Weekend Mix

So let us stop talkin' falsely now
The hour's getting late — Bob Dylan

HEADLINES: 

• US Supreme Court halts deportation of detained Venezuelans (BBC)

• ‘Hands-Off’ protests return Saturday under the ‘50501’ movement (WP)

• Rubio says Trump admin may soon "move on" from Ukraine-Russia peace efforts: "It's not our war" (CBS)

• Immigrants prove they are alive, forcing Social Security to undo death label (WP)

• A Global Rebalancing Is Well Underway as Investors Sell Off U.S. Bonds (Barron’s)

• Grover Norquist Can’t Believe What He’s Hearing (Atlantic)

• Judge pauses Trump administration’s plans for mass layoffs at Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (AP)

• Ford halts shipments of vehicles to China amid tariffs (Reuters)

• Designed in US, made in China: Why Apple is stuck (BBC)

• Appeals court temporarily halts contempt inquiry over deportation flights (ABC)

• Transcript: Trump’s Rage at Harvard Darkens With “Alarming” New Attack (TNR)

• Don’t listen to RFK Jr. on autism. Meet my special-needs son. (WP)

• US Measles Cases Rise 12% in a Week to Reach 800 in 24 States (Bloomberg)

• RFK Jr.’s cuts to CDC eliminate labs tracking STIs, hepatitis outbreaks (WP)

• The government doesn’t understand Meta (Verge)

• Aid groups are raising new alarm over Israel’s blockade of the war-ravaged Gaza Strip, where it has barred entry of all food and other goods for more than six weeks. Thousands of children have become malnourished, and most people are barely eating one meal a day as stocks dwindle, the United Nations says. The warning came as Israeli strikes overnight and into Thursday killed at least 27 people, including at least six women and 15 children. [AP]

• The Curse of ChatGPT (Atlantic)

• Russia seeds chatbots with lies. Any bad actor could game AI the same way. (WP)

• DOJ Plants Gun On Maine (The Onion)

MUSIC: 

Levon Helm & Sheryl Crow - Evangeline

Will Writers Survive? (My Conversation With Chat GPT)

A sprawling article in The New Republic last year questioned whether the coming of artificial intelligence (AI) spells the end for human writers. (TNR)

“If a computer can write like a person, what does that say about the nature of our own creativity?” asked the author, Samanth Subramanian.

The answer was, after a long winding trail of considerations, that nobody can yet say for sure, at least according to this author. But he seemed to suggest that human writers would prevail in the end.

The key word in this equation is “human.” In our society, human writers do much more than simply write. They invent and provoke and stimulate and define. They give voice to voiceless as well as to the unspeakable. They create the public narratives that help define both our social and private lives.

In fiction and nonfiction alike, they express the inner longings of the human spirit, which machines may emulate but cannot replicate. They connect people with each other through stories.

Like artists of all kinds, writers’ work can be copied — we call it plagiarism — but as creators they themselves cannot be replaced. AI may take away many of the jobs writers have; if so that will be a tragedy. But the writers will remain.

Writing is so much more than turning a phrase, word-smithing or even telling a story. Fundamentally, it’s about forging authentic human connections one at a time, word by word.

That will always be superior, IMHO, to the artificial connections enacted by machines.

And only a human being can tell the difference.

***

When I asked ChatGPT whether AI will replace human writers, here is how it answered:

• AI is definitely changing how writing gets done. It’s already helping with brainstorming, editing, summarizing, and even generating full drafts. In some contexts—like product descriptions, SEO content, or basic news reports—it can replace certain types of writing jobs or dramatically speed them up.

• But when it comes to deep storytelling, emotionally resonant writing, humor, cultural nuance, and original thinking, humans still have a big edge. Writing is more than words on a page—it's insight, lived experience, voice, and sometimes even rebellion. That’s hard to automate.

• Also, people want human stories. There’s value in knowing someone real is behind the words.

(My part of this essay is a rewrite of one I wrote a year ago.)

