The crude venality of the Trump administration blew up trade talks with Canada and are triggering a backlash with rural Texans that could cost the GOP control of the US Senate.

Today's Iran war post: Bessant's twin messes, neither of which he is managing well, plus some other sightings.

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Part the First: Is There No Place to Hide, or Just Be Yourself? Caitlin Johnstone points out once again that while we have been snoozing happily in a virtual haze, we are being followed by the latest incarnation of Big Brother to come along.  From Today in Dystopia: We Have Cameras Everywhere in that Town: […]

Today's Iran war news: As Bessent and Trump flail about, a discussion of what the coming crisis might look like.

DropSite News exposes how the too-cutely-named Israel front Honest Reporting managed to secure funds from the Knight Foundation

Russia's blockade of Odessa, which will have a global impact on grain supplies, is not getting the attention it warrants.

An update on near and longer-term forecasts for the impact of the arriving super El Niño.

Türkiye is being called upon for a more active role in against Iran and Russia. Will it oblige and would it make any difference?

An overview of the increased stresses on water supplies and their relationship to energy production.

Across the world countries are adopting policies that threaten to radically transform the Internet.

Forests are remarkably resilient, but what counts as time is far longer than a human lifespan.

Türkiye, Saudi Arabia, and Pakistan claim to want a regional security architecture without outside actors.

Greetings gentle reader and welcome to another installment of the Sunday Morning Movie. Today it’s a tragedy with a touch of comedy,Betrayal: Løperjenten (1981) And next week’s film, The Eccentrics: Sherekilebi (1974) Reviews of Betrayal: Letterboxd says: A feminine movie seen mostly through the eyes of little Kamilla (some close-ups on her reminds me of […]

Food banks are having an even harder time as SNAP cuts means even more have difficulty in paying for an adequate diet.

Today's Iran war news: The Trump team is fracasing over what to do as Iran goes on the front foot while servicemembers are badly overstressed.

A hard yet often witty look at how US environmental policy was built to fail, and the issues presented by AI and voter shifts.

A bizarre attack on the autism bona fides of environmentalist/TV presenter Chris Packham shows normies do not grasp that passing is hard work

Questioning whether some iconic political films are really all that political.

An ode to the public transportation commute—for the way it forces a visceral reminder of our shared humanity.

Perfidery and treachery abound as the latest Israel-Türkiye standoff leads to many questions.

A sweetly silly tale of the power of dreams versus the weight of authoritarianism.

Steve Keen and Michael Hudson discuss empire, finance, and the coming crises.

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Working-class members are less well represented in politics than most imagine.

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As bankruptcy rates rise, a primer on the process and some strategies that might hold the creditor wolves at bay.

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Silicon Valley promises abundance, but corporate America is built for extraction, and AI is their new vehicle.

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Nitty gritty data on how the rich are pulling away from everyone else, too politely called a K-shaped economy. That is setting in nationwide.

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Feral hog containment programs are having some success. Are mammals harder to control than other invasive species?

"Peace through strength" continues its disastrous world tour.

Morocco’s pressure on Spain is the latest example of a growing form of political coercion Europe is particularly exposed to.

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Early predictions that consumers would bear most of the burden of Trump's tariffs are proving to be true.

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A high-level historical assessment shows that the US image of dominance in war has persistently fallen short in practice.

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European businesses make it less often into the really big leads than their US counterparts. It's not for want of trying.

No progress made in limiting heat deaths over the past five years.

We are stuck in digital bureaucracies— more effective than real life ones at runarounds, time-wasting, and conditioning for resignation

For three years the Von der Leyen Commission has been secretly negotiating to hand over its citizens' data to a state committing a genocide.

The U.S. and Israel achieved what Iranian propaganda never could: they legitimized Iran in the eyes of many Sunni Muslims

Today's Iran war news: More proof of Trump impotence via sanctions huffing and puffing, plus Bessent weirdly going to war with the Fed.

Three particularly stressed oligarchs are getting a lot of negative attention this week as Mark Zuckerberg's Meta faces a $1.4 trillion lawsuit, Sam Altman's OpenAI is bleeding talent and their IPO seems an ever more remote possibility, and Larry and David Ellison are in a full-on media war with 12 attorneys general over their attempted purchase of Warner Bros Discovery.

Today's Iran war news: Iran ups the ante as markets look even more green around the gills.

For more than three decades, MIT physicist Ted Postol has challenged official claims about U.S. missile-defense performance. His remarkable isolation points toward a deeper problem: the defense establishment generates abundant technical criticism but too often fails to give that criticism enough leverage to stop troubled weapons programs before enormous commitments are made.

Today's Iran war news: Trump vocalizes aggressively, including threatening nukes, as Iran and Ansar Allah dig in and energy supplies tighten

Insurance billionaire Mark Walter briefly owned both the Los Angeles Dodgers and Lakers before being forced to sell one of the teams, seemingly under the duress of a criminal investigation involving a certain sovereign wealth fund that is very well connected in Hollywood.

Today's Iran war news: New shoes look set to drop as the MOU expires and the Gulf supply chokehold remains in place.

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Part the First: Another Promising Breakthrough in HIV Therapy.  For those of us who were following the HIV/AIDS epidemic more than forty years ago, advances in antiviral therapy have been more effective than many of us could have imagined when the only drug available was AZT, which did not work.  Too many healthy friends and […]

Israel has accomplished big things in very little time. But is it sustainable?

Nolan’s Odyssey is the work of a mature artist speaking about his time, perhaps to the detriment of the original work.

Today's Iran war news: more on the economic standoff as the Ansar Allah-Saudi conflict heats up and navy suicides come into the spotlight.

AI routinely fails to increase corporate productivity. Using it to get rid of workers is a big reason why.