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Odds and Ends — 5 June 2026

preparedwombat

Published: 05 Jun 2026 › Updated: 05 Jun 2026Odds and Ends — 5 June 2026

Odds and Ends — 5 June 2026

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Cryptocurrency, Investing, Money, Economy, Business, AI, and Debt:

Blackstone restricts flagship fund withdrawals as private asset fears reemerge

Anthropic Urges Global Pause in AI Development

Anthropic is calling for top artificial intelligence labs to weigh slowing the pace of development, suggesting that AI systems are advancing so rapidly that they may soon be able to improve themselves without human intervention in ways that could pose significant societal risks.

Coronavirus and Public Health:

How physicians are rethinking vaccine conversations in an age of doubt

Iran:

Politics:

^ At first glance, it might appear to be a joke. But jokes are supposed to be funny, on some level at least. So grifting and/or money laundering seem more likely.

House Cuts Food Aid for Pregnant Women and Children

George Santos Threatened Reporter

Official Left Over Concerns About CIA Spending

Amaryllis Fox Kennedy, a former senior Trump administration official, said she resigned last month in part because she was increasingly frustrated with the lack of oversight of the intelligence community’s use of taxpayer funds—including gold bullion.”
Said Kennedy: “I couldn’t keep signing the checks. I would have become complicit.”

———— Screwworm ————

———— Pride Month ————

Andy Ogles Blames Staff for Homophobic Tweet

———— The Epstein Coverup ————

———— Stark. Raving. Mad. ————

———— Autocracy R Us ————

ICE to stop reporting deaths of newly released detainees

As the number of immigrants dying in government custody rises, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement is shrinking the scope of which deaths it will be required to report.

After all, Otto Warmbier did not die in North Korean custody. Why should we be held to a higher standard?

———— Blatant In-Your-Face Corruption ————

Ballroom Donors Won $50 Billion in Contracts

More than half of the publicly identified donors to President Donald Trump’s White House ballroom project have won new or expanded federal contracts worth more than $50 billion during the past six months.

———— Putin&Krasnov vs. Ukraine ————

It’s Trump Who Doesn’t Have the Cards

A funny thing happened to Trump’s attempt to hand Ukraine over to his comrade in thuggery: the war has turned in Ukraine’s favor. The fighting remains a gruesome slugfest, but Ukraine’s superior flexibility and capacity for innovation have gradually given it the upper hand in the drone warfare that increasingly shapes combat. In fact, Ukraine is so proficient at drone warfare that the United Arab Emirates, Qatar and Saudi Arabia — which are facing drone attacks as a consequence of Trump’s disastrous Iran war — have signed agreements to draw on Ukrainian technology and expertise.
Zelensky, it turns out, does have quite a few cards, while Trump has far fewer cards than he imagined.

Disabling One Bridge Could Shatter Russia’s War Machine (and It’s Not the Kerch)

Russia’s Elite Is Souring on Ukraine War

Russia’s inability to break through the stalemate in Ukraine is becoming so evident that significant voices in the Russian establishment have publicly started to call for an end to the conflict.
The big question is whether President Vladimir Putin will acknowledge this reality and abandon his aspiration to extinguish Ukrainian independence.

———— DOGE ————

He Blew the Whistle on DOGE. Then His Brakes Were Cut

———— Melon Husk ————

———— Mors Imperii ————

Donald Trump’s Superficiality Is Bone Deep

Of all the reasons for Trump to hesitate to crown Vance as the Republican presidential nominee in 2028, he has fixated not on Vance’s inflammatory comments about single women or on the difficulty vice presidents have detaching themselves from their administration’s unpopular record, but instead on the one time that Vance briefly mishandled a football trophy.
This is an extraordinarily shallow method for picking your party’s standard-bearer. It isn’t a surprise, however, because Trump is almost certainly the shallowest man ever to inhabit his office. Superficiality is a value system that has guided some of his administration’s most important decisions as it has drifted from menace into frivolity and decadence.

Serendipity:

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“An imbalance between rich and poor is the oldest and most fatal ailment of all republics.” – Plutarch

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