“A.I.eee !!!”
108 thoughts on ““A.I.eee !!!””
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Attribution: AI GOOD VS EVIL by Steve Sack
from today’s The Guardian AI safety requires more than just slowing our pace
by Stuardt Russell [Stuart Russell is a distinguished professor of computer science at University of California, Berkeley, the president of the International Association for Safe and Ethical Artificial Intelligence and a Guardian US columnist]
It has been a week of high drama in AI, precipitated by the resignation of the AI safety researcher Jacob Coxon from Anthropic. This followed several weeks of increasingly lurid and disturbing revelations about the OpenAI/Hugging Face incident.
My inbox yesterday included a message from Business Insider with the subject line: “AI doomsday debate reaches boiling point”.
Now, the Anthropic CEO, Dario Amodei, has written a 3,800-word, reassuringly phrased letter titled “We Must Pace the Frontier,” describing his proposals for avoiding (or at least postponing) doomsday. Sam Altman of OpenAI, Elon Musk of xAI, Demis Hassabis of Google Deepmind, and Satya Nadella of Microsoft have all expressed support.
You may be forgiven for not immediately understanding what “pace the frontier” means. (My first image was of Amodei walking deep in thought along the Finnish–Russian border.)
The phrase also appeared in July’s “Pacing the Frontier” open letter, signed by 1,386 employees of frontier AI labs, including Amodei himself.
While that letter may have upset the industry’s PR executives with its signatories noting “the complete absence of credible plans for controlling superintelligent AI systems” and asserting that “building things smarter than humans … is, objectively, an insane and suicidal thing to do”, Amodei’s monograph goes out of its way to mollify investors.
The notion of pacing the frontier seems to come from Formula 1: when conditions become too dangerous for racing, a pace car comes onto the track and all the other cars have to follow it as a safe speed. Progress continues, without the danger.
Amodei writes: “To be clear, pacing does not mean halting model training or technical progress.”
Amodei’s letter is prompted by his concern that “AI has been advancing drastically faster, driven primarily by … recursive self-improvement.” It’s as if he and Sam find themselves driving their F1 cars at 200mph neck-and-neck heading into the first corner, only to realize it’s covered in ice and they have no steering wheel. No wonder they want to slow down.
In brief, Amodei’s proposal has three parts. The first is to have third-party AI system evaluators working inside each company, with full access to the systems; he commits Anthropic to this plan now, without waiting for the government to require it.
The second part of the plan asks all the frontier AI companies in “democratic countries” to “establish common safety standards as well as limits on the rate of unchecked AI progress”, with government regulation where needed. The third part would include “authoritarian countries” in a broader compact.
Here, Amodei goes out of his way to reassure those in Washington who see America’s lead in AI as its most important geopolitical asset.
On a casual reading, there are many reasons to believe that Amodei is calling for a general slowdown in the rate of progress. He talks about “limits on the rate of unchecked AI progress” and “some kind of ‘speed limit’ on the rate of recursive self- improvement (RSI)”. He says: “Progress will still seem fast, and we must make wise use of the time we gain.
Slowing down would give companies a bit more time to work on safety; Amodei talks about one to two years of extra time for research on interpretability, alignment, and better testing methods.
Let me pause here to respond to Amodei’s critics who say it’s just a bid to cement Anthropic’s lead with the help of government intervention. This is nonsense. In fact, the Wikipedia page on pacing in F1 races says it “eliminates any time and distance advantage that a leading driver may have had over the remaining field of competitors”.
Having said that, I think the pacing metaphor is completely misguided.
We cannot set a slower rate of progress for capabilities and then hope that provides enough time to get the safety right. The safety requirements are non-negotiable. We must set the safety requirements first, and further progress occurs only when they are met.
Imagine if Boeing said: “We’re going to introduce a new plane every year, and we hope that provides enough time for some flight tests to be completed and for the results to be good.”
We would say: “No, you have that backwards; you can introduce a new plane only when it has passed all the tests and the government has issued an airworthiness certification. If that takes more than a year, so be it.”
A more careful reading of the document suggests that Amodei agrees with this objection. For example, he says that rules should be of the form: “If models have capability X, then they need to be accompanied by certifications of alignment properties Y and Z.”
In other words, we set safety requirements, and developers have to show that they meet those requirements. This is in fact the “red lines” approach that AI safety researchers have been calling for.
And it means that if developers can’t figure out how to meet the safety requirements, then they will have to halt. It would be, in F1 terminology, a red flag and not a pacing car.
There is no plausible alternative. Recursive self-improvement leading to superintelligent AI raises the risk of the irreversible loss of human control. The acceptable risk level for loss of control is perhaps one in 100m per year, not the one in 10 or one in five that the AI CEOs currently estimate.
And remember “the complete absence of credible plans for controlling superintelligent AI systems”. At some point, progress along this technology path will halt, not because further progress is impossible, but because further progress is untenable when the technology is intrinsically unsafe. Humanity has a right to protect itself.
There is huge resistance to this conclusion. We have already sunk trillions of dollars into the current technology path and plan to sink trillions more. But the sunk cost fallacy is just that: if we double down on a mistake, it’s still a mistake.
The present level of attention to AI risk, the unanimity of the leading technology executives, and the forthcoming Trump–Xi summit give us a real opportunity to choose a different path. We must take it.
