The wildest, scariest, indisputable truth about AI's large language models is that the companies building them don't know exactly why or how they work. read more
President Trump's second term has been a payday for the powerful, exposing a disconnect in his promise to deliver for "the forgotten man" of America's working class. read more
President Trump reportedly picks up when his cell rings even if he doesn't know who's calling. Senior members of his team also love chatting on their personal devices. That makes the administration uniquely vulnerable to basic scams like spoofed calls and impersonation attempts. read more
It's boom time for the next generation of fast travel read more
In a time in which politics has caused significant division, protests have become more common. Specifically, protests on overpasses. A group of those protesters have faced scrutiny in recent months, getting at least three visits from State Police. What has followed has been an argument over right to protest and where that protest can happen read more
Another view ...
Anti-vaccine advocate RFK Jr. fires entire CDC panel of vaccine advisors
arstechnica.com
... Anti-vaccine advocate and current US Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has taken the extraordinary action of firing all 17 vaccine experts on a federal committee that advises the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on immunization practices.
In an opinion piece published Monday in The Wall Street Journal, Kennedy announced that he had cleared out the committee, accusing them of being "plagued with persistent conflicts of interest" and a group that has "become little more than a rubber stamp for any vaccine."
"Without removing the current members, the current Trump administration would not have been able to appoint a majority of new members until 2028," Kennedy added. ...
Announcing a restructuring of federal health guidance processes via an op-ed in a newspaper is also unusual.
In Kennedy's article, he criticized ACIP and FDA advisors for being in the pocket of the pharmaceutical industry. However, he argued that the "problem isn't necessarily that ACIP members are corrupt."
"Most likely aim to serve the public interest as they understand it," he wrote. "The problem is their immersion in a system of industry-aligned incentives and paradigms that enforce a narrow pro-industry orthodoxy."
Kennedy, who is currently trying to shift the national attention to his idea of clean living and higher-quality foods, has a long history of advocating against vaccines, spreading misinformation and disinformation about the lifesaving shots. However, a clearer explanation of Kennedy's war on vaccines can be found in his rejection of germ theory. In his 2021 book that vilifies infectious disease expert Anthony Fauci, he bemoaned germ theory as "the pharmaceutical paradigm that emphasized targeting particular germs with specific drugs rather than fortifying the immune system through healthy living, clean water, and good nutrition." ...
Sly & The Family Stone - Everyday People (1968)
www.youtube.com
Lyrics excerpt ...
...
[Verse 1]
Sometimes I'm right and I can be wrong
My own beliefs are in my song
The butcher, the banker, the drummer and then
Makes no difference what group I'm in
[Chorus]
I am everyday people, yeah, yeah
[Verse 1]
There is a blue one who can't accept the green one
For living with a fat one, trying to be a skinny one
Different strokes for different folks
And so on and so on and scooby-dooby-dooby
[Refrain]
Ooh, sha-sha
We got to live together (Ooh, sha-sha)
[Verse 2]
I am no better and neither are you
We are the same, whatever we do
You love me, you hate me, you know me and then
You can't figure out the bag I'm in
[Chorus]
I am everyday people, yeah, yeah
[Verse 3]
There is a long hair that doesn't like the short hair
For being such a rich one that will not help the poor one
Different strokes for different folks
And so on and so on and scooby-dooby-dooby
[Refrain]
Ooh, sha-sha
We got to live together (Ooh, sha-sha)
[Verse 4]
There is a yellow one that won't accept the black one
That won't accept the red one that won't accept the white one
Different strokes for different folks
And so on and so on and scooby-dooby-dooby
[Chorus]
Ooh, sha-sha
I am everyday people (Ooh, sha-sha)
...
Thank-you for the great music, Sylvester Stewart, a.k.a., Sly Stone.
Sometimes, I wonder if this may be how First Lady Trump thinks of Pres Trump ?
Tuff Darts - [Your Love Is Like] Nuclear Waste (1977)
www.youtube.com
Wow, I had to really look for lyrics. Found some ...
...
I'd rather crawl through poison ivy
or grab high tensions wires
cut my legs off at the knees
or set myself on fire
Than have to feel your charms
closing in around me
or feel your slimy kisses covering my body
Your love is like a nuclear waste
your body is a danger to the human race
they should stamp contaminated right across your face
your love is like a nuclear waste
I'd rather stick my tongue into a vat
drink ex-lax all day long
or have to chew on razor blades
or--------- to king kong
Than have to be between the sheets with you for any time
or have to feel your scaly flesh moving onto mine
...
