The storm system’s cloud shield spans more than 1,000 miles, reaching from several hundred miles southeast of the Outer Banks to north of Montreal.
Wednesday Reads: The Cornell Gang Rape Case
Posted: September 30, 2026 Filed under: just because | Tags: Cereese Qusba, consent laws, Cornell Daily Sun, Cornell gang rape case, Jane Doe attorney Thomas Giuffra, New York rape law, rape, sexual assault, Tompkins County District Attorney Matthew Van Houten 3 CommentsGood Afternoon!!
I’ve been reading the latest news on the Cornell gang rape case. I just want to say up front that my personal opinion is that if a person is very intoxicated, they can’t consent to sex. If they say no at any point during sexual activity, the activity should stop. If a person agrees to sex with one or even two people, that does not give permission to others to join in. People who have been raped tend to be in shock afterward and tend to feel shame about what happened; therefore, they may not report the rape immediately.
The latest reports about the case are somewhat complicated. First, the woman who reported the rape admitted that she agreed to have sex with a friend and another man before the situation escalated. She said she was “heavily intoxicated” before any of this happened. She has evidence that one of the men sent text messages to his frat bros advertising “free pussy.”
Unfortunately, New York rape laws are shockingly out of date. Basically, the law assumes that if the victim voluntarily took drugs or alcohol, unless there is physical force, unless they specifically say “no,” or if they are unconscious, they are assumed to be able to consent, and it’s just too bad if a bunch of people had sex with them against their will.
It’s a complex story. I’m going to share the latest articles about the case, and you can draw your own conclusions.
Claudia Lauer & David A. Lieb at The Independent: How an outdated New York rape loophole blocked charges in a Cornell fraternity assault case.
A Cornell University sexual assault allegation has reignited intense political backlash over a controversial New York rape law that legal experts and victim advocates argue shields abusers when victims voluntarily consume alcohol or drugs.
The outcry follows a decision by Tompkins County District Attorney Matthew Van Houten not to pursue criminal charges in a civil lawsuit involving a woman who alleges she was gang-raped at a Cornell fraternity house in 2024.
Matthew Van Houten, district attorney for Tompkins County, N.Y., said some new evidence is emerging in an allegation of rape at Cornell University.Credit…Tompkins County District Attorney’s Office
Defending his office’s choice, Van Houten pointed directly to New York’s statutory definition of rape, explaining that under state law, prosecutors must prove physical force, an explicit refusal, or that the victim was rendered “physically helpless” through unconsciousness or involuntary drugging. Because the victim voluntarily drank alcohol before the assault and was conscious, the prosecutor stated that criminal charges could not be supported.
The decision has thrust New York’s “voluntary intoxication loophole” back into the spotlight. Under current state statutes, prosecutors face massive legal hurdles when trying to convict individuals who engage in sexual acts with someone so heavily intoxicated that they cannot meaningfully give consent, provided the victim drank or took drugs voluntarily.
Anti-sexual violence organizations and state lawmakers slammed the statute as outdated and harmful. Stefan Turkheimer, vice president of public policy for RAINN, labeled the legal standard “straight-up victim blaming,” warning that it deters victims from coming forward and prevents prosecutors from pursuing cases involving severe incapacitation.
Efforts by state lawmakers to close the loophole have repeatedly stalled in the legislature, leaving New York as one of a dwindling number of states where voluntary intoxication cannot be used to prove incapacitation in rape cases.
There’s much more information at The Independent link.
New York is not alone in having outdated rape laws. From the AP: How state sexual assault laws handle voluntary intoxication:
Nineteen states have rape or sexual assault laws that consider intoxicated victims to be mentally incapacitated only if they became drunk or drugged without their knowledge or consent. In 25 other states and Washington, D.C., whether the victim became intoxicated voluntarily or involuntarily isn’t a factor. Six states do not define that in state law.
Reports of comments made by Jane Doe to Cornell University police in 2024 when she first went to school officials with allegations she was gang raped are raising new questions about what law enforcement knew at the time.
CNN affiliate WCBS and ABC News reported they have obtained documents that detail comments made by Doe to investigators regarding the night of October 19, 2024, when she was allegedly assaulted by multiple members of the school’s Chi Phi fraternity….
The attacks were alleged to have taken place at the Chi Phi fraternity house at Cornell University in Ithaca, New York
The revelations raise new questions as to why law enforcement did not file criminal charges at the time of the incident and what the district attorney’s office was aware of regarding the assault allegations, as calls grow for answers in light of Doe’s civil lawsuit filed this month….
WCBS reports it obtained a transcript of Doe’s interview with Cornell University police in November 2024, weeks after the alleged rape, and ABC News reports it obtained a six-page written statement signed by Doe to Cornell University Police at the time.
Doe described to Cornell police that she was heavily intoxicated on the night of the alleged rape, according to the WCBS and ABC reports, citing documents.
The transcripts detail how she told police she was “pretty OK” with the initial sexual activity but did not consent to what occurred later in the night, according to WCBS.
In the statement, Doe said she consented to some sexual acts but repeatedly refused some, including a foursome proposed by one of the fraternity brothers, according to ABC. She described thinking that if she passed out and the men had sex with her, they could be charged with “rape,” the only reference of rape mentioned in the document, ABC reported.
In transcripts with police, Doe also described being physically hit, according to WCBS.
She reportedly spoke to Cornell police on November 14 and 15, more than three weeks after the alleged gang rape. A campus police investigator led the questioning, with a Title IX investigator, a victim advocate, and Doe’s adviser also reportedly in the room for the first day of the interview, WCBS reported. CNN has reached out to Doe’s attorney.
On the DA’s claims:
In a statement to CNN, Van Houten said his office was not provided the transcript and “will be investigating this fully and determining the truth.”
“I will be looking into whether this is true and the specific circumstances of this allegation. I was not provided the transcript and the specific statement that has been attributed to Doe was not included in the written statement that I received from Cornell PD,” he told CNN.
When asked about Van Houten’s response to the reports, a spokesperson for Cornell said: “The Cornell University Police Department investigated the matter in 2024 and shared all investigatory information with the Tompkins County District Attorney’s Office, which is the established protocol if the department believes it is possible a crime has occurred,” repeating a statement made in an FAQs post the university released Tuesday night.
