Links 4/6/2026

Artemis 2 LIVE: Artemis 2 astronauts ready for historic moon flyby Space.com Cruise ship caught on reef off tiny Fiji island where Cast Away filmed The Guardian Milwaukee mass timber project, billed as nation’s tallest, reportedly faces foreclosure Multifamily Dive How citations ruined science David Oks Climate/Environment Study shows thawing permafrost releases much more greenhouse gas than expected Earth.com Climate experts say spring is coming earlier. How will that affect agriculture and ecosystems? Grist Too Successful to See How Much Trouble They’re In. The Snap Forward Google Is Considering Natural Gas Without Carbon Capture in Its AI Data Center Strategy Distilled Pandemics China? When Non-Interference Is No Longer Enough: A Qualified Case for Chinese “Interventionism 2.0” Sinification Syraqistan What the Hell Happened with the Rescue of the F-15E WSO in Iran? Larry Johnson It’s Official: US Boots-On-Ground Deep Inside Iran Amidst Another Day of Humiliating Losses Simplicius IRGC is claiming the US bombed its own soldiers to prevent capture, which is plausible IMO. “Following the desperate attempts of the American terrorist army to rescue the pilot of their downed fighter jet, a number of enemy aircraft entered Iran in the early hours of April… pic.twitter.com/mlDyVU3kb7 — Low Profile (@SeosQuinn) April 5, 2026 *** Went way over my head: This post includes several figures of speech, including metonymy, hyperbole, metaphor and irony. A little gem that is written to mystify the intellectually impoverished. pic.twitter.com/neapkklerW — Dinesh D’Souza (@DineshDSouza) April 5, 2026 What the fuck! On Israel’s Channel 14 News Shimon Riklin suggests it is time for Israel to use an atomic bomb on Iran: “Why aren’t we using a neutron bomb (in Iran)? It’s a type of atomic bomb that doesn’t damage buildings, it kills people.” pic.twitter.com/eAFlTY9vdq — Power to the People ☭🕊 (@ProudSocialist) April 4, 2026 Trump White House Pushes Satellite Firm to Withhold All Images of Iran War Common Dreams U.S. Israeli Bombing of Iran is Causing an Environmental Catastrophe Covert Action Magazine Confirmed: United States Sent ‘A Lot Of Guns’ To Rioters In Iran Prior To Full Scale War. The Dissident Old Blighty BREAKING NEWS: The UK armed forces worked with the US military to halt an Iranian defence operation yesterday. After the Americans continued its massive assaults, dropping 300 to 400 bombs a day on Iran, the Iranians fired defensive drones to try to damage the bases of the… pic.twitter.com/LNtKtSP4E5 — Nury Vittachi (@NuryVittachi) April 5, 2026 British Intel’s Secret Lebanese Panopticon Kit Klarenberg European Disunion German males under 45 may need military approval for long stays abroad BBC Hungary places TurkStream pipeline under military protection after Serbia explosives scare Daily News Hungary Hungarian PM faces ‘false flag’ claims after Serbia says explosives found near pipeline The Guardian New Not-So-Cold War One dead after Ukrainian drone attacked grain vessel in Azov sea – official RT Stochastic terrorism in Russia Events in Ukraine Russian government judo-chops internet & cows Edward Slavsquat South of the Border U.S. Moves to Secure Venezuela’s Gold as Influence Deepens After Intervention Oil Price Spook Country Hired Killers The After-Action Report Trump 2.0 He’s Not Grifting Anymore. He’s Just Taking It. Meidas+ IRS adds Palantir tech to find tax cheats The Street Democrats Suck House Democrats Have Moved to the Right Since 2018 Left Notes This Democratic governor is touting her role in the Iran war Politico Police State Watch Exclusive: FBI’s New Political Pre-Crime Center Ken Klippenstein Three Hundred Habeas Cases in Which the Government Has Defied Court Orders Lawfare DHS LAUNCHES MASSIVE “LESS LETHAL” CHEMICAL WEAPONS BUYING SPREE The Intercept AI The back story behind the first “$1.8 Billion” dollar “AI Company” Gary Marcus The case for taxing AI slop Elysian It’s open season for refusing AI Blood in the Machine The Inevitability of the AI Depression Charles Hugh Smith Healthcare? Kill switches, guardrails: The raging debate over healthcare AI agents Becker’s Hospital Review Yes, Therapy Sessions Are Being Used to Train AI Matt Stoller Economy Economics Has Lulled Us Into a False Sense of Security Steve Keen Global Fuel Shortage Pushes Governments Toward Demand Controls OilPrice 1/ Goldman Sachs analysts report that the biggest oil crisis in history is about to hit globally, with profound and highly destructive consequences. A new report asks “”Are We Running Out of Oil?”, and concludes that the answer is yes. ⬇️ pic.twitter.com/jtJux8V1lj — ChrisO_wiki (@ChrisO_wiki) April 5, 2026 Naval Expert: The U.S. Knew Iran Would Close Hormuz American Conservative Imperial Collapse Watch Expanding Battlefield Wolfgang Streeck, New Left Review Are You Numb to the Propaganda Yet? Un-Diplomatic Where Did All the Skilled Workers Go? Demand Surges in U.S. SupplyChain 247 Spending total now much higher and counting: China’s high speed rail costs about $17-21 million per km to build. China