https://www.bikeitalia.it/2025/10/16/la-bici-e-la-nuova-auto-elettrica-scrive-l-economist/

cross-posted from: lemmy.world/post/37519364

Top White House officials told a reporter, “Your mom,” when asked who picked the location for Donald Trump’s upcoming meeting with Vladimir Putin.

Trump announced Thursday that he will soon meet with Putin in Budapest, Hungary, to discuss an end to the war in Ukraine. The choice has raised questions, because Putin is wanted by the International Criminal Court. However, Hungary appears unlikely to cooperate with the warrant and is in the process of leaving the court, the Associated Press reports.

When HuffPost asked the White House who chose the location for the meeting, White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt replied, “Your mom did.” White House Communications Director Steven Cheung also followed up with, “Your mom,” the outlet reports.

MicroWave

2025-10-18 13:02:59

Karoline Leavitt says ‘Your mom’ when asked who picked Hungary for Putin-Trump talks

Top White House officials told a reporter, “Your mom,” when asked who picked the location for Donald Trump’s upcoming meeting with Vladimir Putin.

Trump announced Thursday that he will soon meet with Putin in Budapest, Hungary, to discuss an end to the war in Ukraine. The choice has raised questions, because Putin is wanted by the International Criminal Court. However, Hungary appears unlikely to cooperate with the warrant and is in the process of leaving the court, the Associated Press reports.

When HuffPost asked the White House who chose the location for the meeting, White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt replied, “Your mom did.” White House Communications Director Steven Cheung also followed up with, “Your mom,” the outlet reports.

White House’s Karoline Leavitt and Stephen Cheung say ‘Your mom’ when asked who suggested Hungary for Putin-Trump meeting

Trump said he will meet with the Kremlin leader in Budapest to discuss an end to the war in Ukraine

^{Katie Hawkinson (The Independent)}

In just over a week, nearly 42 million people in the U.S. who get federal food assistance are in danger of seeing their benefits disappear because of the ongoing federal shutdown.

About 1 in 8 U.S. residents get an average of $187 a month through the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP. One of those people is Shari Jablonowski. The 66-year-old widow, who lives outside Pittsburgh, is bracing to lose the $291 in food aid her disabled nephew gets each month. She raised her now-adult nephew and two nieces as her own, and even without this looming crisis, her budget is a tightrope.

"This month, I could not afford to pay … anything, gas or electric," she says. Instead she paid her monthly car payment, since she needs to drive to doctors' appointments, visit her mother, and one niece uses the car to get to work.

More than a month later, the local congressional office in Tucson is shuttered and the phones ring unanswered. Republican House Speaker Mike Johnson has refused to swear in Grijalva, a Democrat, while the government is shut down, leaving the residents of her sprawling southern Arizona district without a vote in Congress — or help back home.

“Here I am paying taxes to the federal government,” Wilson said from her Tucson office this week, “and not only is it closed but I don’t have a representative either.”

Grijalva spent much of the week in Washington unable to access government email and federal systems. While most congressional offices are buzzing with activity, her suite on the Hill remains mostly quiet and many desks sit empty. She doesn’t have the resources or authority, she said, to staff a district office or assist constituents who try to contact her. Without security privileges, she’s barred from bringing so much as a hammer into the Capitol for hanging pictures. It would be considered a weapon, she said.

https://www.cnn.com/2025/10/25/politics/adelita-grijalva-arizona-mike-johnson-epstein

I came across this article in another Lemmy community that dislikes AI. I'm reposting instead of cross posting so that we could have a conversation about how "work" might be changing with advancements in technology.

The headline is clickbaity because Altman was referring to how farmers who lived decades ago might perceive that the work "you and I do today" (including Altman himself), doesn't look like work.

The fact is that most of us work far abstracted from human survival by many levels. Very few of us are farming, building shelters, protecting our families from wildlife, or doing the back breaking labor jobs that humans were forced to do generations ago.

