The Remnant with Jonah Goldberg, 09/23/26
Source: The Dispatch
“‘This Is Western Civilization, Bro’ | Interview: Stephanie Slade.” (09/23/26)
https://thedispatch.com/podcast/remnant/this-is-western-civilization-bro-interview-stephanie-slade/
Federal Health Care Subsidies Are Devouring the Budget and Killing Patient Satisfaction
Source: Reason
by JD Tuccille
“Getting government involved in any area of human life is an effective way to guarantee you spend gobs of money without improving the situation or making people especially happy. That’s clearly true of health care, a field in which government has increasingly intruded for years even as dissatisfaction becomes the norm and costs go through the roof. A recent report finds that health care now consumes almost one of every three dollars the federal government spends, with more to come.” (09/23/26)
IMF warns UK & US to take action on spiraling debt costs
Source: BBC News [UK state media]
“Kristalina Georgieva, managing director of the IMF, issued a warning on debt levels at the UN general assembly meeting in New York City. The world’s advanced economies including the UK and US need to cut borrowing and reduce debt levels following weeks of spiraling government interest costs, the head of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) has warned. In an exclusive interview, Kristalina Georgieva said global economic shocks had been ‘pushing debt levels up like a staircase not to heaven’ but that governments had taken ‘no action to contain that service cost’. ‘[It’s] time to take that action,’ she said, adding that ‘courage’ was needed by politicians to take the necessary steps. The intervention comes as government borrowing costs have surged in response to wars disrupting the supply of oil, which has fueled inflation.” (09/23/26)
As Gas Prices Soar, Congress Goes Home
Source: Antiwar.com
by Dennis Kucinich
“On September 15, the House of Representatives expressed its constitutional will and voted 220–204 to direct the President to end American participation in the war against Iran. This constitutional crisis extends beyond one resolution or one cabinet secretary. The House exists as an independent branch of government, with its own authority over war, appropriations and impeachment. The Speaker, by preventing a recorded vote on the Hegseth Impeachment and sending members home, prevented the House from exercising one of its most consequential checks on executive power. The practical effect was to protect the Administration from an immediate confrontation with a chamber that had voted to end the war.” (09/23/26)
https://original.antiwar.com/kucinich/2026/09/22/as-gas-prices-soar-congress-goes-home/
AI Safety Needs More Evidence and Less Fruitcake Speculation
Source: The American Prospect
by Ryan Cooper
“A lot of rich and influential people have suddenly become very worried about artificial intelligence models’ danger to humanity, thanks to several recent episodes in which various AI ‘agents’ carried out hacks of other websites and systems. OpenAI’s Sam Altman, Anthropic’s Dario Amodei, and xAI’s Elon Musk all now agree that the government needs to help them set up a cartel in violation of antitrust law—er, I mean, ‘pace the frontier’. Yet for odd reasons, the ‘AI safety’ discussion has been focused almost entirely on rather weird-sounding future scenarios. Will artificial intelligence models unleash an economic or social cataclysm? Or cause the extinction of the human race? Or destroy all life on Earth? Or even turn all the matter on the planet into paper clips? Or all the matter in the galaxy? The universe?” (09/23/26)
https://prospect.org/2026/09/23/ai-safety-needs-more-evidence-less-fruitcake-speculation/
Idiot pols introduce bill to ensure that Americans aren’t beneficiaries AI advances
Source: Newsday
“Two leading progressive lawmakers, Sen. Bernie Sanders and Rep. Greg Casar, are unveiling legislation Wednesday that would ban artificial superintelligence and create a federal agency to oversee advanced AI as some of the industry’s own leaders urge Congress to impose guardrails on the advancing technology. The bill, provided first to The Associated Press, would also pause advanced AI development until guidelines are implemented while creating the Department of Artificial Intelligence. Multiple employees at leading AI companies are endorsing the bill. … The legislation would permanently prohibit artificial superintelligence, which it defines as a system that exceeds human cognitive ability or has sufficient capabilities to plan and execute the destruction or disempowerment of humanity.” [editor’s note: I’m shocked — shocked! — that people who would benefit from limiting competition in AI are endorsing a bill that would try to limit competition in AI – TLK] (09/23/26)
https://www.newsday.com/news/nation/ai-superintelligence-bernie-sanders-k74948
The Good Fight, 09/23/26
Source: Yascha Mounk
“Shashank Joshi on Why Russia Won’t Invade NATO—Yet.” (09/23/26)
At Turtle Bay, Trump Sinks Under His Own Weight
Source: The Dispatch
by Kevin D Williamson
“Of course, it is embarrassing for Americans to be represented by such a man as Trump: ignorant, rage-addled, smeared in make-up applied with an artistry that falls somewhere between clown and hooker along with an evolving assortment of hair dyes, doddering, bloated. It is tempting to treat a pathetic figure such as Trump the way Trump would treat such a figure. But what afflicts Trump more than whatever causes his ankle swelling is a curse that might be best understood as a form of moral obesity …. Trump is a man who seems to have suffered the spiritual equivalent of an ischemic stroke when he was about 27 and never to have recovered the full use of his faculties.” (09/23/26)
https://thedispatch.com/article/donald-trump-united-nations-iran-midterms/
Banning US diesel exports will likely backfire on Americans
Source: Responsible Statecraft
by Karthik Sankaran
“Sen. Chuck Grassley has endorsed a moratorium thinking it will provide more fuel the states, particularly famers. Not so fast, say experts.” (09/23/26)
MS: Police make second arrest in death of Tasia Fortune, found hanging from tree, seek 3rd suspect
Source: SFGate
“Police in Mississippi have arrested a second man in the death of a [b]lack woman found hanging from a tree and have issued an arrest warrant for a third suspect. Jackson police said late Tuesday that they arrested 25-year-old Earnest Lloyd Jr. in the death of 29-year-old Tasia Fortune, whose body was found hanging behind an abandoned home in the city on Aug. 3. Like Fortune and the first man arrested, 51-year-old Jarques Ratliff, Lloyd is [b]lack.” [editor’s note: One more brick falls in the wall of claims about “racist lynchings” – SAT] [additional editor’s note: Arrests are not convictions. And falling bricks would explain a lot about whatever goes on in SAT’s head – TLK] (09/23/26)
https://www.sfgate.com/news/article/mississippi-police-make-2nd-arrest-in-death-of-22445378.php