built over 1,000 km of high speed rail for the cost of US war on Iran so far https://t.co/CWy3p1Hfgp pic.twitter.com/A0i87Cvgrs — Carl Zha (@CarlZha) March 16, 2026 Casino Nation Polymarket took down wagers tied to rescue of downed Air Force officer TechCrunch Mr. Market Needs Its Monday Dose of Hopium Iran mediators make last-ditch push for 45-day ceasefire Axios Class Warfare Disabled People Are the Canaries in the Coal Mine Dollars & Sense The Bottom 50%: The Untold Economic Story The Counterprogramming Club Home Depot’s New Last Mile Phenomenal World Antidote du jour (via): See yesterday’s Links and Antidote du Jour here. The Oks piece on science citations: I did my PhD so long ago that the Science Citation Index was reasonably new, and a wonderful resource. But no good deed goes unpunished so I’m not surprised to see it fingered as having become destructive. In those far off times I would take Friday afternoons off from work in the lab or on the computer and spend time in the libraries – Maths, Physics, Chemistry, Engineering. If there was a fifth Friday in the month I might visit the Copyright Library. I suppose a current PhD student would scarcely believe it. But it’s not just that the glory days of the sciences are over, even more so the glory days of the universities. Fake science, bogus universities – such a shame but there we are. “Jamie Dimon says the U.S. was right to go to war with Iran: ‘Why the Western world put up with all these proxy wars for 45 years is kind of beyond me’’ Frankly Jamie Dimon sounds a helluva lot like Trump here – but without the expletives and the Truth Social account. If Dimon’s views are typical of other billionaires, then you can see that they too would have pushed for this war against Iran. But of course none of them would be so vulgar as to mention stealing Iran’s oil & gas reserves as the real reason for this war. That is what Trump is for. But of course you have to wonder if it is people like Dimon that has been helping keeping the price of oil down the past several weeks. I would not be surprised if so. Why the world put up with the USA for so long is another question. I guess the leaders of western Europe and the Gulf states thought they’d get special treatment, favours, and protection, while others just put up with being kept down and pushed around, or got assassinated, ousted, or whatever. I also guess a lot of that’s being reconsidered with Trump making no secret of the US being the enemy of the entire world. Where even to start with the galactic ignorance Dimon displays here? He can’t possibly be this clueless, so I’m filing this one under Upton Sinclair’s timeless observation: “It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends on his not understanding it.” From today’s ‘The Bottom 50%: The Untold Economic Story’: > As a child of the bottom 50, I know this is how the upper 50 think. I’ve been in the room with them. I went to graduate school with people who think like that. I’ve been mistaken for a member of the top 10% in my classes at Brown and Harvard, and scholars are more honest with classmates assumed to be from the same class. I’ve sat across from top economists who make clear this is an operating assumption they have. Lest we forget Jamie is of the Epstein Class. And if one needs some jucier poison, never forget Russ and Pam Martens, who really keep a keen sharp eye on his multi-faceted doin’s and scores of opaque Settlements. I mean, if being teleported to a Waffle House doesn’t give you experience in emergency response, then I don’t know what. It would have had more legitimacy if it was a Chick-fil-A on a Sunday. I took that story as something else. That he got drunk and when he came to his senses, he was in a Waffle House as he had a bad case of the munchies after being on a bender. Now if he wanted more people to believe him, he should have said that god teleported him to a Hooters. Fatima chance of that happening… As a friend said to me, “I assumed that is how everyone got there at some point.” Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor was magically transported to a suburban Pizza Express in Woking. Gooooooood Mooooooorning Fiatnam! Many in the platoon wanted to call it Bungle in the Jungle, but just deserts were in order and the setting was all wrong as there were no lions or tigers to be seen, just the burnt out wreckage of a reputation. #TIL Today I Learned actually last night when I read Simplicius’ latest I did more reading … Laurie Anderson’s “O Superman” is explicitly about the failed Iranian hostage rescue Operation Eagle Claw … head exploding emoji … Margaret Atwood five years ago on O Superman: Prophetic 80s (not the best personal essay I’ve read, mostly navel gazing, but a couple factoids buried therein) Silly wabbit, it’s ceasefire lie season! https://www.cnn.com/2026/04/06/world/live-news/iran-war-us-trump-oil Ceasefire lies Have you ever seen such ceasefire lies? They spread them with ease Like a dog full of fleas Whistlin’ tunes that Blinken knows, and loved so Ceasefire lies Now the whole world’s looking