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More employees using AI, survey finds
In the fourth quarter of last year, 43% of public-sector employees said they used AI at least a few times annually, according to Gallup polling.
White House signals safe passage for housing bill
The Senate is on track to pass President Donald Trump’s proposed ban on institutional investors in housing as part of a larger package of measures.
Republican spending rises in Kentucky Senate race
A group supporting Rep. Andy Barr, R-Ky., is dropping more money to attack businessman Nate Morris in the Republican Senate primary.
Trump Humiliated as Viral Exchange With Journo on Iran Backfires Badly
Donald Trump claims Iran is responsible for the bombing of an elementary school that killed scores of children, even though evidence continues to mount that the United States is responsible. In a striking exchange with a reporter, Trump was asked why no other government official will confirm what he’s saying. He said straight out: “because I don’t know enough about it.” He then stumbled through some awkward dissembling. But in saying that, Trump accidentally admitted that he’d made an incendiary factual claim about an extraordinarily serious matter without having the foggiest idea what the facts actually are. Trump’s assertions about the school bombing also forced White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt to undertake a clumsy cleanup effort. We talked to Paul Waldman, author of a piece at his Substack, The Cross Section, that discusses a new analysis showing that Trump’s war is the most unpopular U.S. war in modern history. We discuss why that exchange was so humiliating to Trump, what it revealed about the White House’s indefensible war and his inability to sell it, and the deeper reasons why Americans are not reflexively rallying behind the “commander in chief.” Listen to this episode here. A transcript is here.
White House seeks to tweak deportation rhetoric
Republicans tacitly acknowledge that the administration’s hardline rhetoric on mass deportation risks alienating voters.
Shit, Here We Go Again: War By Cartoon Sociopaths
In the second week of an inept narcissist's spiraling war - not even of choice but of whim - that's killed over 2,000 people and wreaked widespread havoc, almost as grotesque as the witless carnage itself is the "slopaganda" issuing almost daily from a White House evidently run by 14-year-old gamers who splice real combat footage with Call of Duty-esque video games to create banal war porn celebrating "JUSTICE THE AMERICAN WAY." Millions of us wanna know: "What the fuck is wrong with you people?"Under Trump we will have no more wars - I am peace," once intoned the hollow reality-show specter now spreading mindless death, terror and economic mayhem across 12 countries. To date, US and Israeli airstrikes have killed at least 2,000 people across the Middle East, mostly civilians, and over 1,100 children, including infants and toddlers, in what the UN calls "a catastrophic" situation. In Tehran, bombs have struck at least four schools, strikes on oil refineries and storage facilities have blanketed the city in dark smoke and black rain in what many view as a Gaza-like genocidal attack on infrastructure, and historic heritage sites have been bombed in what experts call "a declaration of war on civilization," with no end in sight.It's clear from Trump's flailing rhetoric he didn't expect or plan for a war, just a fast, hard, "kill their leader and they fold" move like Venezuela (which is def not Iran) so they could pick a pliable new leader. But everything he touches dies: After sloppily killing all their own choices for successors, they instead got the far more extremist, angrier son Mojtaba Khamenei, 56, a hardliner with close ties to Iran's most ideologically rabid, repressive clerics - and, after Trump's blithe assertion he'll kill him too, with nothing to lose. The outcome, deemed "the blueprint for a generational blood war," also pissed off rich Gulf states who've been courting him with investment pledges. One Dubai oligarch "at the heart of a danger (we) did not choose": “Who gave you the authority to drag our region into a war?”The slapdash incompetence of his "little excursion to keep us out of a war" quickly exposed an erratic take on what he actually called his "performance" not governance, more improv than strategy. The rationale kept shifting - no nuclear weapons, people free, regime change - as did the language: A "47-year-conflict" became an "imminent threat." ("Words, what are they for?") The promise Iranians' "future is yours to take" became a demand for imaginary "UNCONDITIONAL SURRENDER!" He bounced ideas off journalists, didn't expect the resulting energy debacle and spread to neighboring states, ignored likely consequences - what oil? - had no contingency plans and rebuffed allies: To the UK's offer of help: "We don’t need people that join Wars after we’ve already won!” Despite all his professed "reasons," most voters still think he made a war to deflect from a pedophile bestie.Not so fast, said Iran President Masoud Pezeshkian, who warned their enemies “must take their dream of the Iranian people’s