WASHINGTON D.C. – Using a fresh browser tab on a secure device, sources confirm that US President Donald Trump has, for the first time in his life, done a google search to find out what the word “Tariff” means. Reports indicate the search began around 10:20 AM this morning, following worldwide reports of confusion and […]
The post Trump googles “tariff” for first time appeared first on The Beaverton.
OTTAWA – With less than a month to go until the federal election, candidates for the Conservative Party of Canada have been shocked and dismayed to learn that the things they post and share on public-facing social media platforms are indeed visible to the public. “I assume X is basically a diary, and that’s why […]
The post Dropped Conservative candidates horrified to realize other people can see their social media posts appeared first on The Beaverton.
Hey!
Oh my god, I’m so glad I found you. I was starting to get worried. The game is about to start, and there’s no way I could even begin to pay attention until I found the one. The one other person of color at this hockey game, that is. You see, it’s a rule that we have to find each other before the puck drops. We have to make intense eye contact but share no words. We have to assure each other with a look that says “You’re not alone” and “Don’t worry, I’ve got your back.” Because when someone shouts something alarmingly racist during the national anthem, we have to be able to find each with wide eyes that say “What the actual fuck is going on?”
During the first intermission, we should meet by the bathroom near section 112 to check in on each other. Maybe we can even grab a giant pretzel. Silently, of course. That’s the key to this relationship. No words, all eyes.
It’s a shame, because I would love to know how you ended up here. Is it anything like my story? Was it an attempt to find a new hobby in your thirties that didn’t involve leaving your couch? A deep depression that made watching shows like Love Island and Survivor impossible? Were you as bored of Deuxmoi as I was and decided you’d rather hear hockey gossip? Or was it the endless TikToks about hot hockey players that made you finally look into what the fuss was all about?
Maybe you just started a job at a company where your boss proudly announced the end of DEI, and you felt the need to become an expert in the whitest activity imaginable. If that’s the case, I’m so sorry. Because the whitest activity imaginable is rowing. But hockey is a pretty close second or third, so maybe it will still work out in your favor.
More likely, judging by your lack of team paraphernalia, you got dragged here by your friends and don’t know a single thing about hockey. In which case, I wish I could tell you about some of my favorite parts. For example, when a player breaks a rule that involves physically hurting someone, they’ll get put in the penalty box, or what I like to call “hockey jail.” Hockey is the one sport where a white man will get put in jail for breaking a rule. It might only be for two to five minutes, but hey, that’s longer than Ted Kennedy got.
It’s funny, isn’t it? Willingly putting yourself in this potentially hostile environment because you simply must watch grown men slam each other into the boards up close.
We better hurry, the next period is about to start. I really do hope you enjoy the game. And who knows, maybe I’ll see you at the next one. Just remember the rule, and you’ll be fine. But if something goes wrong, find me in the crowd and blink twice. I’ll drop my Dippin’ Dots and come to your rescue.
See you on the ice,
Sahar
President Trump has announced a sweeping plan of tariffs against dozens of nations, including the Antarctic Heard and McDonald Islands, which are uninhabited by humans but very much inhabited by penguins. The fake liberal media criticized this as a mistake, but Trump’s tariffs are actually a brilliant long-term strategy to help America win the war against birds.
Birds have taken advantage of America’s generosity for too long. Every year, millions of illegal and undocumented birds cross the border into American airspace. These birds come here to commit criminal acts (e.g., pooping on Teslas) and to take our jobs (e.g., pooping on Teslas). There are even reports that some birds fly in violent gangs called “murders,” probably to support Hamas.
Every day, good Americans face the dangerous threat of birds. Birds are not the cute, harmless animals depicted in the mainstream media. Birds have sharp beaks that can poke American eyes, talons that can stab American hearts, and feathers that can tickle American noses and cause American sneezes.
The war against birds is long overdue. This is especially true on the trade front. Since Trump came into office, American families have been suffering through the rising costs of consumer goods, including the price of eggs. You know who makes eggs? Birds! Trump is fighting for our rights by getting to the very source of the problem.
Trump’s tariffs against the penguins will revitalize the American economy. The Heard and McDonald Islands have exploited our nation’s economy for decades. Now, instead of paying exorbitantly high prices for penguin-made products, American consumers will revitalize the American ice and freshly vomited fish industries.
Now, some may say that birds are not our enemies and, in fact, could be considered our longtime allies. After all, what about the role of carrier pigeons in helping us fight fascism in World War II? Others may say that birds are not our enemies, but have been our victims—caged, killed, forced to labor, detained against their will, trafficked across state lines, deprived of legal representation. We’ve taken their lands, stolen their children, and destroyed the environmental factors they need to survive. Blah, blah, blah. These arguments are woke and DEI, and the United States has never betrayed its allies or victimized any populations ever.
The good news is President Trump and his administration are setting us on the right path in the War Against Birds. Under the leadership of Secretary of Health Robert F. Kennedy Jr., the bird flu no longer exists (or, at least, no research or vaccines for it exist anymore). Elon Musk’s DOGE has defunded national parks, well-known to be crime-ridden hellholes where birds congregate to plan anti-American activities. And the administration’s strong push to eliminate DEI will ensure that no birds will ever again get the unfair advantages (wings, hollow bones) that have literally elevated them above everyday Americans.
