“Political outsider Abelardo de la Espriella held a razor-thin lead in Colombia’s presidential election with nearly all the votes counted Sunday, in a runoff vote marked by people’s fears of a renewed internal conflict. A victory by de la Espriella would effectively be an indictment of the policies of outgoing President Gustavo Petro, whose protégé had promised to continue his agenda if he defeated his rival. De la Espriella, a business owner and lawyer who earned U.S. President Donald Trump’s endorsement despite never having run for office, led progressive lawmaker Iván Cepeda taking 49.7% of the votes, with 99.9% of the results released by electoral authorities. Cepeda, Petro’s ally, earned 48.7% support. Election officials have not formally announced a winner. … Cepeda told supporters that his campaign considers the count ‘unofficial and non-binding’ and that his team will challenge results from more than 30,000 voting stations.” (06/22/26)
“With Elon Musk’s ascent to trillionaire status following last Friday’s SpaceX IPO, progressive politicians are once again calling for a wealth tax. Elizabeth Warren, Bernie Sanders, and more argue that taxing immense fortunes would provide the revenue needed to fund everything from universal childcare to expanded healthcare and housing programs. Listening to them, one gets the impression that society is perpetually just one new tax away from solving its big problems. That’s fantastical thinking. The wealth tax is often presented as an obvious way to fund government programs—basically free money. Yet its proponents rarely grapple with two realities. First, the tax may be practically unworkable. Second, even if it could be implemented, the revenue would not solve the problems these politicians identify, and may even worsen them. These are separate questions, and both deserve examination.” (06/20/26)
“The U.S. military [murdered] two men in its latest strike targeting a suspected drug-trafficking boat in the Caribbean, U.S. Southern Command announced late Sunday, lifting the monthslong operation’s death toll to at least 213. The strike left six survivors, according to SOUTHCOM, which said in a statement that it immediately notified the U.S. Coast Guard to activate search-and-rescue operations. … Sunday’s strike was the third conducted since Tuesday and the fourth this month, [murdering] at least eight people. The status of two survivors from a strike last week was not known.” (06/22/26)
“AI is everywhere. It’s getting incorporated into everything. That’s simply progress, we’re told. And therefore we need to embrace it, lest we look like a Luddite and let China win (whatever that means). Yet, simultaneously, a lot of people also are afraid because of AI. Very afraid. And sometimes, we’re told that we should be afraid too. However, in public discourse surrounding AI, there often can be a lack of detail regarding what specifically we’re supposed to be afraid of. Sometimes it is not even clear what is meant by the term ‘AI.’ … these more hyperbolic, sci-fi depictions of the threat(s) posed by AI tend to get more attention than, and consequently distract from, more realistic and more imminent threats pertaining to privacy, freedom, autonomy, and even just a way of life many of us have come to enjoy.” (06/19/26)
“President Trump on Sunday issued new threats against Iran and its negotiators as US and Iranian officials were in Geneva, Switzerland, for the first round of talks under the US-Iran Memorandum of Understanding. Speaking to Fox News reporter Trey Yingst, President Trump claimed that he spoke with Iranian officials overnight and told them: ‘You close [the Strait of Hormuz] and you won’t have a country.’ … Yingst said Trump also told the officials that if the strait is closed, ‘you won’t even make it back to your f–cking country,’ which appears to be a threat against the lives of Iran’s officials in Geneva, who include Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi and Parliament Speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf. … Trump’s threats violate the MoU, which states that the two sides must ‘refrain from the threat or use of force against each other,’ and Iran’s PressTV reported that Iran’s delegation in Geneva raised objections with the US side over his comments.” (06/21/26)
“It has never been a better time in America to be a socialist. We aging Gen Xers who thought that socialism had been decisively refuted by the fall of the Berlin Wall have been refuted ourselves: Democratic socialists now run Seattle and New York City, and come January, probably D.C. too, where Janeese Lewis George won the Democratic primary that generally decides the district’s mayoral elections. … The challenge is that socialism’s rise is spiky, concentrated in blue cities where affluent (but often downwardly mobile) college graduates cluster. That’s a problem for the Democratic Party, where the excesses of progressive governance are helping to make the party’s brand toxic in the less true-blue areas. But it’s also a challenge for the socialists, because cities are the hardest place to execute big plans for new taxing and spending.” (06/21/26)
“A Senate committee is considering a vote in July to prevent the Trump administration from transferring core functions of federal special education programs to the Health and Human Services Department, which is overseen by Robert F. Kennedy Jr. The move – one of the most dramatic changes in President Donald Trump’s yearlong crusade to dismantle the Education Department – immediately set off alarm among disability rights groups, who fear it could eventually disrupt services for students with disabilities. Critics pointed to RFK Jr.’s pattern of controversial past statements about autism in particular (he said during a press conference last year that the condition ‘destroys families’). Though federal officials have not yet provided a clear timeline for the bold shift – even in internal communications to employees – they’ve promised that students’ rights will continue to be protected.” (06/20/26)
“It is a sad and disturbing fact that the white supremacist cis hetero chauvinists behind the mirage factory that is Atlantic neoliberalism have adopted the notion of ‘LGBTQ rights’ as one of their many excuses for flattening the planet and turning it into a colossal beige fulfillment center at the service of the global 1%. But this must be seen for what it truly is; fickle, empty and totally deceptive propaganda.” (06/20/26)
“This week, a federal judge in Montana cancelled oil and gas leases on 1.5 MILLION acres of land in the State of Wyoming (a different district). And more acres in Montana and the Dakotas. … The State of Wyoming alone will lose $330 million in royalties and fees – not counting the taxes paid by the people who work getting and transporting the natural gas, and the taxes as the money circulates through the local economies. Now, as lovers of liberty, we are of mixed feelings about the bureaucrats and politicos down in Cheyenne (or Helena, or Bismarck and Pierre) getting less money. But it is the people that won’t get paid because that oil and gas will stay in the ground, instead of fueling the economy, that really take it in the shorts. … So why did this judge do this? Including going outside his district? Bluntly, because the guy is in bed with the environists.” (06/20/26)