unconditional surrender to their graves." Then he apologized to neighboring countries for strikes against their U.S. bases. In response, Trump crowed they were ready "to cry uncle" and declared it "the first time Iran has ever lost in thousands of years." MAGA voted for an isolationist America First leader; they got a raging, idiotic, ignorant warmonger who launched more military attacks on more countries in a year than any president, and who doesn't give a shit about Americans. Asked if we should be worried about retaliatory attacks from Iran, he shrugged, "I guess...When you go to war, some people will die.” Aka, whatever. But lookit these cool, macho videos celebrating Epic Fury! - YouTube www.youtube.com Within days, the White House, or the puerile gamesters running their social media account, moved on from simply glorifying the violence to transforming it into video games, “gamifying" it by seamlessly merging video footage of actual U.S. strikes and explosions with bellicose clips from Call of Duty, Grand Theft Auto, Mortal Kombat. They also interspersed real kill-footage with popular action flicks and TV shows - Braveheart, Gladiator, Top Gun, Iron Man, even Saul Goodman and Walter White: "I am the danger" - complete with relentless, churning techno music to get your jingoistic heart racing. The result, both cringey and chilling, is to render real-life pain, blood, death, grief, terror, destruction, displacement mere cartoon entertainment, stripped of humanity, unworthy of empathy.In a rare move, the gaslighting profanity of the videos prompted a "call to conscience" from Cardinal Blase J. Cupich, Archbishop of Chicago, who decried the "profound moral failure" they represent. Seeing "real war with real death and real suffering treated like a video game" was "sickening," he wrote, war and its brutality become "a spectator sport" and a moral crisis. "Our government (is) thrilled by the destructive power of our military, addicted to the 'spectacle' of explosions," he wrote. "The American people are better than this." Maybe, some of them. But the malignant narcissist with a puerile, warped, self-serving world view and fanboys marveling at the capture of Maduro as "the most gangster thing I've seen in my life" are still hideously, obliviously "locked in" to the atrocities. So are, of course, his loyal buffoonish minions, strutting and gloating over America's bloody, illegal "victories." "We're marching through the world," declared giddy, craven lickspittle Lindsay Graham to a laughing Maria Bartiromo on Fox. "We’re clearing out the bad guys." All praise to "Ronald Reagan plus," "the greatest commander in chief of all time." He doesn't want "a fair fight," just "a quick one," he said, joining the bully ranks, and to make lots of money. Committed to being the cringiest cheerleader on the vile team, he even brought props; he waves "inane Make Iran Great Again" and "Free Cuba" hats, and smirks, "Stay tuned." Oh puke. Who asked America to clear out the bad guys? Who thinks what we need is a hat-based foreign policy? Idiotic hubris, thy name is. Meanwhile, insufferable Press Barbie Stepford, her little Christian cross front and center, has gone full, smug, North Korea agit-prop. What does Trump's imaginary “unconditional surrender" mean, she is asked. She yammers at length, dragging out the titles in an effort to bolster her gobbledygook: "It means that when President Trump, as commander-in-chief of the Armed Forces, determines that Iran no longer poses a threat to the United States of America and the goals of Operation Epic Fury has (sic) been fully realized, whether they say it themselves or not." And as the blessed leader of MAGA, she adds breezily, there may or may not be boots on the ground in Iran; "President Trump wisely keeps all his options on the table." And bring on the video games. - YouTube www.youtube.com Most repulsive is smarmy, abusive, chest-thumping Christo-fascist and "day-drunk dipshit" Kegseth, who finally got a war to go with his puerile bravado. Preening in his greasy hair and patriotic pocket square, he vows to "unleash overwhelming and punishing violence,” revels in "death and destruction from the sky," brags, "America is winning - decisively, devastatingly and without mercy," and gloats of the "quiet death" - and war crime - of 87 Iranian sailors killed when a US torpedo hit their unarmed frigate heading home from a training exercise the US took part in. A lethal "broken boy in a costume," he's reviled by peers for his bombastic language and "moral depravity." One advocate calls him "a very dangerous person," "out of his depth," "cavalier, obtuse and so incompetent I wouldn’t feel safe leaving him in charge of a DoorDash order."Despite all that - and reports of Pentagon excess topping $93 billion spent in one month, under use-it-or-lose-it funding rules, on furniture, ice cream machines, sushi prep tables, iPads, king crab, lobster tail, steak, doughnuts - still there he was, pig-eyed, smirking, loathsome, ostensibly assuring us not to worry about Russia reportedly giving Iran intel on American troops, because "the president has an incredible knack at mitigating those risks." "Nobody's putting us in danger," he