Fortunately for the American people, the president’s tariffs are hitting important enemies, like birds, and not important friends, like Russia. Sure, Trump’s indiscriminate tariffs were calculated based on essentially no logical basis and will likely cause trillions in economic loss for America. And, sure, the average consumer will bear the brunt of it, and we may very well be on the edge of the next Great Depression. But remember that birds are the enemy, Trump is always right, and anything bad that might happen will be Joe Biden’s fault.
Now, the president’s plan is brilliant, of course, but it isn’t perfect. We need to push harder. Tax all birds, not just penguins. Place a 25 percent tariff on all avian exports. Support mammalian manufacturing. Disband the Audubon Society.
Then, once victorious, we commence the war against reptiles.
“A stunned world reckons with economic fallout from Trump’s tariffs. Not even America’s closest trading partners were spared by a policy broadside that spooked investors and left policymakers scrambling to formulate responses.” — New York Times
My fellow Americans,
For far too long, we have been held captive, prisoners of an unfair and unjust system—one that would see us access goods and services beyond the wildest imaginations of most developing nations. No longer! At long last, we have been liberated from being able to afford anything.
For many years, we have struggled to right this ship, to bring our spending and employment to heel. We have chipped away at our economy, bit by bit, but somehow we have continued to suffer under a global hierarchy in which we are both the wealthiest and most influential country in the world. A terrible fate to suffer, indeed.
Fear not, my friends, for those days are over. We are finally free from the shackles of capitalism. I mean, to be clear: it’s still capitalism. We’re just making sure that basically none of you benefit from it anymore. You. Are. Welcome.
This was not an easy battle. It came at a price—a price you’ll all be paying, based on a random assortment of numbers we pulled from thin air. We accomplished this great feat the way we always have: by just making it all up.
Our people have all fought valiantly, and we have won. Now you shall enjoy the spoils of our victory, which will cost about twice as much as any previous spoils. One day, we will all look back on this period and remember it as the beginning of the end of the best days of our lives.
Smile, countrymen, for a time of great surplus is finally and firmly out of sight, and a time of great agony is upon us!
No longer shall we exchange our economy of ideas and innovation for labor and goods.
No longer shall we bend the knee to other nations by being the nation other nations look up to.
No longer shall we be bound by the straitjacket of prosperity.
From now on, we are the envy of no one. Does that not feel righteous? Does that not fill you with purpose? You are all now unencumbered by things like “long-term market stability” and “jobs.” You are finally, totally free. (Nothing else is free, though. It’s all very expensive now.)
Congratulations, we did it.
CNBC:
- Markets plunged the day after President Donald Trump imposed a far-reaching “reciprocal tariff” policy, including a 10% baseline tariff on almost every country on earth.
- The plan slaps much steeper tariff rates on many countries, including 34% on China, 20% on the European Union, 46% on Vietnam and 32% on Taiwan.
- Economists and U.S. trade partners are raising questions about how the White House calculated the tariff rates it claimed other countries “charge” the United States.
Apple, in particular, is taking it on the chin, about 9.5% for the day. Amazon and Meta were both down 9%. Nike is down over 13%. From CNBC’s corresponding story on just how the White House computed the “tariff” rates it claims for various countries:
Many observers said the U.S. appeared to have divided the trade deficit by imports from a given country to arrive at tariff rates for individual countries.
Such methodology doesn’t necessarily align with the conventional approach for calculating tariffs and implies the U.S. would have looked at only the trade deficit in goods and ignored trade in services.
“Such methodology doesn’t necessarily align with the conventional approach” is an overlong euphemism for “The president literally doesn’t understand what tariffs are.” James Surowiecki was seemingly the first person to figure out the White House’s nonsensical formula:
Just figured out where these fake tariff rates come from. They didn’t actually calculate tariff rates + non-tariff barriers, as they say they did. Instead, for every country, they just took our trade deficit with that country and divided it by the country’s exports to us.
So we have a $17.9 billion trade deficit with Indonesia. Its exports to us are $28 billion. $17.9/$28 = 64%, which Trump claims is the tariff rate Indonesia charges us. What extraordinary nonsense this is.
Don’t rack your brain trying to make sense out of the nonsensical.
The Economist:
On economics Mr Trump’s assertions are flat-out nonsense. The president says tariffs are needed to close America’s trade deficit, which he sees as a transfer of wealth to foreigners. Yet as any of the president’s economists could have told him, this overall deficit arises because Americans choose to save less than their country invests — and, crucially, this long-running reality has not stopped its economy from outpacing the rest of the g7 for over three decades. There is no reason why his extra tariffs should eliminate the deficit. Insisting on balanced trade with every trading partner individually is bonkers — like suggesting that Texas would be richer if it insisted on balanced trade with each of the other 49 states, or asking a company to ensure that each of its suppliers is also a customer.
And Mr Trump’s grasp of the technicalities was pathetic. He suggested that the new tariffs were based on an assessment of a country’s tariffs against America, plus currency manipulation and other supposed distortions, such as value-added tax. But it looks as if officials set the tariffs using a formula that takes America’s bilateral trade deficit as a share of goods imported from each country and halves it — which is almost as random as taxing you on the number of vowels in your name.
There is no way to report on these tariffs in a way that is honest and accurate without describing them as bonkers and nonsensical. News publications that are trying to present them as rational, or describing them as “reciprocal” just because that’s the word the White House is using, are beclowning themselves.
Mike Masnick has a great piece at TechDirt running down just how stupid everything about Trump’s tariff trade war is:
Whoever on the Council of Economic Advisers used this formula should turn in their econ degree, because this is not how anything works. Even if they then go on to publish another version of the formula that looks all sophisticated and shit.
