maggie bell

Iranian war disrupts supply lines to Ukraine’s battlefield The blockade of routes from Asia due to the conflict surrounding Iran is making the supply of batteries and drone parts for the Ukrainian army slower and more expensive.

Good morning to readers. Oil prices have surpassed $99 per barrel (+37% compared to pre-war).

As the Iran war hits supply chains from Asia to Europe, the Ukrainian army relies on Chinese equipment.

With longer routes and higher prices, Andrii's company has to deliver it on time.

'AI Is African Intelligence': The Workers Who Train AI Are Fighting Back Kenyan workers are still the underpaid labor behind AI training, moderation, and sex chatbots. The Data Labelers Association is fighting back.

I met with AI data labelers in Kenya who are organizing their colleagues to fight the brutal working conditions and horrible pay given to the workers at the "bottom of the AI supply chain." They believe the NDAs they've signed are unenforceable so are speaking out:

www.404media.co/ai-is-africa...

Joe Rogan Says Trump’s Supporters Feel ‘Betrayed’ by Iran War

This is true, but Rogan is still very much a Trump guy. He spent 5-10 minutes on Iran in his last few pods, in which he also promoted the SAVE act, said Minneapolis ICE resisters are paid protesters, and suggested there’s no difference between a king and a president www.nytimes.com/2026/03/11/u...

They pulled the plug on this disaster, but I hope they're still sued into bankruptcy as a warning to other companies.

Someone just posted about how they don't care if their students use AI as long as the text conveys the ideas the students meant to convey. The thing is, you don't know exactly what you think until you write it. And if some prefab thing pops up, you're liable to decide that was what you thought.

Every year, millions of tonnes of perfectly fixable products end up as waste, because repair is too expensive or too complicated.

Taco on Iran will come too late for Trump The US president has already done lasting damage to international trust in America

"Trump will nevertheless present his exit as a victory. Iran will have every incentive to ensure nobody believes him. That is the crux of his self-inflicted dilemma." - excellent by @edwardluce.bsky.social:

And therein lies the folly of this utterly reckless adventure. It's more likely to deliver the one outcome it allegedly sought to avoid.

In a further sign of the Putinisation of America under Donald, it seems the US military also dismissed the capabilities of the Ukrainian military.

With over 4 years of evidence in front of them, this seems more stupid than us doing it.

Drüben bei Instagram ist dem früheren SPD-Bundestagsabgeordneten Robin Mesarosch angesichts des SPD-Wahlergebnisses in Baden-Württemberg der Kragen geplatzt.

Ein sehenswerter - weil in der öffentlichen Schonungslosigkeit seltener - Rant (zweiteilig):

Claw back this money and crucify everyone involved.

One thing I've been stressing is that, if Hormuz traffic remained stopped, the monumental oil supply shock will manifest as sharp price spikes in wealthy nations that sap disposable incomes

In poorer countries, the shock will manifest as outright physical shortages.

4/ Ok, so what ARE the goals? It seems, primarily, destroying lots of missiles and boats and drone factories.

But the question that stumped them: what happens when you stop bombing and they restart production?

They hinted at more bombing. Which is, of course, endless war.

Bombing of Iran’s oil infrastructure to have major environmental fallout, experts warn Monitors admit they are struggling to keep track of the environmental disasters arising from widening war

Es fällt uns ja meistens leicht, die Umweltauswirkungen zu ignorieren. Nur sind wir als Spezies leider, leider auf sauberes Wasser und saubere Luft angewiesen.

I don’t think people who aren’t regularly covering the reproductive rights beat realize how common it is for women to be incarcerated for miscarriages.

KENNEDY: You said, 'Republicans think can troll their way to ethnic cleansing.' Did I read that correctly?

BIER: DHS tweeted for 100m deportations. That would be ethnic cleansing!

K: You don't think it's hyperbolic?

B: I think advocating 100m deportations is ethnic cleansing. Yes. Your time is up

“What we see is this lawlessness and attack on freedoms here at home also infecting our foreign policy,” said Van Hollen. “It is a gross violation of international law just to go all off and attack another country. It’s not a preemptive strike … It also is a gross violation of your constitution."

h/t @beanwrap.bsky.social

Screenshot of Tesla letterhead, with the text "The entirety of this file is confidential business information"

our regulators may not be actually requiring Tesla to comply with their orders, but at least they're doing so with basically zero transparency

almost every publicly-available file related to this case just looks like this

Musk is just one example. A huge chunk of Silicon Valley bowed down to Trump, ranging between the begrudging, the opportunistic, and the enthusiastic. Professor Francesca Bria has referred to the emerging: “Authoritarian Stack“— “a network of firms, funds, and political actors turning core state functions into private platforms.” She points out that the key actors in the Silicon Valley right — including Anduril, Palantir and venture capital funders like AndreessenHorowitz — are closely connected and working with one another. They also, crucially, share an ideology that places them as empire-makers able to compete with sovereign states. Another example: Larry Ellison joined phone calls about overturning the 2020 election, and Trump has enabled him and his son to expand their media empire via TikTok, Paramount (including CBS News) and now Warner (including CNN). Also: HBO, Nickelodeon, MTV, Comedy Central, BET, TNT.