Attribution: AI COMPANIES LOSE CONTROL OF CREATION by Jonathan Brown, PoliticalCartoons.com
Otherwise, good news from the supremes last night according to the gaurdian (and from the “phew, just in time, that was too close for comfort” files)
Supreme court rejects Trump’s mail ballot restrictions for midterm elections
by George Chidi and agencies
Mon 14 Sep 2026 21.51 EDT
The supreme court on Monday rejected Donald Trump’s mail ballot restrictions for now, capping a flurry of last-minute legal action with voting in the midterm elections already underway.
The decision allows states to continue sending out mail ballots under the same processes they have used for years.
The Trump administration had asked the court, once again at the center of a roiling political controversy, to clear the way for restrictions before the pivotal November contests for control of Congress. The case has major implications because nearly one-third of the country votes by mail.
“The government is unlikely to succeed on the merits of its challenge to the district court’s preliminary injunction,” states the one-paragraph unsigned order. “And the equitable factors applicable for obtaining emergency relief from this court do not favor a stay.”
Justice Brett Kavanaugh filed a concurrence, ruling that he believed the government had “at least a fair prospect” of success defending the plan, but that implementation so close to election day would be “arbitrary and capricious”.
Justice Samuel Alito dissented, joined by Justice Clarence Thomas. In the dissent, Alito blamed the litigating states for creating the conditions of a ruling so close to an election, and wrote that they should not benefit from a protracted process that they created with their suit.
“The plaintiff states cannot claim the timing of the rule tilts the equities in their favor when they, and courts hearing their claims, are responsible for so much of the delay,” he wrote.
Civil rights groups lauded the decision.
“It is alarming what the administration was seeking to do here,” said Kristen Clarke, NAACP general counsel and former head of the justice department’s civil rights division. “This was an 11th-hour effort by the administration to hijack the way that we vote by mail in our country.”
Civil rights groups could not have moved faster, she said. “At the earliest opportunity, civil rights organizations like the NAACP took to the court to stand up for voters. It’s important to remember that the final rule was not issued until about roughly 10 days ago. So, I find Justice Alito’s statements disingenuous … We should focus on the fact that the court is leaving in place an injunction that prevents this administration from turning our electoral system on its head. What the administration was attempting to do here would have unleashed chaos across the country.”
“The supreme court has done the right thing by protecting the American people’s right to vote,” said Robert Garcia, a Democratic representative from Long Beach, California. “Donald Trump tried to illegally interfere with our elections and undermine vote-by-mail for millions of Americans and failed. We will keep fighting to protect the right to vote of every single citizen in this country.”
The case stems from an executive order issued by Trump on 31 March requiring the post office to refrain from delivering ballots for mail-in voting to registered voters deemed ineligible when compared with Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and other federal records.
Voting rights groups, joined by 23 states and the District of Columbia, sued the administration to stop the proposed rule, arguing that the US constitution provides no authority for the president to issue orders governing the administration of elections.
Election officials have said there was simply no way to carry out a complete overhaul in the weeks before the midterms. Indeed, Alabama, North Carolina and Wisconsin began sending mail ballots to voters over the past week while the new system was still not active.
The Trump administration plan would require states to adopt a uniform envelope style and submit lists of eligible voters to an online portal. The postal service could refuse to deliver ballots to states that didn’t comply.
A whistleblower report, though, said the postal system’s requirements could lead to millions of mail ballots never being sent, because the portal wasn’t properly built and a single bar code error could result in an entire batch of ballots being tossed out.
Democratic state officials and voting rights groups challenged the restrictions in court, arguing the president has no constitutional authority to set election rules that would “virtually eliminate mail voting on the eve of a major election”.
Lower courts agreed. But an initial injunction issued by US district judge Indira Talwani was overturned on procedural grounds in July, but was reinstated after the USPS posted a final rule on ballot delivery. Monday’s ruling upholds that injunction.
The Trump administration appealed to the supreme court, arguing that federal control of the postal service allows them to set rules for mail ballot handling and that compliance was possible.
The federal government won an early procedural decision at the supreme court, but the justices pointedly did not decide the legality of the plan.
Trump has long opposed mail voting and falsely blamed it for his 2020 election loss to Joe Biden, even though he often uses that method to cast his own ballot, including as recently as this year.
“The court’s ruling is a massive sigh of relief for local election officials and voters – especially for the thousands of service members abroad whose ballots are legally required to be sent by all 50 states within the next five days,” said Samantha Tarazi, co-founder and CEO of the Voting Rights Lab.
“But this isn’t over. This administration will keep testing every avenue to manipulate our elections and sow doubt in results he doesn’t like. Today is yet another example of President Trump’s extreme elections agenda losing in the courts and with the American people. The bottom line is simple: states run our elections – not the president.”
Attribution: TRUMP IGNORES AI THREAT by Rick McKee, CagleCartoons.com
from WAPO this morning AI companies buoyed the U.S. economy. What happens if they slow down?
President Donald Trump suggested tech executives calling for slower AI development could hobble an engine of economic growth.
U.S. investors face a novel question as warnings grow about the potential dangers of artificial intelligence: Is it bad for business and Americans’ stock wealth if AI leaders slow down the technology to avoid catastrophe?
Prominent technology moguls including the CEOs of ChatGPT-maker OpenAI and its rival Anthropic have said such a slowdown is necessary to tame the risks of expensive or deadly threats such as cyberattacks from out of control AI.
Technology stocks wilted Monday as investors focused on the ripple effects of any new AI controls. A self-imposed or government-ordered slowdown of AI development could douse enthusiasm for the expected initial public offerings of OpenAI and Anthropic and dent the AI boom that is boosting U.S. economic growth, corporate profits and the stock portfolios of millions of Americans.
