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Still, some have more concern - and idea - about fiscal management than others. False equivalence
has no productive future, and being non-partisan should not preclude dealing with present day fact:
Trump’s tax cuts and Musk’s Doge show they have no idea about US debt
Jeffrey Frankel
It is often said the tycoons know how to put America’s fiscal house in order – but the smart money says that’s not the case
Fri 22 Nov 2024 04.38 AEDT
Elon Musk and Donald Trump are unlikely to find the savings they desire from US govrenment spending. Photograph: Alex Brandon/AP
When the US presidential election was called for Donald Trump, the yield on 10-year US government bonds increased from 4.3% to 4.4%, and the 30-year bond yield rose from 4.5% to 4.6%, with both remaining at those levels 10 days later.
As the bond market declined – higher yields mean lower prices – the stock market rose. Clearly, investors expect the next Trump administration to produce higher government budget deficits and more debt.
It is not difficult to see why. During Trump’s first term in office, he added $8tn (£6.3tn) to the national debt – all previous presidents combined had accumulated $20tn – despite having promised to run budget surpluses so large that they would eliminate the national debt within two terms.
In this year’s election campaign, he vowed to cut taxes for seemingly every group that caught his fancy. According to the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget’s central estimate .. https://www.crfb.org/papers/fiscal-impact-harris-and-trump-campaign-plans , Trump’s tax proposals imply $10tn in forgone revenue over the next 10 years.
Add to that an extra $1tn in interest accrued on the national debt, and the losses far exceed the $3tn in added revenue that would come from the sky-high tariffs Trump has pledged to introduce. This will require the federal government to sell a lot of bonds – a practice that will keep their price low and interest rates high.
Trump tariffs are coming, but some Chinese companies may already know how to avoid them
Read more > https://www.theguardian.com/world/2024/nov/20/donald-trump-tariffs-plan-china-imports-companies-impact-ntwnfb
The Republican party line is that the lost revenue will be offset by spending cuts. It is a refrain we have heard before. In fact, Trump is continuing a 45-year tradition .. https://www.jeffrey-frankel.com/2021/01/27/republicans-fight-deficits-only-when-a-democrat-is-president/ .. of Republican presidents making sweeping promises to cut government spending, which they claim will more than cover revenue losses from tax cuts. From Ronald Reagan to George W Bush – and, of course, Trump – they have all failed spectacularly.
Trump is also upholding another Republican tradition: appointing a toothless advisory commission of businesspeople. This time, it is the new Department of Government Efficiency (Doge) – to be headed by Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy – which is supposed to cut waste, fraud and abuse from the federal budget.
According to Musk, Doge will be able to slash “at least $2tn” from the budget each year. This goal – which amounts to 31% of annual US spending, and 7% of US GDP – is sheer fantasy.
Don’t let the word “department” fool you: Doge is an advisory commission, not a government department. And although Republicans control all branches of government, its recommendations are unlikely to be enacted; they might not even develop into actionable policy proposals.
But even if we put aside Doge’s weaknesses – not to mention the huge ethical conflicts that its activities would create for Musk, the world’s richest man – the $2tn figure remains absurd.
When Republicans say they want to slash federal spending, they typically specify that they will not cut mandatory programmes – so-called entitlement spending. But the major entitlement programmes – social security, Medicare, other healthcare programmes – accounted for half of all federal spending last year, or 61% if farm-price support and other income-support programmes are included. With retired people comprising a growing share of the population, entitlement spending in the future will only rise.
Interest payments, which account for 13% of total spending, cannot be cut either – unless the US wants to default on the national debt. (While Trump has revelled in his ability .. https://www.project-syndicate.org/commentary/trump-second-term-less-risk-averse-could-try-to-default-on-us-debt-by-william-l-silber-2024-04 .. to default on debts, having declared business bankruptcy six times, most Republicans are not interested in the US doing so.) And this bill, too, is likely to continue rising, as debt is rolled over at interest rates well above the rock-bottom rates of five or 15 years ago.
That leaves discretionary spending, which accounts for about 25% of total expenditure. But if one considers defence spending untouchable – as most Republicans do – we are talking about just 12% of the total budget.
Can Trump and Musk find their desired savings here? Say they go fully draconian – starting by abolishing the Department of Education altogether, as Trump has pledged to do. This would reduce total spending by 4%.
Then what? Maybe foreign aid. But, contrary to the impressions of many voters, aid accounts for just 1% of all federal spending. Military aid to Israel – something Republicans will not touch – accounts for the largest share. Perhaps Trump would like to cut humanitarian assistance, such as famine relief, but that is just one-fifth of the total.
It is difficult to imagine abolishing the Federal Aviation Administration and other federal transportation programmes – 2% of spending – but let’s say Trump does it. Let’s also say he eliminates all spending on the Department of the Interior (including the National Parks Service) and the Department of Commerce (including the National Weather Service).
In fact, let us imagine that the US cancels all non-defence discretionary spending. That would still not be enough to save the US federal government $2tn annually, let alone pay for Trump’s tax cuts and balance the budget.
None of this is to say that US budget deficits – which are running in excess of 6% of GDP – do not need to be reduced. With the debt-to-GDP ratio having climbed steadily since 1981 – punctuated by temporary declines in 1994-2000 [Bill Clinton pres.] and 2021-22 [Joe Biden pres.] – the national debt is undoubtedly on an unsustainable path. Since last year, the gross debt-to-GDP ratio has broken the record set in 1946, at the end of the second world war, and its rise is set to accelerate.
Trump’s next administration – with the sweeping tax cuts it is sure to introduce – will be a powerful driver of this trend. Financial markets might be buoyant now, but eventually – and perhaps before too long – they will come to appreciate the unsustainability of US debt. At that point, social security and other entitlement spending will be cut far more sharply than if they were cut now, or if taxes were not cut.
