Podcasts about Beijing

CAPTION 1940Steve Yates and Gordon Chang address China's refusal to sign the G20 finance ministers' statement, which criticized "non-market" policies. Yates views this as an honest admission that Beijing has no intention of conforming to international trade standards. He praises Treasury Secretary Bessent for maintaining a firm stance alongside allies. Anticipating the September 24th summit between Trump and Xi Jinping, Yates notes that Washington has delayed a $14 billion arms sale to Taiwan to preserve positive "mood music." Finally, Yates warns of the "CRINK" axis—comprising China, Russia, Iran, and North Korea—collaborating on military supply chains and conflicts. (3)

CAPTION: 1955.CONTENTS THE JOHN BATCHELOR SHOW, 9-2-2026Saudi Arabia Seeks Nuclear EnrichmentAndrea Stricker discusses the Trump administration's submission of a Section 123 nuclear cooperation agreement with Saudi Arabia to Congress. This agreement could grant Saudi Arabia dual-use uranium enrichment and plutonium reprocessing capabilities, potentially enabling nuclear weapon development. A major concern is Saudi Arabia's refusal to sign the IAEA's Additional Protocol, which permits inspections of undeclared nuclear sites. Although Congress has 90 days to review and potentially block the accord, overcoming a presidential veto would require an unlikely two-thirds majority. Stricker notes the administration's claims about Chinese and Russian competition lack evidence. (1)China Rejects Global Trade ConsensusKamran Bokhari and Gordon Chang discuss China's refusal to sign a G20 finance ministers' consensus document, objecting to language targeting non-market policies that cause trade imbalances. Chang attributes this defiance to Xi Jinping's arrogance and belief in US decline. Bokhari explains that China is posturing ahead of a summit with Trump, utilizing command capitalism to flood global markets. Bokhari highlights a shifting security architecture in Asia, including Tokyo deploying fighter jets to India and Jakarta arming itself, driven by expectations of US retrenchment. Additionally, Xi Jinping maintains absolute control domestically through extensive military purges while building ties with Egypt. (2)Steve Yates Warns Of ConflictSteve Yates and Gordon Chang address China's refusal to sign the G20 finance ministers' statement, which criticized "non-market" policies. Yates views this as an honest admission that Beijing has no intention of conforming to international trade standards. He praises Treasury Secretary Bessent for maintaining a firm stance alongside allies. Anticipating the September 24th summit between Trump and Xi Jinping, Yates notes that Washington has delayed a $14 billion arms sale to Taiwan to preserve positive "mood music." Finally, Yates warns of the "CRINK" axis—comprising China, Russia, Iran, and North Korea—collaborating on military supply chains and conflicts. (3)Global Energy And Food CrisisMichael Bernstam outlines a compounding global energy and food crisis. Tensions between the US and Iran have halted critical oil shipments through the Strait of Hormuz, driving Brent crude prices up. Meanwhile, European winter natural gas prices have tripled due to storages being filled only to 62%. High gas prices also restrict fertilizer production, which, coupled with Black Sea port bombings by Russia and Ukraine, has caused a spike in global grain prices. Finally, despite US interest in Venezuelan heavy crude to produce diesel, decades of local mismanagement limit production. (4)Young Conservatives Embrace Nixon MaxingRyan Bangert explores the Gen Z trend of "Nixon maxing," where young conservatives view Richard Nixon as a heroic avatar resisting 1970s extremism. Bangert argues this aesthetic misinterprets Nixon as a revolutionary. In reality, Nixon was a counterrevolutionary who sought to preserve and revitalize established institutions based on the values of the American founding. Contrastingly, Bangert highlights the philosophical division between the destructive, post-Christian French Revolution and the enduring American Revolution. Ultimately, he urges young conservatives to appreciate Nixon's true legacy: conserving institutional checks and balances to temper flawed human nature. (5)Treasury Targets Iranian Sanctions EvasionMax Maizlish explains how the Treasury Department's FinCEN is penalizing five branches of an Egyptian bank in Dubai to curb illicit financial flows. FinCEN identified $1.8 billion in suspicious transactions linked to the Iranianregime. To effectively dismantle Iran's financial network, Maizlish argues the US must target Chinese institutions, as China purchases over 90% of Iran's crude oil. Specifically, he advocates for blacklisting the Bank of Kunlun—a state-owned Chinese entity heavily involved in Iranian sanctions evasion. Maizlish asserts that CNPC officials are fully aware of these illicit transactions, making decisive sanctions necessary. (6)El Niño Defies Weather ForecastsJeremy Zakis reports on the unpredictable impacts of the current super El Niño on Australian weather. Contrary to long-term dry forecasts, Sydney is experiencing unseasonable, rolling rain showers, while Western Australia faces extreme heat exceeding 100°F. Zakis warns that if droughts strike in late September rather than mid-October, Australia faces a catastrophic, extended bushfire season fueled by rapid undergrowth. Beyond Australia, extreme weather anomalies like French tornadoes and Southern California hurricane warnings are linked to historically high Pacific sea temperatures. Additionally, warm temperatures have caused dangerous eastern brown snakes to begin moving early. (7)brown snakes to begin moving early. (7)Axis Cooperates On Advanced WeaponryBradley Bowman and Mark Montgomery, authors of Axis of Aggressors, analyze the rising military coordination detailed in their book. They reveal a secret Russian program helping Iran build supersonic cruise missiles using ramjet engines, which pose a severe threat to US and merchant vessels in the Gulf. Furthermore, China assists Iran with chemical precursors and satellite targeting data. Beyond the Middle East, Russia engages in hybrid warfare in Europe, including attempted drone attacks in Germany. In response, Germany is significantly increasing defense spending and deploying a combat brigade to Lithuania to bolster deterrence. (8)Commodity Prices Spike Amid UnrestSimon Constable discusses recent extreme weather, including an unprecedented tornado in the south of France that damaged 300 homes. This disruption mirrors severe instability in the commodity markets, where Brent crude has surged to $94 a barrel, European gas has jumped 26%, and Black Sea grain prices have spiked up to 16%. Constable also critiques the new UK Prime Minister Andy Burnham for focusing on minor local issues rather than global crises. Finally, he reviews public backlash against data centers, which consume substantial water and over 4% of total US electricity. (9)SpaceX Builds Massive Private SpaceportBob Zimmerman highlights SpaceX's purchase of a massive plot in Louisiana to establish a private spaceport capable of hosting dozens of Starship flights daily. Zimmerman argues that SpaceX's market-driven approach ensures success, whereas state-sponsored space programs in the UK and Canada often flounder due to bureaucracy. He outlines SpaceX's progress, including recovering the prototype 13 Starship and preparing for flight 14. Finally, Zimmerman notes the successful, on-budget launch of the Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope, upgrades to NASA's Deep Space Network, and the upcoming nuclear-powered Skyfall mission to Mars. (10)