Larry Ellison is another example of the authoritarian stack in government. Oracle is a long-time government contractor, unlike some newer members of the stack, and Ellison is now using his fortune to build a media empire that will be critical of Dems. Why keep paying him?

The obvious example here is Elon Musk. Musk is an explicitly white nationalist political force now, aligned with Republicans, but implementing his politics by supporting the far right in at least 18 countries around the world. Within the US, he was Trump’s largest donor during the 2024 campaign, and used his position in government to dismantle parts of government that progressives have championed, often in legally questionable ways. The U.S. government has developed a multi-layered dependence on Musk’s companies, particularly in aerospace, national security, and digital infrastructure. If it wants to send astronauts to space, or bring them home, it increasingly must turn to Musk. The DOD depends upon Musk for both Starlink for internet service, and for military-use satellites. Grok has been embedded into government, including the Pentagon. Most recently, HHS is sending users to Grok as part of its Make America Healthy Again campaign.

A third sovereignty concern: your contractor is your ideological enemy, deeply embedded in government, with more resources than many nation states, and willing to use his power to undermine your policy goals. I don't think Dems have thought through if and how they would dislodge such contractors.

Procurement, Capacity and Soverignity When your contractors are also your enemy

New, from me: Trump's retribution against Anthropic is over the top. But it should cause Democrats to think about how they will deal with contractors like Musk or Ellison when they return to power.
What do you do with vendors working to oppose you? 🧵 donmoynihan.substack.com/p/procuremen...

Screenshot from NY Mag feature on how much people make in NYC: "Bronx Day-Care Worker $31,000 $16,600 from day-care profits $14,400 from trainings and consulting Last year, I lost a lot of kids. I live in the Bronx, and a bunch of families in my neighborhood lost their child-care vouchers. We're talking about people who make as much as I do; most of the moms I work with are home health aides. They can't afford full-time child care. If I have 16 kids, I can pay myself for 40 hours of work. But last year, I didn't, and obviously I'm still doing the same amount of work. I've been running the day care out of my home for more than seven years. It's a profession I entered out of necessity and have stayed in out of passion. I pay for everything - food, cleaning supplies, toys - and we have to meet the same requirements as a large company in terms of paying for liability insurance, which can feel pointless in this industry. I mean, if something happens to one of my children, I lose my license. End of story."

Screenshot from NY Mag feature about how much people make in NYC: "Consultant $17,000,000 $9.5 million from consulting fees $7.5 million in stock in companies that went public The big-picture way that I make my money is consulting; that work covers my day-to-day. Separate from that, I had stock in a couple of companies that went public. Because I made money later in life, my tastes and needs are a lot simpler. I don't spend money on things like having multiple homes, or flying private, or watches, or boats. I make enough money that I do what I want and I don't think about it. I also don't believe in leaving my kids a crazy amount of money because everyone I know who has that is fucked up, so why would I do that to them?"

When people in the future ask what America was show them this

He has also deported dozens of dissidents back to Iran, where they were likely executed.

the "'Alex Bores Used To Work For *spooky music* Palantir' –PaidForByJoeLonsdaleCoFounderOfPalantir" scandal really illustrates how the central crisis of Citizens United was that it legalized ratfucking

The Race at the Center of Everything A Kennedy heir, a Never-Trumper, and two Albany lawmakers walk into a forum...

Excellent piece by @michaellangenyc.bsky.social on the race for NY-12. I think Michael is right on three key points:

• Nina Schwalbe is great but won't win.
• The race is between Micah Lasher + Alex Bores.
• Alex's best shot is to win via AI as wedge issue.

www.michaellange.nyc/p/the-race-a...

The Campaign to Take Down Alex Bores Is Just the Beginning A leading AI industry-backed Super PAC is targeting a pro-regulation candidate — and building a strategy that other politicians will have to contend with.

"[The] goal is not actually to kill Alex's race. Their goal...is to scare other legislators into submission."

I profiled NY-12 Democrat Alex Bores & the AI industry's strategy against him for Politico Magazine:
www.politico.com/news/magazin...

Today, Ekrem Imamoglu stands trial on the most Kafkaesque allegation of establishing a " criminal organisation for illicit gain." The most threatening political rival to President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan allegedly sought, through this purported network, +

Here’s a piece I wrote in 2007 about how an over-reliance on militarized drug war tactics has basically thinned out the herd and ensured only the most efficient and adaptive operations survived. We’ve been selectively breeding highly evolved supertraffickers for decades. Sit this one out, Stephen.