HEADLINES: 

• Trump says Maryland senator ‘looked like a fool’ in El Salvador while meeting Ábrego García as legal battles continue (Guardian)

• Rubio says the US will drop Ukraine-Russia peace efforts if no progress within days (AP)

• America’s Mad King (Atlantic)

• Trump officials’ defiance over Abrego Garcia’s deportation is ‘shocking,’ appeals court says (AP)

• Supreme Court will review Trump’s attempt to ban birthright citizenship (WP)

• IRS decision on Harvard’s tax-exempt status expected soon amid concern over Trump interference (Guardian)

• A Loophole That Would Swallow the Constitution (Atlantic)

• It’s Time to Protect America From America’s President (NYT)

• Americans are coming together to fight for freedom against a president who hates it (MSNBC)

• Judge says Trump officials could be found in contempt. What happens next? (BBC)

• Can Trump fire Fed chair Jerome Powell? Here's what to know. (Axios)

• Finally, the Trump regime has met its match (Guardian)

• How America Can Avoid Becoming Russia (Atlantic)

• ICE, DOGE ask to use sensitive Medicare data to find where immigrants live (WP)

• Tariff Pauses and Exemptions Prove the Need to Rethink (Bloomberg)

• Musk’s fury over a Tesla investigation foreshadowed his war on Washington (WP)

• Drug Development Is Slowing Down After Cuts at the FDA (WSJ)

• RFK Jr. Is Using a New Study on Autism Rates to Push His Anti-Vaccine Agenda (Mother Jones)

• Internal budget draft reveals deep cuts to federal health programs (WP)

• Half the World’s People Depend on Rice. New Research Says Climate Change Will Make it Toxic (Inside Climate News)

• Google has illegal advertising monopoly, judge rules (BBC)

• Proposed rule change on endangered species triggers alarm for environmentalists (AP)

• Astronomers Detect a Possible Signature of Life on a Distant Planet (NYT)

• Iran's Khamenei sends letter to Putin ahead of talks with US (Reuters)

• 2 dead, at least 5 injured in Florida State University shooting; suspect is a student (WP)

• OpenAI Unveils Technology That Can ‘Reason’ With Images (NYT)

• Nation Can’t Believe It On Harvard’s Side (The Onion)

 

Going Rogue

Besides journalistic sources, I sometimes include links to articles published in academic journals and other respected publications.

Today is one of those times.

In his essay in Foreign Affairs called The Age of American Unilateralism — How a Rogue Superpower Will Remake the Global Order, political scientist Michael Beckley suggests that the Trump administration’s controversial foreign policy moves may signal a permanent shift away from the liberal world order that has characterized the past 80 years or so.

While I do not necessarily agree with Beckley’s perspective, here are a few of his major points:

• The American-led liberal order has outlived its original purpose, growing into a maze of burdens and vulnerabilities. It didn’t fail, but it triumphed over threats that no longer exist: the devastation of World War II and the spread of communism.

• Globalization fueled growth but hollowed out American industries and concentrated the gains. Between 2000 and 2020, U.S. industrial output (excluding semiconductors) fell nearly ten percent, and one in three factory jobs disappeared. Nearly all net job growth went to the richest 20 percent of zip codes, leaving much of the country behind. 

• The social fallout has been staggering: rising disability claims, drug overdoses, and prime-age workers dropping out of the labor force at Great Depression–level numbers. Many wounded communities retain political clout thanks to an electoral system that amplifies rural voices over urban majorities. The result: a hard pivot away from liberal internationalism and toward protectionism and border controls.

• 77 percent of young Americans are unfit to serve in the military, largely because of obesity, drug use, and lack of education. Trump plans to unveil a $1 trillion defense budget, but rebuilding the U.S. defense industrial base could take years.

• (B)y treating global affairs like a transactional hustle, the United States risks tearing down the very system that has kept the peace for generations. Trade wars don’t just raise prices. They unravel alliances and push rivals toward confrontation. That’s how the world fell apart in the 1930s: protectionism, fear, and rising powers with no way to grow but through force.

• The goal isn’t just to win a great-power contest. It’s to channel it; to fix what’s broken at home and shape a world that reflects American interests and values. A free world that works—for the United States and for those willing and able to stand with it.

HEADLINES:

• Judge Threatens Contempt Inquiry Over Deportation Flights (NYT)

• Standoff between court, Trump officials intensifies as judge launches contempt proceedings (WP)

• Van Hollen travels to El Salvador as Trump officials ramp up defense of illegal deportation (Politico)

• Fed Chair Powell gives starkest warning yet on potential economic consequences from tariffs (CNN)

• Donald Trump says Fed chair Jay Powell’s ‘termination cannot come fast enough’ (Financial Times)

• Colleges Are Fighting Trump—and Trying to Save Themselves (New Yorker)

• Trump officials threaten Harvard with foreign student ban (DW)

• How Harvard Ended Up Leading the University Fight Against Trump (WSJ)

• Transcript: Trump’s Unhinged Eruption at Harvard Reveals MAGA Weakness (TNR)

