Musk taps into his private government piggybank while Trump tries to privatize federal agencies, and more news from The Lever this week.
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Musk is a dangerous phony White House tech veteran, Waldo Jaquith, posted a Bluesky thread about what Elon Musk’s DOGE saboteurs did on Friday to a federal technology group where Jaquith once worked. We know by now (and as you read on Saturday) that Musk’s “waste, fraud, and abuse” pitch for the cameras and is as phony as Trump University. Musk possesses “scant interest in constitutional law” and considers oversight of his operations the “dictatorship of the bureaucracy.” His goal is not to improve government or even to shrink it (the Goldilocks question) but to hobble it. So under the pretext of cutting “waste,” he is in fact destroying the government’s ability prevent his becoming … emperor, or something more like Eldon Tyrell or Peter Weyland. Musk would enjoy the comparison. Pay attention: 18F, the federal government’s technology shop, was demolished by Musk’s team shortly after midnight. It was a cost-recoverable org, charging agencies for their expertise, using a consulting model. Its cost to government was negligible, its benefits huge. My team there once saved DoD $500 billion.
After 30 years, a long-planned milestone has arrived
I’ve not been out taking pictures, so here’s another cormorant from the sequence I shot a few days ago.
THE annual Coffs Coast Science and Engineering Challenge (SEC) for school students will take place on Tuesday 8 April at the Wiigulga Sports Complex and Multipurpose Centre. The event attracts around 240 Year 10 students from state and private schools across the Coffs Coast, including Coffs Harbour, Dorrigo, Woolgoolga, Bellingen and Grafton. Advertise with News...
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OZFISH Coffs Coast Chapter is rallying locals to join a Clean Up Australia Day event at Bonville Creek boat ramp in Sawtell. The clean-up is on Sunday 2 March and will kick-off at 9am for two hours. Advertise with News of The Area today. It’s worth it for your business. Message us. Phone us –...
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COFFS Harbour yachtsman Eric Marsh, 71, crossed the start line in the McIntyre Mini Globe Race (MGR) on Sunday 23 February, setting out from Falmouth Harbour, Antigua. The start gun was fired by a member of the National Sailing Academy, which is the official host of the MGR. Advertise with News of The Area today....
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LOCAL residents with a tale to tell can save their story for future generations through a special opportunity as part of this year’s Seniors Festival. City of Coffs Harbour is driving a jam-packed program of events for a celebration which is themed ‘Your time to shine’. Advertise with News of The Area today. It’s worth...
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As the British state harasses and arrests a growing number of activists and dissident journalists, including the author of this piece, UN rapporteurs delivered a forceful letter of protest to London condemning its abuse of counter-terror legislation. In December 2024, a quartet of UN rapporteurs focused on “peaceful assembly and of association” and the “right to privacy” delivered a strongly-worded letter to the British government. Expressing grave concerns about the potential “misapplication of counter-terrorism laws” to arrest, detain, interrogate and […]
The post UN demands answers from UK on terror law abuse first appeared on The Grayzone.
The post UN demands answers from UK on terror law abuse appeared first on The Grayzone.
The questioning of The Grayzone’s editor-in-chief at Dulles International Airport appears to signal a disturbing escalation in the attack on antiwar journalism. As I approached the customs line at Dulles International Airport early on the morning of February 24, a man called out to me, “Mr. Blumenthal?” He identified himself as an officer with Customs and Border Protection, and led me into a cavernous secondary screening room, where he treated me to a strange and disconcerting questioning session. I had […]
The post Max Blumenthal: Why was I questioned by the Feds? first appeared on The Grayzone.
The post Max Blumenthal: Why was I questioned by the Feds? appeared first on The Grayzone.
I felt it apropos on this Oscar Eve to honor Hollywood’s annual declaration of its deep and abiding love for itself with my picks for the top 10 movies about…the movies. Action! Cinema Paradiso– Writer-director Giuseppe Tornatore’s 1988 love letter to the cinema may be too sappy for some, but for those of us who (to quote Pauline Kael) “lost it at the movies” it’s chicken soup for the soul. A film director (Jacques Perrin) returns to his home town in Sicily for a funeral, triggering flashbacks from his youth. He reassesses the relationships with two key people in his life: his first love, and the person who instilled his life-long love of the movies. Beautifully acted and directed; keep the Kleenex handy. Day for Night– French film scholar and director Francois Truffaut was, first and foremost, a movie fan. And while one could argue that many of his own movies are rife with homage to the filmmakers who inspired him, this 1973 entry is his most heartfelt declaration of love for the medium (as well as his most-imitated work). Truffaut casts himself as (wait for it) a director in the midst of a production called Meet Pamela.
Disney+ had some good news to share regarding how well Doctor Who is doing when it confirmed April 12th as the show's return date.
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CYCLISTS are seeking to open the discussion on the long-term project of achieving safe cycle lanes across the Coffs Coast, starting with councils and Transport for NSW regularly clearing leafy cycle paths and roadsides. The cycling community is growing rapidly across the Coffs Coast. Advertise with News of The Area today. It’s worth it for...
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THREE forest campaigners have been convicted of a traffic obstruction offence relating to an incident at Billys Creek on the Dorrigo Plateau in early 2024. Meredith Stanton, David Mcrae and Jane St Vincent Welch faced Coffs Harbour Local Court on Monday, 17 February, to fight on-the-spot fines of $200 received while protesting on private land...
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CAMP Quality Family Fun Day at Big Banana Fun Park last Sunday was hugely successful judging by the smiles, amount of laughter and tired kids at the end of the day, said the organisers. The experience gives families facing cancer the opportunity to have a much-needed break from the trauma of cancer, bringing laughter and...
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Politicians, media commentators and academics routinely assert that Australia is a middle power. They assume that while their country is not a great power, it has a loftier status than smaller states around the globe, enabling it to “speak louder than the latter and to exert some influence on the former”, as John Campbell once Continue reading »
Governments want you to feel powerless, but the tools for change are in our hands. Australia’s economy is failing to decarbonise. Burning trees to produce electricity is phoney environmentalism. You’re never too small to make a difference I attended The Australia Institute’s third Climate Integrity Summit a couple of weeks ago. These summits are not Continue reading »
The 2025 school year is under way, and every young Australian is sharing the experience of renewing friendships and the routines of school and learning. But, these days, students are far less likely to be sharing the same type of school, as we are increasingly herding students into schools which have less in common than Continue reading »
In 2023 Kathleen Folbigg was pardoned and released after 20 years of wrongful imprisonment; soon after, her convictions were quashed by the NSW Court of Criminal Appeal. There remain two further actions before this sorry saga can be declared closed: (a) the awarding of proper compensation and (b) a full inquiry, best done by a Continue reading »
The English often sing There’s Always Been an England. For America the song would probably be something along the lines of there will always be an enemy. In the case of the US, it would be a combination of enemies — real and imagined — from both outside and inside the country. First Nations people, Continue reading »
I wrote a joke for you.
The post A Jewish Joke appeared first on Jeffrey Zeldman Presents.