“The Southern District of Texas announced the seizure of more than $50 million in NVIDIA GPUs bound for China in violation of US export laws. Authorities arrested two businessmen, one of them the owner of a Houston company, accused of smuggling the chips used to train and run AI models. … The smuggling operation used a combination of falsified paperwork, purposefully misclassified goods, straw purchasers and even removing the NVIDIA labels on GPUs to ship them to both mainland China and Hong Kong. The conspirators face between 10 and 20 years in prison if convicted.” (12/09/25)
“Donald Trump’s 2025 National Security Strategy reveals a radical blood-and-soil conception of national strategy based on maintaining white patriarchal Christian domination at home and abroad.” (12/09/25)
“The Pentagon’s own manual on the laws of war describes a scenario similar to the Sept. 2 boat-strike in discussing when service members should refuse to comply with unlawful orders. ‘For example,’ says Section 7.3 of the manual, ‘orders to fire upon the shipwrecked would be clearly illegal.’ But I would argue that all the focus on the ‘double-tap’ is misguided. The real issue, the issue we should be focusing on, is not one illegal double-strike on Sept. 2. The issue is Trump’s whole illegal war. As of this writing, the U.S. military has bombed 23 small boats allegedly transporting illegal drugs off the coast of Venezuela, killing 87 people. And yet to date, the administration has not provided one iota of proof that the boats were actually carrying illegal drugs. Even if they were, those boats posed no national security threat to the U.S.” (12/09/25)
“There are economic, environmental, and practical arguments for making landfill disposal free or even subsidized, rather than charging tipping fees. The major case for free or subsidized landfill disposal is that it reduces Illegal dumping. Charging per ton or per bag creates an incentive for some households and businesses to illegally dump waste to avoid fees. And illegal dumping cleanup is expensive for municipalities, because cleanup costs sometimes exceed the revenue from tipping fees. Eliminating fees would remove the incentive to dump in streets, rivers, or abandoned lots. Free disposal would lead to fewer external cleanup costs. Furthermore, it would encourage proper waste management by small businesses. Many small contractors, such as roofers, landscapers, carpenters face tight margins, and tipping fees can encourage burning waste onsite, causing air pollution, dumping in forests or fields.” (12/09/25)
“The Lithuanian government has declared a ‘nationwide emergency situation’ in response to a series of incursions from neighbouring Belarus by weather balloons carrying smuggled cigarettes. Prime Minister Inga Ruginiene condemned the balloon incursions as a ‘hybrid attack’ by Belarus that posed a real risk to national security and civil aviation. This year alone, officials say about 600 balloons linked to smuggling and almost 200 drones have entered Lithuanian airspace, leading to the repeated closure of Vilnius airport. Belarusian leader Alexander Lukashenko denies being behind the incursions, alleging the issue has been ‘politicised’ by Lithuania, which is a member of both the EU and Nato.” (12/09/25)
“‘Social sector’ workers — described by Forbes as ‘nonprofit organizations and the social sector at-large’ — have been losing jobs because of budget cuts and corruption cuts. Many newly unemployed are unhappy about having to job-hunt. Some complain about having to take jobs from profit-making businesses. Others lament sparse communication from prospective employers. … Job seekers might feel less demoralized if they didn’t take the impersonal aspects of the search so personally.” (12/09/25)
“Judges at the International Criminal Court (ICC) sentenced a leader of the feared Sudanese Janjaweed militia to 20 years imprisonment Tuesday for war crimes and crimes against humanity committed in the catastrophic conflict in Darfur more than two decades ago. At a hearing last month, prosecutors sought a life sentence for Ali Muhammad Ali Abd–Al-Rahman who was was convicted in October of 27 counts of war crimes and crimes against humanity that included ordering mass executions and bludgeoning two prisoners to death with an ax in 2003-2004.” (12/09/25)