sneered. "We're putting the other guys in danger - that's our job." Then he launched into a casual genocidal rant deemed "some really dark shit." Per Rumsfeld: You go to war with the sociopathic, bullying, self-declared Secretary of War you have, and the base war porn that goes with him. And of course the imbecile who last weekend attended the "dignified transfer" of the senselessly dead Americans he's to blame for, wearing his undignified white USA golf cap because he cares more about his "hair." He eloquently noted "I hate to do that" - see the dead, also muss his hair - but "it’s part of war. It's the bad part of war." Truth. Later, he was asked about the murder of up to 175 girls in an Iranian elementary school. Though the investigative Bellingcat and multiple news outlets confirmed a US Tomahawk missile hit the school - another war crime - Trump suggested, with no evidence, it may have been Iran; challenged why he thought so, he conceded he had no idea what he was talking about. Still, slimy Hegseth concurred: "The only side that targets civilians is Iran." And the only side to mistakenly kill 175 children is America.Trump went golfing, then spoke at a GOP retreat at his friggin' golf club. He railed against Dems opposing the SAVE America Act, which would sabotage the mid-terms with new voting strictures: "It even has 'America' in its name," he whined, and Schumer is "now a Palestinian officially." He dismissed concerns about soaring gas prices, "a very small price to pay (for) World Safety and Peace. ONLY FOOLS WOULD THINK DIFFERENTLY," and warned Iran not to "try anything cute" to block the Strait of Hormuz, or "Death, Fire, and Fury will reign (sic) upon them." And still more war slopaganda streamed from a White House that touts killing as sport. Home runs in baseball, like missiles hitting targets, are "pure American dominance." Football = missile hits = "TOUCHDOWNS!", all, "JUSTICE THE AMERICAN WAY." Iran, it turns out, also seeks their own justice. Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi announced they do not want to harm ordinary Americans who oppose foreign wars like "Operation Epic Mistake,” but they will no longer seek diplomacy and they have "many surprises in store" if America keeps attacking their oil or nuclear sites. In response to our cartoon agitprop, they also released their own LEGO-style video - missiles, explosions, a whiteboard reading, "My homeland is my life." Comments: "Begun, the content wars have," "Who would've thought a country run by religious fanatics that propagates martyrdom would not just roll over upon being attacked?" and, "Maybe I shouldn't have wished to live in more interesting times." Also, "Even their AI slop is killing ours."Trump, flailing in the face of political and economic blowback to a feckless, miscalculated war/not war against a potentially nuclear-armed nation of 91 million, is struggling to figure out how to end it, or at least randomly declare victory like in elections. We are awash in mixed messages. Hegseth on where are we now: "We're in a very strong place," "This is just the beginning," "Our will is endless." Trump, asked if it's over or just starting: "You could say both," "The war is very complete, pretty much," "I can end it whenever I want," though Iran has reportedly rejected two ceasefire offers, US intelligence sees "no imminent collapse" of their government, and the Strait of Hormuz is (predictably) both closed and lethal though Trump is "looking at it strongly." "It's going great," he says. "It is won, but not won enough." For once, he's right: We're tired from so much fucking winning.It turns out the only imminent threat was, is Trump, writes David Rothkopf, who cites "the madness" of so many people around the world "buffeted by the psychosis of a single man," his "whims, impulses, ignorance, greed, malevolence, hatefulness, turning pique into economic pain, promoting the incompetent and monstrous to do his dirty work, seeking desperately to steal glory he does not deserve," and by shuttering US programs worldwide causing "the death of millions who simply had the misfortune to live in Trump's time." On Saturday, Country Joe McDonald died at 84 after a decades-long music career. Its touchstone was perhaps his furious performance, before nearly half-a-million people at 1969's Woodstock Festival, of his I-Feel-Like-I'm-Fixin'-to-Die Rag, about another rich man's war and poor man's fight. May he, and too many others, rest in peace and power. "And it's 1, 2, 3, what're we fighting for?" - Country Joe McDonald"Looking at what we are confronted with today, those most likely to argue they should hold a place above ordinary people are actually, in fact, the least of us, the most contemptible among us." - David RothkopfUpdate: The Pentagon has barred several news photographers from Kegseth's Iran war briefings after his aides found some earlier photos "unflattering," The Washington Post reported Wednesday. Thank goodness the purported leader of the world's largest military is laser-focused on his priorities in these apocalyptic times. Iran's LEGO-themed agit-propScreengrab on X - YouTube www.youtube.com
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