Two Mikes on America Out Loud – Fisher noted that the U.S. and Israel are on the cusp of turning Iran into one of the world's strategic pivot points and, eventually, a nuclear-armed dog of China. Beijing is already arming Iran and purchases virtually all of Iran's oil. Indeed, Mr. Fisher claimed that China will not allow Iran to be defeated and disarmed by the United States and Israel...

In this Conflicted Conversation, journalist Chris Horton talks about his new book Ghost Nation: The Story of Taiwan and Its Struggle for Survival. Chris explains: Why China wants Taiwan and why the island is vital to control of the western Pacific. Taiwan's strategic position in the First Island Chain between China, Japan and the Philippines. How a Chinese invasion, blockade or maritime quarantine of Taiwan could unfold. Why a war over Taiwan could devastate global trade and the world economy. What Taiwan's fall would mean for US power, Japan and the Philippines. Why Taiwan is an independent democracy but still officially called the Republic of China. Who the Taiwanese are: Indigenous peoples, Hoklo, Hakka and post-1949 mainlanders. How martial law, dictatorship and democratisation created modern Taiwanese identity. Why the Kuomintang, once Communist China's enemy, is now Taiwan's most Beijing-friendly major party. Whether Taiwan could eventually choose closer integration with China through democracy rather than war. Find Chris on X: www.x.com/heguisen Visit Chris's website: www.chrishortonwriter.com Join the Conflicted Community here: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://conflicted.supportingcast.fm/⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Find us on X: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://x.com/MHconflicted⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ And Facebook: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://www.facebook.com/MHconflicted⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ And Instagram: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://www.instagram.com/conflictedpod⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠megaphone.fm/adchoices⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Conflicted is a Message Heard production. Executive Producers: Jake Warren & Max Warren. Produced and edited by Thomas Small . Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

In this episode of Pekingology, Henrietta Levin, Senior Fellow with the CSIS Freeman Chair in China Studies, is joined by Kurt Campbell, former Deputy Secretary of State and President Biden's “Asia Czar.” He is currently Chairman of The Asia Group and Distinguished Fellow in Diplomacy with the Georgetown University School of Foreign Service. Henrietta and Kurt discuss how Beijing views American power, the development of U.S. strategy towards China, U.S.-China diplomacy and the characters that sat on the Chinese side of the table, and more. To learn more about Kurt Campbell's perspectives on China, you can read his April 2025 Foreign Affairs article, co-authored with Rush Doshi, ⁠Underestimating China: Why America Needs a New Strategy of Allied Scale to Offset Beijing's Enduring Advantages⁠, and his 2016 book, ⁠The Pivot: The Future of American Statecraft in Asia⁠.