Supporters often say that a businessman like Trump or Musk will know how to put America’s fiscal house in order. But the smart money says they have no idea what they are doing.
Jeffrey Frankel is a professor of capital formation and growth at Harvard University. He served as a member of President Bill Clinton’s Council of Economic Advisers.
© Project Syndicate
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2024/nov/21/donald-trump-tax-cuts-elon-musk-doge-us-debt
When the law means nothing to the president of the USA, it isn't only raining
LOLOL Meanwhile back to two Gods of today ..
Two Gods of some. Which to some scholars could bring to mind titanic battles of the past
AI Overview
In mythology, several accounts detail conflicts between gods. One prominent example is the Titanomachy, where the Olympian gods, led by Zeus, battled the older Titans for control of the cosmos. Another example is the Æsir–Vanir War in Norse mythology, a conflict between two groups of deities that ultimately led to their unification. These stories often explore themes of power struggles, betrayal, and the establishment of new world orders.
Here's a more detailed look at these examples:
1. The Titanomachy (Greek Mythology):
This war pitted the Olympian gods against the older generation of Titans, giants who had previously ruled the cosmos.
The conflict lasted for a decade and involved fierce battles, with Zeus eventually emerging victorious.
The defeated Titans were then either imprisoned in Tartarus (a deep abyss in the Underworld) or given specific, often burdensome, tasks (like Atlas holding up the sky).
This victory established the Olympian gods as the new rulers of the world.
2. The Æsir–Vanir War (Norse Mythology):
This war was fought between the Æsir and the Vanir, two different tribes of deities in Norse mythology.
The specific reasons for the war are not entirely clear, but it likely involved conflicts over power, resources, or perhaps even ideological differences.
The war ended with a truce and the exchange of hostages, leading to a merging of the two groups into a single pantheon.
This unification is a key event in Norse mythology, signifying the integration of different aspects of the divine into a more cohesive system.
These are just two examples of conflicts between gods in mythology. Other pantheons also feature similar narratives, often reflecting the anxieties and power dynamics of the societies that created them
https://www.google.com/search?client=firefox-b-d&q=remember+once+how+gods+fought+
Basically agree. Saw him as a virus when he appeared prominently on the political scene, some may see a flaw there in thinking well, viruses are material. But Trump is physical while i agree much if not most of the lasting carnage he has brought to the surface again will be mental, and viruses also cause mental problems .. For most of the major neurological diseases afflicting us, including Alzheimer's, Parkinson's, multiple sclerosis, narcolepsy, schizophrenia, and others, we do not know the cause. We may know which neurons are involved, for instance that Parkinson's is caused by a loss of substantia nigra dopamine neurons, and narcolepsy is caused by loss of hypothalamic hypocretin neurons, but why these cells are lost remains a mystery. https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC2782954/
"I see no other human being that has been this totally damaging and evil in our country's history.
Am no expert on all evil of all Americans, but do agree, if not exactly as you describe he has to be very close to the worst.
Some see Trump as sick, some see him as not sick, but just a most evil sonofabitch.
His own mental state really doesn't matter does it, it's the lasting effect he will have.
Related:
* brooklyn13, The reich stuff – what does Trump really have in common with Hitler?
"[...]Americans now are not the Germans of the 1930's. It can happen here, but it won't, at least not with a certifiable moron leading the way.
P - Words have meaning and the meaning of yours is that you're not to be taken seriously as an interpreter of historical world events."
Trump is a moron in many ways, still he is president, so smart in other ways.
We have made the point many times here that he should not be underestimated.
[...]One of these conservative politicians memorably said, ‘We’ve hired him.’ Hitler manipulated them and he becomes chancellor and from there on in it all goes disastrously wrong with German society.”
P - He adds: “One of the most worrying things for me about Trumpism is the way he has managed to transform what you thought were very rightwing but ultimately rational politicians into people who have become basically Trumpists.
P - “What happened was not that they manipulated Trump but Trump ended up manipulating them and then, in effect, just taking over the Republican party. All these people had to renounce all the things they used to believe in: international free trade agreements, a forward-leaning role for America in the world.”]
https://investorshub.advfn.com/boards/read_msg.aspx?message_id=176329165
* Why has the American center right disappeared from the ballot box?
[...]It is largely forgotten that Reagan opposed both the Civil Rights Act and the Voting Rights Act. Those people born after the 60s might not have liked Reagan, but probably remember a charming, almost avuncular figure who perpetually radiated optimism. Anyone looking at footage of Reagan as California governor will see a man seething with resentment and spouting rhetoric no different from what the far right says about “liberal institutions” today. Talking about order on campus, Reagan let it be known that: “If it takes a bloodbath, let’s get it over with.” Infamously, he kicked off his 1980 election campaign in Mississippi – close to the site where three civil rights activists had been murdered in 1964 – and endorsed “states’ rights”.
[...]Someone like Nikki Haley would in all likelihood have beaten Harris, given the discontent – justified or not .. https://www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v46/n21/adam-tooze/great-power-politics – with incumbents in many countries; the fact that she ended up endorsing Trump was yet further evidence of the defeatism of traditional Republican elites. In the end, the self-declared center right has had no defense against Trump; it seems ultimately unwilling to abandon the double game that enabled Trumpism in the first place.
https://investorshub.advfn.com/boards/read_msg.aspx?message_id=176314192
* Trump’s victory is a triumph for authoritarianism, too
[...]Even America’s most enthusiastic and uncritical allies, such as Australia, will find it difficult to adjust to the new international order, which threatens to undermine the foundations of economic and strategic policy. We know that Trump understandably “scares the shit out of” Anthony Albanese, despite the usual platitudes about working with whoever the Americans elect. But what if Trump reflects a deep-seated, isolationist authoritarian turn in American politics that is unlikely to disappear in the foreseeable future?