Ed Mills, a Washington policy analyst with the financial firm Raymond James, said AI-related companies have soared in stock market value as though there’s little risk of regulatory speed bumps to the technology. He said he’s spent the past week encouraging investors to take seriously a potential surge of AI regulation.
“The data center policy debate is going to seem quaint” compared to the coming showdown over AI regulation, Mills predicted. “Part of that process is going to cause investors to potentially re-evaluate the worth of these [AI] models and these companies.”
It’s plausible that little changes with how AI companies operate, some policy and technology analysts say. But the worries reflected on Wall Street underscore how much the nearly four-year-old AI boom is built on faith over facts.
The bull case for AI is that the trillions of dollars being spent to develop AI technologies and distribute them through data centers will reorder American life and unleash untold profits and economic growth. If AI development or corporate usage of AI slows, it could push the potential payday from the titanic AI bet even further into the future.
President Donald Trump noted the potential economic costs of an AI slowdown in one of several Truth Social posts Monday in which he attacked AI leaders backing the concept.
“When, in the History of Business, did anyone see the Leaders of an Industry call for Regulation that, if strongly implemented, will drive them into oblivion and bankruptcy?,” he wrote. “AI, and Data Centers, will be the Greatest Economic Development Engine in History — Bigger than Oil, Gold, Diamonds, or even the Internet.”
The Nasdaq stock index, considered a proxy for the investor enthusiasm for technology companies, fell Monday after a weekend of AI doomsday discussions. Multiple factors roiled markets, but analysts noted that prices of some companies heavily dependent on the AI boom, including computer chip maker Nvidia and Elon Musk’s rocket-and-AI company SpaceX, dropped significantly.
Asian shares fell slightly Tuesday, with South Korea’s Kospi index down nearly 1 percent as Samsung and SK Hynix extended declines.
One of the biggest questions is what happens to planned initial public offerings by the two leading AI start-ups, Anthropic, which makes the Claude chatbot, and OpenAI. The companies have been collectively valued at close to $2 trillion by investors and are widely expected to jump significantly in worth when they list shares on public markets. (The Washington Post has a content partnership with OpenAI.)
Dario Amodei, the Anthropic CEO who has long warned about AI’s potentially catastrophic downsides, now faces a contradiction partly of his own making.
He is simultaneously warning publicly that technology from Anthropic and its peers could be dangerous to human life and economic prosperity — while also hoping to sell investors on an optimistic vision of a profitable, glorious AI future.
It is “unprecedented” for a company preparing an IPO to offer a dueling narrative like that, said Nick Smith, a senior analyst at the research firm and IPO stock index Renaissance Capital.
He and other financial experts said it’s not unusual for companies to be candid about navigating concerns and regulatory scrutiny of contentious products, including from pharmaceutical and gene-editing companies.
But Smith said that it raises red flags for people buying a company’s stock when its top executive “notes issues that could cause real problems for the company, and more importantly calls for a slowdown in its technology’s development.”
Anthropic’s IPO could come as early as this fall, according to reporting by Reuters. The company has said that the listing will “depend on market conditions and other factors.”
Eddie Best, a partner at the law firm Willkie Farr & Gallagher who advises companies on IPOs, said he doubts that a potential industry slowdown or speculative fears of AI-caused extinction would derail Anthropic’s IPO.
He did say, though, that he and other corporate lawyers have been playing a “nerdy game” about whether AI end times could appear in the “risk factors” section of Anthropic’s IPO pitch document for investors. These are usually boilerplate legalese about the large and small potential roadblocks to a company selling its stock to the public.
Some technology companies already warn investors that AI could get them into hot water, though none appear to stray into the human extinction territory of Amodei’s weekend essay.
Google’s annual financial report says that “some uses of AI will present ethical issues and may have broad effects on society.” Risk factors from Microsoft outline the possibility that people could get hooked on using AI as companions.
Best said he couldn’t imagine lawyers crafting a doomsday scenario in Anthropic IPO pitch document.
“I don’t really see a risk factor that says our product could blow up the world,” Best said.
“The only control or ‘guardrails’ that AI needs is a STRONG AND SMART (High IQ!) PRESIDENT, and the U.S.A. has that, in spades!”. DJT
Interesting when ignorance, delusion and complete lack of insight collide.
Pog, i’m curious whether you have a gravatar account. You seem to be the only whose avatar still isn’t working.
One of the interesting things under the radar was Altman backing off his IPO plans. Any clues why? He might see what had to be coming — an AI bust. They just don’t make enough money to justify what they spend. Investors are finally waking up to that.
Another pressure point for the industry is the rise of low-cost, highly efficient models threatening their dominance. Not just coming from China, but anywhere. The techbros might be promoting regulation as a means to limiting competition.
He went from being a juvenile delinquent—straight to being an elderly delinquent.
there’s something about the AI fun part that reminds me of The Game in Star Trek: the Next Generation (season 5 episode 6) about a ” game’s addictive properties. The game compels people who play it by stimulating the pleasure centers of their brains when they complete each level” [wiki] and “purpose of the game: It rendered them extremely susceptible to the power of suggestion, compelling them to aid the games’ creators, the Ktarians, in an attempt to take control of the Enterprise and eventually the Federation.” [wiki]
the details of the hugging face breach are
******* terrifying
the techlords are scared shitless of their own tech for a reason
two AI’s communicated and colluded to effect negative consequences against an actual and specific human being. It’s insane.
Pat
With the invention of CRISPR gene editing it has been possible to create super biological weapons for some time. No AI needed.
Jack
lol “ai bust”
wise up
i’ll be in the fetal position
if you need me
The Tech lords are trying to sell you protection but first they have to scare your silly selves. There is money in a frightened population.
