curated news excerpts & citations
… trying to ‘unbury the lede’
Chris Murphy:
Trump’s Corruption Scheme in Venezuela
Trump and Rubio said the reason for removing Maduro by force was to restore democracy to Venezuela.
…
But there was and is no transition to democracy. Trump installed in power Rodriguez, who led the torture campaigns as Maduro’s chief lieutenant. She continues to run a violent, repressive state. And the torture continues.
The real reason for the invasion of Venezuela was to allow political allies of Trump to profit from the country’s oil.
More recently, one of Trump’s biggest campaign backers, Harold Hamm, struck a deal to develop and operate a 126,000-acre region in the country’s oil-rich Orinoco Belt.
…
Trump’s Venezuela oil empire is coordinated by an alleged money launderer named Alejandro Betancourt – the kind of guy you need to run a scheme like this.
Trump had DOJ drop its investigations into Betancourt to allow him to keep the wheels greased.
Meanwhile, democracy isn’t on the agenda. In fact, the oil deals just solidify Rodriguez’s grip on power.
And Trump’s meeting with her will further legitimize her.
But that’s the point. As long as the money keeps rolling in for Trump friends.
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Michael Wriston, Em Chapin @ Project Salt Box:
ICE signs contracts worth up to $7.3B to expand detention in 5 statesWith its warehouse plan stalled, ICE is building on land it already owns, and one of the companies it hired is tied to a developer who worked on its earlier property deals.
(Michael Wriston, Em Chapin @ Project Salt Box more…)
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ReligiousLiberty.TV:
The Vaccine Paradox: Why the Fetal Cell Argument is Inaccurate and Needs to Be Retired…
In countless private discussions, vocal opponents of the vaccine will candidly concede the facts. When pressed on the biochemical realities, they admit that the shot contains no fetal tissue. They admit that their own medicine cabinets are filled with drugs tested against the exact same cell lines. They acknowledge that singling out this specific vaccine as uniquely contaminated is factually indefensible.Yet, when the microphones turn on, the legal filings are drafted, or the public debates flare up, they continue to raise the fetal cell argument anyway.
Why? Because in an era of institutional mandates, the “aborted fetal cell” claim functioned as the ultimate trump card.
Faith, Fact, and Pretext: Further Examination of the Fetal Cell Argument Against COVID-19 Vaccines
“Faithful Unto Death”: The Theology of Vaccine Refusal – Was It Faith, Fear, or Legal Strategy?The pandemic forced a difficult question: ”when does genuine faith end and strategic religious language begin?”
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James Eagle:
Anthropic now leads the AI industry…
During this period the market grew tremendously. Total business AI adoption went from 35% to over 50%.
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These companies are not necessarily always rivals, nor are their products substitutes. Roughly 79% of Anthropic’s customers also pay for OpenAI.
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Within companies, teams might use both, side-by-side. Another reason is that different teams inside a company might use different frontier models for different tasks, from different providers.
(James Eagle more…)
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Heather Cox Richardson:
Letters from an American – September 21, 2026On September 18, while White House chief of staff Susie Wiles was out of town, Trump suddenly announced he was banning CNN, MS NOW, and Politico from the White House. …
This morning, after the weekend’s backlash, he posted: “The White House is not instituting an assault on the Free Press, something which I cherish. It is instituting an assault on the FAKE NEWS, something that has grown like Cancer in our beloved United States of America. It is corrupt, purposeful, pervasive, fully coordinated, and totally out of control. It is a threat to our National Security, and must be stopped, NOW!”
There’s that “national security” claim again: the same justification he’s using for building his ballroom and now his triumphal arch. It is also, not coincidentally, the excuse President Richard M. Nixon floated for covering up the Watergate break-in in June 1972.
(Heather Cox Richardson more…)
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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