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    Links 5/16/2026 | naked capitalism

    WorldNewsHub24By No Comments11 Mins Read
    Links 5/16/2026 | naked capitalism

    Retired Californian finds fulfilment as Lumphini cat caretaker Bangkok Post

    Earth Rotation Residuals as an Early-Warning System for AMOC Decline Craig Tindale

    Who are the Japanese? Huge DNA discovery rewrites history Science Daily (Kevin W)

    Thai watermeal tipped as ‘green gold’ of future food Nation Thailand

    Hantavirus

    Climate/Environment

    Birds dying along California beaches as marine heat wave intensifies Deseret Sun

    China and Norway push to increase krill harvests around Antarctica Mongabay

    ‘Insect apocalypse’ is already fueling malnutrition in some regions, first-of-its-kind study reveals LiveScience

    Climate Change Is Creating a New Kind of Weather Disaster Gizmodo

    Super El Niño could reshape catastrophe risk pricing, insurers warn ITIJ

    Drones now key to fighting malaria as the climate crisis fuels ‘catastrophic’ rise in cases Independent

    Some seas may soon be trapped in near-permanent heatwaves, scientists warn Earth.com

    Ancient Euphrates River Is Disappearing And People Are Linking It To The Bible NDTV

    No trees, no fans: surviving extreme heat in India’s salt pans Japan Times

    Arizona, Nevada and California take massive Colorado River water cuts Federal plan Tucson.com

    China?

    I am at a bit of a loss when reading some of the hot takes on the Trump-Xi summit. There was no sherpa work because Trump does not do that (see the summit with Putin in Alaska). No sherpa work = at best very little concrete will be concluded. Trump blew up the low-odds possibility of China agreeing to buy more soyabeans or Boeings by two sets of sanctions of Chinese companies mere weeks before the get-together. The one thing Trump might have fantasized he could have gotten done was to get Xi on board with some level of support in getting the Strait of Hormuz open. But China no way no how will provide military support. The other path is negotiations, which are impossible due to US maximalist demands, lack of patience, and being both negotiation and agreement incapable.

    So this wound up being a wag-the-dog event, a distraction from the war in Iran (and Chas Freeman added the Epstein files). However, another Trump-Xi meeting is set for Washington in September.

    As a diplo-connected contact wrote:

    One of Trump’s key concessions to China was to be the lifting of restrictions for the supply of Nvidia H100 (second most powerful AI chips) that he’d previously restricted. Jensen Huang went on the trip hoping to sell $billions of these devices once Trump eased the restrictions.

    However, China said they weren’t interested as their new Huawei Ascend chips are far more powerful and are fully integrated with Deepseek. Jensen had more bad luck after he went shopping in China and he had to dump all of his purchases into the trash as they weren’t allowed on the plane.

    And there was no acknowledgement from the Chinese on the purchase of Boeings (500 expected originally, revised down to 200) or soybeans.

    What a shambles

    Xi owned Trump in this summit.

    After Trump’s pledge to ‘open up’ China, low expectations for trade deal Aljazeera

    Trump’s Failed Mission to China Larry Johnson

    Salesman Trump leaves China with very little in his bag Asia Times (Kevin W)

    Good detail, do click through:

    * * *

    Taiwan releases statement in response to Trump comments The Hill

    The US-China trade war is entering a worrying new phase: a legal arms race South China Morning Post

    China’s Growing Quantum Dominance Forces U.S. to Adapt F-35 Software Military Watch

    China has decisively won the shipping war Kevin Walmsley

    India

    India raises fuel prices as global energy crisis adds pressure on economy Independent

    Church leaders killed in latest ethnic violence in India’s Manipur Aljazeera

    Africa

    Acute hunger grips nearly 20 million people in war-battered Sudan, says IPC Aljazeera

    European Disunion

    Fußball 101: Bier Bundesletter (Micael T)

    The EU and China are stumbling into a trade war Economist

    China ‘very disappointed’ with Europe’s planned investment restrictions, diplomat says Reuters

    Nato to press Europe’s arms makers to boost investment and production Financial Times. Lead story.