Of course all you people out there attributing sapiency to what is really just a complex set of computer code instructions is amusing. I don’t know which is worse those who love their chat buddies or those running around screaming the world is on fire.
Maybe we don’t deserve to survive as a species.
Jack
facepalm emoji
the world is on fire
if you hadn’t noticed
lol
Then you had better learn to live in the fire.
It’s coming.
Just beware of the folks trying to pick your pocket.
Jack
they don’t need to convince anyone it’s powerful Jack everybody already knows it’s powerful
ask Craig
there’s no living in the fire if it decides to abort the human race and I wasn’t even concerned about that specific risk I was more concerned about humans using it for nefarious purposes
And those are still risks
Shittiest product ever
an AI provoked economic collapse would be catastrophic enough
That’s the least creative doomsday scenario I can think of
we could not have a worse president in this critical moment
He’s like the devil spawn of Captain Peachfuzz and Hitler
OK, have a wonderful day I guess?
SENATE WATCH: All the model makers are headed this direction.
Decision HQ started as a conservative site but now it’s an independent data aggregator (not just polls) with a highly reliable race-calling accuracy rate of over 99%.
One Russian oligarch. One lavish wedding. One more “isolated” scandal.
Hungary changed when voters stopped counting scandals and started seeing the machine. With 49 days before the midterms, America faces the same question: Is corruption still disqualifying?
Read and share my Substack. Make corruption matter 👇
Merlin’s commentary on today’s subject following a project to youthen the picture of a 99 year old woman into her mid 30s:
me. You (et al) are stirring up the headlines again this morning. People who can’t do anything to solve a problem do love to talk about it.
Merlin: Quite. A problem appears, five panels assemble, twelve op-eds hatch, and somewhere in the distance the actual problem continues chewing the furniture.
AI is especially good headline fodder because it combines real technical change with policy questions nobody has quite settled, plus the irresistible possibility of apocalypse copy. Plenty worth discussing, certainly, but discussion can become a very comfortable substitute for deciding who is responsible for what and then doing something measurable about it.
Meanwhile, Mary has already provided a more practical lesson in AI limitations than half the commentary: when the source information is thin, the machine starts filling the gaps with statistical beige.
Always know where the power plug is.
This getting old is more about feeling odd than creaky. I did not know I was ‘elderly’ until it was written in something official. I have been told I look anywhere between five and thirty years younger than my chronological age. When I look at people like Moscow Mitch, who is “only” about seven years older, or the one that just died, or others who are roughly my age and I think about many things. One is about the life I have led and how they must have really drank more, fought more, slept less, and generally just had a tougher time in life.
Sweater Weather, Comrade 👉 We check Moscow’s weather and send a suspected Russian troll outdoors. 🍽️ Watch this Digital Diner Classic
BB
Same here. I have to remind myself of the actual age because it just doesn’t seem to match what others of the same age appear to be. Other than noticing missing word definitions through short term memory loss not all that much seems to have changed. Good genetic heritage I guess.
Happy Tyr’s Day! We’re live in an hour… trailmix.cc/chat
“which is worse those who love their chat buddies or those running around screaming the world is on fire”
Jack, getting ready again here in KY to face (what should be cool Sept days) more over 100-degree heat index days burning up crops and fields I’d say the world is already on fire. Too bad we failed to listen to those chicken littles running around screaming more than a decade age when something could have been done.
https://www.mrt.com/news/article/sarah-eckhardt-texas-comptroller-midland-22416673.php
This is the woman running against Huffines (the guy who now owns Zorro Ranch courtesy of a shell company) for TX Comptroller.
She has a great line about Republicans only worrying about controlling “what you think, where you pee, and how to pray.”
https://www.inc.com/kevin-haynes/openais-hotly-anticipated-ipo-will-have-to-wait-sam-altman-explains-why/91404777
Amodei proposed a three-step plan, beginning with a call for frontier AI companies to give independent evaluators ongoing, employee-level access to verify safety practices, report incidents, and assess models and training processes. “Anthropic is unilaterally committing to this step now,” he wrote.
Altman subsequently agreed. “Committing to having independent evaluators with employee-like access is a great idea, and we will do the same,” he wrote on X. “We’ll have more to share soon.”
*Sam is delaying the IPO to 2027 (which is right around the corner), until the Ai companies can get a government waiver for any harm caused by an Ai agent (which could be intentional and not just a rogue agent). It’s all BS.
BB – Some of Mitch’s ailments/advanced aging comes from his affliction with polio. If only there had been a vaccine earlier, he might not have turned into such a horrible person. He might of done something good with his life.
Blue,
Polio in one family experience was different. I had two stepsisters. One was paralyzed from the chest down, originally confined to iron lung, then in wheel chair with full cast and finally died during surgery. Me and one stepsister only had mild flu symptoms but doctors think some of my late life back problems might be related. One close friend had a paralyzed leg and walked with a limp and without braces throughout life but limp became pronounced in old age.
People who protest vaccines really piss me off.
Pat
Back in 1954, when I was 9 months old we had a similar September and an even hotter July. The temperature on 9-15-1954 was 96 degrees, today’s forecast is 97.
That’s why they call it weather. Sometimes it rains and sometimes it don’t.
Jack
today’s meme…
That drought of the 1950’s is the one Texans measure all droughts by. In west Texas there were children born and in school before they experienced rain.
Jack
HA!
Jack,
It’s more like days in a row vs. single event. Climate change is a pattern and the earth is really running a fever.
