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Exclusive: How Big Pork takes money from small farmers — then uses it to lobby against them
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Politics · Economy · Military · Security · Tech
Exclusive: How Big Pork takes money from small farmers — then uses it to lobby against them
Russ Kremer is a longtime hog farmer in the Missouri Ozarks, where his 2,000 pigs have plenty of space to roam on his 150 acres. He doesn’t feed them antibiotics, and you won’t find a single animal in a cage. Kremer is decidedly anti-industrial hog farming. Whenever he sends his pigs to slaughter, like every hog farmer in the US, he’s legally required to give over a small share of his sales — 35 cents for every $100 — to the National Pork Board. If you’re not a hog farmer, you might not have heard of the National Pork Board. But you’ve probably seen its ads. Its job is to promote pork to consumers, and it’s the group behind the once ubiquitous slogan “Pork. The Other White Meat.” The idea behind the National Pork Board — financed with mandatory contributions from Kremer and virtually every other American hog farmer — is that all pork producers should benefit from this kind of prominent marketing to buoy their product. So a dollar or so from each pig should be worth it. The group’s fun

Anthropic insiders warn AI could kill all humans
Three Anthropic researchers went public last night with chilling concerns about out-of-control AI, warning it could destroy humans this decade. Anthropic AI researcher Jacob Coxon wrote on X, after resigning Tuesday to sound the alarm: "The people building AI earnestly believe that it could kill us all by the end of the decade. This is not a marketing stunt. If anything, many executives and senior researchers will couch their phrasing in the press to sound sensible - but I hear the same people express fear privately. No other human activity poses this level of danger." Anthropic alignment-science lead Evan Hubinger responded: "Jacob is correct here — we really do earnestly believe AI could kill all humans! I personally think it is >10% within the next decade. I believe Anthropic is trying its best, but we do not yet have a plan to solve alignment for superintelligence and are not clearly on track to." Samuel Marks, Anthropic scalable-oversight lead, added: "AI developers believe the

Trump’s escalation of fight with Canada puts GOP Senate candidates in a vice
President Trump’s escalation of the trade war with Canada is coming at a bad time for Senate Republican candidates, who are being put in the awkward place of having to defend the administration’s economic record while having to push back against Trump’s targeting of critical Canadian imports and companies. Trump got pushback from a loyal…

OpenAI is begging for someone to slow the AI race
AI leaders are sounding the alarm as their own breakthroughs sharpen an extraordinary dilemma: slow down and risk falling behind, or press ahead and risk losing control. Why it matters: AI executives and researchers increasingly see a race they can't safely slow on their own. Instead, they're urging governments, rivals and outside institutions to impose restraint across the field. "The idea of racing forward at all costs seems absurd once one internalizes the seriousness of the stakes," OpenAI chief scientist Jakub Pachocki wrote Sunday. Meanwhile, Anthropic researcher Jacob Coxon said Tuesday he was leaving the company rather than contribute to what he sees as a race between OpenAI and Anthropic to build systems that will be difficult if not impossible to control. "Neither company is acting responsibly," he said in a post on X. "They are racing straight to self-improving superintelligence and gambling with our lives." Colleague Evan Hubinger, who leads alignment science at Anthropi

Mexico, U.S. deploy anti-drone operation at Tijuana border
Mexico and the United States have deployed fixed and mobile counter-drone systems along the Tijuana-San Diego border corridor to detect and disable commercial drones used by criminal organizations, Mexico's Defense Secre

Citing the 'Deep State,' Trump overhauls the intelligence community
The catastrophic 9/11 attacks forced the intelligence community to radically revamp its ways of doing business. Now, critics say, President Trump is dismantling much of what was built since then.
International
World · Middle East · Asia · Europe · Russia · China · Diplomacy
Xi, Putin pledge closer ties with North Korea in anniversary messages
Chinese President XI Jinping and Russian President Vladimir Putin vowed to strengthen ties with North Korea in congratulatory letters sent to leader Kim Jong Un, state media reported Wednesday.

German Democracy, as We Knew It, Is Over
A far-right state election victory is ushering in the end of the country’s postwar political system.

Southeast Asia’s Subtle Shift on Taiwan
An erratic United States and a rising China have the region recalibrating.

Britain, Canada, France ban imports from Israeli West Bank settlements
Britain, Canada and France announced bans Tuesday on imports from Israeli settlements in the occupied Palestinian territories.

Introducing the Fall 2026 Print Issue
How to survive in a world without rules.

How to Survive in a World Without Rules
Self-help is becoming more vital in a vicious world.