• Harvard’s challenge to the Trump administration could test limits of government power (AP)

• The threat to university research in America (Economist)

• What Harvard could lose in its battle with the Trump administration (WP)

• The Age of American Unilateralism (Foreign Affairs)

• Inside Mark Zuckerberg’s Failed Negotiations to End Antitrust Case (WSJ)

• The White House is starting a new media policy that restricts wire services’ access to the president (AP)

• CNN's data chief warned Republicans that Trump's approval rating is sinking among this key group in the polls ― and that could cost them dearly during next year’s midterm elections. [HuffPost]

• Trump’s D.C. U.S. attorney pick appeared on Russian state media over 150 times (WP)

• CDC says measles cases are most likely underreported as outbreak swells in Texas (NBC)

• UK Supreme Court says legal definition of ‘woman’ excludes trans women, in landmark ruling (CNN)

• Famine and atrocities mount as Sudan’s civil war enters its third year (AP)

• 30 Years Later, a New Look at the Oklahoma City Bombing (NYT)

• Claude just gained superpowers: Anthropic’s AI can now search your entire Google Workspace without you (VentureBeat)

• NASA Announces Bold Plan To Still Exist By 2045 (The Onion)

 

Free Speech Assault

For everyone keeping track of whether the U.S. will remain a democracy, these are dark days.

Writing for the Cato Institute, hardly a left-wing bastion, David J. Bier explains one key aspect of the current mess with the headline of his piece: US Citizens Don’t Have First Amendment Rights If Noncitizens Don’t.

Following is a summary, but you may wish to read the entire article:

• Every restriction on the free speech rights of noncitizens is also a restriction on the free speech rights of Americans. For one thing, free speech is a protection for listeners as much as it is for speakers, and in that way, it undermines everyone’s right to hear when the government shuts down anyone’s right to speak freely.

• Trump’s administration is threatening US citizens’ free speech rights in many other ways, such as threatening arrests of people who inform noncitizens of their constitutional rights, filing shakedown lawsuits against media companies, attacking law firms that defend unpopular clients, canceling contracts in states where governors have criticized Trump, threatening sanctions against media companies for negative coverage of him, banning disfavored media from the White House, and sanctioning federal contractors for use of the words “diversity, equity, or inclusion.”

• The administration’s assault on noncitizen speech reveals a much deeper problem. A significant portion of the American public has simply forgotten the value of free speech entirely, and that’s the biggest threat to free speech of all.

That last point Bier makes is what concerns me the most. Free speech has always been a controversial subject for Americans, because it truly has always been a revolutionary concept.

As such, it is completely at odds with authoritarian power, which seeks complete control over what is said and what is heard. Therefore, it is not surprising that we have reached this moment of crisis between Trump and the Constitution.

The question now is, when it comes to the First Amendment, which side are the people on?

HEADLINES: 

• "It’s The End Of Democracy": Americans Are Reacting To Donald Trump's Latest Decision — And They're Not Holding Back (BuzzFeed)

• Trump to the USA: There Is No Rule of Law (Mother Jones)

• Trump administration has done nothing to facilitate release of wrongly deported Maryland man, his lawyers say (ABC)

• Trump is using Kilmar Abrego Garcia to send the Supreme Court a message (MSNBC)

• Trump has been escalating his war with the media, allowing members of his administration to take turns bashing a CNN reporter, denying journalists access to the Oval Office and calling for networks to be punished. [HuffPost]

• White House bars AP reporter, defying court order (Axios)

• US Citizens Don’t Have First Amendment Rights If Noncitizens Don’t (Cato)

• Trump threatens Harvard's tax-exempt status after freezing $2bn funding (BBC)

• The Promise of American Higher Education (Harvard)

• What Harvard Learned From Columbia’s Mistake (Atlantic)

• Palestinian Columbia Student Detained by ICE at U.S. Citizenship Interview (WSJ)

• Inside DOGE’s push to defy a court order and access Social Security data (WP)

• Pentagon’s ‘SWAT team of nerds’ resigns en masse (Politico)

• Why It’s Impossible for Most Small Businesses to Manufacture in the US (Wired)

• DOGE is collecting federal data to remove immigrants from housing, jobs (WP)

• Autism rates have risen to 1 in 31 school-age children, CDC reports (NBC)

• Measles cases in Texas rise to 561, state health department says (Reuters)

• Orban Escalates Culture War in Hungary by Mandating Two Genders Only (NYT)