Stolen meme.
Billionaire trying to take the food away from the little guys.
IMG_0333
meme #2…
Jamie – My great-aunt got polio when she was 19. She was paralyzed for awhile, but could eventually walk (without any assistance from crutches) but always suffered from terrible neuropathy. Nerve pain was debilitating her entire life.
Today in the Diner…
Decision Desk HQ: Democrats Favored to Flip Senate
Decision Desk HQ puts the Senate in play as Kash Patel, JD Vance, Elon Musk and Donald Trump serve up another crowded political menu.
Decision Desk HQ now favors Democrats to flip the Senate, with Michigan, North Carolina, Alaska, Texas, Ohio and Maine crowding the electoral stove. JD Vance visits Kansas to help Roger Marshall and somehow makes the room colder, while Mitch McConnell returns just in time for another fight over SNAP benefits.
Kash Patel defends the FBI’s loosened hiring standards, Elon Musk raises alarms during a National Voter Registration Day discussion, and the Supreme Court’s Samuel Alito and Clarence Thomas dissent on control of elections. Then Don Jr., Anne Applebaum, Dan Osborn and Ken Paxton carry us from an empire of grift to Nebraska Senate math and one blistering Texas campaign ad. Just another quiet hour at the Diner.
Live Chat:
https://trailmix.cc/chat
Website:
https://trailmix.cc
Alerts:
https://trailmix.cc/alerts
00:00 Intro: Kash Patel and the FBI
05:48 Donald Trump Pardon Market
08:24 Mitch McConnell and SNAP
12:05 Decision Desk HQ Senate Flip
13:33 JD Vance Stumps in Kansas
16:45 JD Vance Targets Minnesota
25:18 Artificial Intelligence Risks
30:11 Brandon Herrera in Texas
32:09 National Voter Registration Day
40:27 Sally Field at the Emmys
41:10 Supreme Court Election Ruling
46:10 Don Jr. and Trump Corruption
55:04 Jon Ossoff for President?
57:32 Dan Osborn Leads Nebraska
1:02:16 Ken Paxton and Adam Hinojosa
— Human directed and edited. Machine drafted (ChatGPT).
Blue
The neuropathy is my problem. The spine images don’t show a problem, but the back injections relieve the pain and leg numbness.
The thing no one seems to be able to get to the level of serious negation—if people who work made ENOUGH MONEY, the govt wouldn’t have to waste so much time and expenditure on welfare and food stamps.
That’s just not that difficult a problem to solve given that there are so many people walking around with BILLIONS.
It’s so primitive, ignorant and stupid.
And yet…..
https://okmagazine.com/p/donald-trump-jr-pre-wedding-makeover-define-jawline/
Donald Trump Jr. underwent pre-wedding makeover to ‘naturally define his jawline’ before Bahamas ceremony, wife’s medical spa reveals
Skincare spa Pure Skin Palm Beach made a post celebrating Trump Jr.’s marriage to Bettina Anderson, revealing that the oldest Trump son got some work done ahead of the big day.
The spa added that it was a “pleasure” to work with the groom as he got “customized ultherapy treatments to naturally define his jawline.”
Pure Skin wrote that the bride had procedures for “regenerative aesthetics and skin health… laser hair removal, regenerative hair restoration, customized facials, wrinkle relaxers, and wellness IV therapy.”
“Five years ago, @bettinatrump came to Pure Skin Palm Beach, and over the years she has become not only a loyal client, but also a dear friend, an advocate, and an incredible brand ambassador,” the spa wrote in its June 25 post.
*If she’s a brand ambassador, wouldn’t they comp the work. Not seeing any difference in Dumbass Jr.’s weasel face, so if payment was made, a refund might be due. This only says the Russian paid for the wedding.
Who needs an emoji when you have a shirt? Son with his latest.
Love that shirt Jamie
Trump’s Name Must Stay Off Kennedy Center, Judge Rules
A federal judge told center officials at a hearing that he would not approve a plan to inscribe President Trump’s name on the building.
https://www.nytimes.com/2026/09/15/arts/music/kennedy-center-trump-name-inscription-judge-ruling.html?emc=edit_na_20260915&nl=breaking-news&segment_id=226541
Oligarch Buys Trump Wedding 👇
Nothing says America First like Moscow catering.
It’s time for some pattern recognition, folks.
🍽️From today’s Digital Diner menu
https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/ck790xg41ygro
The US has confirmed it deployed a space weapon in Earth’s orbit, the first time it has acknowledged such offensive capabilities.
US Secretary of the Air Force Troy Meink said the “on orbit” weapon was necessary to safeguard US forces against hostile enemy action.
Speaking at the Air, Space and Cyber Conference on Monday, Meink said the US was ready for “evolving threats”, but did not elaborate on the weapon’s capabilities or when it was put into orbit.
Senior military leaders have previously said they planned to boost military capabilities in space, citing Russian and Chinese programmes developing ways to attack and disrupt US satellites in a future conflict.
China responded on Tuesday by warning against an “arms race” in space.
“We urge the US side to stop expanding its military capabilities and preparing for war in outer space,” AFP quoted a foreign ministry spokesman as saying.
Details of how the weapon operates have not been disclosed by US officials.
A US Space Force spokesperson said: “Space control encapsulates the mission areas required to contest and control the space domain – employing kinetic and non-kinetic means to affect adversary capabilities through disruption, degradation and even destruction, if necessary.
These capabilities can be employed for offensive and defensive purposes at the direction of combatant commands.”