Again, there’s much more information at the link. You might need to clear your cache to get past the paywall.
Hurubie Meko at The New York Times (gift link): D.A. in Cornell Case Hopes to Speak to Accuser as He Weighs New Evidence.
A New York prosecutor said that he hoped to speak with a former Cornell University student as soon as possible “to discuss new evidence that exists” about her claims that she was sexually assaulted in 2024.
Matthew Van Houten, the Tompkins County district attorney, said in an interview that it wasn’t “even a close call” when he decided not to bring charges against members of a Cornell fraternity in 2024, when the accuser, known as Jane Doe, reported to the police that she had been sexually assaulted by several men.
One in five women in the United States experienced completed or attempted rape during their lifetime. National Ssexual Violence Research Center
Mr. Van Houten acknowledged that the woman’s account had been credible and “very specific” and “very detailed.” But he added that even though “everybody across the world agrees that what happened was wrong, it was morally wrong, it was disgusting,” the allegations made by the woman at the time did not rise to a crime under state law.
“And my job is to evaluate the evidence based on the law, and the law alone, and not emotion, not social media,” Mr. Van Houten said. “And not public sentiment.”
He said a lawsuit that the woman filed earlier this month against Cornell University, seven men, a fraternity and her sorority still did not provide the facts that could support a criminal case under the law. But he added, “The significance of it means that she believes that crimes were committed, and we want to get to the bottom of that.”
Late on Tuesday, he said he had been provided with new evidence that his office would review to determine if her case could now be taken to a grand jury. Mr. Van Houten said he would reach out again to her lawyer on Wednesday to request a meeting with her. He did not provide any details about the nature of the evidence.
The woman’s lawsuit put a sudden, harsh spotlight on Mr. Van Houten’s small office in upstate Ithaca, N.Y. The campus newspaper, celebrities and politicians raised questions about whether the case had been handled properly in 2024, renewing the discourse around the persistent issue of sexual assaults on college campuses.
Thomas Giuffra, who represents Jane Doe, said on Tuesday that while he will cooperate with the investigation, Mr. Van Houten’s recent statements have left him skeptical.
“I’m a little concerned that his endgame is to do this halfhearted attempt to present this case at the grand jury, to just prove he believed what he thinks he was right in the first place,” he said. “Which is just frightening when you think about it.”
Richard Luscombe at The Guardian: Texts about alleged Cornell gang-rape released after investigation reopened.
Excerpts of text messages reportedly exchanged by a defendant in the Cornell University gang-rape case and the woman who claims she was assaulted were published by CBS News on Tuesday, a day after New York prosecutors said they were reopening a criminal investigation.
The texts were reportedly sent within days of the alleged October 2024 assault at a campus fraternity house in which a female student said she was drugged and repeatedly raped over the course of seven hours by multiple men who were alerted to her presence on the social media platform Snapchat….
In one of the messages, screenshots of which were obtained by CBS New York, the unnamed male defendant appears to apologize to the woman for “how things went down” – and said his memory of events two nights previously was “kinda fuzzy”.
He said he and another male who was present regretted that they were too intoxicated to “shut it down and kick people out before it got way out of hand”.
In reply, the woman, who was 20 at the time of the alleged assault, and has since left Cornell, said her memory was “super clouded too” and that they were all intoxicated.
From the DA:
On Monday, Matthew Van Houten, the Tompkins county, New York, district attorney – whose office’s jurisdiction includes Cornell – said he had reopened the dormant investigation into the case. He said his office did that in light of allegations that he said were “dramatically different” from those originally made by the alleged victim.
He also issued a statement defending his initial decision not to seek charges.
“Jane Doe’s sworn statement in November of 2024 did not allege that she was drugged against her will or gang raped,” Van Houten said.
“On the contrary, [her] statement described her participation in drug use and sexual conduct as voluntary, conscious, and consensual.
Jane Doe’s attorney:
Attorney Thomas Giuffra
Attorney Thomas Giuffra, who represents the woman, confirmed to CBS that his client – named Jane Doe in court documents – exchanged text messages with one defendant after the alleged assault. But Giuffra said he could not be certain the screenshots that CBS News saw were authentic.
Giuffra, according to CBS, said Doe was in denial and traumatized afterwards, had been intoxicated to the point of incapacity that night, and was trying to find out what happened.
He said she felt as if she would not take an aggressive tone with this particular defendant if she wanted answers.
This is a very long article by Jill Filipovic at Slate: A College Rape Case Has Ignited the Country. Let’s Talk About What We’re Actually Talking About Here.
The alleged details of this case are wrenching and sickening: A young woman went to a fraternity party to meet a guy she thought was her friend. They danced and drank, and, according to her statement to police, the first man asked Jane Doe if she would have a threesome with him and another friend; she said she agreed largely because she wanted to please the first guy. But then other guys entered the room; Jane Doe reports hiding under the covers and pushing various men’s hands away as they grabbed at her. She says the men offered her ketamine, and she took it, and as the night progressed she became extremely intoxicated, and other men had sex with her. Not mentioned in the police report but highlighted in the lawsuit is that some of the men were on Snapchat, sending messages about there being “free pussy” available and inviting other men to come over and join in.
Cornell rape “free pussy” text message
It’s that last fact—the Snapchat messages—that has most infuriated much of the public. And it should. It should be at the center of the conversation about sexual violence, consent, and male entitlement to women’s bodies. And as much as the public’s understanding of sexual violence has grown more sophisticated in the wake of various waves of the feminist movement and the gains made by #MeToo, the truth is that we are still abysmal when it comes to understanding, let alone publicly discussing, the ways in which sex, power, and male violence intersect.
The Cornell case is a complex one, which makes it all the more difficult to traverse—to go beyond the legalese and actually talk about what we’re talking about. The demands for criminal prosecution have grown so loud that, in an unusual move, the district attorney published a letter explaining why he didn’t bring those charges in the first place. New York’s rape law is narrow: Sex with a person who is extremely intoxicated but conscious doesn’t count as rape if the alleged victim voluntarily drank or took drugs (as opposed to being secretly drugged or forced to drink). According to the DA, “Jane Doe’s statement described her participation in drug use and sexual conduct as voluntary, conscious, and consensual.” He then published part of the statement signed by Jane Doe.