In my first job, which was IT support, the concept was not lost on me that all day long I pushed buttons to make computers beep in more friendly ways. There was no physical result to see, no produce to harvest, no pile of wood being transitioned from a natural to a chopped state, nothing tangible to step back and enjoy at the end of the day.

Bankers, fashion designers, artists, video game testers, software developers and countless other professions experience something quite similar. Yet, all of these jobs do in some way add value to the human experience.

As humanity's core needs have been met with technology requiring fewer human inputs, our focus has been able to shift to creating value in less tangible, but perhaps not less meaningful ways. This has created a more dynamic and rich life experience than any of those previous farming generations could have imagined. So while it doesn't seem like the work those farmers were accustomed to, humanity has been able to shift its attention to other types of work for the benefit of many.

I postulate that AI - as we know it now - is merely another technological tool that will allow new layers of abstraction. At one time bookkeepers had to write in books, now software automatically encodes accounting transactions as they're made. At one time software developers might spend days setting up the framework of a new project, and now an LLM can do the bulk of the work in minutes.

These days we have fewer bookkeepers - most companies don't need armies of clerks anymore. But now we have more data analysts who need to understand the information. In the future we may need fewer software coders, and in turn, they will likely be many more software projects, heck there will likely be a lot more software that's all seek to solve new problems in new ways.

How do I know this? I think history shows us that innovations in technology always bring new problems to be solved. There is an endless reservoir of challenges to be worked on that previous generations didn't have time to think about. We are going to free minds from tasks that can be automated, and many of those minds will move on to the next level of abstraction.

At the end of the day, I suspect we humans are biologically wired with a deep desire to output rewarding and meaningful work, and much of the results of our abstracted work is hard to see and touch. Perhaps this is why I enjoy mowing my lawn so much, no matter how advanced robotic lawn mowing machines become.

Hi everyone, just wanted to share – I've finished the Shavian cover for my novel, Blue Are the Hills. The full Shavian transliteration is complete, and it's almost ready for release (now I'm just doing battle with Scrivener to compile it properly). There are almost no modern novels in Shavian, so I'm looking forward to sharing mine. It's a literary sci-fi novel about identity, hope, and transhumanism. Only a couple of things left to do and it will be ready. This has been a very fun project!

What's Shavian? I'm glad you asked! It's an alphabet created by John Kingsley Read in response to a challenge by George Bernard Shaw, intended to make a lexicon specifically designed for English, in order to make reading and writing English easier.

Here's more info, including many resources (lexicon, guidelines, fonts): shavian.info.

It's fun if you're into linguistics or cryptography at all.

Curious to know is anyone here actively buying domain names right now?
I’ve got some solid names that could fit startups, SaaS, or brand builders perfectly.
If you’re in acquisition mode, let’s connect I might have what you’re looking for 👀

#domains #branding #startup #digitalassets

By MEE staff
Published date: 24 October 2025 20:45 BST

"We emphasise that the current phase requires a unified national position and a national political vision based on unity of voice and destiny, and the rejection of all forms of annexation and displacement in the Gaza Strip, the West Bank, and Jerusalem," the statement said.

The factions urged an end to "all forms of torture and violations against prisoners in Israeli prisons", and "the need to take all necessary measures to maintain security and stability throughout the Gaza Strip".

There was no mention of disarmament - a thorny issue that is unlikely to come to fruition in its absolute form as the US and Israel have demanded.

Palestinian factions start 'national dialogue', US appoints diplomat to monitor ceasefire

Palestinian factions met in Cairo on Friday to lay out the beginnings of a "national dialogue" that will address Gaza's governance and future as part of a Palestinian state, a joint statement on Friday indicated. 

^{MEE staff (Middle East Eye)}

Same reason the House is out of session to avoid releasing the Epstein files?

The vision of a child bride is a deeply foreign concept to most Americans. Underage marriage is regarded by most as an abroad problem, or the type of detestable horror committed by isolated malcontent cult leaders, later to be turned into a true crime documentary one laments over with their friends.