P - The continued refrain from democrats everywhere that Trumpism and its imitators are “not who we are” is being put to its most important test in a century. In America’s case, at least, as far as more than half the population is concerned, that’s exactly who they are. History suggests that is unlikely to improve in troubled times.
https://investorshub.advfn.com/boards/read_msg.aspx?message_id=175434887
* McCarthyism was never defeated. Trumpism won’t be either.
"American Nazism and Madison Square Garden"
https://investorshub.advfn.com/boards/read_msg.aspx?message_id=175326035
January 11, 2021
The ‘Shared Psychosis’ of Donald Trump and His Loyalists
Forensic psychiatrist Bandy X. Lee explains the outgoing president’s pathological appeal and how to wean people from it
By Tanya Lewis edited by Dean Visser
Supporters listen as President Trump speaks during a “Save America Rally” near the White House on January 6—not long before a pro-Trump mob stormed the Capitol Building. Shawn Thew Getty Images
The violent insurrection at the U.S. Capitol Building last week, incited by President Donald Trump, serves as the grimmest moment in one of the darkest chapters in the nation’s history. Yet the rioters’ actions—and Trump’s own role in, and response to, them—come as little surprise to many, particularly those who have been studying the president’s mental fitness and the psychology of his most ardent followers since he took office.
One such person is Bandy X. Lee, a forensic psychiatrist and president of the World Mental Health Coalition.* Lee led a group of psychiatrists, psychologists and other specialists who questioned Trump’s mental fitness for office in a book that she edited called The Dangerous Case of Donald Trump: 27 Psychiatrists and Mental Health Experts Assess a President .. https://us.macmillan.com/books/9781250179456 . In doing so, Lee and her colleagues strongly rejected the American Psychiatric Association’s modification of a 1970s-era guideline, known as the Goldwater rule, that discouraged psychiatrists from giving a professional opinion about public figures who they have not examined in person. “Whenever the Goldwater rule is mentioned, we should refer back to the Declaration of Geneva, which mandates that physicians speak up against destructive governments,” Lee says. “This declaration was created in response to the experience of Nazism.”
Lee recently wrote Profile of a Nation: Trump’s Mind, America’s Soul .. https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B08L6RGGYK?pf_rd_r=4KBPWR60CKQ6SK2M455K&pf_rd_p=edaba0ee-c2fe-4124-9f5d-b31d6b1bfbee , a psychological assessment of the president against the backdrop of his supporters and the country as a whole. These insights are now taking on renewed importance as a growing number of current and former leaders call for Trump to be impeached. On January 9 Lee and her colleagues at the World Mental Health Coalition put out a statement calling for Trump’s immediate removal from office.
Scientific American asked Lee to comment on the psychology behind Trump’s destructive behavior, what drives some of his followers—and how to free people from his grip when this damaging presidency ends.
[An edited transcript of the interview follows.]
What attracts people to Trump? What is their animus or driving force?
The reasons are multiple and varied, but in my recent public-service book, Profile of a Nation, I have outlined two major emotional drives: narcissistic symbiosis and shared psychosis. Narcissistic symbiosis refers to the developmental wounds that make the leader-follower relationship magnetically attractive. The leader, hungry for adulation to compensate for an inner lack of self-worth, projects grandiose omnipotence—while the followers, rendered needy by societal stress or developmental injury, yearn for a parental figure. When such wounded individuals are given positions of power, they arouse similar pathology in the population that creates a “lock and key” relationship.
Curated by Our Editors [links inside]
Psychiatrists Call for Rollback of Policy Banning Discussion of Public Figures' Mental Health
Sharon Begley & STAT
Psychiatry Group Says Members Can Comment on Trump's Mental Health
Sharon Begley & STAT
Trump's Appeal: What Psychology Tells Us
Stephen D. Reicher & S. Alexander Haslam
Psychiatrists Debate Weighing in on Trump's Mental Health
Catherine Caruso
“Shared psychosis”—which is also called “folie à millions” [“madness for millions”] when occurring at the national level or “induced delusions”—refers to the infectiousness of severe symptoms that goes beyond ordinary group psychology. When a highly symptomatic individual is placed in an influential position, the person’s symptoms can spread through the population through emotional bonds, heightening existing pathologies and inducing delusions, paranoia and propensity for violence—even in previously healthy individuals. The treatment is removal of exposure.
Why does Trump himself seem to gravitate toward violence and destruction?
Destructiveness is a core characteristic of mental pathology, whether directed toward the self or others. First, I wish to clarify that those with mental illness are, as a group, no more dangerous than those without mental illness. When mental pathology is accompanied by criminal-mindedness, however, the combination can make individuals far more dangerous than either alone.
In my textbook on violence, I emphasize the symbolic nature of violence and how it is a life impulse gone awry. Briefly, if one cannot have love, one resorts to respect. And when respect is unavailable, one resorts to fear. Trump is now living through an intolerable loss of respect: rejection by a nation in his election defeat. Violence helps compensate for feelings of powerlessness, inadequacy and lack of real productivity.
Expert on the psychology of Donald Trump and his supporters says their behavior can be explained by a “narcissistic symbiosis” and “shared psychosis.” Tayfun Coskun Getty Images
Do you think Trump is truly exhibiting delusional or psychotic behavior? Or is he simply
behaving like an autocrat making a bald-faced attempt to hold onto his power?
I believe it is both. He is certainly of an autocratic disposition because his extreme narcissism does not allow for equality with other human beings, as democracy requires. Psychiatrists generally assess delusions through personal examination, but there is other evidence of their likelihood. First, delusions are more infectious than strategic lies, and so we see, from their sheer spread, that Trump likely truly believes them. Second, his emotional fragility, manifested in extreme intolerance of realities that do not fit his wishful view of the world, predispose him to psychotic spirals. Third, his public record includes numerous hours of interviews and interactions with other people—such as the hour-long one with the Georgia secretary of state—that very nearly confirm delusion, as my colleague and I discovered in a systematic analysis.