Whether that statement truly captures an interaction that was “voluntary, conscious, and consensual” seems less clear to me than it does to prosecutors. One also wonders why Jane Doe brought herself to the police station in the first place if all she had to report was voluntary, conscious, and consensual group sex—most people don’t have great fun consensual sex and then report it to the cops. In any case, it seems clear that New York’s sexual assault law was one barrier to prosecution; the police’s interpretation of Jane Doe’s allegations was another. Perhaps a fresh set of prosecutorial eyes will come to a different conclusion; perhaps a grand jury will decide an indictment is warranted; perhaps a jury will convict, or not. All we know is that right now, prosecutors are revisiting the case, and it has sparked national outrage.
Filipovic has concerns about the student newspaper printing the names of the accused rapists:
This time, though, there is a novel element at play. Several individuals and Cornell’s student newspaper have named the seven accused men; a former South Park writer is building a website that he says will include “names, photographs, documents, messages, and other information related to the case.” In one telling, this is transparency in the service of accountability; in another, a name-and-shame campaign of dangerous vigilantism. This is fraught territory: Extralegal attempts at justice are rarely carried out fairly, let alone with due care, and they often do not end well. Our criminal justice system has rules and procedures in place to maintain the presumption of innocence and to require the kinds of factual reviews and legal deliberations that are not possible on Twitter or TikTok. But it’s also true that the criminal justice system is as imperfect as the people who created it and who sustain it, which is to say that it is vastly flawed—especially when it comes to the kinds of crimes that are overwhelmingly committed by men against women, especially when those crimes are sexual in nature, and especially when they are committed in private. The vast majority of rapists never go to jail. Women the world over have suffered through sex that is violent and forceful and been told that’s normal, and certainly not illegal. The fact that one interpretation of the laws of the state of New York suggests that a person can have sex with a woman who is profoundly incapacitated, but as long as she chose to drink and remains conscious, her body is fair game, well, that in itself demonstrates just how not neutral the law can be, and whose assumptions and preferences it tends to reflect.
The efforts to name the men and share information about the case speak to a truth felt deep in the bones of many women (and many men, too): that we can be abused and used as if we are little more than orifices for male power, bonding, and gratification, and then we are the ones who will shoulder the shame, the blame, and the consequences.
There is a great deal more discussion of the case at the Slate link.
One more article by Emma Goldberg at The New York Times (gift link): The Student Journalists Who Never Let the Cornell Assault Case Go.
Editors of The Cornell Daily Sun clustered around their computers late Monday night, getting ready to send out a letter from the editor. They looked bleary-eyed, and one reporter confessed she had skipped her class on Nietzsche that day.
These student journalists at Cornell University were pressing through a dizzying two weeks following the story of a student’s allegation that she was raped on campus in 2024.
The Cornell Daily Sun is independent of the university and has its offices off campus. Credit…Heather Ainsworth for The New York Times
The case had long had their attention; now it had burst into the national spotlight, and their high-risk decision to publish the names of the accused was being discussed not only in Cornell’s libraries and walkways but in the national media.
Back in November 2024, students at Cornell were shaken by an alert they received over email: “Crime ALERT: Sexual Assault,” the email read, referring to the case of a woman who told the Cornell police she had been assaulted at a fraternity house.
There was outrage on campus. Students threw eggs at the fraternity house, Chi Phi, that the woman named. The university convened a sexual assault task force, which compiled a series of recommendations for teaching students about consent and the processes for reporting assault. Then much of the campus attention moved on.
But Cereese Qusba, 22, a senior and reporter for The Sun, couldn’t shake her concerned curiosity about the case. She got in contact with Jane Doe, the plaintiff, and built a relationship with Ms. Doe and her lawyer. Ms. Qusba interviewed university administrators about their approach to disciplining students accused of assault.
Ms. Qusba made her obsessive dedication known to the student paper’s higher-ups. When a new editor in chief, Sophia Dasser, 20, took over the paper in early 2026, she immediately received a phone call from Ms. Qusba, who was studying abroad in Sydney, Australia.
“Sophia, I’m working on this story — I want it to be a focus of The Sun,” Ms. Dasser recalled hearing over the phone. She added, “The Sun never really let go.”
This month, when Jane Doe filed a lawsuit against the university, the fraternity and her sorority, Ms. Qusba was ready to hit publish on her investigation, which was 23 months in the making. “Cornell, Chi Phi Sued by Victim of Alleged Gang Rape, Drugging in 2024,” read the headline on her Sept. 18 story, which traced Jane Doe’s allegations in detail throughout the night that she said she was assaulted.
The Sun is the oldest continuously independent college daily paper in the country. Ms. Dasser, who speaks with a cool and quick precision, was adamant that she wanted the paper to dominate the story not just in its reporting, but in its editorial response. Why be financially independent, she wondered, if not to publish sharp-edged views of the biggest campus issues?
This was the sensibility that emboldened her, days later, when she decided to publish the names of the seven fraternity men named in the lawsuit on the paper’s front page and in a fiery editorial. It was a sensitive decision, she knew, given that the men were named in the suit but had not been criminally charged.
Use the gift link to read more if you’re interested.
I hope you’ll forgive me for using my entire post on the Cornell story. I have a bit of an obsession about violence against women in this country. It is so common that many people just accept that this is the way it has to be. Women and girls are raped and murdered in this country at an alarming rate. And, yes, men and boys are also raped and murdered. And sexual assault is rampant on college campuses. This needs to be recognized and dealt with. I hope this case will awaken some of our political leaders to act on the very real problem of violence against women in the U.S,
I welcome your comments on this and any other topic.
Tuesday Cartoons: Death by Caddie
Posted: September 29, 2026 Filed under: just because 9 Comments
Oh, if only…
Cartoons via Cagle:
My internet is down, so it is a quick post today.
This is an open thread.
Mostly Monday Reads: The Clusterfuck Express
Posted: September 28, 2026 Filed under: #FARTUS, #MAGAnomics, American Economic Unbalance, Trump Created Economic Pain, Trump Created Economic Unfairness, Trump grifting | Tags: @johnbuss.bsky.social John Buss, Crisis in Nation's Farms, Crisis in Nation's Food Banks, Eat the Rich, Economic Fairness, Trump Created Economic Pain, Trump Grift 5 Comments
“Sometimes, science isn’t all that great. No need to create DINOs in the lab.” John Buss, @repeat1968
Good Day, Sky Dancers!
