Odds and Ends — 17 October 2025

@preparedwombat 78

14 days ago

oddsandends

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

Salesforce Faces Class Action Over Alleged Illegal AI Training Data

Bitcoin hits 15-week low under $105K as US regional bank woes echo 2023

Coronavirus and Public Health:

Long Covid is Real — and It’s Changing an Entire Generation

Hundreds of thousands of kids in America are struggling with an illness that many doctors and schools refuse to recognize

Politics:

I resigned from the military because of Trump

I could not swear to follow a commander in chief who seems so willing to disregard the Constitution.

https://twitter.com/mehdirhasan/status/1978538559301624249

GOP Lawmaker Got ‘JFK Assassination Report’ from Russia

Luna just did something that would have ended careers a decade ago: she publicly solicited documents from the Kremlin, received them from Russia’s ambassador, thanked Moscow on Twitter, and promised to publish whatever they handed her.
This should sound familiar. It’s exactly what happened in 2019 when Lev Parnas and Rudy Giuliani pushed Russian disinformation through congressional Republicans to attack Joe Biden. The difference now is they’re doing it openly.

https://twitter.com/donwinslow/status/1978618954592469091

Mike Johnson Backs Off Pledge to Debate Hakeem Jeffries

House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) on Wednesday walked back his agreement to debate House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.) on C-SPAN’s “Ceasefire” program.
Johnson originally told the network he’d “love” to debate Jeffries on air but later said the agreement was conditional.

https://twitter.com/RonFilipkowski/status/1978881077834817568

https://twitter.com/MilesTaylorUSA/status/1978882000011333742

Federal immigration officers in the Chicago area will be required to wear body cameras, a judge said Thursday after seeing tear gas and other aggressive steps used against protesters…
Separately, hours later, a federal appeals court ruled against the Trump administration and said a lower court’s temporary ban on deploying the National Guard to assist immigration officers in Illinois would stay in place while the government pursues an appeal.

https://twitter.com/jbendery/status/1978551308014530697

https://twitter.com/kyledcheney/status/1978961934171943306

https://twitter.com/propublica/status/1978946267221741638

———— Putin&Krasnov vs. Ukraine ————

https://twitter.com/WillyPete300/status/1978881539422200306

https://twitter.com/DarthPutinKGB/status/1978896904219169072

https://twitter.com/Daractenus/status/1978901618046222646

https://twitter.com/ruthbenghiat/status/1979008560362123514

———— Smoot-Hawley 2.0 ————

Tariff Costs to Hit $1.2 Trillion

…Donald Trump’s tariffs will cost global businesses upward of $1.2 trillion in 2025, with most of the cost being passed onto consumers, according to a new analysis from S&P Global.
The firm says that just one-third will be borne by companies, with the rest falling on the shoulders of consumers, under conservative estimates.

———— Melon Husk ————

https://twitter.com/NathanJRobinson/status/1978493694417174640

———— Hegseth on the Rocks ————

Pentagon Reporters Walk Out En Masse

News outlets were nearly unanimous in rejecting new rules imposed by Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth that would leave journalists vulnerable to expulsion if they sought to report on information — classified or otherwise — that had not been approved by Hegseth for release.”
Many of the reporters waited to leave together at a 4 p.m. deadline set by the Defense Department to get out of the building. As the hour approached, boxes of documents lined a Pentagon corridor and reporters carried chairs, a copying machine, books and old photos to the parking lot from suddenly abandoned workspaces. Shortly after 4, about 40 to 50 journalists left together after handing in badges.

https://twitter.com/JoeNBC/status/1978934631526244506

https://twitter.com/NPRinskeep/status/1978620360086937665

https://twitter.com/ansonmount/status/1978292733929205869

https://twitter.com/jimsciutto/status/1978934709871673789

———— Mors Imperii ————

https://twitter.com/ZacksJerryRig/status/1978542636022522328

JD Vance Blurts Out Trump’s Dark New Scheme

The vice president said the administration is already “retraining” the entire government to attack its political enemies.

https://twitter.com/covie_93/status/1978945698562207992

Hard to Believe, Unless You Follow Politics

It may seem to partisan Democrats who follow politics closely that ‘everybody’ knows what they know about the Republican Party, but that’s not how it works. Most people don’t follow politics very closely. And most people, especially those who are not dedicated partisans, tend to heavily discount accusations hurled by one party at the other…
Discounting accusations is normally functional; it just doesn’t work when it comes to Trump, since plain cold facts about him and his presidency sound as if they were wildly overstated accusations. He really is a convicted felon. He really was found to have committed sexual assault. He really does lie far more often than other politicians. He really did attempt to overturn an election. He really has broken his oath of office countless times — and during his current term, both Democratic and Republican judges have found that he has broken the law time after time after time.
And it’s not just that people discount what they know. Those who pay less attention to politics miss all sorts of stories that seem major to those who follow the news closely.

https://twitter.com/micah_erfan/status/1979039735415726569