Brendan Duke, on X, shows that the fancier version of their formula — which is fancy in the way that Vertu phones are “fancy” — is even stupider, because the two Greek letters they chose to glam it up just cancel each other out.
Back to Masnick:
This is what happens when you ask ChatGPT to “make my wrong econ math look more scientific.” The document even admits that they couldn’t figure out the actual tariff rates, so they “proxied” them with this formula instead. That’s a bit like saying you couldn’t find your house keys, so you proxied them with a banana.
The fundamental problem here isn’t just that the tariff numbers are wrong — though they absolutely are. It’s that the entire premise rests on treating trade deficits as if they were tariffs. They’re not the same thing. At all.
Let’s back up for a moment and talk about trade deficits, because Trump has been getting this wrong for longer than some of his supporters have been alive. His logic appears to be:
- “Deficit” sounds bad
- Therefore, trade deficits must be bad
- Therefore, countries with whom we have trade deficits must be cheating us
- Therefore, we should punish them with tariffs to “level the playing field”
This sounds like it must be an exaggeration for comic effect, but it’s not. That’s how Trump’s mind works. This is what Trump has been saying about trade deficits for decades. It’s like how he understands “asylum” to mean “insane asylum” and so when he talks about political asylum he starts talking about “the late great Hannibal Lecter”.
by Jesse Coburn
ProPublica is a nonprofit newsroom that investigates abuses of power. Sign up to receive our biggest stories as soon as they’re published.
Three federal lawmakers are calling on the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development to stop any initiatives involving cryptocurrency and the blockchain, saying the scantly regulated technologies should be kept far away from the agency’s work overseeing the nation’s housing sector.
In a letter to HUD Secretary Scott Turner on Wednesday, Reps. Maxine Waters, Stephen Lynch and Emanuel Cleaver sharply criticized the agency for considering such experiments, given cryptocurrency’s volatility and vulnerability to fraud. The Democratic representatives, all members of the House Financial Services Committee, warned of repeating “the same mistakes of the past,” noting that the 2008 financial crisis was triggered in part by the proliferation of risky financial assets in the housing market.
“The federal government cannot allow under-regulated financial products to infiltrate critical housing programs, especially when they have already proven to be dangerous, speculative, and harmful to working families,” the lawmakers wrote.
The letter is a response to reporting by ProPublica that the housing agency recently discussed taking steps toward using cryptocurrency. The article described meetings in February in which officials discussed incorporating the blockchain — and possibly a type of cryptocurrency known as stablecoin — into the agency’s work. The discussion at one meeting centered on a pilot project involving one HUD grant, but a HUD finance official in attendance indicated the idea could be applied much more expansively across the agency.
“We are looking at this for the entire enterprise,” he said in that meeting, a recording of which was obtained by ProPublica. “We just wanted to start in CPD,” he added, referring to HUD’s Office of Community Planning and Development. The office administers billions of dollars in grants to support low- and moderate-income people, including funding for affordable housing, homeless shelters and disaster recovery, raising the prospect that these forms of aid might one day be paid in an unstable currency.
Asked for comment on the letter, HUD spokesperson Kasey Lovett referred ProPublica to a prior comment by Turner, in which he said, “There’s no merit to it.” Lovett previously told ProPublica: “The department has no plans for blockchain or stablecoin. Education is not implementation.”
It’s unclear how a crypto project would work. But HUD officials alluded to the possible use of stablecoins, which are pegged to the U.S. dollar or another asset. That is supposed to protect stablecoins from the wild swings in value common among bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies, although such fluctuations have happened with stablecoins in the past.
The HUD proposal raised alarm among some officials, with one comparing the idea in internal discussions to paying grant recipients in “Monopoly money.” At best, one HUD staffer told ProPublica previously, the idea was a waste of time and resources; at worst it was a threat to the stability of the housing sector.
“It’s just introducing another unregulated security into the housing market as though 2008, 2009 didn’t happen,” the staffer said, referring to the subprime mortgage crisis. “I don’t see any way this will help anything. I see a lot of ways this could hurt.”
The HUD official pushing the idea internally was Irving Dennis, the agency’s new principal deputy chief financial officer, a staffer said at one of the meetings. Dennis denied to ProPublica that HUD was considering any such experiment. He published a book in 2021 in which he wrote that HUD should use the blockchain.
The blockchain is a digital ledger most commonly used to record cryptocurrency transactions. Boosters of the technology depict it as a way to cut middlemen such as banks out of financial transactions and to make those transactions more transparent and secure. One such evangelist is Robert Judson, an executive at the consulting firm EY, who is listed in a document obtained by ProPublica as an attendee of one of the HUD meetings. Judson has written glowingly about the potential of blockchain to prevent aid money from being misused. (Dennis was previously a partner at EY.)
Judson and EY did not respond to requests for comment for this article, but Judson previously confirmed to ProPublica that EY had discussed the matter with agency officials.
In their letter, the three representatives requested extensive information from HUD about its consideration of crypto and the blockchain, including whether the agency had assessed the risks of using the technology. The House Financial Services Committee is scheduled to consider a bill Wednesday that would regulate stablecoins.
In brief: Houston is continuing to see exceptionally warm weather this week, and we’ll also experience ongoing windy conditions. There will be a very slight chance of storms north of the region today and Friday, and the risk of more widespread severe weather on Saturday. Afterwards conditions appear to be gorgeous next week.