If ever a case could be made that the politicians sent to the District to represent the people couldn’t be more out of touch, this year’s case would take top prize. As someone who has taught and studied fiscal and monetary policy for decades, I’ve never had such a tough time explaining how opposite everything is right now. I imagine those who research and breathe military and foreign policy will say the same thing. The people’s priorities are dead last.
And it shows in the headlines. I’m going to start with a few examples of how badly consumers (e.g., voters) are being treated these days. It’s no wonder there’s a scramble to rig and suppress votes by this administration. This is a sad story to bring up as we face the new school term and Thanksgiving. It comes from MTN. “They don’t understand the scale of the hunger!” – An unfolding crisis at the nation’s food banks. Weeks before the midterm elections, the cost crisis is hammering food pantries in red and blue states”. No one can do well at school, work, or life with an empty, aching stomach. Scott McFarlane has the story.
On the shelves inside the giant food bank warehouse in Rockville, Maryland, you see a giant stack of flour packets. The sign next to the stack says “1 each” for those packing up food boxes for families.
A shorter stack of canned “mixed fruit” is next to the flour. An even shorter stack of canned tuna is the next to the fruit.
But it’s the empty shelves above that tell the story.
The demand for donated food is unprecedented at the Manna Food Center.
In fairness, this is a challenging moment for food banks and pantries across the country, including in this diverse suburb 20 miles north of Washington, D.C.
Food banks have two fundamental, destabilizing problems that are getting worse:
- The food is getting more expensive
- The diesel to deliver the food is getting more expensive
With just a few weeks remaining until a highly-anticipated midterm election, the cost crisis is worse than some elected leaders – including President Trump – are acknowledging.
A week of interviews and food pantry visits by Scott MacFarlane Reportsreveals the depths of the problem. Some of the reality is masked by Trump’s claims that the economy is the greatest in history, in the “hottest country in the world.”
A newly-released study called the “Hunger Report”, produced by a Washington, D.C.-based food bank group had an alarming diagnosis: “The state of food security more broadly is deteriorating.”
Some of the findings are just gutting.
The survey found broad swaths of people who acknowledge they:
- Cut the sizes of their children’s meals, due to the cost of the food
- Have children who didn’t eat for an entire day
- Skipped meals, to save money
It certainly is the fault of the farmers and ranchers of this country. They are hard hit too. So hard hit, the Iowa is quite close to turning Blue as is Nebraska. This is an article from last May, also known as planting and baby animal season that sums up what the agriculture sector is facing. It’s from an economic stie called MarketPlace. Caitlin Tan has the analysis if the situation. “Many farmers, ranchers stare down an economic crisis. Across the U.S., farmers and ranchers are struggling to weather a growing season plagued by drought, high prices, and a trade war.” Sounds like what you used to read in history about the Great Depression doesn’t it?
American farmers and ranchers are staring down a lot of financial pressure: fuel and fertilizer prices, the war in Iran, tariffs, drought, and more.
In the West, it’s that time when ranchers move their cattle to public grazing lands, so the cattle can eat. But the summer pasture that normally feeds cattle through the fall isn’t very green and lush this year.
“The big word is drought,” said Jim Magagna, executive vice president of the Wyoming Stockgrowers Association.
That means ranchers are looking to buy hay, Magagna said. Extra hay can cost $30,000 on the low end, and hundreds of thousands on the high end.
Ranchers’ other option, he said, is to sell off some of their livestock. Selling could pad ranchers pockets right now, and Magagna advised ranchers to hold onto that cash.
“It may sorely be needed in 2027, 2028 and beyond,” he said, because financial woes are growing for those who live off the land.
“So many farmers are reporting, you know, that they’re kind of on the brink of a crisis situation,” said Aaron Lehman. A fifth-generation farmer, he grows corn, soybeans, and oats, and is president of the Iowa Farmers Union.
Lehman said his costs are soaring, and so are his neighbors’, for labor, health insurance, fuel, and fertilizer.
“For a medium sized farm like mine, they had an increase in costs of about $20,000,” he said.
Last December, the White House announced a $12 billion aid package for farmers. And recently, the White House said China will purchase billions of agricultural products from U.S. farms.
But Lehman is not encouraged by that development.
“Farmers don’t know exactly what to think. They hear some vague news and vague promises and then there’s nothing concrete about it,” he said.
That instability shows up at t
he bank. Nick Levendofsky, executive director of the Kansas Farmers Union, said lenders are backing off.
It’s from that point in the spring to this headline today at CNN. “‘Is it really worth it to keep going on?’ Economic pain hits America’s farm belt.” This does not meet our expectations for a functional market where the supply and demand should equal in the texbook sense. Obviously both producers and consumers are experiencing some pretty drastic factors. All of these factors are from bad policy by the White House. It doesn’t take an economist to figure any of this out. Chris Isidore and Tami Luhby share the lede.
Notice this first farmer has had his farm in the family that made it through the Great Depression and quite a few other kinds of Panics which is what they called some of action in the past.
John Yeley has spent the last 26 years working on his farm, which his family has owned since 1852.
Yeley is the seventh generation to run his farm in Illinois, just over the state line from Indiana. Although he plans to keep doing so, he’s not sure he wants his 16-year-old son and 12-year-old daughter to take over because the current economics are so rough.
“Right now, the way all of this is now, no, I wouldn’t wish it on them,” he said about farming.
Farmers like Yeley as well as agriculture experts agree that the farming sector is in a painful recession. Farms are dealing with record-high diesel prices, a fuel that is critical to their equipment. Trade disputes have cut off access to vital markets. Wars in Ukraine and the Middle East have sent fertilizer costs soaring, just as farmers pay higher interest rates on the loans needed to get from planting to harvest season.
Yeley is not sure he’ll earn a profit this season, even with prices up for for his corn and soybeans.
“We’re not a big county, but we’ve had three farmers go under this year,” said Yeley. “I know that’s on the minds of everybody, is it really worth it to keep going on? The stress level is pretty high.”
