“Congolese and Rwandan officials met in the United States and agreed on coordinated steps to de-escalate tensions in eastern Congo, where government troops are fighting rebels backed by neighboring Rwanda, according to a joint statement. The statement issued by the Congolese, Rwandan and U.S. governments said that Congolese and Rwandan officials met on Tuesday and Wednesday to advance progress in eastern Congo as peace efforts led by the U.S. and partners including Qatar have stalled and violence continued. The mineral-rich eastern Congo has been battered by decades of unrest as government forces fight more than 100 armed groups, the most potent the M23 rebel group backed by Rwanda.” (03/19/26)
“The United States made war on three continents over three days earlier this month, conducting attacks in Africa, Asia, and South America. During that span, the U.S. also struck a civilian boat in the Pacific Ocean. The globe-spanning scope of the attacks represents one of the few instances since World War II that the United States has been simultaneously involved in armed conflicts with such a wide geographic sweep.” (03/19/26)
“In a marked shift, commercial satellite companies that provide open-source data used widely by many, including journalists and researchers, have restricted access to images showing Iran and the wider Middle East, including areas where there are U.S. military sites that have been targeted by Iran’s retaliatory fire. Planet Labs, which regularly provides imagery used by news organizations including CBS News, said earlier this month that it was delaying the release of all new imagery of Iran, the Persian Gulf, U.S.-allied bases, and ‘existing conflict zones’ for 14 days. … The other large firm often relied on for satellite updates is Vantor, formerly called Maxar, which currently has controls in place on imagery from parts of the Middle East, a spokesperson said.” (03/19/26)
“In an autocracy, truth and falsehood aren’t resolved by fact-finding institutions. They’re dictated by the leader. This is what’s happening now in the United States. Donald Trump says he had to bomb Iran because it posed an imminent threat to the United States. And Tulsi Gabbard, the director of national intelligence, says only Trump himself can judge whether that claim is true. In the years before America turned authoritarian, Gabbard didn’t talk this way. She insisted on testing the government’s claims against evidence.” (03/19/26)
Source: Reason
by Jeffrey A Singer & Patrick Eddington
“Consider this scenario. You’ve recently received a government-subsidized biowearable. Accordingly, the authorities now know when you’re sleeping, because the device reports your sleep cycle, location, and daily movements in real time to a cloud server accessible through a legal process. It knows when you’re home. It knows when you leave. Those data are then obtained by an FBI field office (either through direct purchase or, if necessary, a legal process), because a federal prosecutor has decided that your criticism of immigration enforcement operations and your social media posts supporting Immigration and Customs Enforcement protesters constitute ‘incitement to violence’ against federal agents. Under the Trump administration’s elastic (and legally dubious) domestic terrorism definitions and designations, that is enough to open a criminal investigation. And because the government has known for weeks when you’re at home sleeping, it knows exactly when to break down your door.” (03/19/26)
“There are no wind turbines on the Great Lakes — and it isn’t for lack of wind. This titanic network of interconnected freshwater lakes with a surface area larger than New England, New York, and New Jersey combined is theoretically ideal for wind farms. Winds sweeping across the lakes are stronger, more consistent, and less turbulent than those over land. The National Laboratory of the Rockies has estimated that the Great Lakes states have enough offshore wind potential to generate more than three times their combined annual electricity consumption. … the vast inland lakes remain untapped largely due to a lack of streamlined permitting processes at the state level and economic hurdles.” (03/19/26)
“The Grammy-nominated rapper Afroman won a defamation lawsuit filed by seven Ohio sheriff’s deputies who sued him over music videos in which he used home security footage to mock their raid of his home. ‘We did it, America! Yeah, we did it! Freedom of speech! Right on! Right on!’ the 51-year-old rapper, born Joseph Foreman, shouted outside the courthouse after the Wednesday evening verdict. … The Adams County deputies [whined that] they were publicly harassed over the viral videos, which were viewed more than three million times on YouTube. The videos show rifle-wielding deputies busting down Afroman’s door, searching his shoes and suit pockets, and hungrily eyeing a cake on the kitchen table, inspiring one song’s title, Lemon Pound Cake. In other music videos, Afroman took aim at the deputies’ personal lives and called them ‘crooked cops’ because of $400 that went missing in the raid.” (03/19/26)