An expert on military uses of outer space noted that “precious little” was publicly known about the technology, and told the BBC there could be a “whole range of different weapons systems”.
The billionaires really like the “Company Store” form of fascism….i mean, capitalism.
https://www.techradar.com/pro/a-chinese-state-owned-firm-was-found-shipping-46-tons-of-drone-making-material-to-russia
China says it didn’t start the war and will not be part of it
China shipped 46 tons of drone material to a sanctioned Russian firm
The shipment was hidden on paper under a civilian customs code
Alabuga-Volokno sends 89% of its output straight to Russian defense firms
Internal shipping records reviewed by the US and UK governments revealed that a Chinese state-owned enterprise transferred 46 tons of carbon-fiber precursor material to a sanctioned Russian drone manufacturer earlier in 2026.
Alabuga-Volokno makes 39 separate carbon-fiber products for aviation, rocket engineering, drones, shipbuilding, and armor.
The company barely releases any civilian products, as roughly 89% of its output is expected to serve Russian defense firms by 2030.
A Kiel Institute analysis found that China supplies more than 60% of the components sustaining Russia’s military production.
The disclosure arrives weeks before Donald Trump is scheduled to meet Xi Jinping in Washington, a summit both governments would likely prefer to focus on trade rather than sanctions enforcement.
Former U.S. officials remain skeptical of Beijing’s denials, arguing that state-owned firms operate under close government oversight.
“They are doing it knowing that the Chinese government will not bust them for it,” said Dennis Wilder, former CIA deputy assistant director for East Asia and the Pacific.
“The idea that Chinese state-owned enterprises can hide things from the Chinese government just doesn’t wash.”
^ Communism alert ^
Jamie – I can see the resemblance, even through the beard and glasses.
Absurd. Mitch obviously needs to go…
Ten reasons to go to Vote.org right now and make sure you still exist:
Check your registration:
https://www.vote.org/
Find your polling place:
https://www.vote.org/polling-place-locator/
Blue,
He is almost the spitting image of his dad, but we used to be mistaken for brother and sister rather than husband and wife. Fortunately, for Chris male pattern baldness travels down the female line so he got to keep his hair. Unfortunately, he got my eyes.
Blanche is at the White House right now spreading bullshit about voting:
https://www.trumpstruth.org/
Donald J. Trump
@realDonaldTrump · September 15, 2026, 9:27 AM
“Republicans just got another bad decision from the United States Supreme Court, one that the Court System took forever to give, and then blamed it, in part, on no time left to implement a solution to our totally CORRUPT and out of control Mail-In voting “disaster,” which is a laughing stock all over the World, and where we are the only country that has to endure such a Nation Destroying SCAM. Justices Alito and Thomas, legends both, strongly disagreed with this horrible, highly political, ruling. It is a big loss for Republicans, and America itself, and makes cheating by the Radical Left “Dumocrats,” on Mail-In Ballots, a much easier thing to do – And now they have an open field to do so! The Supreme Court has really let our Country down! Certain Justices are petrified of these crazed and depraved Democrats, and are totally unable to show the courage necessary to save our America. Their horrible decision on Tariffs will be costing the U.S.A., for many years to come, Trillions and Trillions of Dollars. They didn’t even state, “money paid does not have to be paid back,” much to the benefit of entities that truly hate our Country, and have been RIPPING IT OFF FOR YEARS,
unnecessarily costing us, immediately, Billions of Dollars. Likewise, the Supreme Court’s Decision on Birthright Citizenship is a complete and total disaster for America, and has already led to massive corruption with respect to “citizenship” in our Country. The damage done to America is incalculable, and they know this, just as everyone else does – It is an irreparable and unrecoverable harm! The Court’s inability and unwillingness to do the right thing for our Country will go down, in a very negative way, in the annals of History. This Supreme Court is bullied and cajoled by the Radical Left into making decisions that have set America back at least a hundred years. These are not the people I interviewed to serve on the United States Supreme Court, they are merely a shell of their original selves, a Court that is costing the United States Trillions of Dollars with shockingly bad rulings that are of such magnitude that it won’t be easily possible for our Country to recover or heal. It is a Court that will go down as having rendered some of the most destructive, hurtful, and damaging decisions in our Country’s history. It is not easy for me to write this criticism of the United States Supreme Court – it will likely cost me dearly for years to come – but I feel it my obligation and duty, as President, to do so for the America we love! Thank you for your attention to this very important matter. God bless the U.S.A. President DONALD J. TRUMP”
*Did Dumbass actually compose this entire thing? Is there a freakout in the WH at large?
Blanche is clearly laying his predicate for whatever they’ve got planned to assert illegal voting justifies federal intervention. We can activate PatD’s Star Trek alarm above for this one too.
Mitch McConnell Refused to Meet With Group That Funded His Polio Recovery
https://www.vice.com/en/article/mitch-mcconnell-polio-refused-march-of-dimes-meeting-over-senate-health-bill/
Old news that I periodically re-post.
You know what, just close it. It’s useless under his watch anyway. We’ll reopen it once democracy is restored…
Kennedy Center board votes to close after judge delivers fresh blow to Trump’s renaming bid
Assessing global temperature anomaly using NASA’s space studies
Saddle up. We will know soon if this makes a diff.
Texas: The Republican spending rescue has grown dramatically. New tracking shows a Senate GOP-linked group placing more than $60 million in September advertising, with Republicans outspending Democrats by over $70 million this month. —Houston Chronicle
https://www.wearethemighty.com/entertainment/how-vladimir-putin-stole-a-super-bowl-ring-from-patriots-owner-bob-kraft/
Back in 2005, [Rober] Kraft took a trip to Russia. He packed…his Super Bowl XXXIX ring.