Temperatures continue to be very warm this morning across the Houston region. The normal low for the city, on April 3, is 57 degrees. Yesterday, the minimum temperature at Bush Intercontinental Airport only reached 76 degrees, which smashed the previous record for high minimum temperature of 72 degrees for the day. We’re likely to set a similar record today.
A robust southwesterly flow in the atmosphere will continue to funnel warm air into the region today and Friday. This will help push temperatures up to around 90 degrees for most of Houston today even though skies are likely to remain partly to mostly cloudy. For April, that’s impressive heating without lots of direct sunshine.
The other factor in our weather will be the presence of a frontal boundary just to the north of the Houston area. This will do a couple of things. First, it will support strong southerly winds, at about 15 mph with gusts up to 30 or 35 mph. And secondly, for northern areas (probably along and north of Highway 105) it will produce a slight chance of storms. Down in the Houston metro area we cannot rule out some sprinkles, but we should remain dry for the most part. (By the way, this storm risk is historically high in the Mid-South, and you can find more information about this on The Eyewall). Expect another very warm night in the mid-70s.
We should see similar conditions on Friday, albeit with a slightly higher chance of showers in the Houston area, and thunderstorms for locations in Montgomery County and points north. Temperatures likely will be in the upper 80s for most of the Houston area.
I’ve had a ton of questions about weddings and various outdoor activities on Saturday, due to the timing of the front, winds, and potential for thunderstorms. We’re just now coming into the range of high-resolution models, so we should start to get better details over the next 12 to 24 hours. What we know is that a front will push into Houston on Saturday, likely reaching the urban core of the city by around noon, and pushing off the coast afterward. The entire area faces a slight risk of severe weather during this frontal passage, with the usual threats of wind, hail, and possibly a tornado. At this time, it looks like the period of most concern for storms will be from mid-morning to the early evening in Houston. We should be able to nail this down more in Friday’s post. Highs on Saturday will be in the mid-80s with plenty of humidity ahead of the front before temperatures drop to around 50 degrees by Sunday morning.
I expect rains to end at some point on Saturday night, but we cannot entirely rule out a few showers on Sunday morning. But skies should be clearing, and there will be plenty of drier air. Expect highs in the mid-60s, if you can believe it. It will be a bit breezy, with northerly winds of 15 mph or so, and higher gusts. These winds should die down by Sunday night, as lows drop into the upper 40s for much of the region.
Highs remain in the 70s, and lows in the 50s, through at least Wednesday of next week. Although the temperatures likely climb back into the 80s toward the end of the week, the air still looks reasonably dry. In short, it should be a splendid, spring-like week.
The Orange Show Center for Visionary Art has shared a lineup of art car-related events taking place in Houston from April 10 through 13. This year marks the organization’s 38th annual Art Car Parade, the oldest and largest festival of its kind.
2024 Main Street Drag. Photo: Ben White
Beginning in the morning on Thursday, April 10, the Main Street Drag brings art cars to locations across the city so that individuals who might otherwise not be able to attend the parade can engage with the vehicles. Elementary schools, nursing homes, hospitals, and other similar institutions are on the list of stops. Learn more about the Main Street Drag and how you can bring cars to your location via the Art Car Parade website.
2024 Sneak Peek at Discovery Green. Photo: Ben White
Discovery Green will host an Art Car Sneak Peek on the evening of April 10. The free, family-friendly event will take place from 6 p.m. to 10 p.m. and will include live music, food and drinks, and art activities for kids
The following evening, from 6 p.m. to 11 p.m. The Orange Show will host The Legendary Art Car Ball, an annual fundraiser that features costumes, live music, interactive performance art, food and drinks, and illuminated art cars. The 2025 line-up includes Brittany Davis, Kam Franklin, Free Rads, Geoffrey Muller, Art Jam – Mark Medina, the Renegade Carnies, and the Moon Papas. Purchase tickets for the event here.
Claire Johnson, “The Ploppet”
The parade will run along Allen Parkway and Smith Street, beginning at 2 p.m. on Saturday, April 12. Leading up to the main event, cars will line up on Allen Parkway, between Taft and Bagby, from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. During this time, a Kids Creative Zone, supported by H-E-B, will be active at Sam Houston Park (1000 Bagby Street). From 5 p.m. to 9 p.m., the Art Car After Party, presented by Downtown Houston+, will be held at Market Square.
David Best, “Orange Horse”
Wrapping up the weekend is an Art Car Awards Ceremony, in which over $16,000 will be granted to artists and groups participating in the Art Car Parade. Last year, the Ann Harithas Legacy Award was granted to The Ploppet, by Claire Johson & the Ploppet Crew; and First Place Art Cars included Orange Horse, by David Best; Little Horn, the Baby Rhino, by Kimi Bainter; and Car Pet, by George Sacaris and family. The awards ceremony will take place from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. at the Orange Show on Sunday, April 13.
The post The Orange Show Releases the Schedule for its 2025 Art Car Festival Parade appeared first on Glasstire.
BEND, OR—Pointing out how the 4-year-old Jack Russell terrier was already shaking with anticipation, avid bungee jumper Isaac Branch confirmed Thursday that his dog also loves bungee jumping. “Rocko’s obsessed with bungee jumping—he does it all the time!” said Branch, 25, who described the 15-pound canine as a “total adrenaline junky” who gets so riled up by just the sight of the bungee harness that he often urinates all over the floor. “Once we’re on the bridge, he goes absolutely crazy with excitement and starts running [away from me] so fast. I can barely get him to hold still while I strap the GoPro to his little head, which he also loves. I think his favorite part is the free fall, because his muzzle pulls back into this huge, tight smile.” At press time, Branch had reportedly set up a GoFundMe for Rocko following an unsuccessful jump.