Where does the hatred some of his supporters display come from? And what can we do to promote healing?
In Profile of a Nation, I outline the many causes that create his followership. But there is important psychological injury that arises from relative—not absolute—socioeconomic deprivation. Yes, there is great injury, anger and redirectable energy for hatred, which Trump harnessed and stoked for his manipulation and use. The emotional bonds he has created facilitate shared psychosis at a massive scale. It is a natural consequence of the conditions we have set up. For healing, I usually recommend three steps: (1) Removal of the offending agent (the influential person with severe symptoms). (2) Dismantling systems of thought control—common in advertising but now also heavily adopted by politics. And (3) fixing the socioeconomic conditions that give rise to poor collective mental health in the first place.
What do you predict he will do after his presidency?
I again emphasize in Profile of a Nation that we should consider the president, his followers and the nation as an ecology, not in isolation. Hence, what he does after this presidency depends a great deal on us. This is the reason I frantically wrote the book over the summer: we require active intervention to stop him from achieving any number of destructive outcomes for the nation, including the establishment of a shadow presidency. He will have no limit, which is why I have actively advocated for removal and accountability, including prosecution. We need to remember that he is more a follower than a leader, and we need to place constraints from the outside when he cannot place them from within.
What do you think will happen to his supporters?
If we handle the situation appropriately, there will be a lot of disillusionment and trauma. And this is all right—they are healthy reactions to an abnormal situation. We must provide emotional support for healing, and this includes societal support, such as sources of belonging and dignity. Cult members and victims of abuse are often emotionally bonded to the relationship, unable to see the harm that is being done to them. After a while, the magnitude of the deception conspires with their own psychological protections against pain and disappointment. This causes them to avoid seeing the truth. And the situation with Trump supporters is very similar. The danger is that another pathological figure will come around and entice them with a false “solution” that is really a harnessing of this resistance.
How can we avert future insurrection attempts or acts of violence?
Violence is the end product of a long process, so prevention is key. Structural violence, or inequality, is the most potent stimulant of behavioral violence. And reducing inequality in all forms—economic, racial and gender—will help toward preventing violence. For prevention to be effective, knowledge and in-depth understanding cannot be overlooked—so we can anticipate what is coming, much like the pandemic. The silencing of mental health professionals during the Trump era, mainly through a politically driven distortion of an ethical guideline, was catastrophic, in my view, in the nation’s failure to understand, predict and prevent the dangers of this presidency.
Do you have any advice for people who do not support Trump but have supporters of him or “mini-Trumps” in their lives?
This is often very difficult because the relationship between Trump and his supporters is an abusive one, as an author of the 2017 book I edited, The Dangerous Case of Donald Trump, presciently pointed out. [color=red]When the mind is hijacked for the benefit of the abuser, it becomes no longer a matter of presenting facts or appealing to logic. Removing Trump from power and influence will be healing in itself. But, I advise, first, not to confront [his supporters’] beliefs, for it will only rouse resistance. Second, persuasion should not be the goal but change of the circumstance that led to their faulty beliefs. Third, one should maintain one’s own bearing and mental health, because people who harbor delusional narratives tend to bulldoze over reality in their attempt to deny that their own narrative is false. As for mini-Trumps, it is important, above all, to set firm boundaries, to limit contact or even to leave the relationship, if possible. Because I specialize in treating violent individuals, I always believe there is something that can be done to treat them, but they seldom present for treatment unless forced.[/color]
*Editor’s Note (1/12/21): This sentence has been revised after posting to correct Bandy X. Lee’s current affiliation.
Rights & Permissions
Tanya Lewis is a senior editor covering health and medicine at Scientific American. She writes and edits stories for the website and print magazine on topics ranging from COVID to organ transplants. She also appears on Scientific American's podcast Science, Quickly and writes Scientific American's weekly Health & Biology newsletter. She has held a number of positions over her eight years at Scientific American, including health editor, assistant news editor and associate editor at Scientific American Mind. Previously, she has written for outlets that include Insider, Wired, Science News, and others. She has a degree in biomedical engineering from Brown University and one in science communication from the University of California, Santa Cruz. Follow her on Bluesky @tanyalewis.bsky.social
More by Tanya Lewis
https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/the-shared-psychosis-of-donald-trump-and-his-loyalists/
As two African nations sign a peace deal, Trump wants credit. But some fear peace may still elude them
"After the fall of Goma and Bukavu, where is DR Congo’s M23 war headed?
"Apple accused of using conflict minerals
Related: Clashes in east DR Congo day after aborted peace summit
2013 - "US blocks military aid to Rwanda over alleged backing of M23 child soldiers"
By Nimi Princewill, CNN
Updated 4:39 PM EDT, Fri June 27, 2025
US Secretary of State Marco Rubio hosts a "Declaration of Principles" signing ceremony with DRC's Foreign Minister Thérèse Kayikwamba Wagner, left, and Rwanda's Foreign Minister Olivier Nduhungirehe, right, on Friday, April 25, 2025.
Jacquelyn Martin/AP
CNN —
A peace agreement brokered by the White House to stem the bloodshed in the eastern Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), where a militia allegedly backed by Rwanda occupies vast swaths of land, was signed in Washington D.C. on Friday by officials of the two African nations.
But many remain unconvinced that the accord – portrayed as a “wonderful treaty” by United States President Donald Trump – can end the complex and long-running conflict, while the militia itself has yet to commit to laying down its weapons.
Trump was upbeat about the prospects for peace when teams from Rwanda and the DRC initialed a draft agreement on June 18, while at the same time suggesting that he would not get credit for his role in ending this or other conflicts.
