“Donald Trump announced he is pausing ‘Project Freedom,’ the US effort to guide stranded vessels out of the strait of Hormuz, so he can finalise a deal with Iran, but added that his blockade of Iranian ports would remain in place. Trump’s abrupt change of plan was declared in a social media post, saying he was pausing the effort for ‘a short period’ to give space for US efforts to finalise a settlement with Iran to end the war. … Iran’s parliament speaker and chief negotiator, Mohammad Bagher Qalibaf, signalled Iran has yet to fully respond to the US attempt to reopen the waterway. … Hapag-Lloyd AG, one of the world’s largest container shipping companies, said in a statement that its risk assessment ‘remains unchanged’ and that transits through the strait ‘are for the moment not possible for our ships.'” (05/06/26)
“Russian drone and missile attacks have killed at least 27 people in Ukraine, officials said, days before a two-day unilateral ceasefire by Moscow was due to take effect. Ukrainian officials said Russian glide bombs killed at least 12 people in southeastern Zaporizhzhia on Tuesday, hitting a car repair shop and residential buildings …. Further northeast, six people were killed, and 12 others were wounded in the city of Kramatorsk, the last hub under Ukraine’s control in the embattled Donetsk region. Four more people were killed in the city of Dnipro. Russian strikes also hit Ukrainian state-run gas facilities in the Poltava and Kharkiv regions overnight, killing three employees and two rescue workers, according to Serhiy Koretskyi, the CEO of Naftogaz.” (05/06/26)
“US public debt has reached 100 percent of GDP (gross domestic product) for the first time since the aftermath of World War II. Just because we have been here before, and we managed, doesn’t mean we will do so again. This time is different in important ways that are underappreciated by both policymakers and the public. In 1946, the United States emerged from a global war with high debt, but also with a young population, strong growth prospects, and a political commitment to fiscal restraint. Today, America faces the opposite: an aging population, structurally rising entitlement spending, and persistent deficits with no credible plan to rein them in.” (05/05/26)
“Indiana Senate Republicans who opposed congressional redistricting were largely defeated during Tuesday’s primary election, with only one race so far called for an incumbent after President Donald Trump’s call to oust them. The results come after months of political threats, and an estimated $9 million in spending to back primary challengers against the incumbents. … In November, Trump vowed that any Republican who voted against redrawing the state’s congressional boundaries, ‘potentially having an impact on America itself, should be PRIMARIED.’ In spite of Trump’s threats, Indiana Senate Republicans rebuffed him, siding with Senate Democrats to kill the redistricting bill 31-19.” (05/05/26)
“‘Whatever can happen,’ Augustes De Morgan wrote in 1866, ‘will happen if we make trials enough.’ To which I must add, if ‘we’ don’t make trials enough, someone else will. AI will inevitably be pushed to whatever, if any, limit it has. If American researchers can’t legally do it, Chinese researchers will do it. If Chinese researchers can’t legally do it, Swiss researchers will do it. If every government on the planet imposes pesky regulations on doing it, people who don’t care about pesky government regulations will do it. … Those of us who are allowed to avail ourselves of the most advanced AI possible will disproportionately reap whatever rewards it produces. Those of us for whom maximal AI is forbidden fruit will be more vulnerable to AI’s dark sides.” (05/05/26)
“Contrary to what your high school textbook and film franchises like ‘Rambo’ and ‘Red Dawn’ taught you, the Cold War was not primarily a conflict between the United States and the Soviet Union. That’s what the US teaches because it frames the war as something the US won — the Soviets are gone, after all — and because it relegates most of the actual violence of the war to the status of sideshow or backdrop to the “real” story of the war, the superpower rivalry. This version of the Cold War is real and lethal, but limited to proxy wars conducted in places white people don’t live, with the occasional spy thriller thrown in to mix things up. … Rather than a hypothetical conflict that occasionally got heated, The Cold War was a series of extremely violent and very real wars in which millions of people all over the world died.” (05/05/26)
“An off-duty Secret Service officer was arrested in Miami-Dade County, Florida, at around midnight Monday and charged with indecent exposure after allegedly masturbating in a hotel hallway, according to a police affidavit. The officer, identified in the arrest record as John Spillman, 33, was placed on administrative leave, Richard Macauley, the chief of the Secret Service’s uniformed division, said in a statement obtained by NBC station WTVJ. … According to the arrest affidavit, law enforcement officers responded to the DoubleTree by Hilton Miami Airport and Convention Center and allegedly found Spillman naked and masturbating at the end of a hallway. A guest on the same floor told the officers that the suspect had followed her from the hotel lobby ‘and they immediately entered their room because she was in fear for their lives,’ the affidavit said. Hotel security also alleged they saw the suspect masturbating, it said.” (05/05/26)
“Leo XIV, in the role of Pontiff, does not act as a political figure. The Pope has no elections to run. His job is to safeguard doctrine, maintain the unity of the Church, and serve as a spiritual authority. This makes the President’s attack against the Pope unusually preposterous.” (05/05/26)
