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- China blocks Meta’s $2bn acquisition of AI start-up Manus
It comes after months of scrutiny by Chinese regulators over deal struck with Facebook owner. [TheTopNews] Read More.55 mins ago - ‘It’s Insane’: Fox News Host Brian Kilmeade Rips Suggestion Trump Assassin...
Fox News host Brian Kilmeade called out conspiracy theorists on Monday for suggesting that Saturday’s assassination attempt against President Donald Trump during the White House Correspondents’ Association dinner was “staged” as part of an attempt to boost his approval ratings. “I love the fact the president started giving the facts out. It doesn’t stop the conspiracy theories, but hopefully it squelches them,” said Kilmeade during a discussion about the incident on Fox & Friends. “All of a sudden I’m hearing, ‘Well the whole thing is– Was it staged? Was it staged so the president’s approval ratings can go up?'” Co-host Lawrence Jones protested, “It’s unbelievable.” “It’s insane,” continued Kilmeade. “Nothing could possibly have been staged. FBI Director Kash Patel on that coming up.” The New York Times reported on Sunday that conspiracy theorists had been claiming Saturday’s incident was “staged” as “part of an apparent plot by Mr. Trump or others to distract from bad polling numbers or the war with Iran.” According to the Times, the term “staged” quickly became a trending topic on social media, with “more than 300,000 posts on X by midday Sunday.” During Monday’s episode of Fox & Friends, the co-hosts also called for better security to protect the president, likening the situation to increased airport security following the September 11 terrorist attacks. “The [White House] ballroom obviously needs to be built, but in the meantime, we’ve still got to secure the events outside of the ballroom,” said Jones. “Every single event that the president or cabinet members are gonna be [at] are not gonna be government events. Like for example, I’m not sure this Correspondents’ Association Dinner could have been held at the ballroom if it was built. It’s a private organization.” He questioned, “Can we only protect federal buildings at this point? What a disgrace as a country. I mean, we just got to do better.” Co-host Ainsley Earhardt went on to suggest, “I mean, you have these crazy people, and you have to protect our president against this. And like he said over the weekend, it is probably the most dangerous job, and is it gonna be an inconvenience? Yes. Look after 9/11 what we had to go through, what we still have to go through, at the airports. Ziploc bags, the X amount of ounces per, you know, all our hairspray.” “All that stuff just to make sure we’re safe on… [TheTopNews] Read More.1 hour ago - Trump Backs Comedian’s Viral Bid to Change Name of ICE: ‘GREAT IDEA!!! DO IT...
(AP Photo/Julia Demaree Nikhinson) President Donald Trump urged officials to move forward with a proposal to rename Immigration and Customs Enforcement so that the acronym ICE can be switched up to NICE, a viral idea first pushed by comedian Adam Carolla during a Fox News interview that seems designed to troll critics. Posting late Sunday on Truth Social, the president shared a tweet by a supporter suggesting the rebrand and gloating that the change would mean “the media has to say NICE agents all day everyday.” Trump responded: “GREAT IDEA!!! DO IT.” (Screengrab via Truth Social) The “NICE” rebrand concept has long existed as a meme among Trump’s political base, particularly during periods of heightened criticism of ICE’s enforcement tactics. The meme appears to have originated with Carolla, who appeared on Fox News to speak with host Jesse Watters in September. At the time, the comedian joked that given the agency is a “national organization,” the administration should “start it with the word N.” “Can you imagine Gavin Newsom?” the comedian joked to Watters. “These NICE agents pulling up in NICE vans!” The Fox News segment came as the agency faced sustained public scrutiny over its role in the president’s immigration crackdowns, which have sparked protests in several cities. Earlier this year in Minneapolis, demonstrations escalated following two separate incidents in which federal agents shot and killed two U.S. citizens, Renee Good and Alex Pretti, during unrest tied to enforcement operations. The White House, meanwhile, has not formally announced any steps toward implementing the proposed name change, and it remains unclear whether Trump’s directive signals a genuine policy initiative. ICE, established in 2003 under the Department of Homeland Security, is responsible for enforcing federal laws governing border control and customs. Any official name change could require administrative action and may face legal hurdles.The post Trump Backs Comedian’s Viral Bid to Change Name of ICE: ‘GREAT IDEA!!! DO IT’ first appeared on Mediaite. [TheTopNews] Read More.1 hour ago - Secret Service Agent Who Took Bullet for Reagan Says Security Did ‘Hell of a G...Tim McCarthy, a retired Secret Service agent who took a bullet for former President Ronald Reagan during an assassination attempt in 1981, praised security’s response after an armed man stormed the White House Correspondents’ Association Dinner, where President Donald Trump was seated on Saturday night. After the armed man was taken down during the incident at the Hilton Washington – the same hotel where the attempted assassination against Reagan took place decades prior – security at the event was widely criticized on social media. During a Sunday appearance on NewsNation, however, McCarthy urged critics to “ratchet down the rhetoric,” insisting that the Secret Service and local law enforcement had actually done “a hell of a good job” protecting the president. “I think for the most part, the Secret Service got it right, and as you know, I was critical of what happened in Butler, in West Palm Beach, but I’m hardly critical about it now,” he said. “This guy really didn’t get too far. He ran through the metal detectors – he’s not the first one to do it – exchanged gunfire with agents and uniformed division officers. He wasn’t even on the same floor, ultimately, as the president. He was on several floors below – though actually below, the ballroom is two floors high – and was tackled by an agent, never got to the stairs to go down.” McCarthy continued: Now, security is in layers, and if he’d gotten to the bottom of the stairs, he would’ve been met with more resistance. If he’d gotten to the doors of the ballroom, more resistance, and if he walked in the door, as you know, he was facing several counter-assault teams, MPD SWAT teams, the president’s already evacuated to a safe room, possibly already upstairs in the limo and in the garage that was built, where the old assassination attempt was, and back at the White House. So from what I can tell right now talking to my colleagues, it was handled pretty well. You never want something like this to happen. Security was tested, security responded, and at this point it did pretty well. Tackled him before he even got to the stairs to even get close to coming down by the president. So so far, based on what I know, I’m pretty satisfied with what the Secret Service did on this occasion. He added, “The response by… [TheTopNews] Read More.2 hours ago
- What Happens If America Nationalizes AI?