    Friedrich Merz vows to oppose new EU debt despite Germany’s borrowing spree Financial Times

    Greece’s Water Crisis Is Becoming an Economic Crisis Tovima

    Old Blighty

    I’ll never regret what I did – Palestine Action activist cleared over Elbit raid The Standard

    There’s a risk of another Liz Truss moment’: City raises spectre of bond market meltdown again Guardian

    Andy Burnham will push to become PM before Labour conference, allies say Guardian (Kevin W). Forgive me for badly uninformed priors. Wes Streeting is an even more fierce Zionists than Starmer, so by default, your humble blogger is of the “anybody but Streeting’ school. Reader comment on Burnham welcome.

    UK govt warned fuel crisis may lead to ‘crops rotting in fields’ Agriland

    China warns UK over nationalisation of British Steel Financial Times

    Why does Guernsey dump raw sewage into the sea? BBC

    Surfers to launch nationwide protests over failing water system Independent

    e

    Israel v The Resistance

    Featuring this rather than the full video, which the YouTube censors have made age restricted:

    Senate fails to curb Trump’s war on Iran even as Republican opposition grows Guardian

    Simulations Confirm Iran’s North Korean Attack Submarines Can Sink U.S. Navy Carrier Groups Military Watch

    Iran turns to Pakistan land corridor as US naval pressure disrupts Gulf trade Middle East Eye

    New Not-So-Cold War

    Zelensky Claims Leaked Russian Intel Docs Show Russia Preparing to Take Out “Decision-Making Centers” of Ukraine Simplicius. Hard to take the Zelensky effort to elicit rage seriously. Government buildings in Kiev are legitimate targets. Putin has apparently been resisting great pressure from the General Staff to strike decision-making centers. The more interesting part of this story is Zelensky saying that drone strikes into Europe are also in the works, and Simplicius describing why this is not impossible.

    Ritter’s Rant 089: The Karaganov Fallacy Scott Ritter (Micael T)

    Big Brother is Watching You Watch:

    NHS England confirms: Palantir staff can access patient data The Register (Chuck L)

    Imperial Collapse Watch

    Stocks and Precious Metals Charts – Change Forged in Misery and Blood Jesse’s Café Américain Jesse’s musings are regularly very good and I have been too busy to check in for a while. A section from this piece:

    There will be no good and sustainable monetary system easily reached for the same reasons that this generation of leaders can no longer create and put forward fair and workable laws for their own country. They are overcome by ego and greed. They wish for a system riddled with loopholes and personal advantage for them and their friends. So this is what is produced. And until this changes, progress and change will be spattered with misery and blood, as it has so often been in the past.

    If there is any key point I wish you to take and hold in your minds and hearts it is that there is no such thing as a perfect, self-regulating monetary system. There could only be such an ideal model if men and women were angels, perfectly rational and reliably virtuous.

    Trump 2.0

    Trump administration proposes easing toxic wastewater regulations for coal-fired power plants ET Now

    Colorado’s Democratic governor commutes ex-election clerk Tina Peters’ sentence after Trump pressure Associated Press

    Our No Longer Free Press

    Rich Guy Quote Journalism Peter Shamshiri (Paul R)

    Economy

    The Iran War Could Crash the Global Economy, Here’s How Fair Observer

    The World Is Burning Through Its Oil Safety Net Wall Street Journal

    Iran, Ukraine wars deliver worst hit in years to oil refining output Reuters

    Mr. Market Needs Therapy

    Bond Market on Verge of Crash, Long Bond Yield Near 19-Year High Michael Shedlock

    Global bonds tumble as flaring inflation spooks investors Reuters

    The Energy Crisis Is Becoming a Currency Crisis Bloomberg. A lazy report via being narrowly accurate but substantively misleading in details. The baht is not in currency crisis terrain, FFS. It may wind up there there but it is not in the position of the rupee. The baht is exactly where it was a year ago. On top of that, it rises during high season, November to March, so a lot of the fall since the start of the war is attributable to that. There are still many complaints from local businesses that it is overvalued.

    Links 5/16/2026 | naked capitalism

    AI

    US AI policy is a clumsy mess. Here’s what to do about it Gary Marcus

    Mayo Clinic is Using AI to Listen to Emergency Room Visits 404 Media (The Joker)

    Brussels runs on summaries and AI is now writing them Euractiv

    Do Job Postings Show Early Labor‑Market Effects of AI? Liberty Street Economics

    Your CEO is suffering from AI psychosis Jake Handy (The Joker)

    The Bezzle

    Class Warfare

    Antidote du jour (Tracie H):

    See yesterday’s Links and Antidote du Jour here.

    Trump-Endorsed Paxton Crushes Bush Era Relic Cornyn

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