But child marriage remains legal in the majority of U.S. states, and getting rid of it has proved supremely difficult.

Thirty-four U.S. states still permit a child under the age of 18 to marry — usually with the consent of their parents or a judge. Four states — California, Mississippi, New Mexico, and Oklahoma — establish no minimum age for a minor to enter into a binding legal and social contract. According to a new report from Unchained at Last, a nonprofit advocating for the end of underage marriage exceptions in the United States, and Equality Now, a gender equality nonprofit, over 314,000 marriages involving minors — most between the ages of 16 and 17 — were registered over the course of the last two decades.

Over 80 percent of those marriages involved a girl who was underage (some as young as 10), and most of those marriages were to adult men. The organization’s report found that in that same time frame, over 60,000 of those marriages involved a child that was not legally old enough to consent to sex with their spouse.

If you aren't irate yet, here are two explanations for opposition:

In New Hampshire, where an underage marriage ban was enacted in 2024, one Republican state representative argued that underage marriage was a “legitimizing option” for girls of “ripe, fertile age” who became pregnant before adulthood. In Missouri, a Republican-authored ban was opposed by members of the same party, with one member of the GOP arguing that eliminating child marriage would increase incentives for the pregnant child to seek an abortion.

Let's go back to "some as young as 10." There's no fucking defense for that. The argument is literally, "If you get a preteen pregnant, you should be able to marry her so she doesn't seek out an abortion."

I'm not a total prude here ... I get that there are edge cases like one high-schooler having just turned 18 while his girlfriend is still a sophomore, which to my mind is a morally grey area, but if that's about a pregnancy, that's a separate issue from marriage itself.

This said, knocking up someone one-third your age and needing the law to swoop to your rescue shows some extremely twisted thinking that probably mean being part of the general public is risky. It shouldn't be rewarded with a literal get-out-of-jail-free card.

Child Marriage Remains Legal in Majority of U.S. States. Why?

Despite a widespread and growing consensus that child marriage should be banned, a majority of U.S. states still allow the practice.

^{Nikki McCann Ramirez (Rolling Stone)}

cross-posted from: lemmy.world/post/37860057

Election day is Tuesday, Nov. 4

This November, 17 amendments have been proposed by our legislature (under attack for its similar efforts to kick you out of your own government through racial redistricting) to continue in this strong tradition of taking away opportunity for civic engagement. Don’t let them, and learn what’s on the ballot next month ahead of time (totaling to more than $50 billion in property tax cuts). Fund your public services, and fight back by getting informed on what other unsatisfactory things are going to be added to this work-in-progress document.

---

Edit:

Here is a collection of helpful guides to the November 2025 Constitutional Amendment election:

League of Women Voters of Texas - 2025 Constitutional Amendment Election Voters Guide

Texas Tribune - 17 statewide propositions will appear on the November ballot. Here’s what Texas voters need to know.

KUT News - Your guide to Texas' proposed constitutional amendments on the ballot this November

Austin Chronicle - Chronicle Endorsements for the November 2025 Election

Lone Star Left - Texas 2025 Constitutional Amendments Ballot Guide And Vote Recommendations

Progress Texas - 2025 Texas Statewide Ballot Guide

Texas 2025 Constitutional Amendments Ballot Guide And Vote Recommendations

Defend Water, Schools, and Democracy: A progressive guide through 17 ballot measures

^{Michelle H. Davis (Lone Star Left)}

Oggi è sabato sera, e quindi, come è ormai tradizione, ho fin troppo da programmare, ma non ho nulla da dire… Tuttavia, considerato che stasera il famoso terremoto l’ho sentito pure io, e dunque i tempi sembrano pericolosamente maturi perché la mia esistenza possa purtroppo terminare a breve, nella malaugurata ipotesi in cui la situazione […]

octospacc.altervista.org/2025/…

minioctt

2025-10-25 21:30:57

inciampamento dell’octo di ieri quasi prevenuto per magia divina (stavo per inciampare sul marciapiede ma mi sono raddrizzata)