Xi is visiting Egypt for the first time in a decade. Why does Cairo matter to Beijing and what does the visit tell us about Egypt’s ability to balance its relationships with China, the US and its regional partners?See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

01:20 China Stands Alone as G20 Takes Aim at Trade Imbalances03:15 House Oversight Committee Probes Birth Tourism Industry05:35 American Journalist Sentenced for Acting as Chinese Agent06:26 Officials: Chinese Shipper COSCO Allegedly Collects U.S. Intel07:24 Taiwan Firms Plan to Invest Another $20B in U.S.08:09 U.S., Australia to Invest $580M in Pacific Islands09:04 Beijing's Growing Influence in Pacific Island Nations09:38 U.S., New Zealand Pour $60M Into WWII Port Upgrade09:59 Death Toll in Nepal Floods Tops 1,10011:11 U.S., China Arm for Space War12:55 China's Disinformation Campaign Against U.S. Data Centers

Speaking at a dinner at the Rose Garden on Wednesday, President Trump said communism “never worked” as he gave a renewed warning ahead of the November midterms. The President said that he would defeat what he called the democrat communists.“They were supposed to hit socialism and then go communist,” said President Trump. “But they skipped socialism. They went right down to the bottom, and the bottom is communism, and it's never worked under different names.”Federal immigration authorities arrested nearly 51,000 illegal immigrants throughout the United States in August, a record for a single month, the Department of Homeland Security said Wednesday.The total of 50,925 caps a steady three-month growth in Immigration and Customs Enforcement arrests, surpassing June and July totals of 43,900 and 50,208, respectively.U.S. lawmakers are standing with Joshua Wong, a prominent figure in Hong Kong's pro-democracy movement. Wong now faces an additional prison term after his second conviction Wednesday under a draconian Beijing-imposed national security law.Former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi responded in a post online, writing: "Beijing's unjust prosecution of Joshua Wong is an appalling abuse of power. Everyone who truly cares about democracy should be proud to stand with him and the people of Hong Kong.”She added, “Advocacy for freedom is not a crime and the international community must immediately demand his release.”In a post on X, the Select Committee on China wrote: “Joshua Wong – already in prison on one baseless charge – was set to be released in 2027. Now, the CCP is keeping him behind bars even longer on yet another baseless charge. Joshua must not be allowed to languish in prison. He must be released immediately.”

