Royal Navy chief backs drones, autonomous weapons in ‘Hybrid Navy’
The leader of Britain’s Royal Navy has outlined a “Hybrid Navy” built on a mix of crewed, uncrewed, and autonomous platforms to ensure it can continue to defend the nation and operate overseas.…
Job's a good 'un: Bank of England tech project wins watchdog praise
Parliament's spending watchdog has held up a successful large-scale public sector tech transformation as a rare example worth emulating, in a striking departure from the usual diet of failure and overspend.…
What happens when MAGA propagandists get high on their own supply
Explaining the Right is a weekly series that looks at what the right wing is currently obsessing over, how it influences politics—and why you need to know. Republicans are eagerly pushing three wildly unpopular ideas with a certainty that boggles the mind. President Donald Trump started off the week by asserting that the shooting incident during the White House Correspondents’…
Obviously qualified
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Farewell, Jeeves: Ask.com shuts down
Fear and opportunity: Immigration scams surged as Trump’s sweeps lured desperate people to eager defrauders
Con artists posing as ICE agents and immigration officers are using WhatsApp and fake court hearings to bilk vulnerable people out of their savings with empty promises to fix immigration problems. As mass deportations continue, scam complaints soar. By Naisha Roy, Northwestern University, and Francesca D’Annunzio and J. David McSwane for ProPublica As an asylum-seeker living in the…
ICE gets green light to tear-gas Americans, and the DOJ clown show
Injustice for All is a weekly series about how the Trump administration is trying to weaponize the justice system—and the people who are fighting back. This week, we’re checking in on the progress of President Donald Trump’s private lawsuits—because he’s got nothing but time to harass other people, but no time at all if the cases are against him. We’ve also got Maurene Comey making…
Damn autocorrect
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The Iran War Remains Unpopular—Unless You’re a Weapons Contractor
As peace talks with Iran continue to stall, the Trump administration announced on Friday an additional $8.6 billion in fast-tracked weapons sales to Israel, Qatar, Kuwait, and the United Arab Emirates. Secretary of State Marco Rubio justified the deal under an “emergency provision” allowing arms to be sold without the congressional approval nominally required for warmaking. This is the third time since the US started bombing Iran two months ago that Rubio has invoked emergency authorization to sell weapons to Israel and its allies.
During those two months, the US and Israel have reportedly drained their munitions stockpiles bombing Iran and Lebanon. At least 3,375 people have been killed in Iran, according to the country’s health ministry; at least 2,509 people have been killed in Lebanon, per the Lebanese Ministry of Public Health. Last week, a White House official for the first time offered an estimate of the conflict’s costs to the United States, ballparking the campaign at around $25 billion.
Generally, arms sales are supposed to go through a congressional review process under the Arms Export Control Act. But it’s not uncommon for the government to bypass that process entirely. (The Biden administration also approved arms sales under emergency powers.)
This most recent set of weapons sales includes $4 billion for American-made Patriot missile interceptors, to be sent to Qatar; “Advanced Precision Kill Weapons Systems” for Israel, Qatar, and Kuwait; and an “Integrated Battle Command System” for Kuwait. The contractors receiving that money will include Lockheed Martin, BAE Systems, and Northrop Grumman.
Those contractors might be the only people happy about the ongoing war on Iran: 61 percent of Americans in one recent poll said they believed the war was a mistake. Another recent survey said that the main priority among Americans, regarding the war, was to end it as soon as possible—whether out of concern for human lives or for gas prices, which have skyrocketed in recent weeks.
In Florida, ‘Alligator Alcatraz’ remains open among sacred miccosukee lands
An appeals court ruled the migrant detention site may continue operating in the fragile Everglades, while litigation over the environmental impacts proceeds. By Amy Green for Inside Climate News Every spring Florida’s Miccosukee Tribe observes its corn dance season on lands the tribe holds as sacred within the fragile Everglades. But this year’s festivities are different…
Netflix delays Greta Gerwig’s ‘Narnia’ movie for big theatrical push in 2027
GOP shills for ballroom, and Trump fumbles his king’s speech
After a shooting at the White House Correspondents’ Dinner on April 25, the GOP’s main takeaway was not that safer gun laws are needed. Rather, Republicans used it as an opportunity to shill for President Donald Trump’s ballroom. Unfortunately for Trump, his war in Iran, rising costs at home, and Cabinet filled with incompetent and corrupt buffoons couldn’t even be overshadowed by a visit…
Trump’s Plans to Rebuild DC in His Image Keep Getting Pricier
Donald Trump’s plans to remake parts of Washington, DC, are much bigger—and more expensive—than originally planned. A top Trump fundraiser is now asking for donations to a nonprofit that will support a proposed massive sculpture garden, as well as the remodeling of a central DC golf course.