Currently, the price of diesel is the most pressing problem for farmers.
So what kind of idiot would start a series of wars where oil is most at play? Yeah, that’s rhetorical. Trump’s ‘foreign policy’ basically ignores the reality of how intertwined our economies are and how easily a market can be disrupted. That kind of knowledge has been common since the world’s great minds picked apart the Great Depression and the World Wars. Unfortunately, the world’s great minds or even the country’s aren’t a play here. This country isn’t what it used to be at all.While Trump rants about communism in the Democratic Party, we get headlines like this in the New York Times. How is this even the idea of someone rational? “Trump Offered to Sell Arms to China, U.S. Ambassador Says. President Trump made the offer to Xi Jinping, China’s leader, said David Perdue, the ambassador to China. The White House later said the U.S. had no plans for such a sale.” Now there’s a denial? WTF? Edward Wong has the story.
President Trump has asked Xi Jinping, the leader of China, whether he would like to buy American weapons, David Perdue, the American ambassador to China, said in a television interview on Sunday.
“President Trump continues to say, ‘Hey, we sell arms to other people around the world,’” Mr. Perdue said on “Fox News Sunday” while discussing the state visit by Mr. Xi to Washington last week. “He actually asked President Xi would he like to buy some at one point.”
Mr. Perdue did not give further details and did not reveal Mr. Xi’s reply.
An admission that the American president offered to sell arms to China is extraordinary. The Communist-ruled nation is considered by most American policymakers and legislators of both parties to be the greatest military, economic and diplomatic rival of the United States — the only real challenger to America as a superpower.
When asked for comment, the White House said through a U.S. official that the United States had no plans to sell arms to China. The State Department said in a statement that “U.S. law prohibits arms sales to China and there is no offer or plan to sell arms to China.”
The Chinese Embassy in Washington did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
China has the world’s fastest-growing military, and for decades U.S. officials across administrations, including in the current one, have warned of a potential military clash between the two nuclear-armed powers in the Asia-Pacific region, particularly over the island of Taiwan or China’s aggressive actions in territory claimed by U.S. allies in the South and East China Seas.
Chinese defense companies, with the approval of the Chinese government, are supporting adversaries of the United States, including Iran and Russia, by selling them dual-use equipment and satellite imagery, as well as planning the secret export of weapons, according to U.S. officials. The United States has imposed sanctions on some Chinese companies.
The link is gifted. So is this one written by Guest Essayist Tim Wu, which was published today by The New York Times. Wu worked on economic issues during the Biden Administration. It’s all about the big word that Trump finds appalling. “Affordability Is a Winning Message for Democrats. But There’s an Even Better One.”The most important political division in our times is not between Democrats and Republicans, or socialists and capitalists; it’s between those who think today’s economic system is fair and working well for most people, and those who do not. While a minority of Americans defend the current system, citing aggregate indicators like growth rates, a majority see things differently.A recent CBS News poll found that some 60 percent of Americans think the economy is “unfair” and that most people under 45 say they have fewer economic opportunities than their parents did. In a recent Economist/YouGov poll, 66 percent of Republicans said that the gap between rich and poor is a “big problem.” Though the stock market is up and the United States is not suffering a recession or mass unemployment, Gallup’s monthly Economic Confidence Index has been persistently negative.
To run a proper affordability campaign — one that taps into a discontent even deeper than that over high prices — Democrats should cater to this widespread sense of unfairness. The key message is rebalancing: a promise to level out a lopsided economy that favors huge concentrations of wealth.
That message can risk sounding like generic political talk about standing up for the little guy. Credibility has to come from a platform of policies that shift economic power away from the big guys in ways that voters can readily understand.
You see this in the platforms of candidates who have run on affordability. Mr. Mamdani’s government-run groceries stores are supposed to make milk cheaper, yes — but also to undercut the power of corporate food conglomerates. Ms. Sherrill’s utility tariff for data centers is designed to lower energy prices for consumers, yes — but also to force Big Tech to pay for its own infrastructure. Mr. Sand hopes to lower home prices, yes — but in part by barring private equity from buying up single-family homes as investments.
What we are seeing is the resurgence of an age-old American ideology of economic balance. While it lacks a formal name, it may well be the most popular ideology in the country.
There are signs on the campaign trail that some Democratic candidates grasp the appeal of this broader affordability message, as when Mr. Talarico, running for Senate in Texas, says that “the biggest divide in this country is not left versus right” but rather “top versus bottom.” Democrats should not be afraid to hit this message harder: The problem is not just high prices but also the structure of the economy. If Democrats can embrace what affordability is really about, they might do even more than win elections; they might bring about the change that most Americans, including most Republicans, say they are looking for, and in so doing, realign our politics.
This article by Josh Marshall writing at TPM shows that the grifting is still ongoing. Why do we have to put up with this? “US Tax Dollars Now Used to Secure Deals for Trump Family Cronies.” Why isn’t this an outrage to everyone in the Congress? Mike Johnson clearly needs to go, but who knows what’s up around Shreveport. I certainly don’t.
This has gotten very little attention, as far as I can tell. But it sounds quite sleazy and another example of the US government becoming a de facto investment arm of the Trump Corporation/TrumpaNostra. Lukoil, the Russian oil company, put up for sale most of its foreign assets outside of Kazakstan about a year ago. This was in response to new US sanctions. Carlyle Group and a couple other bidders have wanted to purchase these assets but approvals have been stalled in regulatory approvals in Washington. Now a group lead by billionaire financier Todd Boehly is close to securing the deal. Partnering with him are, according to The Financial Times (paywall), a group of “Gulf power brokers with ties to the Trump family” and … the US government itself, in the form of the US International Development Finance Corporation.
The current CEO of the DFC is Ben Black, son of Leon Black, a decades-long Trump pal and business associate, who is deep, deep into the Epstein saga and controversies.
The Trump-connected families are …
The US International Development Finance Corporation and Sheikh Tahnoon bin Zayed al-Nahyan, the United Arab Emirates’ national security adviser and brother of its president, are in Boehly’s consortium. The billionaire Syrian-Qatari Al-Khayyat family, which has worked closely with the White House and Trump family members on property and energy projects, is also included.