traumatized Don’t apologize To anyone who can truly say That he has found a better way Ceasefire lies Don’s gone crazy, his brain’s chicken-fried (chicken-fried) Restless and moody, think it’s time for twenty-five With his poor impulse control Like the stories told of Joe Old men They lead us off to war because they can Every daughter killed by their cold hands As they slowly decline, We will all weep tears of joy … Feel so good Feel so good, it’s frightening Wish I could Stop this world from fighting (la-da-da-da-da, da-da-da da-da, da-da-da-da-da-da) Mysteries Like this and many others in the trees Blow in the night With the ceasefire lies Ceasefire lies Don’s just the frontman – Wall Street’s very wise Wish I could (ceasefire lies) Stop this world from fighting https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jYTfV5o2ZMY&list=RDjYTfV5o2ZMY That about sums it up, nice work! Joe’s lookin’ good now, in his aviator shades. Who woulda thunk that he’d age better than raging bull-(family blogger)? Bring back the band: Joe on lead stuttering vocals, Kamala on the drums, Sullivan on bass, and Blinken on guitar! That reminds me, I made an offer on an original Hunter Biden artwork, on Craigs List. re: how citations ruined science “I don’t think that the answer actually has much to do with AI. It has to do, instead, with the incentives that govern scientific institutions. You could boil it down to one word: citations.” aka: publish or perish. Even before AI arrived on scene, some academic scientists began rewriting subsections of their older, already published research papers, knowing those submissions would likely be published. They were ‘mining’ their old research instead of setting out on new research. New research takes time, there’s no guarantee of success, and time spent on research that can’t be guaranteed to generate a published paper in one or two years is a risky proposition in the publish-or-perish world of academic science. The late Dr. Ron Hites of SPEA had a metric for determining how many papers could be extracted from a data set – the ‘Least Publishable Unit’. I don’t suppose that today’s Antidote du jour is a subtle reminder of that 1970 film “The Owl and the Pussycat”. Or maybe that poem of the same name- https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/43188/the-owl-and-the-pussy-cat “A cat and an owl form an unlikely bond. Watch the two animals play with one another in the wild.” https://youtu.be/LK9KfeleYkA If I may recommend a must-read. Wolfgang Streeck, Expanding Battlefield. Streeck is *not* being charitable today, and the whole interview is icy water on the face. Sample: But it could also be that they anticipate technological and economic benefits, as well as greater internal cohesion, from a war others are fighting for them. This will not pan out, of course, but hope dies last, after the Ukrainians, who, according to von der Leyen, are ‘dying for our values’. Frosty. Insightful. Necessary. Sample: No matter how often its crusades fail, the US doesn’t have to pay damages, make amends, or learn anything. Frostier. Necessary. We are now ruled by the goddess Anànke, She of Necessity. Inevitability. Aeschylus, Prometheus Bound: Chorus: Can it be that Zeus has less power than they do? Prometheus: Yes, even he cannot escape what is foretold. Yes, it’s good. I wonder who might read it. Is the Frankfurter Rundschau any more mainstream than the Sidecar blog of the New Left Review? Do westerners have an inability to appreciate ideas unless they are presented by sources of repute or coloured with erudite references? As a student of humanities with zero success getting into western universities (in retrospect, thankfully) this strikes me as a pre-eminent bias in respectable western intellectual life. What Streeck is describing is practically common sense in the global south; perhaps not articulated in the same terms, but felt the same way. The US has been making wars since its foundation; US was created out of a brutal colonization project. Not a single US president or member of the US elite has suffered consequences for their sponsored wars of aggression, “the supreme international crime” because “it contains within itself the accumulated evil of the whole” in the words of the Military Tribunal at Nuremberg. American presidents are tried for crimes of crossing the elite (Watergate) or exposure of petty immorality in office (although that era is now over), but committing the supreme international crime? Well, are you proposing to take away the supreme international right of the masters of the universe to do as they please? In the same vein, the Epstein explanation for Iran war or one or another thing is utterly unimpressive. Pedophilia and salacious sexual gossip is canonical American obsession and stupidly easy conduit, on that account, to set up mass psychosis. To the naive outside observer, genocide is surely a worse thing than some purported international child sex ring. But not to an American, who will expend all of a lifetimes creative energy to unpack this or that secret conspiracy