Justice Department efforts to strip citizenship from naturalized Americans likely violate constitutional rights

Justice Department efforts to strip citizenship from naturalized Americans likely violate constitutional rights

New American citizens recite the Oath of Allegiance during a naturalization ceremony in Miami on Aug. 17, 2018. AP Photo/Wilfredo Lee By Cassandra Burke Robertson, Case Western Reserve University and Irina D. Manta, Hofstra University The Trump administration wants to take away citizenship from naturalized Americans on a massive scale. While a recent Justice Department memo prioritizes national security cases, it directs the department to “maximally pursue denaturalization proceedings in all cases permitted by law and supported by the evidence”…

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Senate committee poised to reject Trump’s proposed massive science cuts

Senate committee poised to reject Trump’s proposed massive science cuts

Nature reports: A key US Senate committee has indicated that it will reject the massive budget cuts that President Donald Trump proposed for some science agencies, including the US National Science Foundation (NSF) and NASA. The US Senate Committee on Appropriations was prepared to vote today to advance a bill laying out fiscal year 2026 funding for science. However, the senators came to an impasse on an unrelated matter — the location for the new headquarters of the Federal Bureau…

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A glaring security issue for blockchains and other digital encryption schemes

A glaring security issue for blockchains and other digital encryption schemes

Erica Klarreich writes: Randomness is a source of power. From the coin toss that decides which team gets the ball to the random keys that secure online interactions, randomness lets us make choices that are fair and impossible to predict. But in many computing applications, suitable randomness can be hard to generate. So instead, programmers often rely on things called hash functions, which swirl data around and extract some small portion in a way that looks random. For decades, many…

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‘People are going to die’: A malnutrition crisis looms in the wake of USAID cuts

‘People are going to die’: A malnutrition crisis looms in the wake of USAID cuts

Wired reports: Few lifesaving tools are as effective as ready-to-use therapeutic foods, known as RUTFs, which are specially designed to treat severe malnutrition and often resemble fortified peanut butter. Despite announcing a $50 million pledged to fund RUTFs earlier this summer, the Trump administration’s deep cuts to foreign assistance have wreaked havoc on RUTF distribution globally, and the State Department hasn’t placed orders with leading suppliers this year. Experts say the disruptions will result in more children dying from hunger….

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With West Bank annexation in the air, settlers revel in their impunity

With West Bank annexation in the air, settlers revel in their impunity

Oren Ziv and Shatha Yaish report: Over the span of two days, one of the last remaining Palestinian communities between Ramallah and Jericho was uprooted from its land. On the evening of July 2, dozens of Israeli settlers descended on the West Bank shepherding village of Al-Muarrajat. They broke into homes, stole around 60 sheep, and erected a small outpost inside the village. By the next morning, settlers were seen sitting alongside Israeli soldiers at the newly built outpost, now…

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California’s cruelly demonized immigrant farmworkers share their stories

California’s cruelly demonized immigrant farmworkers share their stories

  Aeon: In the United States, a large share of fruit and vegetable production comes from California, where the agricultural industry relies heavily on immigrant labour. Many of these workers arrive from Mexico and Central America, and a significant number are undocumented. Directed by the Mexican American filmmaker Andrés Lira, who has Indigenous Purépecha roots and a family history of farm work, Primero, Sueño (‘First, I dream’) is a stirring portrait of a group often rendered invisible – or worse,…

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The Supreme Court is rewarding the Trump regime’s contempt for the rule of law

The Supreme Court is rewarding the Trump regime’s contempt for the rule of law

Paul Rosenzweig writes: In the American system, courts don’t make law; they interpret it. The act of interpreting the law requires, well, interpretation—not mere pronouncement, but an explanation for that pronouncement, backed up by law, evidence, and logic. That’s why the Supreme Court’s failure to offer any sort of reasoning to justify its order in Department of Homeland Security v. D. V. D is a threat to the rule of law, a reward for defiance, and a horrific example of…

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