Oggi è sabato sera, e quindi, come è ormai tradizione, ho fin troppo da programmare, ma non ho nulla da dire… Tuttavia, considerato che stasera il famoso terremoto l’ho sentito pure io, e dunque i tempi sembrano pericolosamente maturi perché la mia esistenza possa purtroppo terminare a breve, nella malaugurata ipotesi in cui la situazione dovesse peggiorare come ha già fatto in passato in queste terre… Racconterò come stavo non per morire, ma comunque per farmi non proprio bene, ieri mattina, cosa per fortuna non avvenuta… è bene che io mi prenda un minimo di tempo per raccontare le storielle divertenti prima di dimenticarmele ma, soprattutto, prima che muoio. 😳

Ieri mattina ero circa in ritardo per prendere l’autobus, e quindi, pur non dovendo correre, ho ovviamente dovuto tenere un passo veloce e sostenuto per non rischiare di raggiungere la fermata troppo tardi… che non è inusuale per me, quindi è strano che sia successo proprio quello che è successo. Praticamente, ad un certo punto del marciapiede su cui stavo, proprio in mezzo davanti a me, c’era un vecchio, che si muoveva fin troppo lentamente… quindi, per non dover uccidere il ritmo, ho dovuto in un attimo spostarmi verso il bordo esterno del marciapiede. Peccato che, forse perché ero ancora mezza fatta di sonno, o forse perché lo spazio di manovra era poco, perché proprio in quel punto c’era anche un palo, sono inciampata nel classico modo alla Taiga Aisaka o alla Usagi Tsukino. 😭

Non mi ricordo (perché sul momento ovviamente non ho processato la cosa, e a ripensarci pochi istanti o minuti dopo non ci ho capito niente) nemmeno come sia possibile che, inciampando nel bordo sinistro del marciapiede (relativamente alla mia direzione, il marciapiede era sulla destra della strada), io sia finita verso destra, quindi di nuovo dentro il marciapiede… ma ci stavo per finire di faccia, che non è proprio un ottimo modo di iniziare la giornata, direi; e, se non di faccia, certamente con le mani, quindi con buona probabilità di spaccare pure il telefono, che avevo in mano. Il bello però è che, in qualche modo, in realtà, non sono caduta… sono riuscita a ribilanciarmi in alto, e continuare a camminare senza nemmeno fermarmi… anche se mi pare di aver fatto molto rumore nella cosa, quindi ancora mi chiedo se il vecchio ha notato che stavo per scapezzarmi qualche metro avanti a lui… 😦

La cosa in realtà non dovrebbe essere tanto strana… suppongo che, nella realtà, fuori dai manga, per gente fisicamente giovane (pure se magari tremendamente vecchia dentro come me), riuscire a non cascare per terra di faccia camminando per strada sia la normalità, e non una roba stupefacente… eppure, a pensarci, quello che mi è successo mi sembra semplicemente rara fortuna; una gentile concessione da parte degli spiriti che, seppur hanno questo terribile vizio di farmi di continuo scherzi di pessimo gusto, non vogliono veramente farmi del male… Perché, a parte che se ero abbastanza addormentata da inciampare, non capisco come io abbia fatto allora a salvarmi dal cadere… ma avevo lo zaino mezzo pesante addosso, ovviamente (con dentro il PC che fa gran parte della massa e dell’area, e oggetti misti). 🙀

