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AI humor in theory and practice.

The post ChatGPT Is Funnier Than You appeared first on Nautilus.

It ain’t the 60’s, folks JV Last at the Bulwark takes a look today at the way the Republicans now see institutions since they realized that they have lost the educated, financially successful American cohorts. Their first order of business was to create alternative institutions which they’ve done successfully with the media which has made it very easy to control politicians by propagandizing their constituents. A case in point: As a result of losing the popular culture, they now believe that they can only control it by using the power of the state, thus authoritarianism. -Republicans can no longer create popular majorities, but they can take control of the apparatus of government. -The institutions of civil society have historically been a mediating layer between citizens and government. But Republicans have also lost the argument with educated and financially successful voters, leading to their loss of support within many American institutions. -In response, Republicans have decided that the existing institutions of civil society are illegitimate and that all power should be centrally located with the state.

The Liberal party’s deputy leader (yep, really), Sussan Ley, has defended the parties leader Peter Dutton from accusations of lying, declaring that Peter can’t be a liar as his pants are not on fire. ”The press and Mr Albanese like... Read More ›

Long before 9/11, Zionist groups like the Anti-Defamation League lobbied for counterterror legislation that singled out Palestinians, a new report reveals.

The post How the ADL’s Anti-Palestinian Advocacy Helped Shape U.S. Terror Laws appeared first on The Intercept.

In my recently published book, Capitalism in Contemporary Iran: Capital accumulation, State Formation, and Geopolitics, by Manchester University Press in the Progress in Political Economy (PPE) Series, I offer an alternative narrative to state formation in Iran grounded in a historical materialist perspective. Drawing on the social ontology of the philosophy of internal relations, the book argues for the importance of tracing the changes in the patterns of capital accumulation and the resulting shifts in class and state formation in Iran within the development of the wider capitalist world market during the neoliberal era to overcome the pervasive methodological nationalism and exceptionalising frameworks.

The post Capitalism in contemporary Iran: Capital accumulation, state formation and geopolitics appeared first on Progress in Political Economy (PPE).

And he’s no Abraham Lincoln either News came last week of the death of Russian dissident Alexei Navalny last week. He had survived an attempted assassination by poison in 2020 but eventually returned to Russia, where he was immediately detained and sentenced first to two and a half years, then nine years and ultimately 19 years in prison on charges of “extremism.” In December he was sent to a distant prison in the Russian Arctic. And now he is gone. Navalny was the most famous political dissident in the world, probably since Nelson Mandela. Those who care about such things held out hope that he would survive incarceration, as Mandela did, and prevail one day in a new Russia. In this era of rising authoritarianism, the death of this man — and his bravery in embodying a dream of freedom and liberty, now for the moment crushed — adds more fuel to fears of the creeping fascism now gaining traction around the world.

“The Beatles are getting the big-screen biopic treatment in a Fab Four of movies that will give each band member their own film.” — The Boston Globe

Following the success of Phase One, we’re beyond excited to announce Phase Two’s new slate expanding on the BCU’s characters, legacy, and stories for the next generation.

Maxwell and the Mallet of Destruction (2029)
Fed up with small-town problems, medical student Maxwell finds a mystical silver hammer whose power he must learn to wield to bang bang life upon the head.

Walrusland (2030)
When a psychedelic trip leaves John trapped as a walrus incapable of communicating, he must win Aqualand’s talent contest and confront his inability to connect to reclaim his voice.

“We are rapidly approaching a critical juncture where the call to halt the Machinery of Violence will lose its significance.” The United States’ decision to Veto a UN Security Council ceasefire resolution in Gaza implies an endorsement of the brutal violence and collective punishment inflicted upon Palestinians, said Amar Bendjama, Algeria’s permanent representative to the Continue reading »

John Menadue, Editor-in-Chief of Pearls and Irritations interviews former Australian Senator Margaret Reynolds on the role of the United Nations, Australian foreign policy and the tragedy unfolding in Gaza. Click below to listen: Continue reading »

As the Palestinian death toll from Israel’s attack on Gaza approaches 30,000, including the death of 12,300 children and 8,400 women, a group of Israeli female soldiers posed for a photo on a position on the Gaza Strip border in Southern Israel, February 19, 2024. Continue reading »

Community opposition to the AUKUS project finds expression in a Sydney suburb. Back in March 2023, a public meeting was held in the Town Hall of the Sydney suburb of Marrickville, under the title “Can War be Avoided or Will Our Peace be Shattered?”. That meeting took place just a few days after the AUKUS Continue reading »

The arrival last week of a boat carrying 24 potential asylum seekers, and possibly another one carrying 13, sent Peter Dutton into his standard boat arrivals scare mode. The usual suspects at the Murdoch press went into a frenzy of panic with Chris Kenny calling it a ‘national dilemma’. Dutton has again warned of an Continue reading »

We’re sleepwalking toward social catastrophe. Perhaps we’re there already – terra solitarius. Almost anywhere you care to look – research findings, news reports, general social chatter – all signs point in the same direction: a society free-falling into mass disconnection, loneliness and isolation. The word epidemic is often used to describe this situation. It’s a Continue reading »

The coalition that took power in New Zealand late in 2023, after a campaign centred on attacking the country’s founding Waitangi Treaty, has been exposed as hosting considerable Atlas Network infiltration. One of the key researchers into the Atlas Network, Lee Fang, observed that it has “reshaped political power in country after country.” In America, Continue reading »

“The big Australian newspapers we looked at have failed to cover the Gaza conflict fairly. … We think their coverage has been shameful” – Paul Barry, ABC Media Watch. Three weeks ago, Al Jazeera told us about a Palestinian family fleeing the fighting in Gaza City. And broadcast this recording of 15-year-old Layan Hamadeh calling Continue reading »

In 2007 I visited Palestine with my late husband Hal Wootten AC, QC, the founding Dean of the Law School at the University of New South Wales and well-known for his pursuit of justice. Hal was determined to understand the conflict from both Palestinian and Israeli perspectives, and he collected a substantial library on middle-east Continue reading »

Free Palestine. Free Assange. Free the world. Here is a Mixed media piece I did while nervously awaiting the resolution of the latest Assange hearing: Text: If Gaza taught me anything, it’s taught me what war crimes really look like. War crimes are cruel power abuses where soldiers with bombs and guns prey on babies Continue reading »

There are some issues I have always assumed Trump would have more than enough money to finance his campaign. There’s a lot of cash floating around and the MAGA cult loves to give him money. Still, this doesn’t seem like good news: As Donald Trump’s legal troubles consume more and more of his time, they’re also consuming more of his donors’ money—and there’s a huge hole in the bucket. On Tuesday, Trump’s “Save America” leadership political action committee reported raising just $8,508 from donors in the entire month of January, while spending about $3.9 million, according to a new filing with the Federal Election Commission. Nearly $3 million of that overall spending total was used for one purpose: to pay lawyers. At the same time, the Trump campaign itself reported a net loss of more than $2.6 million for the month of January. It raised about $8.8 million while spending around $11.5 million, according to a separate filing made public on Tuesday.