AI companies are beginning to entertain the possibility that they could cease to exist. This notion was, until recently, more theoretical: A couple of years ago, an ex-OpenAI employee named Leopold Aschenbrenner wrote a lengthy memo speculating that the U.S. government might soon take control of the industry. By 2026 or 2027, Aschenbrenner wrote, an “obvious question” will be circling through the Pentagon and Congress: Do we need a government-led program for artificial general intelligence—an AGI Manhattan Project? He predicted that Washington would decide to go all in on such an effort.Aschenbrenner may have been prescient. Earlier this year, at the height of the Pentagon’s ugly contract dispute with Anthropic, Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth warned that he could invoke the Defense Production Act (DPA), a Cold War–era law that he reportedly suggested would allow him to force the AI company to hand over its technology on whatever terms the Pentagon desired. The act is one of numerous levers the Trump administration can pull to direct, or even commandeer, AI companies. And the companies have been giving the administration plenty of reason to consider doing so.Future bots could help design and carry out biological, nuclear, and chemical warfare. They could be weaponized to take down power grids, monitor congressional emails, and black out major media outlets. These aren’t purely hypothetical concerns: Earlier this month, Anthropic announced it had developed a new AI model, Claude Mythos Preview, capable of orchestrating cyberattacks on the level of elite, state-sponsored hacking cells, potentially putting a private company’s cyber offense on par with that of the CIA and NSA. In an example of Mythos’s power, Anthropic researchers described how the model used a “moderately sophisticated multi-step exploit” to work around restrictions and gain broad internet access, then emailed a researcher—much to his surprise—while he was eating a sandwich in the park.Washington is getting antsy about the power imbalance. Over the past year, multiple senators have proposed legislation that would order federal agencies to explore “potential nationalization” of AI. Murmurs of possible tactics abound—including more talk within the administration of the DPA after Anthropic’s Mythos announcement, one person with knowledge of such discussions told us. Meanwhile, Silicon Valley is watching carefully. In recent weeks, Elon Musk, OpenAI’s CEO Sam Altman, and Palantir’s CEO Alex Karp have publicly spoken about the possibility of nationalization. Lawyers who represent Silicon Valley’s biggest AI firms are paying attention.So what if… [TheTopNews] Read More.2 hours ago - Joe Scarborough Slams ‘Stupid’ Idea to Hold WHCD in ‘Open Hotel’: ‘Can...Morning Joe host Joe Scarborough slammed the “extraordinarily stupid” idea to host the White House Correspondents’ dinner, and the “concentration” of cabinet members it invites, in “an open hotel” as a decision that has “never made sense.” The remarks came as the MS NOW host opened the first show since chaos erupted at the annual gala on Saturday, when 31-year-old suspect Cole Allen allegedly forced his way toward the ballroom with guns and knives before being apprehended. A Secret Service agent was shot during the incident, though protected by a bulletproof vest. A full 1,052-word manifesto was acquired by the New York Post on Sunday, in which Allen, who had checked into the hotel in the days prior, admitted he was targeting top administration officials and President Donald Trump, while mocking the lack of security. Opening Monday’s Morning Joe, Scarborough said that he and co-host Mika Brzezinski had been saying “for years” that the venue was inadequate. “It just seems extraordinarily stupid to use an open hotel and get State of the Union-type concentration of power in the United States, especially at a time of war against a country that’s been the epicenter of terrorism since 1979, and have them walking around, going in and out of parties, standing to get their pictures taken before they go in. It never made sense to me. It’s never made sense to Mika,” he said. He continued: “We haven’t been in, I don’t know, maybe a decade. I can’t remember the last time, but it seems like such an unsecure place.” Noting the volume of MAGA accounts that used the moment to demand approval for Trump’s ballroom project, he then added: “But I just can’t think of a dumber, dumber place to have this than at the Washington Hilton. I know it’s history, but history be damned when you’re putting your secretary of defense, you’re putting your FBI director, you’re putting the secretary of treasury, putting the vice president, you’re putting the president –” Brzezinski interrupted to argue that it “was still on the Trump administration” or any other administration “in power” to “have that concentration of power in one place at a time of war.” Scarborough, however, pushed on with his point: “Anybody that has been there understands you aren’t securing the entire hotel. You’re not checking people’s bags. You’re not doing the basic things that would be done, like,… [TheTopNews] Read More.2 hours ago
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