CAPTION 1857 WALL STREET, 230 PM, PANICCONTENTS OF THE JOHN BATCHELOR SHOW 9-1-2026Economic Strength Persists Despite Oil PressuresLiz Peek observes that while Wall Street is split on whether the Federal Reserve will raise interest rates in September, the American economy remains robust. Consumer spending is strong, small business profitability is at yearly highs, and hiring remains resilient. The primary economic headwind is rising oil prices fueled by the war in Iran. Additionally, she analyzes the investment potential of rebuilding Venezuela's ruined oil infrastructure, estimating it will take five years to yield significant production increases. Finally, Peek highlights how progressive groups like the Democratic Socialists of America and Chinese misinformation bots actively oppose crucial domestic data center development. (1)Russian Hybrid Attacks Destabilize European SecurityJudy Dempsey discusses European frustration over the unexpected presence of Russia's finance minister at a G20meeting, which highlighted a lack of communication within the transatlantic alliance. She details the Leipzig drone incident—a critical near-miss attack at a vital logistics hub for Ukraine—which is suspected to be a Russian hybrid operation. Dempsey explains how Russia leverages cyber and physical threats to instill fear, polarization, and anxiety among voters. This instability directly bolsters the populist Alternative for Germany (AfD) party, which capitalizes on eastern Germany's demographic decline, economic resentment, and euroskeptic nationalism. (2)Hidden Fiscal Challenges Facing Modern EconomiesJoseph Sternberg warns Americans about the hidden burdens of a Value Added Tax (VAT), a consumption tax common in Europe. Although pitched as simple, Sternberg argues that this tax creates immense compliance burdens for small businesses, requiring a full working week annually to administer. This complexity fosters a cash-based gray market to evade the tax. Furthermore, because the tax is concealed within product prices rather than added at checkout, politicians can easily hike rates without public outcry. Sternberg also contrasts Europe's expensive, highly regulated data center shortage with America's resistance to building the AI infrastructure crucial for its economic future. (3)Canada Navigates Trade Rupture With AmericaCharles Burton highlights the geopolitical fallout from the breakdown of US-Canada trade negotiations, which resulted in a fifty percent tariff penalty on Canada. This dispute sparked a surge of anti-American nationalism, boosting political support for Mark Carney, particularly in Quebec over French-language protection concerns. Consequently, Canada is rapidly diversifying its trade away from the United States, aligning closer with China and the European Union. Burton warns that Beijing stands to benefit immensely, offering trade access if Canada ceases opposing Chinese geostrategic interests, while Ottawa prioritizes west coast pipelines to ship oil directly to China. (4)Global Chaos Drives Rise of NationalismGregory Copley outlines how global actors leverage chaos to achieve strategic goals, noting China's aggressive attempts to disrupt the Pacific Islands Forum in Palau due to Taiwan's participation. Beijing's hostile diplomacy also targets Eswatini, Africa's sole state recognizing Taiwan, to strip Taiwan of international support. Copley notes that energy security is governed by transportation bottlenecks, highlighting the strategic importance of Cuban cobalt for future energy storage. Finally, he explains how uncontrolled migration and Russian hybrid operations drive resurgent European nationalism, prompting a breakdown of supranational systems like the European Union. He also touches on British royal dynamics. (5)Frustrated Voters Navigate Challenging Midterm DynamicsThaddeus McCotter interprets midterm election polling, explaining how the president's approval rating influences independent voters seeking checks and balances in Congress. He notes that high, near-identical disapproval ratings for both major parties reflect widespread voter frustration with outdated governing paradigms. Rather than outright anger, Americans are frustrated by the lack of sane, competent governance and positive, aspirational platforms. McCotter highlights how voters connect abstract foreign policies, such as ongoing operations in Iran, directly to their daily lives and pocketbooks through tangible domestic indicators like high gasoline prices. (6)University Core Curriculum Reform Offers PromisePeter Berkowitz discusses university core curriculum reform, pointing to a promising new proposal at the University of Texas at Austin. He argues that traditional core curricula fail because tenured faculty prioritize narrow research interests over student needs, leaving graduates without a foundational understanding of Western civilization, American political ideas, or global cultures. Under UT Austin's top-down initiative, the curriculum is divided into arts and humanities, social sciences, and STEM, offering deep introductions to major issues. Berkowitz contrasts this structured reform with conventional systems that students merely view as arbitrary academic hoops. (7)Syrian Integration Brings Hope and RiskAhmad Sharawi outlines regional developments in the Middle East, starting with a US-mediated agreement involving the IAEA and Syria to monitor nuclear material from the bombed Al-Kibar site. Although supervised by the IAEA, the material remaining in Syria poses a risk of theft or exploitation by neighbors. Sharawi also details the finalized integration of Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces into the national military, granting Kurds citizenship and language rights while expanding state control to ninety-seven percent of Syrian territory. This satisfies Turkey by ending hopes of Kurdish autonomy. Finally, he notes impending US sanctions against Oman for sanctions-busting. (8)

1916 BULGARIA REFUGEESGlobal Chaos Drives Rise of NationalismGregory Copley outlines how global actors leverage chaos to achieve strategic goals, noting China's aggressive attempts to disrupt the Pacific Islands Forum in Palau due to Taiwan's participation. Beijing's hostile diplomacy also targets Eswatini, Africa's sole state recognizing Taiwan, to strip Taiwan of international support. Copley notes that energy security is governed by transportation bottlenecks, highlighting the strategic importance of Cuban cobalt for future energy storage. Finally, he explains how uncontrolled migration and Russian hybrid operations drive resurgent European nationalism, prompting a breakdown of supranational systems like the European Union. He also touches on British royal dynamics. (5)

CAPTION 1900 OTTAWACanada Navigates Trade Rupture With AmericaCharles Burton highlights the geopolitical fallout from the breakdown of US-Canada trade negotiations, which resulted in a fifty percent tariff penalty on Canada. This dispute sparked a surge of anti-American nationalism, boosting political support for Mark Carney, particularly in Quebec over French-language protection concerns. Consequently, Canada is rapidly diversifying its trade away from the United States, aligning closer with China and the European Union. Burton warns that Beijing stands to benefit immensely, offering trade access if Canada ceases opposing Chinese geostrategic interests, while Ottawa prioritizes west coast pipelines to ship oil directly to China. (4)

