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Trump admits approving bombing of US airbase

“President   Trump   said Iranian leaders cleared their plan with the U.S. to fire retaliatory strikes against an American airbase in Qatar, and even requested a specific time to attack. “They said, ’We’re going to shoot them. Is one o’clock OK?’ I said it’s fine. And everybody was emptied off the base so they couldn’t get hurt, except for the gunners,” Mr.   Trump   said at a press conference in the Netherlands, where he is attending a NATO summit.” This report is from the notoriously right-wing Washington Times.  How is this OK? Where are the GOP voices protesting this? Crickets. https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2025/jun/25/trump-says-iranians-asked-us-time-could-bomb-american-military-base/  

Slow motion genocide

  “ 'It's a Killing Field': IDF Soldiers Ordered to Shoot Deliberately at Unarmed Gazans Waiting for Humanitarian Aid “IDF officers and soldiers told Haaretz they were ordered to fire at unarmed crowds near food distribution sites in Gaza, even when no threat was present. Hundreds of Palestinians have been killed, prompting the military prosecution to call for a review into possible war crimes.” https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/2025-06-27/ty-article-magazine/.premium/idf-soldiers-ordered-to-shoot-deliberately-at-unarmed-gazans-waiting-for-humanitarian-aid/00000197-ad8e-de01-a39f-ffbe33780000

Tesla update

According to Tech Viral: “ Tesla has abruptly stopped Cybertruck and Model Y production, triggering a nearly 3% stock drop to $348.29, as shown in the finance card above. “The pause, Tesla’s third Cybertruck halt this year at its Austin Gigafactory, compounds delays in Robotaxi plans and Elon Musk’s controversies.   “As EV competition intensifies, Tesla’s frequent disruptions fuel doubts about its ability to meet bold goals, raising concerns among investors and customers.” Tesla stock has been on an upward slope since January 2023. Its P/E is 178. Tesla continues to defy gravity.  

The National Science Foundation is homeless

During my career, I was principal investigator on three NSF grants. I also served on five grant review panels for the NSF.   The NSF always struck me as a tightly run, parsimonious science agency. They are scrupulous about *not* funding biomedical research, so as not to compete with the much bigger National Institutes of Health. They stick to the basic science mission.   “ But out of the blue yesterday, word emerged that the Department of Housing and Urban Development is taking over the NSF’s building, evicting all of its more than 1,800 employees.  . . .  Adding to the wildness, the top floors of the building are, according to the AFGE Local 3403, going to be   retrofitted into a kind of executive mansion for HUD Secretary Turner , including an executive suite, executive dining room, reserved parking for the Secretary’s five cars, exclusive use of an entire elevator, special space for his various assistants and a planned gym for the Secretary and his family. Tu...

The future of genomics

About six years ago, I had my genome sequenced at 30-50x coverage by Veritas. It cost me $200. For an additional $100, I purchased my variant call file, which identified all the differences between my genome sequence and the reference human genome sequence. A friend of mine then built a spreadsheet for me so I can easily search any gene that was annotated at the time for my own variants. I’ve since checked several dozen genes for risk variants using the ClinVar database. So far, it seems I’ve won the genetics lotto. Now, it looks like every child born in the UK will get their genome sequenced at birth. “ Babies born in the UK already receive the   newborn blood spot test   (also called the heel prick test), which tests for nine rare conditions. Under the new plan, a blood sample will instead undergo whole genome sequencing, which maps out the entirety of an individual’s DNA and can help to identify genetic diseases, as well as genetic variants that may put someone at an increa...

What’s he hiding in there?

“ WASHINGTON (Reuters) -Tesla told U.S. regulators that all of its answers to questions on the safety of its robotaxi deployment in Texas are confidential business information and should not be made public, according to a letter released Monday.” Because the safety of Tesla’s stock price will be endangered. https://finance.yahoo.com/news/tesla-wants-us-withhold-answers-161117540.html

Waste, fraud and abuse, thy name is DOGE

So far, the only “efficiencies” realized by DOGE have been (1) keeping Elon Musk’s name and image in the news and (2) the systematic destruction of federal programs and the expertise to run them efficiently. Like Elon’s SpaceX rockets, DOGE has mostly failed on the launch. “ On the first day of his second term, President Trump signed an  executive order  to establish the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE)–which he immediately set loose to cut  billions of dollars  of critical programs without regard for the  devastating   and  chaotic   impact that those sudden cuts may have on Americans’ wellbeing. CREW’s review of some of the programs targeted for cuts by DOGE and the Trump administration found that the elimination or reduction of these government agencies have directly cost over 50,000 people their jobs. DOGE’s cuts at these select agencies and programs could result in a loss of over $10 billion in U.S.-based economic activity and ...