Questo è in effetti un bel problema di fisica, che non ho idea di come trasformare in dati formali, e quindi certamente non posso risolvere, ma lascerò l’esercizio ai lettori, come si suol dire per chi non ha voglia di ragionare quando scrive (io, e gli autori dei libri di matematica)… Sono stata capace di raddrizzarmi durante la caduta nonostante lo zaino, o magari, di contro, proprio grazie allo zaino? E, inoltre, sono inciampata anche per colpa dello zaino, o questo non ha fatto praticamente differenza nel momento di terrore? Non è ovviamente la prima volta che rischio di capitombolare malamente su semplici marciapiedi e con indosso scarpe normali, comode, ma ora non ricordo tutte le variabili delle altre volte. L’importante è che, alla fine, il bus che ho preso è stato quello per l’università, come da piani, e non ho dovuto piuttosto aspettare quello per l’ospedale… 🥴
…Ma inoltre, posando questa roba e parlando invece di quelle leggi naturali non scritte… è per caso possibile che questo evento sia da imputare ad un potenziale karma negativo che ho accumulato youthmaxxando e agilitymoggando praticamente ogni giorno vecchi per strada, semplicemente superandoli in continuazione camminando? Per favore, astenersi moralisti da questa domanda in particolare, che il dubbio è serio… Cioè, io mica lo faccio apposta ad essere più veloce di loro, è che ho la mia vita e i miei tempi e sono sempre di fretta e quindi volente o nolente devo fare un po’ di gaming con le gambe… sotto sotto dispiace anche a me di sottoporre i poveri anziani a queste umiliazioni, ma non ho deciso io di avere 21 anni. 💔
#camminare #fretta #inciampare #marciapiede

cross-posted from: news.abolish.capital/post/4087

A US-Israeli geoengineering startup has raised $60m as part of its plan to test ‘sun-reflecting technology’. Critics are warning the new tech could have unexpected negative impacts on global weather and drive “geopolitical conflict”. Supporters, meanwhile, have pointed out it might not do that. 🚨Big News in Solar Geoengineering Stardust Solutions, an Israeli-U.S. startup developing […]

By Willem Moore

If you’re unfamiliar with solar ‘geoengineering’, it’s essentially climate change in reverse. Much like how we’ve caused global warming and other changes by releasing carbon, methane, and other gases, scientists believe we can reverse the problem by releasing particles which reflect sunlight back into space.

In a report titled The Risks of Geoengineering, the Center for International Environmental Law summarised:

   Geoengineering technologies, if deployed at scale, could have profound, unpredictable, and potentially irreversible effects on biodiversity, both through their direct impacts and as a result of compounding and exacerbating existing planetary crises caused by pollution, climate change, and unsustainable land use.

As reported by Politico, this latest geoengineering plan is being led by US-Israeli startup Stardust Solutions. Their technology involves custom particles which the company claims are ‘inert’. They also believe these particles will not accumulate in humans or ecosystems, will not harm the ozone layer, and will not create acid rain.

Stardust Solutions’ founders are nuclear physicists who worked for the Israeli government. Although they insist their new project is unaffiliated with the state of Israel, they are headquartered outside Tel Aviv. This could cause problems for them worldwide given the boycott of Israel which began during Israel’s apartheid era and continued throughout the genocide.

From Canary via This RSS Feed.

Willem Moore, Author at Canary

Articles by Willem Moore for Canary

^{Willem Moore (The Canary)}

cross-posted from: news.abolish.capital/post/4116

From private prisons to health care scams, the attack on unhoused people is about exploitation, not safety.

From the Trump administration to Democrats in California, responses to the homeless crisis in the U.S. continue to ignore the main drivers of the problem and aim to make the unhoused magically disappear. Like so many of the faux social policies in the U.S., this one increasingly looks designed for big private players to profit off the disappearing.

Let’s first look at the main tenets of the U.S. response at both the state and federal level before examining how such ruthless policy offers opportunities for economic elites to cash in on the added layers of cruelty.

Trump’s July executive order frames the country’s homelessness crisis as the sole product of mental illness and drug addiction and helps make it easier to arrest and involuntarily commit the homeless. This is a continuation of a years-long effort by American elites to redirect attention away from the root causes of homelessness. According to a study from UCSF’s Benioff Homelessness and Housing Initiative last year (one of the deepest dives into California’s crisis in decades), the number one problem that is fueling the homelessness crisis is the increasing precariousness of the working poor.