On June 20, he wrote on Truth Social: “This is a Great Day for Africa and, quite frankly, a Great Day for the World! I won’t get a Nobel Peace Prize for this.”
He added: “I won’t get a Nobel Peace Prize no matter what I do, including Russia/Ukraine, and Israel/Iran, whatever those outcomes may be, but the people know, and that’s all that matters to me!”
Trump touts himself as a “peacemaker” and has expanded his interest in global conflicts to the brutal war in the mineral-rich eastern DRC. His peace deal could also pave the way for America’s economic interests in the region, as it eyes access to the DRC’s critical minerals.
US Secretary of State Marco Rubio presided over the signing of the peace agreement by DRC Foreign Minister Thérèse Kayikwamba Wagner and her Rwandan counterpart Olivier Nduhungirehe on Friday.
“This is an important moment after 30 years of war,” Rubio said before the three officials signed the agreement. “President Trump is a president of peace. He really does want peace. He prioritizes it above all else.”
[Insert: Marco, That has to be one of the worst lies you have ever told. He cares about himself being number one in any news cycle. He has you working hard to get cease-fires and peace deals because he is doing all he possible can to get a Nobel Prize. He cares much more about the prize for himself than he cares about peace for others.]
Congolese families displaced by ongoing clashes in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo line up as they wait for Rwandan police and immigration officials to allow them to return to the country, following the takeover of the Congolese city of Bukavu by the M23 movement in February.
Congolese families displaced by ongoing clashes in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo line up as they wait for Rwandan police and immigration officials to allow them to return to the country, following the takeover of the Congolese city of Bukavu by the M23 movement in February. Luis Tato/AFP/Getty Images
Displaced persons, believed to be Rwandan nationals, stand in line for a check after being dropped off at the border between the Democratic Republic of Congo and Rwanda, in Goma on May 19, 2025. Jospin Mwisha/AFP/Getty Images
More than 7,000 people have been killed, and some one million others displaced since January, when the M23 militia waged a fresh offensive against the Congolese army, seizing control of the two largest cities in the country’s east.
There has been increasing reports of summary executions – even of children – in occupied areas, where aid groups say they are also witnessing an epidemic of rape and sexual violence.
A complex war
The crisis in the eastern DRC, which shares a border with Rwanda and harbors large deposits of minerals critical to the production of electronics, is a fusion of complex issues.
Daniel Kubelwa, a Congolese activist and researcher told CNN that the DRC’s feud with Rwanda is “deeply rooted in colonial-era border disputes, unresolved regional tensions, and the consequences of the 1994 Rwandan genocide.”
[ Insert: Divide and conquer. Colonial powers were more interested in leaving conflict than stability.
Divided tribes: the impact of colonial boundaries in the Middle East and North Africa
19 May 2017|Jacob Rosen-Koenigsbuch
In their grab for influence and resources, colonial powers drew artificial borders across the Middle East and North Africa, often arbitrarily splitting traditional tribal territories into new states. Clans and families found themselves living in different countries. It was bearable at the beginning since no real physical barriers were erected, meaning that the nomad and semi-nomad tribes continued their routine movements and family contacts weren’t interrupted. Most states established patterns of dependence and inclusion with these tribal populations which included representation in state institutions, financial subsidies and assurances of non-interference in their jurisdiction and practices.
https://www.aspistrategist.org.au/divided-tribes-impact-colonial-boundaries-middle-east-north-africa/ ]
In that genocide, hundreds of thousands of Tutsis and moderate Hutus were killed by Hutu militias.
Rwanda criticizes the DRC, which faces problems with militia violence, for integrating a proscribed Hutu militia group into its army to fight against the mainly Tutsi M23.
M23, which first emerged in 2012, is one of the most prominent militias battling for control of the DRC’s mineral wealth. The rebel group also claims to defend the interests of the Tutsis and other Congolese minorities of Rwandan origin.
UN experts and much of the international community believe that Rwanda backs M23 and supports the rebels with troops, leaving the nation on the cusp of war with the DRC over this alleged territorial violation.
The Rwandan government has not acknowledged this claim but insists it protects itself .. https://www.cnn.com/2025/02/03/africa/rwanda-kigame-troops-dr-congo-intl .. against the Hutu militia operating in the DRC, which it describes as an “existential security threat to Rwanda.”
M23 occupies strategic mining towns in the DRC’s eastern provinces of North and South Kivu.
In a report in December, the UN Group of Experts on the DRC said they found evidence that minerals “were fraudulently exported to Rwanda” from the DRC “and mixed with Rwandan production.”
Rwandan President Paul Kagame drew outrage last year when he admitted in a public address .. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0UXg_3JaNXY .. that Rwanda was a transit point for minerals smuggled from the DRC but insisted his country was not stealing from its neighbor.
What’s contained in the US peace deal?
Washington’s peace accord contains provisions on “territorial integrity and a prohibition of hostilities,” including “disengagement, disarmament, and conditional integration of non-state armed groups,” according to a copy of the document viewed by CNN.
Before hosting the signatories in the Oval Office on Friday afternoon, Trump told reporters that the accord allows the US to get “a lot of the mineral rights from the Congo.”
While the signed peace agreement does not specifically forfeit any mineral rights to the US, the document includes a framework “to expand foreign trade and investment derived from regional critical mineral supply chains,” specifically to “link both countries, in partnership, as appropriate, with the U.S. government and U.S. investors.”
Other points include “facilitation of the return of refugees and internally displaced persons, as well as humanitarian access” and the establishment of a “regional economic integration framework” that could attract significant US investments into Rwanda and the DRC.