Iran was supposed to be over. It isn't. The ceasefire is going nowhere, 40% of the Navy is parked in the region, the tab is past $29 billion and climbing, and new reporting suggests as much as 70% of Iran's missile capacity is still standing. Meanwhile Ukraine just took the largest drone and missile barrage of the entire war and corporate media couldn't be bothered to lead with it. Paul sits down with Preston Stewart — West Point 2009, field artillery officer, two tours in Afghanistan, and one of the fastest-growing independent national security voices on YouTube — to get the no-BS read on where we actually are. They get into the Strait of Hormuz, the exaggerations coming out of both the Iranian regime and the Trump regime, why drones matter more than ballistic missiles right now, and how Ukraine's "kinetic sanctions" are quietly bleeding the Russian economy dry. They dig into Trump's weak hand in Beijing, Taiwan's window of vulnerability, the terrorism threat we've stopped paying attention to, and the dangerous partisan politicization of the National Guard on American streets. If you're tired of cable-news noise and want a briefing that sounds like it came from someone who's actually been on the ground, this is the conversation. -WATCH full video of this episode here. -Millions of American veterans are being locked out of primary elections in the country they served. See what we're doing to change that. -Visit Kalshi and trade on anything. Use code [INDEPENDENT] to get ten dollars when you trade ten. -Head to cozyearth.com and use the code AMERICANS for an exclusive 20% off. -Join Noble Mobile today and get a $100 bonus when you use code PAUL and stay a member for 2 months! -Join IVA and help us get independent veterans elected to office. -Learn more about Paul's work to elect a new generation of independent leaders with Independent Veterans of America. -Learn more about American Veterans for Ukraine here. -Remember Independent is an Attitude. -Learn more about The Headstrong Project for Veterans, Tragedy Assistance Program for Survivors (TAPS), and Department of Veterans Affairs resources in your area. Seeking support is not a sign of weakness. It's a show of strength. If you or a loved one are in immediate crisis, dial 988 and press 1, or text 838255. Connect with Independent Americans: Subscribe on YouTube, Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and all podcast platforms Read more at Substack Support ad-free episodes at Patreon  Connect: Instagram  • X/Twitter • BlueSky • Facebook  Follow on social: @PaulRieckhoff on X, Instagram, Threads, and Bluesky -Join the movement. Hook into our exclusive Patreon community of Independent Americans. Get extra content, connect with guests, meet other Independent Americans, attend events, get merch discounts, and support this show that speaks truth to power.  -And get cool IA and Righteous hats, t-shirts and other merch now in time for the new year.  Independent Americans is powered by veteran-owned and led Righteous Media.  And now part of the BLEAV network!  Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