From Truthout via This RSS Feed.

The US Is Criminalizing Homelessness and Expanding Incarceration. Who Profits? | Truthout

^{Zack Kligler (Truthout)}

• The Irish Central Bank transfers an Israeli bond issue to the Grand Duchy, which raised 2.41 billion in 2024 and finances the Zionist State Budget.
• Legal experts at Law for Palestine warn that accepting this debt prospectus makes Luxembourg "complicit" in illicit international acts.

Israel relies on the EU's two main financial centers, Ireland and Luxembourg, to finance the war in Gaza and, therefore, the crimes against the Palestinian population that have earned it international condemnation. To do so, it uses so-called diaspora bonds , which Israel has been issuing since 1951 and whose volume increases each time it needs to fund its war campaigns, appealing to Jewish communities around the world for contributions. These are small-value bonds , priced at less than €1,000, but they are very successful: they raised €2.41 billion in 2024, according to the annual report of the Public Debt Unit of the Israeli Ministry of Finance.

To sell these bonds in the European Union, Israel needs a member state to become the country of origin of the issue . Until Brexit , this was the United Kingdom . Since 2021, that role has been played by Ireland . Until Israel asked the Irish Central Bank to transfer the authority to approve the prospectus for its bonds to Luxembourg . On September 1, the Grand Duchy's Financial Sector Supervisory Commission (CSSF) authorized this. The numerous protests outside the headquarters of the Central Bank of Ireland for serving as a financial tool for Israel then moved to Luxembourg, both in the streets and in Parliament. Opposition parties accuse the financial supervisor and the government of "supporting, as a financial center," a policy that the country was at the same time "verbally condemning." Luxembourg recognized the State of Palestine on September 22 .

Following the criticism, the CSSF sent a letter to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs requesting its opinion on Israeli bonds. It also asked the Ministry to inform the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of any changes in the official policy stance toward Israel, as, in such cases, it could review its decision. When the controversy erupted, the financial supervisor argued its independence : "The CSSF assumes no commitment regarding the economic or financial opportunity of the transaction or the quality and solvency of the issuer." The Luxembourg government did the same: it could not intervene in a supervisory body's decision. The CSSF can only reject a bond issue prospectus if it does not meet formal requirements, if the EU has sanctioned the issuer, or if restrictive national measures have been applied to it. "It is limited to determining whether the information contained in the prospectus is complete, consistent, and understandable ," the Ministry of Foreign Affairs recalled in the statement announcing the CSSF's letter.

Not sold in Spain

However, Luxembourg's Foreign Minister, Xavier Bettel, acknowledged that the approval of the bonds could "indirectly" contribute to financing Israel's war in the Gaza Strip. However, a motion by the Luxembourg Socialist Workers' Party (LSAP) urging the government to classify Israel's actions in Gaza as war crimes and crimes against humanity, so that the CSSF could revoke the approval of the bond prospectus, was rejected in Parliament by 40 votes out of 60.

In response to the uproar, Israel's Finance Ministry simply explained that Ireland's transfer to Luxembourg was a "natural step" since it was already collaborating with the Grand Duchy on its tradable sovereign debt program. "This measure will ensure that Israel maintains continued access to investors around the world," according to a statement published by Reuters. Diaspora bonds issued in euros are sold in Austria, Germany, France, Luxembourg, and the Netherlands. Neither in Ireland nor in Spain . In any case, the transfer to the Grand Duchy is only temporary. Ireland has delegated the approval of the prospectus for these bonds to Luxembourg for one year, until September 2026. At that time, unless Israel requests otherwise, the issuance will return to Ireland. If it wishes to issue bonds for a value greater than the current €1,000, it may choose another Member State to place its prospectus.