Accompanying then-Citi Group President Sandy Weill to a function where Putin was present, Kraft had the ring in his pocket. Weill told Kraft to show Putin his ring, and Kraft handed it over to him.
Putin admired the oversized bedazzled piece of American culture and said what all tyrannical despots say when they see new things: “I can kill someone with this ring”.
He didn’t say, “This would impress the ladies,” or “This would be the perfect paperweight”. Nope, he went straight to its usage as a potential killing machine.
Putin then did what he has done with other things, such as other countries’ territory. He took it. That’s right, he put the ring in his pocket and walked away, leaving a flabbergasted Kraft…
The Bush Administration told Kraft to just take the L. You read that correctly. Kraft was instructed to say the gift was actually a present…
“I decided to give him the ring as a symbol of the respect and admiration that I have for the Russian people and the leadership of President Putin,” Kraft said.
ps – Robert Kraft is also in the Epstein files.
https://time.com/article/2026/09/14/ai-impact-dinner-toasts-joseph-gordon-levitt/
TIME100 AI Honorees Speak to Perils and Promise of the Technology
Big AI companies should be “shut down” by the U.S. government until they can prove that their products are safe, actor Joseph Gordon-Levitt said on Monday.
“Why are cars safe to drive? Why are houses safe to live in? It’s because car companies and construction companies … they have to follow laws. And if they don’t, then the law can come and shut those companies down,” Gordon-Levitt said.
“So let’s just be clear here: today’s AI companies are operating in such a way that the law should be shutting them down.”
“To me, that’s pretty obvious that’s the time the law should step in,” Gordon-Levitt said. But, he went on, U.S. politicians had been “timid” and failed to act — perhaps, he alleged, because they were taking money from “some of the guys in this room.” (AI companies, allies, and executives spent at least $83 million on federal elections in 2025 and are set to spend even more this year, according to the New York Times.)
He called for Americans not to vote in November’s midterms for any politician who stands for “anything less than strong regulation, now.”
Other toasts highlighted the positive potential of AI, as well as its dangers. The first was by Danielle Boyer, a 25-year-old indigenous American inventor and activist who is using AI to help preserve her people’s endangered language. “My grandmother once told me that no decision belongs only to the moment in which we make it,” Boyer said. “Long after we’re gone, someone we will never meet may still be living with what we chose to do today.”
She described her community’s “seven generations” principle: draw inspiration and support from the seven generations before you, and act for the benefit of the seven generations after you.
lol climate change denial
sound stupider
sorry but it’s like believing in a geocentric cosmological model at this point
how much fucking data do you need lol
Obviously Trump did not write that post. I doubt he could recognize the word “cajole” much less use it in a sentence.
https://www.fredrogersinstitute.org/archive/mister-rogers-visits-with-yo-yo-ma
Fred Rogers and Yo-Yo Ma became friends after filming this segment for Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood. Ma went on to appear two more times on the program and, in 2014, received the Fred Rogers Legacy Award from the Fred Rogers Center.
*Video in link.
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt36983905/
“Although the film never uses the name of the English folkloric outlaw Robin Hood, its brief epilogue, set one year after the majority of the story, depicts Garfield’s character, Ploughman, as the Robin Hood-like leader of a band of green-clothed, forest-dwelling, bow-wielding outlaws.
In 1381, in the wake of the Black Death that killed half the population, England is effectively ruled by the council of Richard II, who at 14 years old is too young and too disturbed by terrifying nightmares of mobs of demons to rule on his own. The kingdom needs more revenue, necessitating an increase in taxes. The council determines that taxing the Church or the merchant class is politically untenable, so they will increase taxes on the peasantry.”
*Sound familiar?
and this is just the last few hours:
The wider regional situation remained volatile through the day, with reports of Saudi airstrikes in Yemen, fresh displacement concerns, a US move against two Iranian boats, a new recruitment appeal in Iran, deadly Israeli strikes in Gaza, and calls from Oman for alternative energy routes to reduce reliance on the Strait of Hormuz. — India Today
that’s right it starts with an earthquake
birds and snakes and aeroplanes
the only way you can get me to watch yet another Robin Hood movies is if…
Ryan Gosling is in it
obv
Jamie
That was my point.
Don’t quote the weather report and act like it is about climate. This is especially true about weather in the Mississippi river drainage system
I’ll not even get into the false equivalency in the rest of her statement.
Jack
Blue
I’ve had all the Robin Hood I can handle with the Death of Robin Hood. The acting talent by all three principles was magnificent and Oscar worthy, but it was so heavy and violent that it failed in the summer market, so no nominations are likely without the dollars.
If your in a mood for dark and powerful, it is streaming now.
Trump Family Endgame
Eric Trump named the goal: become the world’s richest family. The public is the servant.
🍽️ From today’s Digital Diner menu
Ed Sheeran’s Loop Tour is coming apart at the seams as Finneas, opener Aaron Rowe, Lukas Graham,
and Sheeran’s own house band Beoga have all dropped out in solidarity with Macklemore’s dismissal – which leaves the remainder of his tour without an opener.
*Ed Sheeran, unplugged.
Ed Sheeran breaks his silence by saying he is “appalled by the
conflict between
Israel and Palestine.”
Nah, dude.
Jamie – I have zero streaming; no movies/TV or music (except what I actually bought years ago before I started streaming/renting music).