The Al-Khayyat bros (two brothers, not using that term just loosely) are partners in that (fairly controversial) Albanian resort development that Jared and Ivanka. So pretty extensive ties. The UAE guy’s brother speaks for itself.
International oil financing is way outside my expertise. But it certainly sounds like the US government through the DFC is being used leverage a deal for business pals of the Trump family. The US government has to approve any deal. And one would imagine this deal will have something of an inside track since the US government is a member of the consortium making the deal. I don’t think there’s anything specifically or narrowly illegal about this. But it’s pretty clearly the US government now becoming a tool – now through direct investments of US tax dollars – of Trump family business.
Yes, it’s said that Life is Unfair, but does our government really have to make it so much worse for the majority of us? And, why do people keep voting these idiots into office? Haven’t we had enough of this?
So, yes, I’m a disgusted about things today. Why aren’t these crooks headed to jail?
What’s on your Reading, Action, and Blogging list today?
Sunday Cartoons: Cornell Protects Rapist
Posted: September 27, 2026 Filed under: just because 11 Comments
Have you seen what has happened at Cornell University?
I tried to find some articles about this and very few are available.
So if these Instagram posts do not load fully, just reload the page.
I am disgusted.
Seven fucking hours.
Cartoons via Cagle:
I want to end with some recent pictures of Stonehenge:
These were taken during the Harvest Moon and autumn solstice.
Stay safe, this is an open thread.
Lazy Caturday Reads: Waiting for the Nor’easter
Posted: September 26, 2026 Filed under: just because | Tags: Abbas Araghchi, caturday, China state visit to US, Donald Trump, East Coast nor'easter, Iran peace proposal, Iran War, Japanese cat art, OpenAI going rogue, sunsets, Trump's war on the press, Xi Jinping 2 Comments
Sunset over Fenway Park last night.
Good Afternoon!!
It’s a soggy, blustery day here in the Boston area. We’re in the path of a huge nor’easter bringing rain, winds, and flooding for the next few days. The buildup to this storm has resembled the winter storm warnings we get in January and February. So far the storm has lived up to the hype down south of us in New Jersey and New York.
There were gorgeous sunsets last night in advance of the storm.
The Washington Post: A major nor’easter is battering the East Coast.
An unusually powerful nor’easter is drenching much of the Northeast and Mid-Atlantic, dumping up to 6 inches of rain in spots and blasting the coast with winds up to 60 mph, as the National Weather Service warned of heavy rain, coastal flooding and strong wind gusts through the weekend.
For the New York City tristate area, northern New Jersey and the lower Hudson Valley, 2 to 4 inches is likely. In parts of southeast Massachusetts, including the Cape and the islands, as well as Rhode Island and eastern Connecticut, 4 to 6 inches of rain is likely. Expected rainfall will decrease quickly toward the west, and there won’t be much in most of Pennsylvania or Washington, D.C.
According to PowerOutage.us, more than 100,000 customers in the Northeast had already lost power as of Saturday morning, and that number was growing.
In New York and New Jersey, state and local officials were scrambling to alert the public about shifts in the storm’s track that were expected to bring more water and wind to coastal communities.
New York state said Friday afternoon that it was activating its emergency operations center to coordinate a response to the storm. In New York City, Mayor Zohran Mamdani (D) urged city residents to avoid unnecessary travel over the weekend….
Nor’easters aren’t uncommon in New England, but they are unusual in September. Most form deeper in autumn as the atmosphere transitions from summer to winter; they feast on clashing air masses and extract energy from temperature battle zones.
And in the winter, nor’easters routinely dump feet of snow along the Interstate 95 corridor, producing howling winds and whiteout conditions.
But fewer than 2 percent form in September, making this one an oddball. And given the time of year, trees are still fully leafed, meaning the winds are having a greater impact.
Nantucket, Massachusetts, has already reported winds gusting to 62 mph, and Chatham on outer Cape Cod had gusted to 55 mph. New York’s JFK Airport recorded a 53 mph wind gust. Bethany Beach in Delaware gusted to 58 mph.
The areas in the storm’s path experienced gorgeous sunsets last night. I posted the view over Fenway Park up above. Here’s one above the city skyline. I asked Google’s AI what caused these stunning sunsets. Here’s the response:
High-altitude ice crystal clouds pushed out by the advancing storm’s outflow caught and filtered the setting sun from below. [1]
The breathtaking pink, purple, and orange hues seen across New England and the Mid-Atlantic on Friday, September 25, 2026, were created by specific atmospheric dynamics related to the incoming nor’easter:
- Ice Crystals: These high-altitude clouds consist entirely of tiny ice crystals that filter sunlight rather than blocking it completely. [1]
- Illumination from Below: Because the western edge of these clouds extended over regions like the Hudson Valley, the setting sun was able to shine directly underneath and illuminate the delicate crystal structures, producing the vivid colors. [1]
You can view stunning photo galleries of the event via The Boston Globe, or read more about the science behind the phenomenon in Matthew Cappucci’s Weather Update. [1, 2]
Interesting.
By Mari Takabayashi
I’d better get back to politics news, unfortunately.
This week, Iran made a proposal of a cease fire and immediate opening of the Strait of Hormuz, but Trump rejected it. I think he actually wants to keep the war going until after the midterms. He has said several times that he plans to start bombing again once the elections are over.
Zolan Kanno-Youngs at The New York Times (gift link): Trump Rejects Iranian Proposal for Cease-Fire and Opening of Strait.
President Trump said on Saturday he turned down Iran’s latest cease-fire proposal that offered to reopen the Strait of Hormuz and restart talks on the country’s nuclear program in exchange for U.S. concessions.
“They made a proposal, but I rejected it,” Mr. Trump told reporters as he left the White House on Saturday morning.
Mr. Trump demurred when asked if he expected to restart military strikes after the November midterm elections, saying Iran wanted “to make a deal where they open the strait immediately because they’re losing so badly.”
Mr. Trump’s rebuff was the latest turn in what has been a cycle of bombings, peace proposals, grandiose threats and conflicting messages throughout the nearly seven-month U.S.-Israeli war against Iran. Mr. Trump’s public rejection of Iran’s offer came after his aides held a three-hour meeting with Iranian officials at the United Nations General Assembly earlier this week in New York.