Ireland recognized the State of Palestine in May 2024 , and did so in coordination with Norway and Spain . The controversy over financial support for Israel forced the Central Bank of Ireland to explain why it had transferred jurisdiction over the prospectus to Luxembourg. According to its governor, Gabriel Makhlouf, the advisory opinion of the International Court of Justice , which in July 2024 determined that the occupation of the Palestinian territories "is not a law ," and therefore does not "bind" the Central Bank. "There was no reasonable and proportionate argument that justified us rejecting the transfer," he explained before the Finance Committee of the Irish Parliament last Wednesday.

Luxembourg signed the Genocide Convention

The academics who prepared a legal opinion on the acceptance of Israeli bonds in the EU for Law for Palestine , a human rights nonprofit registered in the UK and Sweden and accredited by the UN Committee on the Inalienable Rights of the Palestinian People, disagree. Approving the prospectus, knowing that it will allow Israel access to European capital markets to fund its budget, would not only "trigger Luxembourg's international liability" but also make it "complicit" in "international wrongful acts ." They argue that the bond issuance constitutes "prohibited aid or assistance" under international law . Luxembourg is a signatory to the Genocide Convention —it also endorsed the International Court of Justice's July 2024 advisory opinion —and therefore has a duty to "employ all reasonable means at its disposal to prevent it." And denying the bond issue would be a "clear, available, and powerful means of economic pressure ," they conclude.

They also emphasize that "no other State interest," not even compliance with domestic legislation or other international commitments, can justify acts that contribute to or assist the commission of serious international crimes.

In their view, Luxembourg will incur a "manifest lack of due diligence" if the activities financed with these bonds include actions that could be considered genocide. Furthermore, the CSSF may have even breached its obligation to protect the companies and individuals who purchase them from "potential future liability as facilitators of Israeli violations of international law ," the legal experts at Law for Palestine conclude.

I think I understand how to post from mastodon but pixelfed just brought in all the text as one huge, run-on title, including hashtags, etc.

Pixelfed mostly cooperates with mastodon and the fediverse but the text, titles, and captioning not working, formatting breaking is pretty signature pixelfed in any of those exchanges.

When the president of the United States decides to demolish the East Wing of the White House to construct a ballroom, all that stucco and molding and wood has to go somewhere. So I tried to find it.

I’d heard that the dirt from the East Wing demolition was being deposited three miles away, on a tree-lined island next to the Jefferson Memorial called East Potomac Park. So yesterday I drove around until I saw trucks and men in construction gear. They were congregating at an entrance to the public East Potomac Golf Links, where rounds of golf carried on as usual, except every few minutes, dump trucks entered the green.

The trucks would cut across the course to a cordoned-off site in the middle, where the grass had been torn away and replaced with piles of dirt. It did not look like much, but several employees at the site confirmed: This was not just any dirt. This was White House dirt.

My Quest to Find the East Wing Rubble

An entire part of the White House can’t just disappear.

^{Nancy Walecki (The Atlantic)}

Bluesky link to video of woman. Make sure to watch the Wheeling, IL video in the comments:

bsky.app/profile/youranoncentr…

A New Yorker dubbed “polka dot dress woman” by the internet has gone viral after footage captured her flipping double birds at a law enforcement Humvee and tussling with agents Tuesday when an ICE sweep triggered protests on Manhattan’s Canal Street.

The raid unfolded late Tuesday when agents began questioning street vendors along the busy stretch of Canal Street. Within minutes, dozens of New Yorkers surrounded the agents, shouting and blocking vehicles as tensions flared.

Video from the scene showed agents shoving protesters to the ground and threatening them with stun guns and pepper spray.

‘Polka Dot Dress Woman’ Goes Viral for Fighting Off ICE Agents in NYC

The woman, dressed in a spotted dress and wearing a leather jacket, can be seen standing in front of the ICE vehicle and later pushing one agent.

^{David Gilmour (Mediaite)}

Miller: “The tragedy is a political party and a movement that has ripped down our statues, our monuments, our holidays, our heroes, our heritage,” Miller continued, ignoring the fact that the Trump administration has itself called for the removal of statues that do not align with its version of history.

