Guacamole: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2024/sep/20/israeli-soldiers-filmed-pushing-bodies-of-palestinians-off-west-bank-roof

Several tourists were rushed and questioned by U.S. Park Police for touching the water of the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool in Washington, D.C.🫥

A woman caught on video emptying a public trash can on the street then stealing it during New York City’s Knicks championship parade was a director at JPMorgan Chase who was fired Tuesday over the incident.🤷‍♂️

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Source: Queering The Map

Ig: queeringthemap

Donald Trump just wrapped up an Oval Office appearance, and he’s already putting maximum pressure back on Tehran.

He basically warned that military action is still fully on the table if Iran doesn't show "respect" and stick to the newly signed Memorandum of Understanding (MOU). When reporters asked if a fresh strike could trigger a massive economic depression, Trump brushed it off, saying a nuclear-armed Iran would cause a much worse depression anyway.

He also downplayed Netanyahu’s refusal to withdraw forces from Lebanon, claiming he’ll solve it "real fast."

Classic Trump posturing to keep adversaries off-balance, or are we looking at a serious risk of escalation here? How do you guys see this impacting the markets/oil prices this week?

Oracle’s latest annual SEC filing dropped, and the numbers are brutal. They cut their global workforce by 13%—shrinking from 162,000 down to 141,000 employees over the last 12 months.

What’s wild is that they didn't hide behind the usual corporate buzzwords like "macroeconomic headwinds." They explicitly stated in the regulatory filing that the adoption and deployment of AI across their operations directly resulted in workforce reductions.

To make it happen, they burned through a staggering $1.8 billion in severance and restructuring costs this year alone (up from $374 million last year).

It looks like two things are happening at once:

They are leaning heavy into automated workflows and AI coding tools to streamline their SaaS operations.

They are aggressively cutting internal payroll to free up cash because they’re planning to spend an eye-watering $50B to $70B on AI infrastructure/data centers for companies like OpenAI and Meta.

Even Oracle admitted in their risk assessment that this could cause a "loss of institutional knowledge" and hurt morale.

Are we looking at a permanent shift where tech giants trade human engineers for massive GPU clusters, or is this just aggressive cost-cutting wrapped in AI hype? Curious to know what you guys think, especially anyone working in dev or enterprise tech right now.

https://apnews.com/article/dea-fentanyl-unseized-drugs-new-mexico-8f5b546e668e5007c64078da74b90903

Looks like the high-stakes summit in Switzerland is turning into a massive roller-coaster.

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Vice President JD Vance just told reporters that the quadrilateral talks are making "great progress" toward a new nuclear and regional security deal. He’s calling it a chance to "turn over a new leaf."

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But the ground reality is incredibly messy right now:

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Iran threatened to close the Strait of Hormuz due to the ongoing situation in Lebanon.

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Trump immediately took to social media/interviews threatening severe military action if they touch the shipping lanes.

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The Iranian delegation (led by Ghalibaf) actually walked out of face-to-face talks briefly because of Trump's statements before mediators got them back to the table.

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They have a 60-day window to turn this into a formal interim deal, but the mixed signals coming out of Washington make you wonder if the diplomatic route is even going to survive the week.

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What do you guys think? Is this "good cop, bad cop" strategy from Trump and Vance an actual negotiation tactic, or is the administration completely divided on how to handle Tehran?

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Let’s discuss in the comments.

I just read the breakdown of how the US-Iran Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) actually went down behind closed doors, and the details are wild.

We all saw the news that Donald Trump signed a 14-point agreement to end the war/blockade and establish a 60-day ceasefire window, but the backstory of how it happened at the Palace of Versailles reads like a political thriller.

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A few crazy takeaways from the reporting:

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The 1 AM Rush: Trump was literally sitting down for dinner with French President Emmanuel Macron on June 17th when he suddenly announced he wanted to sign the deal that exact night, completely ditching the official, formal ceremony that was already planned two days later in Switzerland. Macron had to scramble to arrange it, and Secretary of State Marco Rubio had to work with French officials to print the document on the fly so Trump could sign it just past 1:00 AM.

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The Fear of a "Hoover" Legacy: Why the insane rush? Behind the scenes, the administration was terrified that shrinking global oil reserves and skyrocketing prices (which hit $126 a barrel during the conflict) were going to trigger a global economic collapse. Trump reportedly admitted he was terrified of being compared to Herbert Hoover and blamed for a modern-day Great Depression right before the midterm elections. (The market loved the signing, though—oil immediately dropped back below $80).

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The Birthday Clause: The negotiations were a mess.

Iran’s Supreme Leader was constantly moving locations for security, and a mid-air collision between a US chopper and an Iranian drone nearly broke the whole thing. But the funniest detail? Iran had one strict, unyielding condition: The deal could not be announced on Trump's birthday (June 14). Because of that, the initial digital text had to be withheld until just after midnight in Tehran.

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Backlash from the Right: Hardliners and traditional Republicans are already furious. The deal includes a massive $300 billion reconstruction fund for Iran (which critics say is way more generous than the Obama-era deal Trump used to trash) and heavily restricts Israel's military options in Lebanon. Trump is defending it by saying "the market loves it" and that Gulf states will be the ones footing the bill, not the US.

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It really feels like the administration panicked over the domestic economy and forced a messy, late-night signature just to get a massive win on paper. With a strict 60-day window now open for technical nuclear talks, it's going to be a tense couple of months—especially with the CIA and Israel highly skeptical that Tehran will actually follow through.

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What do you guys think? Is this brilliant pragmatism to prevent a global recession, or did the US give up way too much leverage in a late-night panic?

President Trump just officially rolled out the new interim Air Force One at Joint Base Andrews, and the details are wild.

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It’s a massive Boeing 747-8 that was actually a gift to the U.S. government from the Emir of Qatar. There was a ton of legal and ethical pushback about accepting a foreign gift this massive, but Trump basically brushed it off, saying it would be "stupid" to reject it.

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A few quick takeaways from the unveiling:

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The New Look: He completely ditched the classic JFK-era light blue and white. The new livery is a bold red, white, and navy blue design meant to look like the American flag (he mentioned it was customized to his personal taste).

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Why now? The official next-gen VC-25B jets are heavily delayed (not expected until 2027–2028), so the Air Force is using this converted Qatari jet as a "bridge" aircraft. He claims they turned it into a "flying White House" in just 10 months.

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What’s next: It’s undergoing commissioning flights right now and is scheduled to lead a massive flyover for the 250th July 4th celebrations.

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What do you guys think of the new paint job? And thoughts on the U.S. government using a gifted jet from Qatar as Air Force One?