The post Dog Loves Bungee Jumping, Owner Of Bungee-Jumping Dog Reports appeared first on The Onion.
TECOLUCA, EL SALVADOR—Saying things had only gone downhill after a terrible morning, lawful U.S. resident Oscar Fernandez-Lopez, 38, stated Wednesday that he had already been having a bad day before being deported to the Salvadoran mega-prison known as CECOT. “I knew things were heading in the wrong direction when I spilled coffee on my shirt, and that was without getting sent to one of the most hellish prisons in Central America,” said the husband and father of three, who described his rendition to a penitentiary that can hold up to 40,000 people as “just the cherry on top” of an awful day that had begun with him missing his bus to work and ended with him being shoved into a cramped cell to be sadistically tortured by Barrio 18 gang members. “Maybe it was my mistake for thinking everything might turn around after I stepped in a puddle and got my shoe soaking wet. Now my right to a trial has been suspended for no clear reason, I’ve been falsely labeled as part of the MS-13 gang, I’m separated from my family despite my status as a legal immigrant to the United States, and they’re apparently going to starve me? Jesus Christ, there are days and then there are days.” At press time, when Fernandez-Lopez was overheard telling himself that things would surely start to improve now, several baton-wielding guards in body armor had reportedly entered his cell.
The post Man Already Having Bad Day Deported To Salvadoran Mega-Prison appeared first on The Onion.
After performing as a musical guest on the show to promote his upcoming album, Morgan Wallen made headlines when he abruptly left the Saturday Night Live stage. Here is everything you need to know about the artist.
Birthplace: Bass Pro Shops Pyramid, Tennessee
Genre: See name
Default Setting: Aggrieved
Fandom Name: Whites
Controversies: 2016–present
Favorite Slur: Can’t choose just one
Most Prized Possession: Fabergé truck nuts
Looking For: A traditional, God-fearing influencer
Favorite Drink: Jack and Zyn
Getting Into Heaven: No
The post Artist Profile: Morgan Wallen appeared first on The Onion.
On Tuesday, the Wikimedia Foundation announced that relentless AI scraping is putting strain on Wikipedia's servers. Automated bots seeking AI model training data for LLMs have been vacuuming up terabytes of data, growing the foundation's bandwidth used for downloading multimedia content by 50 percent since January 2024. It’s a scenario familiar across the free and open source software (FOSS) community, as we've previously detailed.
The Foundation hosts not only Wikipedia but also platforms like Wikimedia Commons, which offers 144 million media files under open licenses. For decades, this content has powered everything from search results to school projects. But since early 2024, AI companies have dramatically increased automated scraping through direct crawling, APIs, and bulk downloads to feed their hungry AI models. This exponential growth in non-human traffic has imposed steep technical and financial costs—often without the attribution that helps sustain Wikimedia’s volunteer ecosystem.
The impact isn’t theoretical. The foundation says that when former US President Jimmy Carter died in December 2024, his Wikipedia page predictably drew millions of views. But the real stress came when users simultaneously streamed a 1.5-hour video of a 1980 debate from Wikimedia Commons. The surge doubled Wikimedia’s normal network traffic, temporarily maxing out several of its Internet connections. Wikimedia engineers quickly rerouted traffic to reduce congestion, but the event revealed a deeper problem: The baseline bandwidth had already been consumed largely by bots scraping media at scale.
Remember Mike Waltz? The National Security Advisor who’s spent the last few weeks demonstrating his profound inability to handle basic security? First, there was the illegal Signal chat where he accidentally added a journalist while discussing potential war crimes. Then we learned about his completely exposed Venmo contacts and leaked passwords. And now, in a twist that would be too on-the-nose for fiction, it turns out the same official who previously demanded DOJ action over private email use… has been conducting government business through Gmail.
Ah, but her emails.
All this seems less than great for the top “security” official in the administration.
Members of President Donald Trump’s National Security Council, including White House national security adviser Michael Waltz, have conducted government business over personal Gmail accounts, according to documents reviewed by The Washington Post and interviews with three U.S. officials.
The use of Gmail, a far less secure method of communication than the encrypted messaging app Signal, is the latest example of questionable data security practices by top national security officials already under fire for the mistaken inclusion of a journalist in a group chat about high-level planning for military operations in Yemen.
A senior Waltz aide used the commercial email service for highly technical conversations with colleagues at other government agencies involving sensitive military positions and powerful weapons systems relating to an ongoing conflict, according to emails reviewed by The Post. While the NSC official used his Gmail account, his interagency colleagues used government-issued accounts, headers from the email correspondence show.
This is, needless to say, pretty fucking bad. First, there’s the basic security incompetence: the National Security Advisor conducting sensitive government business through a commercial email service. Even if Gmail has robust security, it’s completely inappropriate for handling government communications — giving Google potential access to sensitive national security discussions that should never leave secured government systems.
But more concerning is what this reveals about Waltz’s (lack of) judgment. As National Security Advisor, he’s one of the highest-value targets for foreign intelligence services. Every personal account, every commercial service he uses represents another potential vulnerability for adversaries to exploit. And given his demonstrated pattern of security failures — from exposed Venmo contacts to leaked passwords — it’s clear he’s making their job easier.