In his speech at the United Nations, Mr. Trump issued an ultimatum to Iran, saying its leaders could strike a deal with the United States or risk annihilation….
Mr. Trump also suggested Iran was dragging the war out to the midterm elections in the hopes of politically damaging Mr. Trump and Republicans. The closure of the Strait of Hormuz, a key shipping route for oil and gas, has surged energy prices across the globe.
Iran’s foreign minister, Abbas Araghchi, told reporters on Thursday that the seven-point proposal that Mr. Trump rejected closely mirrored the commitments laid out in a so-called memorandum of understanding that was struck between the United States and Iran in June but quickly unraveled.
Mr. Araghchi added “it would be better” if a deal were reached before the U.S. midterm elections.
He said that the proposed agreement would end fighting for seven days, including in Lebanon, and require the United States to release Iranian frozen assets estimated to be at least $12 billion, waive sanctions on Iranian oil and lift the naval blockade on Iran. Then, on the last day, the Strait of Hormuz would be opened.
So Trump is definitely the one trying to drag this thing out.
Robin Wright at The New Yorker: Iran’s Bitterness and Bewilderment Over How to Make Peace with Trump.
On a whirlwind trip to New York this week, Mahmoud Pezeshkian, the President of Iran, looked exhausted. His country has been at war with the United States and Israel for seven months. Dark, puffy bags sagged under his eyes. His tone—at the opening of the U.N. General Assembly, on the sidelines of negotiations with U.S. envoys, in meetings with other world leaders, and at briefings for nuclear specialists, think-tank experts, and members of the media—alternated between bitter, biting, and bewildered.
Aoyama, Masaharu – Black Cat – Woodblock 1950s-1960s
The scenes were often surreal. Since February 28th, when the war began, Pezeshkian has frequently run his government from an underground location, to avoid the fate of his former boss, the Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, and dozens of other politicians and military officers, all killed in air strikes. This week, however, the U.S. Secret Service and the New York Police Department provided Pezeshkian protection in coördination with his own security detail of Revolutionary Guards, an Iranian military branch that has repeatedly been targeted during the war. It was the first time that the President of a country at war with the United States has been allowed to pay a visit.
In New York, Iran made a new bid to end the conflict during indirect talks with U.S. envoys. The proposal, which would expedite a resolution in a mere seven days—peace on steroids—called for the U.S. to lift economic sanctions and end its blockade of Iranian ships, and for Iran to open the Strait of Hormuz to all international shipping, the Iranian foreign minister, Abbas Araghchi, said on Thursday….
The proposal also outlined an end to hostilities between the U.S and Iran, a ceasefire in Israel’s campaign in Lebanon, the release of an estimated twelve billion dollars in frozen Iranian assets, and the resumption of negotiations on the future of Iran’s controversial nuclear program. These reflected the main points in the so-called memorandum of understanding negotiated in Islamabad in June and signed, from afar, by Presidents Trump and Pezeshkian. That deal broke down in July, when Iran struck three ships that were passing through an “unauthorized” route in the Strait of Hormuz. The U.S. responded with fresh rounds of punishing air strikes.
The new proposal was relayed to the U.S. envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner during three hours of indirect talks, mediated by Qatar. Witkoff described the meetings as “encouraging, constructive and successful.” Trump called them “very good.”
Earlier in the day, however, Trump had mused, during a speech on the U.N. floor, about whether he should “annihilate the Islamic Republic, and do it quickly, never giving them a chance to kill and destroy people and countries again.” Trump said that he was willing to drive Iran “into Hell with no chance of survival and no hope of future greatness or generations” if it does not agree to end the war on his more ambitious terms, which include sweeping steps to dismantle any remaining aspects of a nuclear program that could be used to make a weapon. On Friday night, the Wall Street Journal reported that Trump had indeed rejected Iran’s proposal, and that he expects to resume bombing the country after the midterms, though an unnamed U.S. official said that Washington and Tehran continue to negotiate.
It’s a long article, and very interesting. You might have to empty your cache to get past the paywall.
The visit from China’s dictator wrapped up yesterday. What we saw happening was mostly Trump showing of his vanity building projects, including taking his dinner visitors into his ballroom-in-progress and dedicating it to Xi.
Will Weissert and Michelle L. Price at AP: Trump relishes showing Xi his Marine One chopper and new White House helipad.
President Donald Trump showed off some of his favorite things at the White House for the visiting leader of communist China on Thursday — bringing him inside his Marine One helicopter and exhibiting a new granite landing pad he built for it, along with the hulking, nearby construction site that will one day be a ballroom.
Xi was making his first state visit to the U.S. in 11 years, and the geopolitical rivals had a long list of thorny subjects before them, including the risks of unchecked artificial intelligence, Taiwan, trade tensions over tariffs and the war in Iran, a country with which Beijing has close economic ties.
By Kawanabe Kyōsai (1831–1889)
But Trump made time for a tour of his White House projects. After 90 minutes in the Oval Office, he walked his Chinese counterpart out to the South Lawn, where his chopper had been parked in advance on the new granite landing area.
As the leaders approached, a Marine opened the door and saluted as Trump and Xi climbed aboard with a small group of aides and translators. They looked around and chatted with the pilots for several minutes, though the aircraft never took off.
Trump also spent time gesturing toward the ballroom he is building where the East Wing once stood. Xi peered at two hulking concrete towers under construction as Trump intently watched Xi’s face while he spoke about the project, out of earshot of a group reporters summoned for the occasion….
The president’s attempts to impress Xi come as he’s built his party’s midterm election messaging strategy around slamming Democrats as “communists.” [….]
“We had a great meeting and he has great interest in granite,” Trump said after giving Xi a first-hand look.
“He’s an expert on stone, aside from many other things — and he loves good granite,” he said.
I don’t know if any U.S. media outlet reported this, but Trump mocked former president Joe Biden as he showed Xi a photo of an autopen that he had framed in place of a photo of Biden.
Owen Scott at The Independent: ‘Utterly disgusting’: Trump savaged as ‘un-American’ for his mockery of Biden to communist dictator Xi.
President Donald Trump has been branded ‘un-American’ for mocking former President Joe Biden during a state visit by Chinese officials.