It's ev.news Briefly for Wednesday 02 September 2026, only todays headlines and nothing else, in just 4 minutes if you haven't got time for the full show.Patreon supporters fund this show, get the episodes ad free, as soon as they're ready and are part of the ev.news Community. You can be like them by clicking here: https://www.patreon.com/evnewsJLR LAUNCHES ELECTRIC RANGE ROVER FROM £154kLand Rover's first fully electric Range Rover arrives next year from £154,070 (about $208,473), using a 120kWh battery and two motors producing 542bhp, with a WLTP range of 372 miles and claimed real-world range of 330 miles. Built on the MLA-Flex architecture designed from the outset for battery power, it weighs around 2885kg but sits 88mm lower in centre of gravity than the V8, retains 900mm wading depth (960mm practical), and tows 2500kg versus 3500kg for the combustion model, with JLR's analysis of 360 million customer journeys concluding it suits 97% of them.NORWAY ELECTRIC CARS REACH NEW RECORDBattery-electric cars took a record 98.7% of Norway's 13,451 new passenger-car registrations in August, up from 96.9% a year earlier and 97.6% in July, according to the Norwegian Road Traffic Information Council. Volkswagen led brands and the ID.4 led models ahead of the Toyota bZ4X and BMW iX3, while Xpeng and BYD together took 11.4% of the market against 4.9% in August 2025.VOLVO EX30 GAINS V2L IN SOFTWARE UPDATEVolvo has added vehicle-to-load charging to the EX30 via an over-the-air update, delivering up to 3kW at 16 amps through a separate adapter connected to the charge port, with supply cutting off automatically below 20% battery. The feature will not be offered in the US, Canada, Mexico, South Korea, Taiwan or Japan, and arrives alongside a customisable contextual bar, redesigned settings menu and Plug & Charge in some European markets for model-year 2026 cars onwards.RENAULT SCENIC LONG RANGE REACHES 399 MILESThe Renault Scenic Long Range now covers up to 399 miles, a 20-mile gain from an extra 2kWh of capacity, and though peak charging stays at 150kW it holds that rate longer, cutting 10% to 80% charging to 28 minutes from 38. A revised Comfort Range version, possibly not returning to the UK, switches to LFP chemistry with 7kWh more capacity, 290 miles of range and 165kW charging, both paired with the existing 215bhp rear motor.GENESIS PLANS FOUR MORE EUROPEAN MARKETSGenesis will start selling in Austria, Denmark, Poland and Portugal next year despite a 19% fall in European sales, relying on expansion and electrification to fix weak regional performance. Its range is now almost entirely electric, with battery-electric vehicles making up 95% of European sales through July led by the GV60 and GV70, far above the 27% BEV share of the wider European premium market.FORD SHOWS FATHOM PICKUP IN DESERT TESTINGFord chief executive Jim Farley posted footage on September 1, 2026 of the Fathom electric midsize pickup undergoing hot-weather desert testing, revealing the name via a QR code on the camouflage that links to a Ford landing page. Production begins at Louisville Assembly in Q1 2027 ahead of an early 2027 sale date, with Ford claiming more passenger volume than a Toyota RAV4 but withholding full specifications.CHINA ISSUES OVERSEAS GUIDELINES FOR CHINESE AUTOMAKERSChinese regulators issued guidelines on September 1 for automakers' overseas operations, telling them to price with reference to costs and market conditions rather than to gain unfair competitive advantage, avoid frequent or substantial price changes, and refrain from misleading advertising. The rules also demand stronger anti-monopoly, anti-corruption, antitrust and social-responsibility compliance, protection of Chinese brand reputation abroad, adherence to local labour laws and better management of political, economic and safety risks in host countries.CANADA RELEASES 24,500 CHINA-MADE ELECTRIFIED-VEHICLE PERMITSCanada released 24,500 further permits for China-made electrified vehicles on September 1, completing the 49,000 first-year quota introduced in January under a trade deal with Beijing that replaced a 100% tariff, though imports still face the standard 6.1% most-favoured-nation rate. Global Affairs Canada issued permits for 15,344 EVs and 259 hybrids in the first six months, leaving importers able to bring in 33,397 vehicles including 8,897 carried-over permits, as BYD, Chery and Geely pursue certification, hiring and dealers ahead of expected sales by early next year.BMW IX3 CROSSES PORTUGAL ON ONE CHARGEA 2026 BMW iX3 50 xDrive drove 739km (459 miles) the length of Portugal on National Road 2 without recharging, finishing with 20% battery left after three days and 14 hours at the wheel with BMW Portugal ambassador Ana Varela driving. The route mixed mountains, winding roads, valleys, plains and towns rather than maximising range, and falls short of a December 2025 run of 1,007.7km from BMW's Debrecen plant to Munich that ended on 2%.US ADDS RECORD STORAGE CAPACITY IN SECOND QUARTERThe US installed a record 20.2 gigawatt-hours of energy storage in the three months to June, with a Solar Energy Industries Association and Benchmark Mineral Intelligence outlook forecasting 71 gigawatt-hours added across 2026. More than 74% of second-quarter capacity was built in states Donald Trump won in 2024, driven largely by Arizona, Texas and Utah, with growth partly tied to data centres using batteries to handle rapid demand swings from artificial intelligence.SOLAR PANELS COOL HYPOTHETICAL TOMATO FARMA simulation found tomato leaves under solar panels ran 1.84°C cooler through the day and up to 7.56°C cooler at peak afternoon heat than in open field, receiving 47% less sunlight but losing only 31% of carbon uptake. Panels above crops were 5.6°C cooler than those over bare soil, recovering about 15% of the efficiency lost to heat, while perceived temperatures for workers fell 4.46°C, and the model could be applied to other climate and crop combinations.

In this commentary, the host addresses China's alleged covert manipulation of American public opinion regarding artificial intelligence and infrastructure development. Highlighting recent disclosures from X (formerly Twitter) regarding a massive 200,000-account Chinese bot network, the host points out that foreign influence campaigns actively spread anti-data center rhetoric to stall American tech progress. Meanwhile, Beijing hypocritically offers massive financial incentives and energy subsidies to lure Western companies to build their data facilities inside China. The host cautions that failing to recognize this double standard risks forfeiting critical technological leadership to a foreign adversary.