that explains the current crisis of leadership; in Truman, Nixon, Reagan, Bush, Bush and now Trump. Simple explanation staring in the face, that to the US elite, it’s all a game, always has been, and wars are other peoples costs to bear is too unpalatable. This is perhaps normal psychological reaction to the unfathomable amorality that defines American foreign policy. But Americans suffer the luxury of being sustainably deluded over decades, whereas in middling Third World countries, delusion means destruction. Terrific antidote today, thanks. Owl and cat are friends. Yes. And thanks for that cute little video. On Saturday morning on our walk we saw an owl, dunno what kind, flying through the forest shortly after dawn. Cool to see such a big bird in action. The USA is not just at War with the rest of the World, it is explicitly at War with at least half of its own population. When it is spending $80 Billion on concentration camps while asserting the need to deport 100,000,000 people that is a conclusion that is hard to avoid. It’s going to get very messy over the next few Months. Adding to your concerns: The Department of Justice (DOJ) will potentially treat opponents of President Donald Trump’s policies as “domestic terrorists,” according to a leaked memo from Attorney General Pam Bondi to all U.S. law enforcement agencies. Among the “anti-American sentiments” Bondi enumerates are anti-Christianity, anti-capitalism, “adherence to radical gender ideology,” “hostility towards traditional views on family, religion, and morality” and “views in favor of mass migration and open borders.” Several legal and national security experts have warned that Trump and his allies are attempting to use these orders to criminalize organized opposition to the Trump administration or create a pretext to target people or organizations that support progressive causes. https://www.democracydocket.com/news-alerts/leaked-memo-bondi-doj-list-target-anti-trump-activists-domestic-terrorists/ At an employer I know, from higher management: “There is a huge push to use AI for all things that is feasible and possible… If you are not, everyone needs to adopt this. Anything you’ve got to share would be helpful.” Fun times, no? I’ve never heard anyone mention what the token cost is for all this. After the subsidies fall away, the truth cost of this compute is rather high. Will adoption really seem like the best idea? This employer is also adopting “agentic” workflows for engineers. What a nightmare time to be alive, no? A friend was recently fired from a job because “You didn’t use ChatGPT to write this, did you?”. She actually put in the work and was fired for not giving them slop. “Hungary places TurkStream pipeline under military protection after Serbia explosives scare” This happened in Serbia who informed Hungary afterwards what they had found. So of course it was all a Russian plot who were cunning enough to use American manufactured explosives- https://www.rt.com/news/637425-serbia-hungary-ukraine-gas/ I note also that the Ukrainians had finally agreed to let the EU insect the Druzhba pipeline after Ursula promised them a pot of money but I read a coupla days ago that the Ukrainians had reneged on that agreement. I am a lie man for the country And I drive the mainstream media code Searchin’ online For one of them not doing as they’re told I see you slingin’ on the wi-fi I can hear you through the whine And the withering lie man Is still on the decline I know I need a small vacation But it don’t look like there’ll be much war refrain If oil flow slows that stretch down Hormuz The rest of the world will never stand the strain And I need you more than want you And I want me for all time And the withering lie man Is still on the decline And I need you more than want you And I want me for all time And the withering lie man Is still on the decline Wichita Lineman, by Glen Campbell https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AxSarBcsKLU&list=RDAxSarBcsKLU On April 1, NC linked to Ed Zitron’s article entitled “The Subprime AI Crisis is Here”, published by him one day prior. In that piece he provided a watchlist of developments including, first on the list: “Any further price increases or service degradations from Anthropic and OpenAI are a sign that they’re running low on cash.” Today Anthropic announced… “According to a customer email shared on Hacker News, Anthropic said that starting at noon Pacific on April 4 (today), subscribers will “no longer be able to use your Claude subscription limits for third-party harnesses including OpenClaw.” Instead, they’ll need to pay for extra usage through “a pay-as-you-go option billed separately from your subscription.” The company said that while it’s starting with OpenClaw today, the policy “applies to all third-party harnesses and will be rolled out to more shortly.” https://techcrunch.com/2026/04/04/anthropic-says-claude-code-subscribers-will-need-to-pay-extra-for-openclaw-support/?utm_source=superhuman&utm_medium=newsletter&utm_campaign=pikastream-video-chat-with-your-ai&_bhlid=83f5732003134755477a26aa93d963193230c080 