“A Wisconsin high school graduate is alleging religious discrimination after school officials barred her from including a Bible verse in a graduation ceremony slideshow due to the district’s neutrality policy. Sarianne Beronja, a 2026 graduate of Arrowhead High School in Waukesha County, said she submitted Proverbs 3:6 as her personal message to appear beside her photo in a slideshow playing during the commencement ceremony. The verse reads: ‘In all your ways, acknowledge Him, and He shall direct your path’. Beronja said that less than 24 hours before the ceremony, an associate principal told her she could not use the verse because religious messages are prohibited. The student said school officials also told her she could not share an alternative message thanking God for being ‘beside me through these last four years’.” (07/01/26)
“This summer, a seismic wave ripped through the foundations of an ossified Democratic establishment as a swell of left-wing challengers channeled disgust at party elites to jolt the entire political system. On June 23, a slate of candidates emerged victorious with endorsements and support from the New York City chapter of the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) and socialist Mayor Zohran Mamdani. They toppled longtime incumbents and added fuel to the economic populist electoral movement that has been sweeping the country. Union organizer Claire Valdez won a race for an open seat in New York’s 7th District, encompassing swaths of Brooklyn and Queens, by more than 20 points while community activist Darializa Avila Chevalier took out Adriano Espaillat in NY-13, in Upper Manhattan and the Bronx, and former comptroller Brad Lander (endorsed by Mamdani but not DSA) beat out Rep. Dan Goldman in NY-10, in Lower Manhattan and Brooklyn, by more than 30 points.” (06/30/26)
“The song ‘Right Here, Right Now’ by Jesus Jones opens with the line, ‘A woman on the radio talks about revolution, when it’s already passed her by’. There are some people who peaked in high school and never got over it – never changing their hair or general style from when they were at the pinnacle of popularity. It’s sad, really, not that the person seems frozen in the midst of good memories from long ago, but that they haven’t continued to advance since then. Life has lapped them; passed them by and left them in the dust. In many ways, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is like that person who hasn’t moved forward, having been lapped by events and left behind by the ‘revolution’ she was the spokesmodel for.” (06/30/26)
“GPT-5.3-Codex, 5.5 Pro, and 5.6 Family. Gemini 3.1 Family and 3.5 Flash. DeepSeek-V4-Pro and Flash. Claude Opus 4.8, Fable 5, and Mythos 5. Voxtral TTS and Realtime … This hodgepodge of names and numbers captures only some of the many new or upgraded artificial intelligence models released in the first six months of 2026. The technology, it’s clear, is moving by leaps and bounds. In parallel, AI firms are taking smaller but arguably just as significant steps to incorporate core principles of ethics and moral and religious reasoning into model development. Some companies are embedding in-house ‘philosophers’ to help with complex questions surrounding design ethics at the human-AI interface. Google DeepMind reportedly has 10 such individuals on staff, hiring two from Cambridge and Carnegie Mellon universities this year. And Anthropic’s Amanda Askell has been featured in multiple media reports.” (06/29/26)
“Win some blue-state and blue-city races, and the cocky new socialist Jacobins believe that they have either already taken over the Democratic Party or will soon absorb it. And in reaction to these new swarms, an increasingly terrified and ossified old Democrat guard either limps away from the hive or invites them in to take over more. It is fascinating but ultimately depressing to watch old-style Democrats say or do anything to avoid the new mob of Robespierres. Democrat candidates who recently begged for a Schumer/Pelosi/Jeffries endorsement now are telling them to get in line at the guillotine. Jewish American Democrats are terrified that what happened to the primaried and defeated Rep. Dan Goldman of New York, an arch-Trump hater, could befall them. Goldman’s obnoxious showboating hatred of Trump and championing of neo-socialist agendas offered no defense against the Jacobins’ antisemitism and hatred of Israel.” (06/30/26)
“On July 4, 2026, the United States of America turns 250 years old. Should the Left celebrate the 250th anniversary of the founding of the United States with the signing of the Declaration of Independence? After all, this is a nation with a very dark and ugly past—with racism, genocide, and imperialism deeply embedded in its psyche. Surely Native Americans have no reason to celebrate. The history of the United States government’s treatment of Native Americans is one of cruelty, oppression, and extermination. Leaving aside the 56 million Indigenous people that were killed by European settlers across the Americas by 1600, since its independence in 1776, the US government has launched more than 1,500 attacks against various Indigenous people, slaughtering them, and taking their lands.” (06/30/26)
“Extraordinarily gifted legislators in the United States Senate are rare. As preconditions to their effectiveness, they must accumulate both significant seniority in the body of 100, and the respect of their ever-changing 99 colleagues. It’s a small club — the United States Senate — and everyone knows who has got the ability and the respect to guide big lifts through the (intentionally) complicated process. Maine Sen. Susan Collins is one of the handful of senators who command the respect of her Republican Conference colleagues and most of the Democratic senators who actually care about making the country run well. That is why Collins is the chair of the powerful Senate Appropriations Committee and is also one of the 17 senators on the critical Senate Select Committee on Intelligence. (Collins is also a member of the Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions.)” (06/30/26)
“Scientists have stumbled on a rare dinosaur fossil from Antarctica, tucked away for decades in a drawer. The bone comes from the tail of a long-necked, plant-eating dinosaur called a titanosaur. Scientists haven’t yet identified the species it belongs to. It was discovered in 1985 during an expedition to Antarctica’s James Ross Island and collected by geologist Mike Thomson. Working with the British Antarctic Survey, Thomson was mapping the area’s rock layers and collected marine reptile fossils to help with future dating efforts. He recorded the find as a large reptile. Decades later, paleontologist Mark Evans spotted the bone in the British Antarctic Survey’s collections and wondered whether it might be a dinosaur. He and other researchers analyzed the shape of the bone and compared it to other more complete dinosaur remains, confirming their discovery. The findings were published on Monday in the journal Acta Palaeontologica Polonica.” (06/30/26)
Source: Caitlin Johnstone, Rogue Journalist
by Caitlin Johnstone
“I hold out hope because people aren’t buying the propaganda like they used to. I hold out hope because trust in the imperial media is at an all-time low while our ability to attack and discredit the official narrative is at an all-time high. I hold out hope because more and more people are realizing that capitalism simply does not work. I hold out hope because empires don’t last forever. I hold out hope because Iran just kicked the shit out of the US and Israel. … I hold out hope because Gen Z proved beyond a shadow of a doubt that it is morally superior to any generation which came before it with its forceful and uncompromising opposition to the genocide in Gaza.” (06/30/26)
“Pope Leo XIV on Tuesday issued a plea to a breakaway group of traditionalist Catholics to call off its plan to consecrate new bishops without his consent, describing the move as a schismatic act and a ‘sin of extreme gravity’. ‘I plead with you and ask you with all my heart: please turn back!’ Leo wrote in a letter to the Rev. Davide Pagliarani, the superior of the Society of St. Pius X. Leo issued the last-ditch appeal a day before the society plans to consecrate four new bishops at its seminary in Econe, Switzerland. Under church law, the consecrations constitute a schismatic act, or an intentional rupture of the unity of the Catholic Church, and incur automatic excommunication for the four bishops and the bishop administering the consecration. Pagliarani responded by writing a formal letter to Leo asking him to take time before deciding any penalty.” (06/30/26)
