Powderhorn

This is so fucking juvenile. "You can't block the strait; we will!" Solving, exactly, what economic problem?

I swear, the junta is just day-trading oil via tweet.

Donald Trump has said the US will begin blockading the strait of Hormuz in an attempt to take control of the strategic waterway from Iran in the aftermath of failed peace negotiations between the countries in Pakistan.

The US president also threatened to bomb Iran’s water treatment facilities, power plants and bridges if Tehran did not agree to abandon its nuclear weapons programme, the key sticking point between the two sides.

Trump’s surprise announcement of a blockade came after face-to-face peace negotiations between the US and Iran in Islamabad that lasted 21 hours collapsed on Sunday morning.

To be clear, I am not asking for sympathy, but when I was very young, I talked about my life in Texas.

Problem was, I grew up in Arizona and had never been here short of a Dallas layover. Some 11 years into being in Austin, the fact that I could talk about living in Texas but could not provide details is to be expected when one first starts talking as a toddler.

Thing is, I don't really know much about the state outside of its climate and politics. This all feels rather circular.

One explanation is that not-quite-reincarnation is real, and I've hit the end of the cycle and will end up back in Phoenix in 1979, a la Groundhog Day. Do I believe that? No. But Occam would suggest such an explanation, because it's damn specific.

I sort of feel as though I've done what I was meant to do.

If I get towed tomorrow because of the paving being done on my street, where No Parking signs were erected Friday alongside heavy machinery being parked here all weekend, I no longer have the home I built out. My sole hope is that being in the van will mean I can't be towed, as it's illegal to tow an occupied vehicle.

I actually had a knock on the van today, and upon emerging, a guy asked me if I was interested in selling my van. I said I actually was. He asked how much I wanted, and I answered $16K, which was too rich for his blood. I personally designed and installed $8K of upgrades to a $12K vehicle that I only put 1,000 miles on, so that's a deal.

I'm not really sure what he was expecting. I pointed at the solar panels, the R-15 insulation on all sides in the living space and the 600Ah of LFP. I think he just wanted a tool truck, but seriously, who goes up to a van in the middle of a rainstorm and asks if you're looking to sell a 26-year-old Class 5 commercial vehicle?

One thought that occurred to me was offering to sign a waiver for any damage, and as I'm about 30 inches (~75cm) from the asphalt, having looked at the equipment hanging out roadside, nothing looks quite wide enough to actually do much damage.

But I have nowhere to go and my starter batteries are dead (I have a jump box, but also, have you seen diesel prices lately?).

To say nothing of the fact that I've been running a fever for a week and a half and have not been legal to drive in that time. I was actually, at my mom's urging, considering going to the ER, but once the temporary towing signs sprouted up, if I leave my van for that, I may have no home to come back to.

This is an ideal time to self-medicate.

I have altered policy in many places as a writer and editor. I interviewed (several more times than necessary) a queer activist and wrote the copy for his GoFundMe last month. I saved my ex from a decaying complex just this week.

I'm really good at saving others, but this isolation and shit continuing to go wrong while feverish is not an ideal circumstance.

Over the past 18 months, I've gotten now 22 direct offers of help and solutions, and zero have panned out. It's like job applications, but applied to mutual aid.

I'm exhausted, my sleep schedule is totally fucked, and god only knows when the paving starts in the morning.

I usually know how to pull off miracles, but there's too much here at once in a compromised state. I have six figures of debt, my dad died last fall, my fridge hasn't been reliable in over a year, and my roof vent went off the track last year, so if we have a south wind and rain, I have indoor rain. It also appears my insurance was canceled, which saved me $150 this month, but when I started my policy, I hadn't let my credit go to shit yet.

Oh, and I learned the place I had an appointment with for new dentures doesn't, you know, well, actually do dentures.

I'm sick of having hope. The geopolitics don't help. I live in a constant state of fear and anxiety, having been told by society my skills don't count. That's why I implored the admins to give me the U.S. News community when it started up three years ago. It's not exactly the same as being an editor, but selecting stories off the wire and presenting them to an audience is just ... what I know how to do. I just have more sources now.

I don't know what comes next, but as I said, I feel as though I've done what I was meant to do in life. Years in a choir, a semester as an exchange student and then winning national awards for writing, hed writing, design, graphics ... you get the idea. I had no intention of going into journalism, but it tends to find you if you're the right person.

At least, it used to.

I hope my worst fears here aren't borne out, but I have too much data of late to believe otherwise. My little oven is squalor, but it's my squalor. Losing it won't end well.

This too shall pass, they say. And it would take a miracle. I'm too exhausted to storm the castle.

I know this is a fraught topic, but blowing up entire villages is past a red line. Just as with Gaza, they're blowing up people just because they can. We in the U.S. are complicit in this.

