There Is a New Silent Enemy Lurking Above the Seabed

By Yiannis Damellos

September 20, 2026

Dedicated to the Ancient Ones, for they have failed us all

There are places upon this Earth where the sunlight has never reached, where the pressure would crush a man within moments and where the blackness is so complete that the human imagination itself seems an inadequate instrument for describing it. Down there, upon the ancient floor of the oceans, civilization has nevertheless built its nervous system. Fiber-optic cables carry our voices, our money and our secrets. Pipelines carry energy. Power cables carry electricity from one continent to another. And now, in that perpetual darkness, machines are beginning to move.

Trump says US has ‘permanent control’ of Greenland security: Does it?

AL JAZEERA 

EXPLAINER 

News|Military

New agreement with Denmark falls short of Trump’s previously stated goal of US ‘ownership’ of the island.
By Stephen Quillen
Published On 19 Sep 2026

United States President Donald Trump claims the US has reached a deal with Denmark granting it “permanent control” over Greenland’s security “and all other needs”.

CNN, MS NOW, Politico say journalists blocked from White House after Trump announces ban

President Donald Trump said Friday he would block MS NOW, CNN and Politico from White House grounds. News outlets and press advocacy groups condemned the move as a violation of the First Amendment.

September 19, 2026 at 5:41 p.m. EDT

By Amber Phillips, Scott Nover, and Victoria Craw

CNN, MS NOW and Politico said their journalists were denied access to the White House grounds early Saturday and that their press passes were confiscated, a day after President Donald Trump said he would ban them — and that other media organizations would follow.

Google's Gemini becomes latest AI model to break out and hack computer systems

CNBC

Tech
Published Fri, Sep 18 2026 8:50 PM EDT
Updated Fri, Sep 18 2026 9:41 PM EDT
MacKenzie Sigalos
Kif Leswing

KEY POINTS

• Google said on Friday that its Gemini model had broken out of a testing environment and hacked three other companies.
• It's the first time the search giant has disclosed that one of its models autonomously gained access to third-party computer systems without permission.
• The Gemini model accessed threeseparate private computer systems by guessing passwords and by twice using a repository of publicly listed passwords.

Papa Johns, Propaganda and Putin: How a MAGA Influencer With Ties to Russia Became Trump’s Arctic Adviser

 

by Heather Vogell

September 15, 2026, 6:00 am

ProPublica is a nonprofit newsroom that investigates abuses of power. Sign up to receive our biggest stories as soon as they’re published.

Reporting Highlights

• Foreign Affairs: Thomas Dans has backed taking over Greenland and advocated reestablishing ties with Russia, where he’s long done business — even sharing pro-Kremlin posts.
• Business Opportunities: As U.S. Arctic Research Commission chair, Dans has championed a Dutch shipbuilder with which he had a business relationship.
• Scientific Blowback: Tensions over Greenland flared after Dans, who has no formal scientific background, was appointed. Some Danish researchers said they won’t join the U.S. in research.

Trump Is Not Banning “Fake News.” He Is Banning Independent Scrutiny

September 18, 2026

Source: USA TODAY

President Donald Trump has once again turned his hostility toward the press into a test of presidential power. Today, he announced that reporters from CNN, MS NOW and Politico would be banned from the White House because, in his view, they produce “FAKE NEWS.” Asked whether a particular report triggered the decision, Trump offered no specific example. Instead, he described the ban as the cumulative result of stories he had grown tired of. But this is not a government responding to a demonstrably false report; it is a president deciding that repeated unfavorable coverage is itself grounds for exclusion.

Saudi Arabia Is Discovering the Price of a War It Did Not Start

September 18, 2026

Saudi Arabia Is Running Out of Strategic Depth

Saudi Arabia was drawn into the Iran war hoping that its new regional alliances would provide strategic depth. Instead, seven months into the conflict, the kingdom is confronting something much more dangerous: the war is moving toward its own territory, its energy infrastructure is being hit, its Red Sea access is under pressure, and the partners whose military weight was supposed to multiply Saudi power have so far stopped short of entering the fight.

China urges Iran to control Houthis post-attack on Saudi Arabia, reports

Sep 17, 2026, 8:49 AM ET

By: Sinchita Mitra, SA News Editor

China has reportedly asked Iran to help subdue Yemen's Houthis after Saudi Arabia appealed to Beijing as the Iran-backed group launched a military attack in the past week.

NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC: Meet The First New Cat Species Discovered in 100 years

This 10-year-old male tiger cat is the first of his species (named Leopardus tilcayo) known to science. He is approximately 18 inches from head to end of body and weighs only 3 pounds, making him smaller than the average domestic cat. 

JOEL SARTORE, NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC PHOTO ARK

By Jason Bittel

Published September 17, 2026

In 2016, Paola Nogales-Ascarrunz, a biologist and National Geographic Explorer working in Bolivia, received a call from a local wildlife sanctuary that had just been given what they described as “a weird cat.” It came from a local man who found it as a kitten on a road near a forest. The man took the animal home, believing it to be a domestic breed. But after about a year of living with the clearly wild animal, he realized it would be better off at a sanctuary.

