SDF Chatter

"Corporations facing federal lawsuits and investigations aren't giving millions to Trump's inauguration out of the kindness of their hearts. They are trying to buy goodwill."

An analysis released Monday in the wake of new Federal Election Commission filings shows that the Trump administration has dropped or paused federal enforcement cases against at least 17 corporations that donated to Trump's inaugural fund, an indication that companies' attempts to buy favor with the White House are already paying off.

In the new analysis, the watchdog group Public Citizen cross-references FEC data released Sunday with its own Corporate Enforcement Tracker, which documents companies facing federal cases for alleged wrongdoing.

Public Citizen found that corporations facing federal investigations or enforcement lawsuits donated a combined $50 million to Trump's inaugural committee. Trump raised a record sum of $239 million for his second inauguration, the new FEC filings show.

At a secret workshop in Ukraine’s north-east, where about 20 people assemble hundreds of FPV (first person view) drones, there is a new design. Under the frame of the familiar quadcopter is a cylinder, the size of a forearm. Coiled up inside is fibre optic cable, 10km (6 miles) or even 20km long, to create a wired kamikaze drone.

Capt Yuriy Fedorenko, the commander of a specialist drone unit, the Achilles regiment, says fibre optic drones were an experimental response to battlefield jamming and rapidly took off late last year. With no radio connection, they cannot be jammed, are difficult to detect and able to fly in ways conventional FPV drones cannot.

“If pilots are experienced, they can fly these drones very low and between the trees in a forest or tree line. If you are flying with a regular drone, the trees block the signal unless you have a re-transmitter close,” he observes. Where tree lined supply roads were thought safer, fibre optic drones have been able to get through.

Alt text: Year is 2050. In the ruins of a city robots surround a human. One of them says "Wait, this person says thank you every time they use ChatGPT. Spare him."

Other robot says "No, by saying thank you he is wasting resources for the server to reply" and punches the human in the face.

Summary

London talks aimed at securing a ceasefire between Ukraine and Russia have been downgraded and will no longer include US Secretary of State Marco Rubio and special envoy Steve Witkoff.

The US state department blamed logistical reasons, but it was clear the decision was last-minute and left the Foreign Office wrongfooted.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has ruled out recognising occupied Crimea as Russian territory, after reports suggested this was being considered by the US and the Kremlin. "Ukraine does not legally recognise the occupation of Crimea. There's nothing to talk about," said Zelensky.

Ukraine's ministry of strategic industries said it was "naïve" to expect Ukraine to change its position on "non-negotiable" issues such as Crimea.

Source: https://mastodon.green/@CiaraNi/114385715738162468

The U.S. expects Ukraine's response Wednesday to a peace framework that includes U.S. recognition of Crimea as part of Russia and unofficial recognition of Russian control of nearly all areas occupied since the 2022 invasion, sources with direct knowledge of the proposal tell Axios.

Why it matters: The one-page document the U.S. presented Ukrainian officials in Paris last week describes this as Trump's "final offer." The White House insists it's ready to walk away if the parties don't make a deal soon.

Summary

Faced with inflation, taxes and concerns over the size of Social Security benefits, most Americans are more afraid of going broke in retirement than they are of death.

In total, 64% of respondents across generations said they are more stressed about running out of funds in their golden years than the prospect of death.

Americans say they need $1.26 million to finance a comfortable retirement, yet the median amount saved is $87,000. “Certainly for boomers...inflation is a big deal.”

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:BallonKathedrale01_edit.jpg

The U.S. is backsliding on air quality measures, according to an annual American Lung Association study.

About 46% of U.S. residents — 156 million people — lived in areas with unhealthy air quality that earned “F” grades from the American Lung Association for ozone or particle pollution.

That’s according to the association’s 26th annual analysis of air quality data, which shows that the country is regressing on clean air measures.

The analysis — which reviewed data from the years 2021 to 2023 — saw an increase of about 25 million people living with unhealthy air in comparison with last year’s survey.

The report shows how the effects of climate change — heat, drought and increased wildfire smoke — are driving changes in air quality across the country.

Summary

The number of births in the US increased slightly in 2024 to roughly 3.6 million, according to provisional data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).

The small increase of 1% comes amid a long-term decline that began during the Great Recession, in about 2008.

The slight year-over-year increase in births is mostly due to Hispanic and Asian mothers, whose birth rates rose 4% and 5%, respectively. The report also showed a record low number of teenage girls and young women giving birth, while the number of women aged 40-44 increased.

However, at least one demographer warned against drawing any conclusions about a trend from the data – noting that growing US families face sustained challenges in economic uncertainty, housing and childcare costs.

Key Points

• Tesla's Q1 2025 earnings showed a 71% drop in net income and a 9% decline in revenue.
• Elon Musk attributed some of Tesla's struggles to "rapidly evolving trade policy" and "changing political sentiment."
• Analysts express concerns about near-term uncertainty for Tesla, linking the company's future to Musk's involvement with the White House.

An ashen pallor and an eerie stillness all that remains where there should fluttering fish and vibrant colours in the reefscape, one conservationist says

The world’s coral reefs have been pushed into “uncharted territory” by the worst global bleaching event on record that has now hit more than 80% of the planet’s reefs, scientists have warned.

Reefs in at least 82 countries and territories have been exposed to enough heat to turn corals white since the global event started in January 2023, the latest data from the US government’s Coral Reef Watch shows.

Coral reefs are known as the rainforests of the sea because of their high concentration of biodiversity that supports about a third of all marine species and a billion people.

But record high ocean temperatures have spread like an underwater wildfire over corals across the Pacific, Atlantic and Indian oceans, damaging and killing countless corals.

Explanation for newbies: The GNU/Linux copypasta is an argument made by Richard Stallman that the operating system should be referred to as "GNU/Linux" or "GNU+Linux" because linux is just the kernel and what makes it useful are the various GNU programs and libraries like coreutils and glibc.

Alpine Linux is a linux distribution that ships without any GNU software (though it can be installed using the package manager).

Yeast powder and b-vitamin supplement for the dog.

Levels of a little-known forever chemical known as TFA in European wines have risen “alarmingly” in recent decades, according to analysis, prompting fears that contamination will breach a planetary boundary.

Researchers from Pesticide Action Network Europe tested 49 bottles of commercial wine to see how TFA contamination in food and drink had progressed. They found levels of trifluoroacetic acid (TFA), a breakdown product of long-lasting Pfas chemicals that carries possible fertility risks, far above those previously measured in water.

Wines produced before 1988 showed no trace of TFA, the researchers found, but those after 2010 showed a steep rise in contamination. Organic and conventional wines showed a rise in TFA contamination, but levels in organic varieties tended to be lower.

European Union watchdogs fined Apple and Meta hundreds of millions of euros Wednesday as they stepped up enforcement of the 27-nation bloc’s digital competition rules.

The European Commission imposed a 500 million euro ($571 million) fine on Apple for preventing app makers from pointing users to cheaper options outside its App Store.

The commission, which is the EU’s executive arm, also fined Meta Platforms 200 million euros because it forced Facebook and Instagram users to choose between seeing ads or paying to avoid them.