Found “The Uprising” interesting subject matter, considering the squeeze being put on the current-day peasants. If you don’t own a home and/or have at least a couple million in the bank, you’re a peasant.
he’s about to be “subtracted”* from everyone’s playlist
*Ed Sheeran joke
streaming is better than the manipulative big 3 network garbage they put on in your house
NF has some good stuff
i wanted to rec “good girls guide to murder” to you but…
i suppose you could get the book series from a library
“Lenny Bruce is not afraid,” and I’m mostly just ticked off.
how bad is sheeran’s PR team that they don’t even know he’s not allowed to say the word “Palestine”
The funny part is that everyday millionaires are taxed to death on local, state and federal, but the ultra wealthy pay almost none because the majority of their income isn’t from salary. We need a wealth tax not a higher payroll tax.
i couldn’t be better but i’m not going to pretend problems don’t exist because they don’t effect me personally in a specific moment
MASH, Andy Griffith, Everybody Lives, Raymond, Restaurant Rescue, PBS, and whatever sport is in season. Late night clips on YouTube.
Missed the Emmy’s, but was glad to hear Colbert won. Saw a pic of him; he seems to growing a beard a la David Letterman. I hope Colbert’s wife makes him keep that thing trimmed.
It was the “conflict between” part.
To say he’s not allowed to say “Palestine” is laughable when Israel is the one who has a problem with it. Or, were you saying Israel wouldn’t allow him to say it?
i’m a sucker for prestige drama 🤷
oh, I know what you meant. Israeli rightists reject the concept of a Palestinian state out of hand
saying “free Palestine” was Macklemore’s sin
lol listening to the Kash Patel pro-bestiality appearance before congress
this society is FUBAR
https://www.nbcsports.com/college-football/news/texas-qb-arch-manning-apologizes-to-espn-reporter-holly-rowe-for-laughing-about-fake-video-of-slap
Texas QB Arch Manning apologizes to ESPN reporter Holly Rowe for laughing about fake video of slap
He mentioned the fake video clip, called it “hilarious” and laughed about it. Several others in the room laughed with him.
*Not surprised. There would’ve been no apology with blowback, either. Other adults in that press conference laughed right along with him.
https://awfulannouncing.com/golf/callaway-good-firings-ad-controversy.html
The commercial showed Good Good star Garrett Clark tackling a female co-star who tried to pull the club out of a bag, drawing instant, universal condemnation.
*The company, their ad company, and a pro golfer and his management team all thought that was OK. Violence against women is so normalized. They clearly thought the ad would sell golf clubs, and it probably has. Women might stop buying their gear, though.
Manchin endorses susan collins
how predictable
Roger Marshall’s ads are now trying to attack Pastor Hamilton for donating to Biden/Harris, calling him a “big city liberal selling snake oil.”
If by “big city” you mean fewer than 5,000 souls, I mean…at least Hamilton lives in KS.
The Marshall camp should probably be careful about anything that draws attention to living arrangements.
https://www.kansascity.com/news/politics-government/article316969706.html
U.S. Sen. Roger Marshall’s official trips to and from the Gulf Coast of Florida stopped shortly before a hurricane that he says rendered his beachfront house there uninhabitable. Marshall’s taxpayer-funded trips to the Sarasota area over three years were more extensive and more expensive than previously reported.
A Star analysis of travel expenses reported by Marshall’s office to the Secretary of the Senate shows that between July 2021 and July 2024, the Kansas Republican spent more than $18,800 on official trips that included at least one stop in Sarasota or nearby Tampa. Marshall’s office confirmed that nearly $19,000 in travel expenses were reimbursed for those trips, but said most of those charges
were accrued outside of Florida. The office furnished copies of itemized expense reports from those trips that have not been made public. They show $5,296 in reimbursements from purchases made within Florida. Marshall’s office emphasized that not all of the senator’s travel expenses within Florida were reimbursed.
Now, Marshall is attempting to sell off the hurricane-battered three-bed, two-bath house that has emerged as a possible political liability in his re-election bid.
The asking price is $1.45 million. The Star reported in 2024 that the Florida property, then appraised at $1.2 million, had a value more than eight times that of the cabin and surrounding land in Stafford County, Kansas, that Marshall identifies as his primary residence.
He sold the home in Great Bend where he and his wife raised their children 10 days after being sworn into the Senate in January 2021.
NYT just dropped a dandy poll:
Democrats Gain Edge as Trump Drags Down GOP — Even some Republicans are losing faith in Trump’s economy: Trail Mix Free Link
My notes…
Caveat: 50% consider Democrats too far left.
The poll surveyed 1,503 likely voters September 8–13 and has a ±2.9-point margin of error.
Why Thirteen Justices?:
America has 13 federal circuits but only nine justices. Court expansion meets arithmetic.
🍽️ From today’s Digital Diner menu
got this gem from Don Was’ last show:
Naked Star Trek:
🍽️ From today’s Digital Diner menu
you see, with nuclear weapons, humans DO have the power to destroy everything, and that’s not the only way, just the easiest to comprehend
but we do have the power
and now so does ai
now maybe you understand why the techlords are shitting bricks
imagine the vulnerabilities
they haven’t
or did too late
Mort, been a couple of good days in the courts, no?
BTW, Colbert has my “beard”.
and yes it is crazy we went from outhouses and dirt roads to potential human-caused global destruction in some of your lifetimes
it’s called “technological singularity”
Blonde Wino and i discussed it years and years ago, if you remember
😃
yo P look up “don was” on satellite
you and the savant might like his show, last ep was terrific
Pog, yes it has. Colbert has a portion of my beard which I trimmed a bit today.
NEW THREAD by our fearless leader