Just to reiterate, opposing Bibi is not antisemitism, it's anti war-crime. Like how opposing Trump isn't unamerican but rather saying "this is wrong."

The Israeli military has demolished entire villages as part of its invasion of south Lebanon, rigging homes with explosives and razing them to the ground in massive remote detonations.

The Guardian reviewed three videos posted by the Israeli military and on social media, which showed Israel carrying out mass detonations in the villages of Taybeh, Naqoura and Deir Seryan along the Israel-Lebanon border. Lebanese media has reported more mass detonations in other border villages, but satellite imagery was not readily available to verify these claims.

The demolitions came after Israel’s minister of defence, Israel Katz, called for the destruction of “all houses” in border villages “in accordance with the model used in Rafah and Beit Hanoun in Gaza” to stop threats to communities in northern Israel. The Israeli military destroyed 90% of homes in Rafah, in south Gaza.

The tactic of mass destruction of homes in Gaza, where Israel has been accused of committing genocide, was described as domicide by academics, a strategy that is used to systematically destroy and damage civilian housing to render entire areas uninhabitable.

She's as hard-headed as I am, so when she asked me to help last month with the issues at her apartment complex by demanding I do nothing, I had to rely on the communication style one can only read decades in.

"I don't want to talk to a journalist."

Babe, what the fuck do you think you're doing right now?

The original issue was her water being about to be turned off in her apartment complex, and while she is my ex-wife, I can't just let her go without water.

After contacting two news outlets in her city counter to her explicit request, the water stayed on. No stories were published that I'm aware of.

Well, the situation has worsened, and the woman I fell in love with is back to her shenanigans. She's sleeping out on the porch tonight because of the German roach infestation that had been solved a few months back, but pest control does unit-by-unit spraying, thus sending the unwanted roaches into someone else's unit.

She does not have hot water after the maintenance guy broke her water pipes "fixing" a leak. As such, her grandson can't stay with her, as is customary for a weekend.

If you think pissing off a mother is bad, it's worse when it's Oma.

When we were together, years ago, and an emergency happened, we could handle it with blinding speed. Basically, triage, and we'll figure it out later. Just without the time in the waiting room.

Things have further deteriorated (roaches were not an improvement), and she has an appointment with her lawyer (via the EAP) at 2 p.m. today. At 4 p.m., the Herald reporter will be showing up. Meanwhile, she went so far up the flagpole that two of the complex's owners flew down from New York and will be there from 2 to 5 p.m.

This is not by accident.

It is, however, a reminder of why her independence and grit was such an attractive force. I mean, her manic-pixie look got my foot in the door, but when I realized she was just as manipulative as I am, I think the deal was sealed. We'd already agreed to lie to her brother the night before I met her, so this has a rich and storied tradition.

Some 15 years later, she has the city investigating multiple violations like not having smoke detectors or fire extinguishers in units. My initial work on her behalf last month meant this was a folo, not a random story for the Herald.

So, now it was time to plan the whole interaction. She smartly told the reporter to meet her at the leasing office instead of her unit. If they bring a photog along, that's not particularly useful, but she's now happy to let them in.

She has been amassing fellow residents beyond pissed to participate in this mutiny. The complex is 80% occupied by military, unsurprising given that Killeen essentially exists only because of Fort Hood. The military pays for off-base housing in certain situations (not my wheelhouse) and has decided the complex no longer meets their standards.

So, we've got the lawyer coming, the press coming, the owners coming and base commanders coming -- all at the same time. It almost sounds like a porn.

And, in a way, it is: competence porn.

Over the course of a two-hour call, I managed to steer her in the directions I thought would be most useful. First off, they have a community grill, so I asked if she had hot dogs and buns. The fastest way to a journalist's heart is through their stomach (she's assuming the reporter will be male, which exposes her latent bias, but I'm not going to gender ahead of time).

And if she's got at least six residents along with everyone else, it's always good to break bread in order to break the ice.

I also told her what part of the story to lead with. There are several concurrent problems here, and she was doing the whole manic thing of "oh, my god, the roaches!" Well, there are multiple lease violations, including forcing fees not listed in the lease.

"If you want to bring them down, babe, lead with the lease violations. Sure, being unable to bathe and the roaches is human interest, but that's not near as strong of a story as 'hundreds of people have been paying junk fees for months.' Make it a widespread issue."

The Herald only publishes a print edition on Sundays (I looked it up, trying to figure out what timeline to expect). So Saturday at 4 p.m. is about the sweetest spot you can hit. They may hang out for an hour or two, but if they're headed back to the office by 6, there's plenty of time for this to become Saturday for Sunday (newsroom jargon).