• Investors are abandoning the dollar and Treasuries, scared by the trade war (WP)

• China Outs US Hackers for Attack, a New Frontier in Spy Games (Bloomberg)

• Xi makes a case for free trade, presenting China as a source of ‘stability and certainty’ (AP)

• Van Gogh’s Last Painting Poses a Problem for an Idyllic French Village (NYT)

• OpenAI is building a social network (Verge)

• Teachers Worry About Students Using A.I. But They Love It for Themselves. (NYT)

• “How can I return an innocent man to the United States when I don’t have the ability to feel empathy or compassion?” said Nayib Bukele (The Onion)

MUSIC: 

Lee Ann Womack & Kacey Musgraves Livin' on love CMT Music Awards 2014

The Leaf: Metaphor or Outlier

One summer afternoon when I was a young boy in Michigan, I was lying on my back in a field staring up at a large tree. It was one of those windless days, hot and still. 

After a while, I realized that a single leaf was for no apparent reason turning on its stem. As far as I could see, this leaf was identical to all the other leaves on the tree, but it was the only one moving.

I was not yet the journalist I would become but at least on this occasion I had the eye for detail that proved useful later on.

After all, one leaf turning might just be a story. Many leaves holding in place most likely is not.

The problem with this for journalists is that by focusing on the exception to the rule, we may give the impression that the rule is no longer in order. An example of this is crime reporting. Covering one shocking crime too intensely can create the illusion that an entire city is “awash in crime” when the fact is the opposite is true. 

In fact, most such crimes are actually just anomalies. 

Of course, there is an entirely different way to tell any story. That solitary leaf I saw may have been ahead of its time — portending a climate disaster to come when all the other leaves remained quiet, steady in place, doing what they were expected to do.

In this version, the swinging leaf is a whistleblower, a ‘canary in the coal mine,’ an indicator of bigger problems.

Enter the investigative reporter, who picks up on the signal and spots a pattern that may provide an explanation for the turning leaf. After observing hundreds of trees, with many thousands of leaves, and interviewing numerous scientists, none of whom can say for sure, the reporter writes a more nuanced story based on the data.

In this new story, we learn that there are many such single leaves on many trees turning slowly on windless days where no one is there to see. But it is also possible that if no one saw them then that didn’t really happen. (Quantum physics.) Then again, perhaps there is a new disease affecting our trees that we need to address if we are to save the forest.

Meanwhile, the people reading these stories may well be still thinking about that one single leaf, turning without reason on a windless day long ago in Michigan. If so, just like the storyteller, they may never see the forest for the trees.

(This is the latest version of a very old essay.)

HEADLINES:

• The Constitutional Crisis Is Here — Trump’s administration is only pretending to comply with the Supreme Court on the matter of a Maryland man it deported erroneously. (Atlantic)

• President of El Salvador says he won't return mistakenly deported man to U.S. (NBC)

• Man accused of setting fire to Pennsylvania governor’s home said he would’ve beaten him with hammer, affidavit says (CNN)

• Trump plan would slash State Dept. funding by nearly half, memo says (WP)

• White House to Ask Congress to Claw Back Funding From NPR and PBS (NYT)

• 'Putin is mocking Trump': EU foreign ministers call for new sanctions on Russia after Sumy attack (Euronews)

• Kleptocracy, Inc. — Under Trump, conflicts of interest are just part of the system. (Atlantic)

• Next Iran-US nuclear talks will be held in Rome, AP source says (AP)

• China has put civilian government officials in Beijing on “wartime footing” and ordered a diplomatic charm offensive aimed at encouraging other countries to push back against US tariffs, according to four people familiar with the matter. Here's how China went from courting Trump to ‘never yield’ tariff defiance. (Reuters)

• DOGE Is Far Short of Its Goal, and Still Overstating Its Progress (NYT)

• Harvard rejects Trump administration’s demands, putting billions in federal funding at risk (WP)

• Meta’s Hopes of a Tech Antitrust Reprieve Are Dashed (Bloomberg)

• Troops arrive at the border to help with enforcement despite fewer migrant crossings (NPR)

• Canadians Are Cashing Out Their American Vacation Homes (WSJ)

• Trump’s executive order on elections, Mike Johnson’s SAVE Act, and Republican-backed laws nationwide are threatening many Americans’ right to vote (Rolling Stone)

• Fear of unemployment jumps to highest level since the pandemic (CNN)

• ‘Parkinson’s is a man-made disease’ (Politico)

• Google’s newest AI model is designed to help study dolphin ‘speech’ (TechCrunch)

• Small Language Models Are the New Rage, Researchers Say (Wired)

• Report: Majority Of Nation’s Civic Engagement Centered Around Oppressing Other People (The Onion)

 

Birthday Mix

(My 3 sons stopping by for a birthday visit. Photo by Claire Weir)

So just like that, I’m 78. Birthdays are a time to reflect and a time to be grateful for what we’ve got. I’m grateful for all the people in my life, including you, my subscribers and readers.

