Society

There are a lot of them.

Shortly after 1:00 this morning, Vittoria Elliott, Dhruv Mehrotra, Leah Feiger, and Tim Marchman of Wired reported that, according to three of their sources, “[a] 25-year-old engineer named Marko Elez, who previously worked for two Elon Musk companies [SpaceX and X], has direct access to Treasury Department systems responsible for nearly all payments made by the US government.”

Musk’s growing influence over the government’s digital infrastructure raises concerns about privacy and overreach.

Experts were wrong about overpopulation before. Could they be wrong about underpopulation now?

28/ What I know is what I said up top: tech does what you tell it to do. If there's *no one to tell you to stop*, and *you don't care either way*, all bets are off. You have someone in charge who unplugs shit and doesn't care, and an administration *on record* that wants to break things.

The president’s opponents, whoever they are, cannot expect a return to the Constitution as it was.

Elon Musk’s bureaucratic coup is under way.

“Musk’s political project with DOGE is actually quite straightforward: The world’s richest man appears to be indiscriminately dismantling the government with an eye toward consolidating power and punishing his political enemies.”

“A self-coup, also called an autocoup…is a form of coup d’état in which a political leader, having come to power through legal means, stays in power illegally through the actions of themselves and/or their supporters.”

A self-coup, also called an autocoup or coup from the top, is a form of coup d'état in which a political leader, having come to power through legal means, stays in power illegally through the actions of themselves and/or their supporters. The leader may dissolve or render powerless the national legislature and unlawfully assume extraordinary powers. Other measures may include annulling the constitution, suspending civil courts, and having the head of government assume dictatorial powers.

Back in September 2024, I posted about “The de minimis exemption” and, over the years, kept track of the proposed changes (and challenges) to how international shipping works (free/low-…

Something so garish defies metaphor

We grow hungry again. Driven by the primal urge to dominate, conquer, make human sacrifices great again. A critical mass is within reach.

Authoritarians and tech CEOs now share the same goal: to keep us locked in an eternal doomscroll instead of organizing against them, Janus Rose writes.

TikTok’s Chinese owner is slow-rolling negotiations for a sale, as the Trump administration seeks to broker a deal.

Watch fascism unfold in the United States in real-time. An automated system tracking and classifying global headlines against historically confirmed steps toward fascism.

In what seems to be an effort to extort Canada for additional benefits, Donald Trump complained yesterday on social media that CANADA DOESN'...

Luke Farritor, who used AI to decode a Greco-Roman scroll from Pompeii, is reportedly part of the team leading Musk’s chaotic takeover of government systems.

President Donald Trump has repeatedly questioned the economics of wind energy, saying that wind "doesn't work" without subsidies. Experts have differing assessments of that. By some metrics, wind power is already competitive with fossil fuels without subsidies. But other measures don’t come to the same conclusion.

From the COVID-19 pandemic to climate change, the high costs of letting the free market run rampant are becoming clear

"Subsidies’ dollar value, unfortunately, do not cover their full cost. Meat production costs reach the environment, the neighborhood, and the market.&q ...

True Price, a Dutch nonprofit, aims to help us grasp the real costs of consumption.

Take 30 seconds to demand the Treasury Department comply with the Privacy Act of 1974, and spread the word After “How do we stop Trump?” the second most common question I’ve received this week is “How do we stop Musk?” As you may know, Trump’s Treasury Secretary Scott

Ars staffers take aim at some of the web’s worst predatory practices.

The Knights of the Flaming Circle was a militant organization founded in 1923 to fight the anti-Catholic Ku Klux Klan.[1] They were part of an opposition that included politicians, labor leaders and immigrant groups.[2] Membership was open to anyone who opposed the KKK and was "not a Protestant".[3] They had significant support amongst various ethnic groups in Pennsylvania and West Virginia.[1] Bryce Bauer has written that, "Instead of only admitting white, native-born Protestants as the Klan did, the organization vowed to accept anyone who was anything other than that."[4]

A republic, if you can keep it.

Why the tariffs might — and might not — still happen.