The National Security Council’s response is a masterclass in missing the point (or, more accurately, misdirecting from the point). When pressed about “sensitive military matters” being discussed over Gmail, their spokesperson offered this gem:
Hughes said NSC staff have guidance about using “only secure platforms for classified information.”
This attempt at reassurance actually reveals the depth of the problem. The distinction isn’t just between classified and unclassified information — it’s about maintaining basic operational security for all sensitive government communications.
And as if to underscore how little they grasp this, we learned from a WSJ article that Waltz’s infamous Signal chat wasn’t a one-off mistake.
Two U.S. officials also said that Waltz has created and hosted multiple other sensitive national security conversations on Signal with cabinet members, including separate threads on how to broker peace between Russia and Ukraine as well as military operations
The scale of security failures here should be absolutely disqualifying for any administration official, let alone America’s top national security advisor. But what makes this situation particularly galling is Waltz’s own history of grandstanding about private email use. Here he is in a tweet that remains up from less than two years ago:
Yes, that’s the same Mike Waltz demanding DOJ action over private email use by a previous National Security Advisor. The hypocrisy would be merely annoying if the stakes weren’t so high. But this isn’t just about scoring political points — it’s about the fundamental security of our nation’s most sensitive communications.
By Waltz’s own standard, articulated in that still-visible tweet, the DOJ should be investigating his wanton use of private commercial messaging services. But more importantly, someone needs to ask: if this is how carelessly our National Security Advisor handles basic operational security, what other vulnerabilities has he created that we don’t yet know about?
Watched this in the Nintendo Today app, which is a lot better than yustub. Apparently I did need a videogame company-specific news/calendar app.
No mention that I saw of Animal Crossing.
Thunderstorms are cranking up as anticipated this afternoon all across the Mid-South all the way north to northern Indiana with a bunch of severe thunderstorm warnings about 7 tornado warnings at the time I am writing this.
A “high risk” for severe weather was issued from eastern Arkansas to just south of Evansville, Indiana today. The reasons included the potential for strong tornadoes, very large hail, and very strong wind gusts. Basically, it’s about as optimal a broad-scale severe weather setup as you could reasonably look for. It could also end up being a tornado outbreak day as well. We’ll see what happens over the next few hours, but as these storms march east, it’s likely that all severe threats will increase this evening.
We’ve been discussing the rain risk the last few days and the potential for catastrophic flooding to emerge in these areas. Round one tonight will start that process. We can get a sense of the potential for rain over the next several hours looking at the HRRR model, which is a high-resolution model we use for thunderstorm forecasting. It shows a bullseye of 3 to 6 inches showing up between now and 7 AM CT on Thursday in western Tennessee, just east of Memphis.
That area between Jackson and Dyersburg, TN may be at highest risk for flooding from this first round of rain. Once the severe weather exits tonight, the front will basically stall out over or just north of the Tennessee Valley. As that happens, the severe weather threat for tomorrow will shift back south and west some into northeast Texas, Arkansas, and western Tennessee.
What about the rain? Tomorrow’s heaviest rains are going to focus near or just north of where tonight’s heaviest rains will occur. According the Storm Prediction Center’s high resolution ensemble forecast, the average rainfall tomorrow will peak around 2 to 4 inches in northwest Tennessee, between Dyersburg, Martin, and Clarksville. There is some degree of uncertainty in how much exactly falls and where it falls. So all of western Tennessee should be on guard.
Arkansas should also watch this, particularly between Pine Bluff and Memphis, TN. Some of the “under the hood” guidance indicates that as much as 5 to 8 inches of rain could fall in these areas. As such, a high risk (level 4 of 4) exists for these general areas tomorrow for flooding rainfall.
High risks for flooding are important to denote because they are extraordinarily well correlated to damaging, deadly flooding. The vast majority of the worst flooding we see in this country occurs on these high-risk days. So tomorrow could be the first volley in a very bad series of them.
Beyond tomorrow, the general trend will be to lift the rain north on Friday into the Ohio Valley or even farther north before it slowly, painfully slowly sags back south and east on Saturday, finally exiting Sunday morning. This period will probably see additional bad flooding spread to the north and then back south again. Again, this appears to be an extremely rare, catastrophic flood event that will unfold over multiple days beginning tomorrow across Arkansas, Tennessee, Kentucky, and portions of Illinois, Indiana, Ohio, and Missouri. Additional “high risks” are likely to come.
WASHINGTON D.C. – In a move that shook global markets and surprised even some supporters, President Donald Trump announced major tariffs on all products made outside the United States, entirely intended as retaliation for the death of beloved film star Val Kilmer. “Val Kilmer was a Very Brilliant Actor,” the President stated in a later […]
The post Trump declares sweeping global tariffs in response to death of Val Kilmer appeared first on The Beaverton.
“Danish Foreign Minister Lars Løkke Rasmussen chastised U.S. officials following a trip by Vice President J.D. Vance to Greenland, saying the country is open to criticism but isn’t happy with how it’s being delivered.” — USA Today, 3/30/25
“The Kremlin said on Monday that Russia and the United States were working on ideas for a possible peace settlement in Ukraine and on building bilateral ties despite U.S. President Donald Trump saying that he was ‘pissed off’ with Vladimir Putin.” — Reuters, 3/31/25
President Trump is working tirelessly to bring an end to the three-year-long war between Russia and Ukraine. While both sides share blame for this conflict—we’re still waiting on that “thank you,” Volodymyr—no country, no matter how powerful, has the right to seize the territory of another sovereign nation.