She assumed that meant it would have to wait a week. Well, I mean, they publish online daily, but a print edition still carries weight, and why the hell she thought a story couldn't go through the sausage machine in five hours is beyond me. I mean, I was married to the woman for years, and she still finds journalism to be a black box. To a certain extent, this isn't all that surprising since she doesn't care how a newsroom works.

Just that she can pull the strings.

Sound like anyone else you know?

What the country is really clamoring for is a useless monument. Cancer cured! Mideast at peace! Now, let's build an arch!

I'm going to break with policy and provide the full story, because it's so short that doing my usual excerpt thing wouldn't be useful.

The Trump administration on Friday released new renderings of the triumphal arch the president wants to install in Memorial Circle at the foot of the Arlington Memorial Bridge.

As part of Donald Trump’s legacy-building quest during his second term in office, the so-called “Arc de Trump” would stand 250ft tall, feature a 60ft golden Lady Liberty, and include a viewing deck. The phrase “One Nation Under God” would stretch across the top of the structure, according to the latest plans from Harrison Design.

The mock-up was submitted to the Commission of Fine Arts (CFA), who are next due to meet on 16 April to consider the proposal.

Trump dismissed all six commissioners last year and replaced them with loyalists. The panel is one of two bodies responsible for signing off on his proposed White House ballroom. Although the CFA approved that project in February, a federal judge halted construction weeks later. The president, however, had already demolished the historic East Wing to make room for it.

The National Capital Planning Commission (NCPC), which ​is chaired by one of Trump’s former lawyers, also greenlit the building project days later, but the status of the work remains in limbo following the district court ruling.

The administration believes the arch will be “one of the most iconic landmarks not only in Washington DC, but throughout the world”, said Davis Ingle, a White House spokesperson, in a statement.

He added that the positioning of the arch, near Arlington National Cemetery would serve as “a visual reminder of the noble sacrifices borne by so many American heroes throughout our 250-year history so we can enjoy our freedoms today”.

A White House official also told the Guardian that the estimated cost of the triumphal arch was “still being calculated” and would be shared in the near future. The White House anticipates “some combination of public and private funds” to be used to pay for the project, according to the official.

A 20-year-old man allegedly tossed a molotov cocktail at the home of Sam Altman, OpenAI’s CEO, before the sun rose on Friday, according to statements from San Francisco police.

The suspect, who allegedly threw the fire bomb at the $27m North Beach residence around 4.12am, has been arrested but not identified. The same person allegedly threatened to torch OpenAI’s headquarters in the city. No injuries were reported.

The San Francisco police wrote in a statement on X on Friday morning that the agency responded to a “fire investigation” after the man allegedly threw a molotov cocktail at Altman’s residence. Law enforcement said there was a “fire to an exterior gate”, after which the suspect fled on foot. There were no injuries, the agency said.

About an hour later, just after 5am, police responded to reports from a business in the Mission Bay neighborhood, where OpenAI’s headquarters are located, about a man “threatening to burn down the building”. Officers said they recognized the man as the suspect from the earlier incident and immediately detained him.

Funny that when you threaten an entire society, some will break. That he was only 20 suggests a sense that he will never have a seat at the table for the rest of his life.

And he's not wrong.

Oh, for fuck's sake ... this again? Even a grocery store knows that when a product doesn't sell, it's time to put it on clearance and take it off the shelf.

I have no personal issue with Harris, but promising to continue the status quo was not what voters wanted in 2024. So she's now in the position of the GOP stance of "if we roll back the clock, everyone will be happy."

Which is obviously poppycock.

Unless you're proposing single-payer healthcare and concrete solutions to the housing crisis, as well as ending all fossil-fuel subsidies and pulling the U.S. out of needless wars (corollary: stop spending on the military when citizens are suffering), you've lost the Zeitgeist.

Anyway, enough ranting ... here's a snippet:

Kamala Harris said she is “thinking about” running in the 2028 presidential election.

“I might, I might. I’m thinking about it,” the former vice-president and 2024 candidate told the crowd at a gathering of the National Action Network (NAN), a civil rights organization founded by Al Sharpton, on Friday in New York City.

Expanding on her response to Sharpton’s question about a potential presidential bid, she added: “I served for four years being a heartbeat away from the presidency of the United States … I know what the job is and I know what it requires.”

She said: “I’ve been traveling the country the last year, spending a lot of time in the south and many other places, and the one thing I’m really clear about is … the status quo is not working and hasn’t been working for a lot of people for a long time."

Speaking about the presidency, Harris added: “It’s got to be about the American people and that’s how I think of it. I am thinking about it in the context of … who and where and how can the best job be done for the American people. I’ll keep you posted.”

Oh, you almost got there. Thing is, you're the status quo.