Last year, dump trucks carrying demolition waste and dirt started depositing their payloads in a giant pile near the 4th hole at DC’s municipal East Potomac Golf Course. It was the first sign that Trump planned to re-create the course to his own tastes. (Later, reporters learned that the debris was the remains of the White House’s old East Wing.)
Today, the Washington Post reported that Trump fundraiser Meredith O’Rourke is soliciting donations to remake the course into a championship-caliber facility for major events and to create Trump’s long-desired “Garden of American Heroes,” a sculpture park on nearby federal land. The federal government plans to formally take over the golf course Sunday, according to the Post.
The concept images for the golf course seem to eliminate most non-golf activities that presently exist in East Potomac, disappearing the park’s bike paths and open spaces where people picnic in the summers.
The garden, meanwhile, is a Trump concept that’s been in the works since his first term. It would involve approximately 250 “realistic” statues of prominent Americans, including Elvis Presley, Kobe Bryant, Alfred Hitchcock, and Dr. Seuss, among many others, according to the New York Times. The statues alone could cost more than $50 million, though Congress has only approved $40 million for for the project.
It’s the latest in a chain of attempts to remake DC in Trump’s image: the renaming of the “Trump-Kennedy Center,” the draping of banners bearing his portrait over various federal government buildings, and resurfacing the Lincoln Memorial reflecting pool in “American flag blue.” He also hopes to add a giant triumphal arch to the Lincoln Memorial area, which would overshadow the memorial itself.
The president, it’s clear, loves a monument: Yesterday, he posted a picture online of his own face photoshopped onto Mount Rushmore.
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Aptos eyes championship titles at SCCAL track and field finals
The Aptos High track and field programs will enter the Santa Cruz Coast Athletic League finals riding a perfect wave.
Both the boys and girls squads finished dual meet competition at 5-0, but now they have a chance at perfection with their sights set on a championship Saturday at Harbor High School. The meet is scheduled to begin at 10am.
The stakes could not be higher for the Mariner girls team, which needs one more win to claim the SCCAL team title outright. In order to do so, they must defeat rival Santa Cruz one final time.
The two programs have been the class of the league all season, and Saturday’s showdown promises a fitting conclusion to the campaign.
The boys group, meanwhile, have a bit more margin. A second-place finish would still be enough to secure the overall SCCAL crown, a testament to the depth and consistency the Mariners have shown throughout the year.
Leading the charge for the boys are Bryce Boudreault and Brady Bliesner, two athletes who have powered Aptos across a range of disciplines all season. Boudreault has been a force in the field events, excelling in pole vault, discus and shot put.
Bliesner has anchored the distance program, starring in the 800 meters and middle-distance relays.
Together, Boudreault and Bliesner represent the kind of versatile, high-point production that championship teams are built around.
On the girls side, Ella Boyes and Kenzie Culbertson have been the program’s standard-bearers.
Boyes has dominated the hurdles while also contributing in the long jump, making her one of the league’s most dangerous multi-event threats.
Culbertson has been a workhorse in the distance events, racking up points in the 800 meters and relays throughout the season.
But what has defined this year’s Aptos program goes beyond its top performers.
Aptos head coach Thad Moren pointed to the willingness of several athletes to stretch themselves across multiple events. It’s a key reason the Mariners have remained so competitive in the team standings.
Isabella Hernandez, Ryder Yamaguchi, Bella Briceño-Nichols and Anthony Sandford-Carroll have each answered the call to compete in a wide range of events, filling scoring gaps and proving that Aptos’ depth is genuine.
“In order to be a competitive championship team, we need athletes that are willing to do a wide range of events and challenge themselves to score points for the team,” Moren said.
Moren said for the girls, it ends with a chance to add a league banner to a perfect record. For the boys, the math is already in their favor — now it’s just a matter of finishing the job.
The wannabe king’s empire is in decline
The Conversation is a weekly dive into the most popular stories on Daily Kos and what it tells us about the national political environment. Ah, the Trump Administration, the best possible evidence of an empire in decline. At the height of its global power and influence, the United States isn’t drifting into dysfunction. It has literally elected to do so by handing the machinery of…
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Horse racing in the Caribbean
Caribbean Matters is a weekly series from Daily Kos. Hope you’ll join us here every Saturday. If you are unfamiliar with the region, check out Caribbean Matters: Getting to know the countries of the Caribbean. Sunday is Kentucky Derby Day here in the U.S. and I admit horse racing is a sport I know very little about. However it is one that finds much interest in the Caribbean…
Make America stupid again
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