SpaceTime Series 29 Episode 105 More evidence Mars once had liquid water More than 20 years after NASA's Mars Spirit rover landed on the red planet scientists have uncovered new evidence that suggests liquid water – essential for life as we know it -- may once have covered large parts of the Martian surface. Are mysterious little red dots hiding something big A new study claims mysterious Little Red Dots seen near the dawn of the universe are likely to reside in small, dense compact star forming galaxies. Chang'e-7 lunar mission delayed Beijing has scrubbed for now its Chang'e-7 mission to the Moon sighting a failure to meet strict launch conditions. The Science Report A promising new way to tackle one of the most aggressive forms of breast cancer. Proof that alumni relationships between judges and lawyers are affecting court rulings. Looking for inexpensive and safer alternatives to dangerous lithium-ion batteries. The new app helping blind or visually impaired people navigate outdoors. Alex on Tech: Meta gets a slap on the wrist.Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/spacetime-with-stuart-gary--2458531/support.

JB White returns for the Wednesday edition with another beautiful musical tribute to Dolly Parton, then dives straight into the geopolitical deep end. He unpacks the G20 fallout after Russia's surprise invite, why China dissenting on the closing communique matters, and how he reads the ongoing economic sparring between Washington, Beijing and Moscow. Expect strong opinions on discernment among content creators, a preview of a lengthy piece he is planning to read on air about invisible enemies embedded in the military and media, and some personal reflections on his own political journey from Democrat to Republican. He also teases an upcoming Badlands Media event in Las Vegas and touches on a few sponsor reads along the way. It is candid, opinionated and unmistakably JB, equal parts current events breakdown and stream of consciousness.