@#31 ... Its as if all the "States rights" Republicans are faint memories now. ...
Yup.
Pres Trump has trod over States Rights in this issue.
Downtown LA declared 'unlawful assembly'; Newsom to sue over National Guard deployment
www.usatoday.com
... Tensions escalated in Los Angeles late Sunday between law enforcement and protesters as California National Guard troops arrived in Southern California to quell demonstrations against President Donald Trump's immigration crackdown, a move that the state's Democratic governor has called unlawful.
Trump ordered the deployment of 2,000 Guard members over the objections of Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass and California Gov. Gavin Newsom, who said Trump wanted to create a "spectacle." U.S. Northern Command said about 300 soldiers were on the ground at three locations in the greater Los Angeles area to provide "safety and protection of federal property and personnel." ...
Anyone now in downtown L.A. subject to arrest
www.nbcnews.com
... Police tonight expanded their unlawful assembly declaration to include all of downtown Los Angeles, generally the area inside a loop created by the 110, 101, 5 and 10 freeways.
The declaration means nobody, with a few exceptions, including members of the news media, should be in the area and will be subject to arrest. ...
@#27 ...So, Newsom does not have the strong negotiating power that he thinks he has. ...
California passes Japan as fourth largest economy (April 2025)
www.bbc.com
... California's economy has overtaken that of the country of Japan, making the US state the fourth largest global economic force.
Governor Gavin Newsom touted new data from the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the US Bureau of Economic Analysis showing California's growth.
The data shows California's gross domestic product (GDP) hit $4.10 trillion (3.08 trillion) in 2024, surpassing Japan, which was marked at $4.01 trillion. The state now only trails Germany, China and the US as a whole.
"California isn't just keeping pace with the world - we're setting the pace," Newsom said. ...
So, in Pres Trump's crusade to "Make America Great Again," why does he seem to be so against California, an apparent example of global American Excellence?
@#6
From back in the day, before COVID ...
Anti-vaccination beliefs don't follow the usual political polarization (2017)
theconversation.com
... When health officials learned that the 2015 measles outbreak was caused by clusters of unvaccinated children, Americans once more wanted to understand why some parents do not vaccinate their children. In our highly polarized culture, media commentators and even academics began to connect opposition to vaccination to either the left or right of politics.
So a question arises: Who is more likely to be opposed to vaccination, liberals or conservatives? As a sociologist who studies infectious disease, I took a look at this. The answer seems to depend on what question you ask.
Because the outbreak started in the wealthy, liberal enclave of Marin County, California, and because some of the best-known "anti-vaxxers" are Hollywood actors, some right-leaning media outlets connected opposition to vaccination to liberals and related it to other "anti-science" beliefs like fear of GMOs, use of alternative medicine, and even astrology. Other writers have opposed such a caricature and have argued that opposition to vaccination is actually either bipartisan or a specifically conservative problem. Academic research on the topic is also conflicted.
While historians have shown that there is a long history of opposition to vaccination in America, the contemporary anti-vaccination movement got its major boost in 1998 when Andrew Wakefield published faulty research in The Lancet that falsely claimed that the mumps, measles and rubella (MMR) vaccine was related to autism.
...
Cyberattack on U.S. Officials' Phones Traced to Suspected Chinese Espionage Ring
www.theyeshivaworld.com
... Cybersecurity investigators noticed a highly unusual software crash -- it was affecting a small number of smartphones belonging to people who worked in government, politics, tech and journalism.
The crashes, which began late last year and carried into 2025, were the tipoff to a sophisticated cyberattack that may have allowed hackers to infiltrate a phone without a single click from the user.
The attackers left no clues about their identities, but investigators at the cybersecurity firm iVerify noticed that the victims all had something in common: They worked in fields of interest to China's government and had been targeted by Chinese hackers in the past.
Foreign hackers have increasingly identified smartphones, other mobile devices and the apps they use as a weak link in U.S. cyberdefenses. Groups linked to China's military and intelligence service have targeted the smartphones of prominent Americans and burrowed deep into telecommunication networks, according to national security and tech experts. ...
@#6 ... Isn't it a crime to profit off a crime? ...
A question asked when the President of the United States has ...
Guilty: Trump becomes first former US president convicted of felony crimes (2024)
apnews.com
... Donald Trump became the first former American president to be convicted of felony crimes Thursday as a New York jury found him guilty of all 34 charges in a scheme to illegally influence the 2016 election through a hush money payment to a porn actor who said the two had sex. ...
@#3
Yeah, I've enjoyed their music since their beginning.