curated news excerpts & citations
… trying to ‘unbury the lede’
John Pavlovitz:
Ed Sheeran and The White Privilege of Neutrality
… Sheeran attempts to position himself above the fray of the rest of us, writing, “I am not complicit. I have my personal views …”
Denying complicity is a confession that Sheeran is aware there is something barbaric to be complicit in. His fervent defense is actually self-incrimination. …
Further, the singer sermonizes, “If we only focus on shouting the loudest, nothing will change.”
Macklemore didn’t shout from the stage. He spoke with direct, unflinching conviction about a people being systematically driven to extinction. There were no histrionics, no profanity, and no politics. Sheeran’s creating some wild, screaming straw man out of the sober demand for an end to a genocide is an effort to shut down conversation by setting up a false equivalency between power and the powerless, all couched in avoiding “politics.”
…
That these people feel a choice in these moments is even possible shows the subtle and insidious ways privilege works. It allows a person to have urgency as an option, where for others it is a necessity. When you believe yourself safe from harm and immune to violence, the fence of neutrality feels like a righteous place to sit, even if that position is deadly to those not afforded such comfort.
… there are times when our morality requires an outside voice that says without ambiguity, “This is a threat to humanity, and this is wrong.” …
The fights for justice and equality always work this way. Sometimes life necessitates a decisive choice; something that pushes us out of neutrality because the situation demands it. In such times of consequence, to not make that choice isn’t an act of tolerance or maturity, but of cowardice. Despite the vehement protests of Ed Sheeran and the people in our lives who share his view, being apolitical is being complicit in the atrocities we refuse to publicly confront.
(John Pavlovitz more…)
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Jeremy Hsu @ Wired & arsTECHNICA:
Customer Data Permanently Lost in Iran Strikes on Amazon Data CentersAmazon Web Services didn’t design its data centers to withstand war, and now the company admits it can’t recover what’s been lost.
(Jeremy Hsu @ Wired & arsTECHNICA more…)Feras Dalatey @ Reuters:
Amazon’s AWS is unable to restore access to Bahrain, one UAE cloud data zone after war damage
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Associated Press:
Iranians rally by the hundreds of thousands in biggest show of defiance since war beganThe crowds marched through downtown Tehran in combat uniform, carrying flags and pledging their readiness to take up arms.
(Associated Press more…)
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Heather Cox Richardson:
Letters from an American – September 18, 2026According to the American Automobile Association, diesel hit its highest recorded average price today at just above $6.44 per gallon. Diesel moves most of the consumer goods in the United States. Iran’s news agency reported today that a political advisor to Iran’s Supreme Leader said Iran would not reopen the Strait of Hormuz until President Donald Trump and Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu are removed from power.
As the conflict drags on with no coherent U.S. strategy, J.P. Morgan wrote yesterday, “We simply don’t know how to model the endgame.” Today Bloomberg reported that Saudi Arabia has told European refiners that they will not be receiving crude oil next month because of the shutdown of the East-West pipeline.
…Trump’s anger at the press was probably fed today by three scoops.
Katie Bo Lillis and Zachary Cohen of CNN reported that this spring, the U.S. military set out to intercept a Chinese ship in the Middle East after an intelligence report said it was carrying components for a nuclear weapons program. After preparing to board the ship and sending up planes, officials realized that the report had been generated by AI. It was, a source told the reporters, “entirely false.” But it almost “started a war.”
Audrey Decker and Mark Satter of Politico reported that a shipment of F-35 fighter jet parts headed from Australia to the U.S. for repairs this summer was diverted to Hong Kong and disappeared, raising the possibility that China could have accessed key components of a highly classified U.S. weapons system.
Noah Robertson, Tara Copp, Warren P. Strobel, and Alex Horton of the Washington Post reported today that at least four more U.S. service members have died in the Middle East during the Iran war than the Department of Defense has announced. Three military contractors have also died since the combat began.
(Heather Cox Richardson more…)Katie Bo Lillis, Zachary Cohen @ CNN:
US military had close call after using AI for false intelligence report, sources sayNoah Robertson, Tara Copp, Warren P. Strobel, Alex Horton @ Washington Post:
More U.S. troops have died amid Iran war than Pentagon has disclosed publiclyEric Platt, Abigail Hauslohner, Peter Wells @ Financial Times:
Donald Trump bans major US news outlets from White HouseJournalists from CNN, MS Now and Politico denied access as president escalates assault on media
Al Jazeera:
Trump bans CNN, MS NOW, Politico from White House for ‘fake news’The US president insists media outlets report ‘fiction and lies’ as he enforces new bans on White House access.