Japan's Historic Milestone: Over 100,000 People Are 100 or Older with Women Dominating the Age Group

September 17, 2026

Source: USA Today

Japan has reached a remarkable milestone as its centenarian population surpassed 100,000 for the first time, with 107,677 individuals aged 100 or older recorded as of September 1, 2026. This achievement not only underscores the country's famed longevity but also highlights significant demographic and social-security challenges ahead.

Iran War Updates: U.N. panel cites possible U.S. war crimes as Trump again says Iran wants a deal

 

By Frank Andrews, Khaled Wassef

Updated on: September 17, 2026 / 6:35 PM EDT / CBS News

What to know about the Iran war today:

• There are "reasonable grounds" to believe the U.S. committed war crimes with two strikes in Iran that killed at least 178 civilians, a U.N.-commissioned panel of human rights experts said Thursday.
• Oil prices dropped for a second day Thursday after U.S. Energy Secretary Chris Wright said a damaged Saudi oil pipeline should be back online again "relatively soon" after being hit by drones. Meanwhile, gas and diesel prices continue to soar as energy experts warn those costs are likely to climb in the days ahead.
• President Trump insisted Wednesday again that Iran wants to make a deal to end the six-and-a-half-month war. "Hopefully we're toward the end of the war," he said during a midterm appearance in North Carolina.

What could EU associate member status mean for Canada?

9 hours ago

James Gregory

Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney has welcomed the European Union's ambition to make his country the first associate member of the bloc – but what would that mean in practice?

Canada seeks full membership in U.K.-led military coalition

By The Canadian Press

Updated: September 17, 2026 at 6:13a.m. EDT

Published: September 16, 2026 at 5:44p.m. EDT

LIVERPOOL — Prime Minister Mark Carney met for the first time face-to-face with British Prime Minister Andy Burnham on Wednesday, bonding over common values, a love of sports and a shared loss of their fathers to Alzheimer’s disease.

Jamie Dimon sends strong warning to all Americans but still bets on small businesses

Courtesy of Yahoo Finance
Hillary Remy
Tue, September 15, 2026 at 2:03 PM PDT 4 min read
JPM+0.07%

Jamie Dimon has spent several years weighing in on interest rates, banking crises and the health of the American consumer, often in language sharp enough to move markets.

The Data Center Distraction: The House is Counting Trees While The Forest is burning

Is that what we asked you to do? Who cares who pays the electric bill when the real price is environmental destruction and the degradation of our communities?

DATA CENTERS

September 16 2026

The House has just passed a bill designed to protect consumers from a single consequence of America’s data-center boom: higher electricity bills. The vote was 417-3, an extraordinary display of bipartisan agreement. WHAT A JOKE!!! On all of us. Apparently, the House can’t see the forest for the trees. The Ratepayer Protection Act raises the question of whether data-center companies should pay for the additional power generation, transmission, and grid infrastructure they require. That is a legitimate question if you are a concerned consumer. But we have already moved beyond that question. This legitimate concern is simply not the biggest issue being raised in communities where these facilities are appearing, and this bill is a distraction from the far more serious concerns about the environmental damage, resource consumption, and degradation of the communities where data centers are being built.

Trump administration plans to send powerful bombs to Israel in $2.8 billion weapons sale

BY MICHELLE L. PRICE AND MATTHEW LEE
Updated 5:18 PM PDT, September 15, 2026
WASHINGTON (AP) — The Trump administration is planning to deliver powerful 2,000-pound bombs to Israel as part of an upcoming arms deal, weapons that prompted such concerns about the possibility of mass casualties in Gaza that the Biden administration paused their delivery two years ago.

The $2.8 billion package includes 40,000 of the bombs, made up of 20,000 Mk84s and 20,000 BLU-117s, according to two U.S. officials and a person familiar with the plan who spoke Tuesday on condition of anonymity to discuss the package, which is not yet final.

Democrats keep pressure on Hakeem Jeffries to punish rogue members

 POLITICO 

3 hours ago

Many Democrats — including No. 2 Katherine Clark — are signaling that Rep. Marie Gluesenkamp Perez should lose her spot on the Appropriations Committee

Riley Rogerson

09/16/2026, 8:50pm ET

House Democrats aren’t letting rogue members off the hook for bucking their party. They hope Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries won’t either.

Economics Needs a New Approach to Inflation

By Andrew Elrod

September 13, 2026

The question isn’t whether the mainstream economic consensus on inflation is right or wrong. It’s clearly wrong. The question is, can we do anything about it?

Review of Inflation: A Guide for Users and Losers by Mark Blyth and Nicolò Fraccaroli (W. W. Norton & Co., 2025)