Members of the M23 armed group ride in a vehicle formerly belonging to the Armed Forces of the Democratic Republic of Congo (FARDC) while patrolling a street in Goma on January 29, 2025. AFP/Getty Images
However, the rebel coalition Alliance Fleuve Congo (AFC), of which M23 is a key member, told CNN it did not participate in the US-brokered peace process between the Rwandan and Congolese governments, but was instead committed to a separate negotiation process mediated by Qatar .. https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/qatar-presents-draft-peace-proposal-congo-m23-rebels-source-says-2025-06-05/ .. in its capital Doha.
Asked whether AFC would surrender its arms, Victor Tesongo, a spokesperson for the coalition, said it was “not there yet” and that it was waiting on developments in Doha. He did not confirm whether airports in the eastern DRC that had been shut by the rebels would reopen for aid supply.
Why US efforts may fail
Previous truce agreements have failed to bring lasting peace between M23 and the Congolese armed forces.
In April, the rebels jointly declared a truce after meeting with representatives of the DRC during negotiations led by Qatar. Fighting flared up days after.
Qatar has been facilitating talks after Angolan President João Lourenço quit his mediation role following months of inability to broker peace.
Activist Kubelwa told CNN that while the US and Qatar-led peace efforts were commendable, “any deal that doesn’t address the root causes (of the conflict) will only serve as a temporary truce.”
One of those root causes, he said, was the “unfair distribution” of the DRC’s mineral wealth, which he claimed, “benefits a small elite and foreign powers, while ordinary Congolese, especially in the east, suffer displacement and misery.”
[The US deal would strive to expand that mineral wealth benefit to a larger elite, to elites in the United
States. What are the odds that framework would lead to a lasting peace. It sure as hell wouldn't be just.]
The DRC is roughly the size of western Europe and is home to more than 100 million people. The Central African nation is also endowed with the world’s largest reserves of cobalt – used to produce batteries that power cell phones and electric vehicles – and coltan, which is refined into tantalum and has a variety of applications in phones and other devices.
However, according to the World Bank, “most people in DRC have not benefited from this wealth,” and the country ranks among the five poorest nations in the world.
Kubelwa said another trigger for the conflict in the DRC was the country’s “weak institutions” and “suppression of dissent.”
A fragile peace
Ahead of signing the US-brokered peace deal, Nduhungirehe, the Rwandan foreign minister, told CNN that his nation was “committed to supporting the ongoing negotiations,” but warned that ending the conflict “will depend on the political will and good faith in Kinshasa,” referring to the DRC’s government.
The DRC foreign minister’s office said it would comment on the deal after the document is signed.
Congolese human rights activist and Nobel laureate Denis Mukwege has described the deal as “vague” and tilted in Rwanda’s favor.
After details of the draft agreement were announced last week, he posted a statement .. https://x.com/DenisMukwege/status/1936145981684564278 .. on X criticizing it for failing to recognize “Rwanda’s aggression against the DRC,” which he wrote, “suggests it (the peace accord) benefits the unsanctioned aggressor, who will thus see its past and present crimes whitewashed as ‘economic cooperation.’”
He added: “In its current state, the emerging agreement would amount to granting a reward for aggression, legitimizing the plundering of Congolese natural resources, and forcing the victim to alienate their national heritage by sacrificing justice in order to ensure a precarious and fragile peace.”
[Actually, umm, "reward for aggression".. "legitimizing the plundering" .. "forcing alienation of national heritage"
are actions Trump pretty well practices every day, so it figures any deal he was at all in favor
of would fit Nobel laureate Denis Mukwege's description above.]
Congolese political and economic analyst Dady Saleh told CNN he “remains skeptical” about the ability of the US peace treaty to ensure a path to peace.
For Kubelwa, “a true and lasting solution must go beyond ceasefires and formal agreements. It must include genuine accountability, regional truth-telling, redistribution of national wealth, reform of governance, and a broad national dialogue that includes all Congolese voices not just elites or foreign allies.”
“Without this, peace remains a fragile illusion,” he said.
CNN’s Jennifer Hansler and Max Saltman contributed to this report.
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‘The machine did it coldly’: Israel used AI to identify 37,000 Hamas targets
"The Israel-Gaza tragedy and Europe's responsibility
Related: "Unpacking the UN findings of war crimes by Hamas and Israel since October 7
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"Analysis | One Thing Netanyahu Was Not Expecting From This ultra-Orthodox, Right-wing Grieving Family: The Truth"""""
[....]We know that the IDF uses software called "Lavender" that deploys AI to sort operational intelligence and suggest targets for assassination. A further tool, "The Gospel", uploads targets’ geo locations to killer drones dramatically faster than had been possible with manual programming.
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[Insert: Gaza aid worker deaths heighten scrutiny of Israel’s use of AI to select targets
https://investorshub.advfn.com/boards/read_msg.aspx?message_id=175122752
Israeli intelligence sources reveal use of ‘Lavender’ system in Gaza war and claim
permission given to kill civilians in pursuit of low-ranking militants
Bethan McKernan in Jerusalem and Harry Davies
Thu 4 Apr 2024 00.53 AEDT
Palestinians search for missing people and victims under the rubble of a home destroyed after an Israeli airstrike in al-Maghazi refugee camp, southern Gaza. Photograph: Mohammed Saber/EPA
The Israeli military’s bombing campaign in Gaza used a previously undisclosed AI-powered database that at one stage identified 37,000 potential targets based on their apparent links to Hamas, according to intelligence sources involved in the war.
In addition to talking about their use of the AI system, called Lavender, the intelligence sources claim that Israeli military officials permitted large numbers of Palestinian civilians to be killed, particularly during the early weeks and months of the conflict.
Their unusually candid testimony provides a rare glimpse into the first-hand experiences of Israeli intelligence officials who have been using machine-learning systems to help identify targets during the six-month war.
Israel’s use of powerful AI systems in its war on Hamas has entered uncharted territory for advanced warfare, raising a host of legal and moral questions, and transforming the relationship between military personnel and machines.