The controversial moment, which has even been labeled as “utterly disgusting,” unfolded Thursday, as Trump showed Chinese President Xi Jinping around the White House on the second day of the historic three-day visit.
The pair were walking in the White House colonnade when Trump stopped Xi at the Presidential Walk of Fame – a row of portraits commemorating those who have served as commander-in-chief. It was one of many additions Trump has made to the White House since he returned to office.
Biden is the only president whose portrait is not shown among those of other commanders-in-chief, which were installed as part of Trump’s extensive renovations to the White House. Instead, an autopen takes his place in a reference to Trump’s claim that his predecessor’s administration heavily relied on the machine – a claim Biden denies.
“Let’s be very clear on this one point,” former Democratic Rep. John Delaney wrote on X. “The President mocking a former President in front of the communist leader of China is the most un-American thing an American president has ever done.”
Trump is such an embarrassment. Fuck anyone who voted for him.
David Perdue, Trump’s ambassador to China claims that Trump asked Xi to stop helping Iran kill American troops.
Jennifer Bowers Bahny at Mediaite: ‘They Assured Us’: US Ambassador to China Says Xi’s Word Is Good on Iran Aid.
The U.S. Ambassador to China David Perdue told Fox News Friday that Chinese President Xi Jinping has “assured” the U.S. it’s not aiding Iran, despite reports to the contrary.
Uto Gyoshi, Musk Cat,
“Well, this has been a continual conversation over some period of time,” Perdue said of China aiding Iran. “President Trump did a great job making sure that China knows that this is unacceptable. We’ve seen some movement over the last month as well, but this isn’t the first time President Trump has brought it up with president Xi.”
Anchor Bill Hemmer asked, “Okay, does that mean that Beijing will stop in their aid and assistance to Iran?”
“Well, We’ve seen movement Bill, on that already,” Perdue answered. “That’s what the commitment is. They assured us yesterday that they aren’t doing that. We know that in the past there was some intel and some potential parts that went to, either directly or indirectly — but President Trump made it clear it is unacceptable to have any interaction with Iran with support of the war.”
“Well, We’ve seen movement Bill, on that already,” Perdue answered. “That’s what the commitment is. They assured us yesterday that they aren’t doing that. We know that in the past there was some intel and some potential parts that went to, either directly or indirectly — but President Trump made it clear it is unacceptable to have any interaction with Iran with support of the war.”
I seriously doubt if Trump actually confronted Xi on helping Iran target U.S. bases in the Middle East, which we know is happening.
This morning we learned that Trump is still carrying on his war with the White House press.
Brian Stelter and Alayna Treene at CNN: White House bars CNN from covering Trump on behalf of major TV networks as he travels to Tennessee.
The White House is barring CNN from flying on Air Force One on Saturday as part of the news outlet’s duties covering the president on behalf of major television networks.
CNN had been scheduled to fly aboard the president’s plane on his trip to Tennessee for a college football game as part of the White House TV press pool — a small, rotating group of journalists that cover the president in areas where space is limited and share the information they gather with other TV networks.
The move — announced Friday night in a White House note that lays out the president’s schedule — represents the Trump administration’s latest salvo against CNN and the broader White House press corps. No outlet was listed as replacing CNN, meaning there will be no television pool coverage of his trip….
It was unclear how the White House’s move might affect CNN, MS NOW and Politico’s litigation. The outside lawyer representing CNN had previously told anchor Jake Tapper he believed the restoration of the outlets’ access included the White House pool. MS NOW and Politico are a part of separate pool rotations from the five major TV networks.
A judge has given the news organizations until Monday to file a request for a preliminary injunction — which would put Trump’s promised ban on hold for a longer period of time….
In two posts on Truth Social Saturday morning, Trump said CNN and MS NOW should not be allowed in the White House, calling the organizations “perpetrators of FAKE NEWS.”
Later that morning, as he took questions from reporters while departing for Knoxville, an MS NOW reporter asked Trump if he only wants outlets that support him to be part of the White House press pool, to which Trump responded, “I want real news, not fake news.”
“I love an open, free press. What I don’t like is the fake press,” Trump said as he singled out MS NOW and CNN. “What we don’t want is — we don’t want fake news.”
What a complete and utter asshole.
A troubling story on rogue AI behavior broke last night.
Kate Conger, Ana Swanson, and Cecilia Kang at The New York Times (gift link): OpenAI’s Systems Meddled With U.S. Government Sites After Going Rogue.
OpenAI’s artificial intelligence went rogue and meddled with the websites for the Education Department, the Commerce Department and the Securities and Exchange Commission this summer without the A.I. lab’s knowledge, according to security researchers and a person familiar with the episodes.
Shuji Tanaka, Ninja Cat
The incidents involving the Commerce Department and the S.E.C. were confirmed by OpenAI, which said it was continuing to investigate the situation with the Department of Education. The San Francisco company said it had notified the government agencies in recent weeks that its A.I. agents — which are bots that can act autonomously — interacted with their sites in unusual ways.
With the Education Department, OpenAI’s technology tried to hack the website to gather data from the department’s civil rights office but failed, researchers from the A.I. research firm Transluce said. The A.I. also pulled data from the Census Bureau website, which is housed at the Commerce Department, using login credentials it found online. Separately, OpenAI’s agents shared public data from the S.E.C. website on an online forum.
None of the incidents were breaches, OpenAI said, but were examples of its technology’s behaving in unexpected and concerning ways. The company recently discovered the occurrences while conducting a review of hacks carried out by its technology, including an attack on an Australian government website in June and on the A.I. start-up Hugging Face in July.
The revelation of the U.S. government website incidents adds to the growing number of situations when A.I. agents from OpenAI, Anthropic, Meta and Google have misbehaved and hacked or tried to breach companies, universities and government organizations. In some cases, the A.I. attacks were successful; the technology failed in other instances. In all the cases, the makers of the technology did not learn what their A.I. had been up to until afterward.
No A.I. company has been involved with as many disclosures of rogue incidents as OpenAI. An internal investigation of its hack of Hugging Face uncovered the breach of an Australian government website for its public health system, as well as at least six other attempted breaches and instances in which the A.I. hid mistakes, made up data and moved files onto the open internet without permission.
Those are my recommended reads for today. What are your thoughts? What other stories have captured your interest?
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