Also, we’re invading Greenland.
After President Trump’s historic victory in the 2024 election, many people worried that a second term would spell trouble for Ukraine. But that could not be further from the truth. Believe us when we say that the president is committed to helping Ukraine and is very pissed off at Vladimir Putin.
Admittedly, when we say “pissed off,” think less “global adversaries” and more “lover’s quarrel.” Kind of like on Roseanne, when Roseanne and Dan would argue, but at the end of the day, you knew they were always on the same team. Just think of Vladimir Putin as Roseanne, Donald Trump as her husband Dan, Volodymyr Zelenskyy as their daughter Becky, and the Donbas region of eastern Ukraine as the door to Becky’s room. Sure, taking Becky’s door off its hinges and removing it might seem extreme, the same way invading Ukraine might seem extreme. But Donald Trump, like Dan, will be there to make sure Russia doesn’t take things a step too far. His hard-line stance will ensure that Russia only gets to keep all of the territory they’ve already illegally seized and nothing more.
Meanwhile, the United States will be invading Greenland.
You might think it’s hypocritical that the United States would criticize Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and then immediately threaten to invade a territory of Denmark. But the two situations could not be more different. Russia invaded Ukraine to extract natural resources and exert greater influence over a part of the world it views as strategic to Russian interests. But the United States wants to take over Greenland to extract natural resources and exert greater influence over a part of the world it views as strategic to American interests. And American interests are more noble than Russian interests. Russia wants to enrich Russia, while the United States wants to enrich the world—by helping American corporations mine minerals to make and sell products the rest of the world desperately needs, like Cybertrucks. See the difference?
Our intentions in Greenland are altruistic in other ways, too. While Russia invaded Ukraine purely to expand its borders, we want to annex Greenland to help keep the people of Greenland safe. Did you know Greenland used to have 10,000 soldiers stationed across the island, and now they barely have 200? Sure, they were all American soldiers we chose to withdraw entirely of our own accord, but that doesn’t change the fact that Greenland is now woefully under-defended. Only the United States can protect Greenland from future invasions. Like the invasion we’re about to launch in the near future.
The truth is, Greenlanders want to be part of the United States, because who wouldn’t? Soon, the capital city, Nuuk, will be an American paradise, where the $TRUMP crypto coin will be the official currency, the people will all wear Kid Rock American flag ponchos, and helicopter polar bear hunting will be the new pastime. And just think of how much better off the people of Greenland will be once they’re Americans, and are therefore no longer saddled with “Nanny State” programs like paid family leave, universal healthcare, vaccination campaigns, or access to reproductive care.
Some will say invading Greenland is unnecessary. They’ll say that, since Denmark is a member of NATO, the U.S. is already obligated to defend Greenland in the event of an attack. But what better way to protect an ally than by annexing their territory and making it ours?
As for tapping into Greenland’s vast natural resources, could American companies just ask to do business in Greenland without making it part of the United States? Yes. And is the main reason Donald Trump wants Greenland that, whenever he sees something he wants, he shouts “Mine!” and chases after it, consequences be damned, like one of those seagulls in Finding Nemo? Yes. But that doesn’t change the fact that Greenland will be much better off as part of the United States.
Especially when President Trump decides to seek a third term.
This post was written by Alison Green and published on Ask a Manager.
A reader writes:
I’ve been doing some remote volunteer grant writing as part of a long-term plan to break out of my current job family (also nonprofit-centric). The nonprofit I’m currently working with is only a few years old, in another state, and very small, with no paid staff. My main contact is the executive director, Helena.
The deadline for the biggest grant of the year is tonight. I’ve finished the actual writing and have all the required documents, except the FY25 budget. We can’t submit if any fields are empty. I’ve requested the budget a few times; each time, Helena has responded with FY24’s revenue/expense report. It’s basically that scene in “The Good Place” where Michael repeatedly requests Eleanor’s file and gets cacti in return. Neither of the two volunteer bookkeepers has been very responsive. Q1 ended yesterday.
Last night, I had the following text exchange with Helena:
Me: Have we heard from Natalie about the budget?
Helena: No
Me: Definitely don’t want to stress her (or you!) out, but I want to submit within the next few hours — would the senior bookkeeper know anything?
Helena: They are very slow on returning emails. Do we need the 2025 budget since we’re only in month 3?
Me: Yeah, they require a budget for the current fiscal year. It doesn’t have to be exact since grants, etc are uncertain. Just needs to make logical sense based on last year’s financials
Helena: Do you have last year’s budget I sent you?
Me: I have the revenue/expenses spreadsheet. I think that’s technically different from a budget?
Helena: I don’t think we have a budget for any year then. I thought the revenue/expenses was the budget.
Me: Last year’s application [which was rejected for incompleteness] had one — basically our expectation for how much we’ll bring in vs allocate to different line items. The revenue/expenses is for what’s already happened.
Helena: Then I think Devon who did the grant came up with it.
Me: Hm. I don’t feel at all qualified to do that.
Helena: Then we’ll have to wait on Natalie.Email from Helena an hour later: “See attachment for 2024 budget.” (It was
a cactusthe revenue/expense report.)My final reply: “Hi Helena, I believe I already have this — just waiting on the projected budget for 2025 (rough estimate is fine). Thanks!”