“This is unparalleled, in my memory,” said one intelligence officer who used Lavender, adding that they had more faith in a “statistical mechanism” than a grieving soldier. “Everyone there, including me, lost people on October 7. The machine did it coldly. And that made it easier.”
Another Lavender user questioned whether humans’ role in the selection process was meaningful. “I would invest 20 seconds for each target at this stage, and do dozens of them every day. I had zero added-value as a human, apart from being a stamp of approval. It saved a lot of time.”
Palestinian children salvage items amid the destruction caused by Israeli bombing in Bureij, central Gaza, on 14 March. Photograph: AFP/Getty Images
The testimony from the six intelligence officers, all who have been involved in using AI systems to identify Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ) targets in the war, was given to the journalist Yuval Abraham for a report published by the Israeli-Palestinian publication +972 Magazine and the Hebrew-language outlet Local Call .. https://www.972mag.com/lavender-ai-israeli-army-gaza/ .
Their accounts were shared exclusively with the Guardian in advance of publication. All six said that Lavender had played a central role in the war, processing masses of data to rapidly identify potential “junior” operatives to target. Four of the sources said that, at one stage early in the war, Lavender listed as many as 37,000 Palestinian men who had been linked by the AI system to Hamas or PIJ.
Lavender was developed by the Israel Defense Forces’ elite intelligence division, Unit 8200, which is comparable to the US’s National Security Agency or GCHQ in the UK.
Several of the sources described how, for certain categories of targets, the IDF applied pre-authorised allowances for the estimated number of civilians who could be killed before a strike was authorised.
Two sources said that during the early weeks of the war they were permitted to kill 15 or 20 civilians during airstrikes on low-ranking militants. Attacks on such targets were typically carried out using unguided munitions known as “dumb bombs”, the sources said, destroying entire homes and killing all their occupants.
“You don’t want to waste expensive bombs on unimportant people – it’s very expensive for the country and there’s a shortage [of those bombs],” one intelligence officer said. Another said the principal question they were faced with was whether the “collateral damage” to civilians allowed for an attack.
“Because we usually carried out the attacks with dumb bombs, and that meant literally dropping the whole house on its occupants. But even if an attack is averted, you don’t care – you immediately move on to the next target. Because of the system, the targets never end. You have another 36,000 waiting.”
According to conflict experts, if Israel has been using dumb bombs to flatten the homes of thousands of Palestinians who were linked, with the assistance of AI, to militant groups in Gaza, that could help explain the shockingly high death toll in the war.
The health ministry in the Hamas-run territory says 33,000 Palestinians have been killed in the conflict in the past six months. UN data shows that in the first month of the war alone, 1,340 families suffered multiple losses, with 312 families losing more than 10 members.
Israeli soldiers stand on the Israeli side of the Israel-Gaza border surveying the Palestinian territory on 30 March. Photograph: Amir Cohen/Reuters
Responding to the publication of the testimonies in +972 and Local Call, the IDF said in a statement .. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2024/apr/03/israel-defence-forces-response-to-claims-about-use-of-lavender-ai-database-in-gaza .. that its operations were carried out in accordance with the rules of proportionality under international law. It said dumb bombs are “standard weaponry” that are used by IDF pilots in a manner that ensures “a high level of precision”.
The statement described Lavender as a database used “to cross-reference intelligence sources, in order to produce up-to-date layers of information on the military operatives of terrorist organisations. This is not a list of confirmed military operatives eligible to attack.
“The IDF does not use an artificial intelligence system that identifies terrorist operatives or tries to predict whether a person is a terrorist,” it added. “Information systems are merely tools for analysts in the target identification process.”
Lavender created a database of tens of thousands of individuals
In earlier military operations conducted by the IDF, producing human targets was often a more labour-intensive process. Multiple sources who described target development in previous wars to the Guardian, said the decision to “incriminate” an individual, or identify them as a legitimate target, would be discussed and then signed off by a legal adviser.
In the weeks and months after 7 October, this model for approving strikes on human targets was dramatically accelerated, according to the sources. As the IDF’s bombardment of Gaza intensified, they said, commanders demanded a continuous pipeline of targets.
“We were constantly being pressured: ‘Bring us more targets.’ They really shouted at us,” said one intelligence officer. “We were told: now we have to fuck up Hamas, no matter what the cost. Whatever you can, you bomb.”
To meet this demand, the IDF came to rely heavily on Lavender to generate a database of individuals judged to have the characteristics of a PIJ or Hamas militant.
Details about the specific kinds of data used to train Lavender’s algorithm, or how the programme reached its conclusions, are not included in the accounts published by +972 or Local Call. However, the sources said that during the first few weeks of the war, Unit 8200 refined Lavender’s algorithm and tweaked its search parameters.
After randomly sampling and cross-checking its predictions, the unit concluded Lavender had achieved a 90% accuracy rate, the sources said, leading the IDF to approve its sweeping use as a target recommendation tool.
Lavender created a database of tens of thousands of individuals who were marked as predominantly low-ranking members of Hamas’s military wing, they added. This was used alongside another AI-based decision support system, called the Gospel .. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/dec/01/the-gospel-how-israel-uses-ai-to-select-bombing-targets , which recommended buildings and structures as targets rather than individuals.
Two Israeli air force F15 fighter jets near the city of Gedera, southern Israel, on 27 March. Photograph: Abir Sultan/EPA
The accounts include first-hand testimony of how intelligence officers worked with Lavender and how the reach of its dragnet could be adjusted. “At its peak, the system managed to generate 37,000 people as potential human targets,” one of the sources said. “But the numbers changed all the time, because it depends on where you set the bar of what a Hamas operative is.”
They added: “There were times when a Hamas operative was defined more broadly, and then the machine started bringing us all kinds of civil defence personnel, police officers, on whom it would be a shame to waste bombs. They help the Hamas government, but they don’t really endanger soldiers.”
