Wednesday Wondering 12.6.23 - Short Selling Terror

As crunched as the holiday is, this couldn’t go out tomorrow as there’s a soft strike against the Washington Post tomorrow, so don’t cross the digital picket! Read something else that isn’t as anti-worker as WaPo…like us perhaps?

Study: Someone bet against the Israeli stock market in the days before Hamas' Oct. 7 attack (CBS News) & Trading on Terror (Research Article) Researchers at NYU and Columbia had enough time to not only deduce strategic bets against the Israeli stock market before the Oct 7th attacks by Hamas, but to get a paper published. Academics, your mentor is going to bring this up at every dissertation meeting going forward.

‘The Gospel’: how Israel uses AI to select bombing targets in Gaza (The Guardian) ‘A mass assassination factory’: Inside Israel’s calculated bombing of Gaza (Local Call & +972) & Aviv Kochavi: “The IDF is not like what it was ten years ago. There is real-time intelligence like in the ‘Matrix’, the scope of bombs and missiles is increasing” (YNet) This story is too horrible to have linked to without multiple verifying sources. Essentially, AI is being used to purposefully deal as much death and destruction as possible in Gaza. The third link is to a Hebrew interview with former Israeli Chief of Staff, Aviv Kochavi, where this technology is mentioned. Comparisons between this tech and “Zola’s Algorithm” from the MCU’s Captain America: Winter Soldier, are not out of bounds, sadly.

Presidents of universities grilled on efforts to counter antisemitism on campus & What Mehdi Hasan’s cancellation shows about MSNBC (WaPo - Opinion) Hunting communists? They were really after Jews (The Jewish Chronicle) For our younger readers, the House Un-American Activities committee did investigate truly unAmerican things, like the 1933 Business Plot to overthrow Roosevelt in a coup. But it mostly ruined a lot of lives, black listing actors, activists, lawyers, and educators for speaking out against our actions in Vietnam and our global funding of authoritarian militaries engaged in ethnic cleansing.

Texas GOP executive committee rejects proposed ban on associating with Nazi sympathizers and Holocaust deniers (Texas Tribune) Texas GOP managed to limbo under a bar set approximately 6 microns off the floor. Strong work.

Russia planned Islamophobic campaigns in Finland, Sweden to delay NATO membership (YLE) Islamophobic protests organized against migrants & refugees were actually psy-ops, created by Russia to sow seeds of chaos and anti-NATO sentiment. If the Russians had just done this in 8 EU countries, they might have actually broken up NATO or the EU. Instead, the EU/NATO are as popular as they’ve ever been. Great job once again, Vlad.

Mosques Shuttered, Razed, Altered in non-Xinjiang Muslim areas of China (Human Rights Watch) Meanwhile in China, the Sinicization or de-Muslimifying has spread to Mosques in Ningxia and Gansu provinces. If you can’t remove the people, the Chinese have pushed to remove the cultural signifiers of the people pretty hard.

(Mis)measuring the Shoplifting Crisis (Manhattan Institute) The Manhattan Institute has figured out that the theft crisis we said wasn’t a crisis, isn’t actually a crisis. That’s right, the center-right faux think tank that is responsible for the last few years of Critical Race Theory fights you’ve had at Thanksgiving, has admitted the Tsunami of Homeless Larceny Addicts doesn’t exist. So, there’s that.

Gold bars featured in Bob Menendez bribery case linked to 2013 robbery, records show (NBC NY) & John Fetterman paid George Santos $343 for a Cameo to troll Bob Menendez (BI) While Fetterman has a long way to go as a Democrat, his called shot on Menendez is needed, accurate, and should be celebrated. Why should Santos lose his Congressional benefits when Menendez’s grift is so much more sprawling, destructive, and obnoxious?

Bear attacks in Japan hit record high as hunger forces some to delay hibernation (The Guardian) Delaying needed rest to work and find food? Sounds like I’ve got a lot in common with Japanese bears.

Pentagon Scientists Discuss Cybernetic ‘Super Soldiers’ That Feel Nothing While Killing, In Dystopian Presentation (Motherboard) Presented without comment, but the Winter Soldier reference above might still hold. Also, this video of a Boston Dynamics robot pretending to do an African dance.

Quote of the week

Van Gogh deserved better from his time and those around him. So do you.

Poem of the week

Jarod K. Anderson’s Cryptonaturalist poetry is lovely, if a bit eery every so often.

Vibe of the week

Old school neo-classical, from the Matrix soundtrack, though it didn’t actually end up in the movie.

Keep your head up,t