“The Republican Party under President Trump celebrates beauty again and beautification again, and just as President Trump has beautified Washington D.C., now he’s repairing, finally, an area of the White House that has been left in disrepair for decades.”

Rattled Miller Puts Up Hysterical Defense of White House Teardown

Trump’s deputy is outraged that anyone would be unimpressed by the president’s changes to the White House.

^{Catherine Bouris (The Daily Beast)}

Two AI-first browsers are redefining how we search, write, and automate online. But which one actually makes your browsing smarter — OpenAI’s ChatGPT Atlas or Perplexity’s Comet? Let’s find out.

🌐 The Rise of AI Browsers

For decades, browsers were passive windows — tools that showed web pages but didn’t think. That’s changing fast.

With the arrival of ChatGPT Atlas from OpenAI and Comet from Perplexity, we’ve entered the era of AI-first browsing, where your browser understands, writes, and even acts for you.

Both browsers promise to transform everyday browsing into intelligent, context-aware, and task-completing experiences. But their design philosophies couldn’t be more different.

🧠 ChatGPT Atlas: OpenAI’s Smart Companion for the Web

ChatGPT Atlas integrates ChatGPT directly into your browsing experience — not as a chatbot tab, but as a native assistant that follows you across websites, emails, and forms.

Atlas combines in-line writing help, contextual page summaries, and memory continuity, meaning it remembers what you’re doing across tabs.

✨ Key Features

🧾 Sidebar ChatGPT always available

✍️ Inline Writing Assistance in text fields and editors

🧭 Summarization & Contextual Insight for any webpage

🤖 Agent Mode (for Plus/Pro users): perform tasks and multi-step web actions

🔒 Memory & Privacy Controls for stored conversations

Best for: Writers, researchers, and productivity-focused users who already love ChatGPT and want seamless integration.

🚀 Comet: Perplexity’s Action-Driven AI Browser

Comet, from Perplexity, approaches the web differently. Instead of answering questions — it acts.

It’s designed around agentic workflows, where your queries become tasks: “Find hotels in Dubai and book the best one under $150.”

Comet’s focus is on execution, not just information. It builds on Perplexity’s trusted Q&A model but adds AI automation, background assistants, and cross-platform sync.

⚙️ Key Features

💬 Conversational Search with Citations

🧩 Agentic Workflows: execute bookings, send emails, complete online actions

🌍 Cross-Platform Chromium Base (supports Chrome extensions)

🧠 Follow-up Intelligence: suggests next steps automatically

🕶️ Privacy Modes: limits background data collection

💬 “Where Atlas summarizes the web, Comet does things on the web.”

Best for: Power users, researchers, and tech-savvy professionals who want AI to handle actions instead of just summarizing information.

✅ Pros and Cons at a Glance
💡 ChatGPT Atlas – Pros

✅ Seamless ChatGPT integration
✅ High-quality writing and summarization
✅ Safe memory and privacy settings
✅ Excellent for focus and productivity

Cons:
⚠️ Limited OS availability (macOS first)
⚠️ Heavily tied to the OpenAI ecosystem

⚙️ Comet – Pros

✅ True “do” browser – action-based AI
✅ Clean research and citation interface
✅ Works with Chrome extensions
✅ Fast-paced feature updates

Cons:
⚠️ Security risk with automated actions
⚠️ Learning curve for complex workflows

🧭 Final Verdict

Both browsers signal the future of the internet.
We’re shifting from “search and click” to “ask and accomplish.”

ChatGPT Atlas shines in stability, coherence, and writing assistance.

Comet impresses with speed, automation, and task execution.

But as of now — Atlas feels safer and more polished, while Comet feels bolder and more experimental.

If you’re curious, try both. Each offers free tiers — and both are redefining what it means to “browse the web.”

👉 Download Comet
👉 Download ChatGpt Atlas