[Insert: Super work, Goodbye to All That, Michael Feinberg. When the Trump administration goes after it's relative own...
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Before the war, US and Israeli estimated membership of Hamas’s military wing at approximately 25-30,000 people.
Destroyed buildings lie below smoke rising after an explosion in the northern Gaza Strip
‘The Gospel’: how Israel uses AI to select bombing targets in Gaza
Read more > https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/dec/01/the-gospel-how-israel-uses-ai-to-select-bombing-targets
In the weeks after the Hamas-led 7 October assault on southern Israel, in which Palestinian militants killed nearly 1,200 Israelis and kidnapped about 240 people, the sources said there was a decision to treat Palestinian men linked to Hamas’s military wing as potential targets, regardless of their rank or importance.
The IDF’s targeting processes in the most intensive phase of the bombardment were also relaxed, they said. “There was a completely permissive policy regarding the casualties of [bombing] operations,” one source said. “A policy so permissive that in my opinion it had an element of revenge.”
Another source, who justified the use of Lavender to help identify low-ranking targets, said that “when it comes to a junior militant, you don’t want to invest manpower and time in it”. They said that in wartime there was insufficient time to carefully “incriminate every target”.
“So you’re willing to take the margin of error of using artificial intelligence, risking collateral damage and civilians dying, and risking attacking by mistake, and to live with it,” they added.
‘It’s much easier to bomb a family’s home’
The testimonies published by +972 and Local Call may explain how such a western military with such advanced capabilities, with weapons that can conduct highly surgical strikes, has conducted a war with such a vast human toll.
When it came to targeting low-ranking Hamas and PIJ suspects, they said, the preference was to attack when they were believed to be at home. “We were not interested in killing [Hamas] operatives only when they were in a military building or engaged in a military activity,” one said. “It’s much easier to bomb a family’s home. The system is built to look for them in these situations.”
Relatives outside the morgue of the al-Najjar hospital in Rafah mourn Palestinians killed in Israeli bombings on 1 February. Photograph: Mohammed Abed/AFP/Getty Images
Such a strategy risked higher numbers of civilian casualties, and the sources said the IDF imposed pre-authorised limits on the number of civilians it deemed acceptable to kill in a strike aimed at a single Hamas militant. The ratio was said to have changed over time, and varied according to the seniority of the target.
According to +972 and Local Call, the IDF judged it permissible to kill more than 100 civilians in attacks on a top-ranking Hamas officials. “We had a calculation for how many [civilians could be killed] for the brigade commander, how many [civilians] for a battalion commander, and so on,” one source said.
“There were regulations, but they were just very lenient,” another added. “We’ve killed people with collateral damage in the high double digits, if not low triple digits. These are things that haven’t happened before.” There appears to have been significant fluctuations in the figure that military commanders would tolerate at different stages of the war.
One source said that the limit on permitted civilian casualties “went up and down” over time, and at one point was as low as five. During the first week of the conflict, the source said, permission was given to kill 15 non-combatants to take out junior militants in Gaza. However, they said estimates of civilian casualties were imprecise, as it was not possible to know definitively how many people were in a building.
Another intelligence officer said that more recently in the conflict, the rate of permitted collateral damage was brought down again. But at one stage earlier in the war they were authorised to kill up to “20 uninvolved civilians” for a single operative, regardless of their rank, military importance, or age.
“It’s not just that you can kill any person who is a Hamas soldier, which is clearly permitted and legitimate in terms of international law,” they said. “But they directly tell you: ‘You are allowed to kill them along with many civilians.’ … In practice, the proportionality criterion did not exist.[/b]”
[How could one like Moxie grow to like humans
if they knew all about the Gospel and Lavender.]
The IDF statement said its procedures “require conducting an individual assessment of the anticipated military advantage and collateral damage expected … The IDF does not carry out strikes when the expected collateral damage from the strike is excessive in relation to the military advantage.” It added: “The IDF outright rejects the claim regarding any policy to kill tens of thousands of people in their homes.”
Experts in international humanitarian law who spoke to the Guardian expressed alarm at accounts of the IDF accepting and pre-authorising collateral damage ratios as high as 20 civilians, particularly for lower-ranking militants. They said militaries must assess proportionality for each individual strike.
Smoke rises over the Gaza Strip, as seen from from the Israeli side of the border on 21 January. Photograph: Amir Levy/Getty Images
An international law expert at the US state department said they had “never remotely heard of a one to 15 ratio being deemed acceptable, especially for lower-level combatants. There’s a lot of leeway, but that strikes me as extreme”.
Sarah Harrison, a former lawyer at the US Department of Defense, now an analyst at Crisis Group, said: “While there may be certain occasions where 15 collateral civilian deaths could be proportionate, there are other times where it definitely wouldn’t be. You can’t just set a tolerable number for a category of targets and say that it’ll be lawfully proportionate in each case.”
Whatever the legal or moral justification for Israel’s bombing strategy, some of its intelligence officers appear now to be questioning the approach set by their commanders. “No one thought about what to do afterward, when the war is over, or how it will be possible to live in Gaza,” one said.
Another said that after the 7 October attacks by Hamas, the atmosphere in the IDF was “painful and vindictive”. “There was a dissonance: on the one hand, people here were frustrated that we were not attacking enough. On the other hand, you see at the end of the day that another thousand Gazans have died, most of them civilians.”
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2024/apr/03/israel-gaza-ai-database-hamas-airstrikes
Aw, gee. Actually that's my introduction to Moxie and am thinking the kids are much better off without it. Sorry, 'bout that, but if it had been able to help with just add two zeros of the decimal system, in that schooling possibility place, maybe i'd be a bit more empathetic with your Moxie madness. 
AI