Pope Leo XIV on Friday offered a new criticism of war, in a social media post that named no names but appeared to hint at the Trump administration leadership harnessing Christian nationalism to glorify the US and Israel’s war against Iran.

“God does not bless any conflict. Anyone who is a disciple of Christ, the Prince of Peace, is never on the side of those who once wielded the sword and today drop bombs,” Leo wrote on his official X account. “Military action will not create space for freedom or times of #Peace, which comes only from the patient promotion of coexistence and dialogue among peoples.”

The pope, who was born in Chicago and is the first American to lead the Catholic church, has consistently spoken out against the fighting in the Middle East since the US and Israel began strikes on Iran in February.

Leo’s post on Friday appeared to be an oblique response to the Trump administration’s repeated references to God while conducting Operation Epic Fury in Iran.

The defense secretary, Pete Hegseth, has especially portrayed the conflict in religious terms, describing it as a holy war carried out “in the name of Jesus Christ”.

The White House Correspondents’ Association (WHCA) is surely hoping that Donald Trump will take a more diplomatic tone later this month when he makes his first appearance as president at the organization’s glitzy dinner in Washington DC, an annual event meant to honor and celebrate journalists and press freedom.

On Monday, Trump threatened to imprison a journalist if they refused to reveal the source of information that a second US airman was still missing after being shot down by Iran last Friday, which he claimed put the service member at risk.

“The person who did the story will go to jail if he doesn’t say,” Trump told a packed room of White House reporters, without specifying which reporter and which outlet he was referring to. The comment shocked watchdogs even at a time when the White House has become increasingly hostile to the media.

While some journalists and news organizations have long questioned the optics of the press mingling with the administration officials they cover, those questions have only grown louder after Trump’s threats and actions. In the first 14 months of his second term, Trump’s government has overseen a multi-pronged effort seemingly aimed at curbing news organizations that have been deemed hostile to his administration, threatening (and in some cases filing) lawsuits against media companies, cutting off access at the Pentagon by creating onerous new regulations, and even raiding the home of a Washington Post reporter.

In June 2024, a cyber-attack on a pathology services company caused chaos across London’s hospitals. More than 10,000 appointments were cancelled. Blood shortages followed and delays to blood tests led to a patient’s death.

Lethal cyber-attacks like this are thankfully rare. But a new AI release could change that – plunging us into a terrifying new world of chaos and disruption to the digital systems that we rely on.

This week Anthropic, a leading AI company in San Francisco, announced “Claude Mythos Preview”, an AI model that the startup says is too dangerous to publicly release, thanks to its exceptional cybersecurity – and cyber-attacking – capabilities. Mythos, the company claims, has found vulnerabilities in every major browser and operating system. In other words, this new AI model might be able to help hackers disrupt much of the world’s most important software.

“This is Y2K-level alarming,” one security expert said. Already, Mythos has found a 27-year-old bug in a critical piece of security infrastructure and multiple vulnerabilities in the Linux kernel, essential for computer systems worldwide. These weak points could threaten almost everything on the internet from the streaming services you relax with to the banking systems you rely on.

From the "racism is totally within our rights under the First Amendment" dept.:

Elon Musk’s artificial intelligence company, xAI, has filed a lawsuit against the state of Colorado over a new AI law set to take effect in June.

The suit seeks to block the state from enforcing the law, which would impose new requirements on AI systems to protect state residents from “algorithmic discrimination” in sectors such as education, employment, healthcare, housing and financial services.

Colorado was the first state to pass a comprehensive bill to regulate AI.

The company claims the law infringes on its first amendment free-speech protections and would force xAI to “promote the state’s ideological views on various matters, racial justice in particular”, according to the Financial Times, which first reported the lawsuit. “Its provisions prohibit developers of AI systems from producing speech that the state of Colorado dislikes.”

The Wi-Fi broke on my Kindle Paperwhite years ago, and I have only one micro-B cable left that will connect to it.

Amazon is to stop supporting older Kindle models leaving longtime ebook fans unable to access new content from the Kindle store.

Devices released during or before 2012 will no longer receive updates from 20 May, affecting owners of older Kindles, including the earliest models such as the Touch and some Fire tablets. It is thought that 2m e-readers could be affected.

Users will still be able to read ebooks they have downloaded, and their accounts and their Kindle library will remain accessible on mobile and desktop apps. Active users have been offered discounts to help “transition to newer devices”. Amazon said performing a factory reset on affected Kindles would make them unusable.

Disappointed users have vented their frustration online, including in comments on The Verge, accusing Amazon of “causing waste at a large scale” and saying their devices would be reduced to a paperweight despite still working.

One wonders whether these old devices just don't have enough telemetry built in for Amazon's liking.