Thank you. The past year has been challenging on many levels. With any luck, I’ll still be publishing by this date next year!

HEADLINES:

• Suspect arrested after arson at Pennsylvania governor’s house forced Shapiro and family to evacuate (CNN)

• Teen charged with killing parents also planned to assassinate Trump, FBI says (NBC)

• U.S., China barrel toward the bottom in escalating trade war (WP)

• U.S. tariffs are about to trigger the greatest trade diversion the world has ever seen (The Conversation)

• Manufacturers struggle with uncertainty, chaos in Trump tariffs (WP)

• Trump Adds Tariff Exemptions for Smartphones, Computers and Other Electronics (NYT)

• Trump goes with his gut and the world goes along for the ride (AP)

• What President Trump’s team wants from the rest of the world (WP)

• Trump administration contends it has no duty to return illegally deported man to US (Politico)

• Don’t Be Fooled: RFK Jr. Is Still Talking Down Vaccines (Bulwark)

• People are turning on Elon Musk (Verge)

• Rural populations near federal lands worry job cuts will hurt their communities (Daily Kos)

• Via porn, gore and ultra-violence, extremist groups are sinking hooks online into the very young (AP)

• Man Who Bumped Tesla While Parallel Parking Sentenced To Death (The Onion)

Out for Delivery

On a sunny, breezy Saturday afternoon, several of my kids were able to drop by for an early, informal celebration of my upcoming birthday. On these annual occasions, it’s perfectly natural for everyone in the family to evaluate how the aged one is doing.

“Is he getting more forgetful?”

“Can he manage daily tasks effectively?”

“Does he show any signs of slippage?”

I think I passed with flying colors on all counts until it came time to order food for the group.

“I’ve got this,” I pronounced. “Everyone likes Indian food, right?”

Back at my laptop, I opened the browser window, loaded Door Dash, chose an Indian restaurant whose name sounded vaguely familiar, confirmed it was open for delivery, made my choices from the menu, double-checked everything, entered my order, and promptly returned to the party.

“It will be delivered in 45 minutes,” I announced.

And it was indeed delivered 45 minutes later, only 60 miles south of here. I’d inadvertently ordered the meal from a restaurant in San Jose to be sent to my daughter’s house in San Jose.

She did report back that it was delicious, however.

HEADLINES:

• Russia ballistic missile strike kills dozens in Ukraine's Sumy, officials say (ABC)

• Israeli military strikes Gaza City's last functioning hospital (NBC)

• There’s No Coming Back From Trump’s Tariff Disaster (Atlantic)

• Trump’s incoherent trade policy will do lasting damage (Economist)

• Tariffs spur market motion sickness (Reuters)

• Trump’s Deportation Black Hole (Reveal)

• Treasury Yields See Biggest Weekly Jump Since 2001 as Cash Flees (Bloomberg)

• Trump authorizes US military to take control of land at US-Mexico border (Guardian)

• People who fled authoritarian countries say they’re experiencing déjà vu (WP)

• Trump envoy, Iranian foreign minister meet in first round of nuclear talks (Axios)

• Trump’s Horrifying Removal of Man in “Error” Takes an Even Darker Turn (TNR)

• Trump officials have private goal to deport at least 1 million immigrants in 2025 (WP)

• Trump has 90 days to do 150 trade deals. Financial markets aren’t buying it (CNN)

• Steve Witkoff’s Russian embrace (Reuters)

• Panama opposition party accuses US of ‘camouflaged invasion’ (Guardian)

• U.S. retailers have a tariff problem (Reuters)

• Trump’s ongoing 25% auto tariffs expected to cut sales by millions, cost $100 billion (CNBC)

• The AI Agent Era Requires a New Kind of Game Theory (Wired)

• How TikTok’s Parent, ByteDance, Became an A.I. Powerhouse (NYT)

• Judge Gives Trump Administration 3 Days To Return Her From El Salvador Prison (The Onion)

MUSIC: 

Lee Ann Womack performs George Jones' The Grand Tour Live at the Grand Ole Opry