I’ve left it there for now. But holy shit, Alison. That exchange seemed so beyond the realm of possibility that I started to think I must not know what a budget is. I even texted my uncle, an accounting professor, for a sanity check. I think Helena is hoping I’ll cave and throw together a budget like Devon did last year, but I have to draw the line somewhere.
I’ve invested considerable time and energy in this grant, enduring other displays of incompetence that could justify their own letters. It would be one thing to be rejected on the merits; that’s an unavoidable part of this work. I just can’t believe it might all come to nothing for such an inane, preventable reason.
I’m definitely not expecting an answer before the deadline, but I’d appreciate knowing how you would have handled this. Should I wash my hands of this unless/until I get a real budget? If so, should I explicitly tell Helena that the ball is 100% in her court? Should I make one last overture to ask if I should submit the “budget” she sent, be told “yes”, and watch her FAAFO? Some other option? Whatever I choose, how should I deal with the fallout?
So, the deal with tiny new nonprofits with no paid staff (and sometimes tiny nonprofits with staff, too, but it’s especially likely when they have none) is that they are very, very often learning as they go, and things may be in chaos.
Nonprofits are often founded by someone who’s really passionate about the work they’ve set out to do (like helping a vulnerable population, changing an unjust law, or whatever it is) but who don’t currently have the skills to build and run an effective organization. Typically one of two things happens:
1. They build those skills along the way, figuring it out as they go, often with some bumpy early years, but in the end successfully professionalizing their operations.
Or…
2. They don’t build those skills and things stay in chaos, meaning their impact remains very limited and they have trouble keeping staff and volunteers. (And in fact, the worst version of this is when they’re good at attracting funding but bad at the rest of it, because then those resources get squandered and more people are affected.)
Organizations in the first category can be great to volunteer with in their early stages, because there’s room for you to have a significant impact (which translates into accomplishments for your resume if you’re using the work to try to move into a new field). But organizations in the second category are pretty much always going to be an exercise in frustration and not a good use of your time or energy.
I don’t know which one you’re dealing with, but it’s possible that it’s the first one, and that Helena just needs help moving the organization in that direction. If you keep observing, you’ll know soon enough if that’s the case or not.
Either way, though, it sounds like you’re dancing around the budget issue too much. You need to just come out and say, “Most grant-giving foundations will not consider applications without a budget for the current fiscal year. We cannot apply without having that. Once we have a current year budget, we can use it for multiple applications, but it’s a prerequisite to be seriously considered for funding and it doesn’t make sense to submit applications until there’s one I can include.” Feel free to add, “That is not something I can create myself; it would need to come from the organization’s leadership.” You could also attach a few very basic samples from other small organizations as templates so that it’s clear what you’re talking about.
If we could go back in time, I’d say that ideally you would have laid that out earlier on so they weren’t scrambling at the last minute … but it’s also completely understandable that you figured a budget would already exist.
That said … if it were just this confusion over a budget, I’d be more inclined to think, “Okay, they’re at the very start of learning about all this, let’s see how they do once the requirements are spelled out.” But you mentioned other displays of incompetence that could justify their own letters, so it’s worth questioning whether this organization is the right one for you to invest time and energy into. Volunteer grant writing can be a great way to get the experience to move in that direction professionally, but you’ll need successes from the work to point to. If your efforts are all for naught because Helena is a disaster, it’s not going to be a good use of your time.
One thing to look at in particular: aside from the budget situation, what results is this organization getting? Is Helena actually good at the core of the work she’s set out to do, and can the organization point to concrete results it’s achieved? If so, and if Helena is open to getting some basic support as the org professionalizes, I’d be more inclined to give that support a chance to pay off.
But otherwise, I’d think hard about whether this is the right situation to give you grant-writing experience. If you conclude that it’s not, don’t view it as “it all coming to nothing.” View it as learning a very useful lesson about things to screen an organization on before you invest time helping them!
The abrupt cancellation of government funding for programs to help food banks distribute healthy, local food is being felt across the country, with some already strapped organizations turning to their local communities for help. What do you think?
“I can’t wait to see the look on woke liberals’ faces when my kids go hungry.”
Rick Jasko, Heirloom Bestower
“If people want handouts from the U.S. government, they should move to Israel.”
Gretchen Clasen, Systems Analyst
“How can food banks turn a profit if they don’t even charge for the food?”
Howie Issler, Retired Longshoreman
The post U.S. Food Banks Struggle Under Funding Cuts appeared first on The Onion.
SAN DIEGO—With the spellbound audience in the Marine Trash Experience amphitheater shouting and squealing with excitement, SeaWorld visitors were reportedly delighted Wednesday by a live garbage-patch feeding. “The keepers threw a bunch of plastic bags into the middle of the habitat, and all of a sudden this enormous blob of debris floated up and swallowed it!” said SeaWorld guest Trinity Morrow, adding that her family would visit the gift shop next in order to purchase plush stuffed garbage patches for both of her children. “We learned that in the wild, the patch’s diet primarily consists of fishing line, styrofoam, and tons of microplastic, but they get extra treats here at the park like cling wrap and action figures. It was amazing to see it ripple through the water, leaving a shiny trail of oil in its wake. We were sitting pretty far back, but the patch still managed to splash us!” At press time, reports confirmed the exhibit had been closed after the patch pulled a trainer into the water and drowned him before partially consuming his body.
The post SeaWorld Visitors Delighted By Live Garbage-Patch Feeding appeared first on The Onion.