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Shane Goldmacher, Maggie Haberman @ NY Times:
‘My Money:’ Trump’s Claim That He Controls MAGA Super PAC…
Federal law says that federal officeholders shall not “solicit, receive, direct, transfer, or spend funds” from soft-money groups.“That is absolutely something a sitting president — any federal officeholder — can’t do even in the era of super PACs and how normal it is to have these multi-million-dollar contributions,” Mr. Ghosh said in an interview.
Still, Mr. Ghosh said he did not expect any quick action from the F.E.C. The agency’s six-member governing board has only two confirmed commissioners — not enough to hold a formal meeting.
(Shane Goldmacher, Maggie Haberman @ NY Times more…)
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Jennifer Rubin:
46 Days to the Midterms
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Edith Olmsted @ TNR:
Trump, 80, Is Shocked by What’s in His Own Executive OrderDonald Trump appeared not to have even read the order before he went to sign it.
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Em Chapin, Michael Wriston @ Project Salt Box:
Follow the Money – August 2026: ICE Pivots Beyond the Warehouse Strategy
ICE plans intel units in every field office to research immigrants, map who they know
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Alexander Ward @ WSJ:
U.S. Reaches Greenland Security AgreementThe deal, which will enhance American military presence on the Arctic island, falls short of the president’s stated takeover ambitions
Stine Jacobsen, Jacob Gronholt-Pedersen, Tom Little @ Reuters:
Greenland, Denmark say Trump deal won’t compromise sovereignty
Last Days in Two Nations
Climate.us
formerly Climate.gov
Climate Solutions Explorer
Have I Been Flocked?
Brockovich AI Data Center Reporting
resources tracking the “Andes” hantavirus outbreak
Apocalypse Early Warning System
Al Jazeera Death toll and injuries live tracker
Mike Ludwig @ truthout: ICE Says 51 People Died in Custody Under Trump. Experts Say That’s an Undercount.
ICE Accountability Project
Sergio Martínez-Beltrán, Ximena Bustillo, Jasmine Garsd @ NPR: Deaths of migrants in ICE custody hit record high under Trump
- August 31: Pierre Damas Bel
- August 1: Edwin Lopez-Cornejo
- July 19: Jose Chajon-Raxon
- July 14: Juan Jairo Coronilla Duran
- July 13: Joan Sebastian Guerrero
- July 7: Lorenzo Salgado Araujo
- June 4: Mamuka Artmeladze
- April 16: Aled Damien Carbonell-Betancourt
- March 25: Jose Guadalupe Ramos-Solano
- March 16: Royer Perez-Jimenez
- March 14: Naseer Paktiawil
- February 25: Nurul Amin Shah Alam
April 1 – Jennifer Peltz and Jake Offenhartz @ AP: Death of a refugee left at a Buffalo doughnut shop by Border Patrol is ruled a homicide - January 24: Alex Pretti
- January 14: Heber Sanchaz Dominguez
- January 14: Victor Manuel Diaz
- January 9: Parady La
- January 7: Renée Good
- January 6: Luis Beltran Yanez-Cruz
- January 5: Luis Gustavo Nunez Caceres
- January 3: Geraldo Lunas Campos
- December 31, 2025: Keith Porter
Suffering Under President Obama
NACDL Criminal Case Tracker
Texas Tribune: A Walk for Peace: photos of Fort Worth monks’ journey to Washington
Walk for Peace – Dhammacetiya – The Ancient Sacred Buddhist Scripture Stupas
Margaret Chase Smith: Declaration of Conscience
NPR: January 6, 2021: A visual archive
Accountability Initiative ICE List
GriftMatrix
Trump Action Tracker
Timeline: Tracking the Trump Justice Department’s Anti-Voting Shift
Tracking the Lawsuits Against Trump’s Agenda
Trump Pardons Database
Project 2025 Tracker
DOGE Tracker
ProPublica: Elon Musk’s Demolition Crew
Wired: 6 Tools for Tracking the Trump Administration’s Attacks on Civil Liberties
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