I saved the watchlist from that article. The Pale Horses of the AIpocalypse: “Back in August 2024, I named several pale horses of the AIpocalypse, and after absolutely fucking nailing the call two years early on OpenAI’s “big, stupid magic trick” of launching Sora to the public, I think it’s time to update them: • Any further price increases or service degradations from Anthropic and OpenAI are a sign that they’re running low on cash. • Any reduction in capex from big tech is a sign that the AI bubble is bursting, as NVIDIA’s continued growth only comes from Microsoft, Google, Amazon, Meta, Oracle and other large companies buying tens of billions of dollars of servers from Taiwanese ODMs like Foxconn and Quanta. • Any further price increases or service degradations from AI startups, such as Cursor, Perplexity, Harvey, Lovable or Replit. These are all token-intensive venture-hogs that burn $4 or $5 for every $1 of revenue. • Any discussion of layoffs at AI companies. • The collapse of a data center deal that has yet to commence construction. • The collapse of a data center already in construction, but before it’s finished. • The collapse of an already-constructed data center. • CoreWeave or any major data center player having trouble or failing to raise debt. We’ve already seen the beginnings of this with CoreWeave’s issues raising for its Lancaster PA data center. • The Further Collapse of Stargate Abilene: If anything happens to the construction of OpenAI’s flagship data center (being built by Oracle) in Abilene Texas, you know shit is getting bad. • Any problems or delays with OpenAI or Anthropic going public: both of these companies are the financial equivalent of Chernobyl, so I can only imagine it’ll take some talented accountants to get them in any shape where investors without lead poisoning actually want to get involved. • Any problems with Blue Owl as an ongoing concern: Blue Owl is the loosest lender in the AI bubble, and if it falls behind on their loans or has issues with its limited partners, that’s a bad sign too. • Any problems with SoftBank: SoftBank was somehow able to raise $40 billion in debt (payable in a year) to fund its chunk of OpenAI’s pseudo-$110 billion round, running over its promised 25% ratio of loans to the value of its assets. This puts SoftBank in a very precarious position. o ARM’s stock tanking: A great deal of SoftBank’s wealth comes from its investment in ARM, including a $15 billion margin loan based on its stock. If ARM drops below $80, things are going to get hairy for Masayoshi Son. • Any issues with NVIDIA’s customers’ ability to pay: If NVIDIA’s customers don’t reliably pay it, things will look bad come earnings season. • NVIDIA misses on earnings: This is an obvious one, but I think the markets will crap their pants if NVIDIA misses on earnings estimates.” Don’t forget the impacts of Helium shortages on chip manufacturing. They can probably hide non-payments through creative accrual accounting, but manufacturing shortfalls will hit the revenues and boost the expenses. That sound is recent buyers of max configured Mac Minis, that thought they were getting cheap inference for OpenClaw, crying out in pain. Then, silence. Exclusive: FBI’s New Political Pre-Crime Center Ken Klippenstein When reviewing the qualifications list to be considered a candidate for ‘domestic terrorist’… I am amazed at Kash Patel’s lack of a keen sense of the obvious…. the application of that list would put Trump at the top with most categories checked. It’s as if Trump is projecting his own qualifications and signing his own warrant. Maybe Kash cannot clearly see this, because he is surrounded by Trump’s rectum. Likewise for the UK’s ‘Prevent’ programme, which would plainly put Tony, sorry, Sir Tony Blair at the top of its list. U.S. Moves to Secure Venezuela’s Gold as Influence Deepens After Intervention Oil Price ~~~~~~~~~~~ If say you were a sovereign country where the USA was holding a bunch of karats for you, i’d be rapidly pursuing exit strategies. Just think if we had spent $20 billion on firefighting planes, equipment and man power instead of this fruitless war? There’s gonna be something approaching the Big Burn of 1910 coming down the pike, everything west of the 100th Meridian is bone dry from a winter that mostly didn’t happen, combined with the heat dome melting off much of the scant snow… https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Fire_of_1910 To me the most powerful picture to come out of this War is the aerial photograph of the graves at Mindab. Yesterday I spoke to an acquaintance who is also the Father of a Daughter, he brought up the picture of these 168 tiny graves when we spoke. Like myself, he reacted to this picture with rage and grief. Those little girls will not be forgotten and nor will their murderers be forgiven. Unlike myself he is influential in Catholic circles, he is a member of Opus Dei and has been involved in good works for decades. There will be an accounting, soon or late and he will be a part of it.