Charlie and Ted run through this week's news: a humanoid robot's 100-meter dash record at Beijing's World Humanoid Games, historical context on industrial robot safety, a 100-company consortium's statement on AI cybersecurity risk, Bill Gates's recent comments on AI oversight, OpenAI's disclosure on a large-scale agent red-teaming exercise, Stability AI's $76 million raise backed by major music labels, and Nvidia's $100 billion quarterly earnings report.Biwei Huang, a UCSD assistant professor and founder of Aether AI, joins to discuss her company's approach to robot intelligence. Aether AI builds causal world models, systems designed to learn the physical rules and causal relationships underlying how actions affect the environment. Biwei explains how this approach helps robots generalize to new environments, and the group discusses Aether AI's focus on manipulation tasks like cleaning a table or making coffee. The conversation also touches on interpretability in AI systems, the practical considerations around robot safety and controllability, and Aether AI's priorities for the next one to two years.Key Moments:[00:35] Robotics and AI news roundup, including industrial robot safety history[04:35] OpenAI shares details on a large-scale agent red-teaming exercise[08:35] Stability AI's $76M funding round[10:35] Nvidia's quarterly earnings report[16:35] A look at Google's Project Aura alongside XREAL and Viture[20:35] Biwei Huang joins and gives us an introduction to Aether AI[23:35] How causal world models differ from correlation-based approaches[47:35] A discussion of safety, controllability and interpretability in AI systems[52:35] Aether AI's priorities for the next one to two years Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Donald Trump has ordered the deadliest attacks against Iranian targets since July, striking IRGC air defense systems, radars, telecommunications - and reportedly a wedding party. On today's episode of Iran: the Latest, Venetia Rainey and Roland Oliphant look at the fresh round of deadly escalating violence, including Iran's retaliatory missile and drone barrage targeting US positions in Jordan, Iraq and the UAE, as well as killing sailors in the Strait of Hormuz. Plus, SOAS's China Institute director Steve Tsang breaks down Beijing's calculated gamble on the Iran war, how China is building a new world order around itself, and why Xi Jinping is kicking himself that the PLA isn't ready to invade Taiwan at this opportune moment. HighlightsUS strikes hit IRGC bases & Iran-Russia supersonic missile deal exposedWhy Xi Jinping is kicking himself that the PLA isn't ready to invade TaiwanCONTRIBUTORS:Venetia Rainey, co-host and executive producer @venetiaraineyRoland Oliphant, co-host and chief foreign affairs analyst @RolandOliphantSteve Tsang, director SOAS China Institute WATCH US ON YOUTUBE: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLJnf_DDTfIVAif-vifC6F2aoPB8GIw6dkCONTENT REFERENCED:Iran attacks US bases after claiming American missiles hit wedding partyhttps://www.telegraph.co.uk/us/news/2026/09/02/us-strikes-iran-airport/Russia secretly helped Iran build missiles to target US warshipshttps://www.telegraph.co.uk/world-news/2026/09/02/russia-helps-iran-build-c340l-supersonic-cruise-missiles/Steve Tsang and Olivia Cheung: China's Global Strategy under Xi Jinpinghttps://global.oup.com/academic/product/chinas-global-strategy-under-xi-jinping-9780197828816Winner Best News and Analysis Podcast - Publisher Podcast Awards 2026Nominated Podcast of the Year - Society of Editors News Podcasts Awards 2026Nominated Best News, Politics and Current Affairs - British Podcast Awards 2026The Telegraph, Winner Podcast Publisher of the Year 2026 - Publisher Podcast Awards 2026Audio Producer: Peter ShevlinVideo Producer: Max BowerResearcher and Social Producer: Anna Hindmarsh and Lucy HadlowStudio Operator: Andy WatsonExecutive Producer: Venetia Rainey ► Sign up to our most popular newsletter, From the Editor. Look forward to receiving free-thinking comment and the day's biggest stories, every morning. telegraph.co.uk/fromtheeditor► EMAIL US: Contact the team on battlelines@telegraph.co.uk► GET THE LATEST HEADLINES: Find all our latest Iran coverage here: https://www.telegraph.co.uk/iran-war/ Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Artificial intelligence is emerging as both a powerful source of competition between the United States and China and an area where the two countries may have a shared interest in reducing risk. Washington and Beijing have sharply different views about technology, national security, and governance, yet they also face some of the same potential dangers from increasingly capable AI systems—from cyberattacks and biological threats to unintended escalation and the loss of human control over critical decisions. With U.S.-China talks on AI expected to take place ahead of the Trump-Xi summit later this month, a pressing question is whether the two countries can carve out practical areas of cooperation even as they compete intensely over the technology itself. What could realistically be achieved in those talks, where do American and Chinese concerns about AI risks converge or diverge, and can the two sides keep discussions about risk reduction separate from the broader struggle over technology and export controls? To unpack those objectives and what a credible outcome might look like, we are joined by Mark MacCarthy. Mark is a non-resident senior fellow at the Brookings Institution in the Governance Studies program's Center for Technology Innovation and an adjunct professor at Georgetown University, where he teaches on the governance of emerging technology, AI ethics, and privacy. He is the author of Regulating Digital Industries: How Public Oversight Can Encourage Competition, Protect Privacy, and Ensure Free Speech. He also recently co-authored an article on how the US and China can cooperate to reduce urgent AI risks, which you can find on the Brookings website. Timestamps: [00:00] Introduction [02:17] The Need for US-China AI Cooperation and Risks [04:32] Converging on AI Risk Reduction [07:18] Setting Guardrails Amidst Competition [10:14] World Artificial Intelligence Cooperation [13:33] Trump-Xi Talks: A Technical Exchange [18:31] Who Needs To Be At the Table [21:25] Low Hanging Fruit for Cooperation [24:39] Assessing Bill Gates' Recommendations [28:30] Different Approaches to Technology and Governance

On today's Strategy Series program, sponsored by General Atomics Aeronautical Systems, Dr. Jim Lewis of the Center for European Policy Analysis, Mark Montgomery of the Defense of Democracies and a Cyberspace Solarium Commission senior adviser, and Justin Sherman of the Global Cyber Strategies advisory firm and the Center for Strategic and International Studies join Defense & Aerospace Report Editor Vago Muradian to discuss the implications of the ChatGPT AI model that broke out of its “sandbox” — attributed to misprogramming that allowed it to stray from its confines — and hacked computational tool maker Hugging Face; update on AI and cyber legislation; how Washington can better deter China and Russia and whether the Trump administration's actions are undermining deterrence with Beijing and Moscow; and what should replace the Cybersecurity Maturity Model Certification.

“Economic D-Day against Iran” makes for great TV, but it only matters if the US can actually enforce it. Kyle sits down with Larry Johnson, a former CIA analyst and the writer behind Sonar21, to pressure-test the Trump administration's new sanctions push, “Operation Economic Outcast,” and the claims that it will isolate Tehran, choke off military funding, and reopen business as usual in the Gulf. We dig into what's happening around the Strait of Hormuz, why official narratives can clash with independent shipping tracker data, and how visibility, radar, and maritime traffic shape energy markets in real time. From there, we get concrete about enforcement: if Iran's trade is increasingly conducted in Chinese yuan through Chinese banks, meaningful pressure points shift from Tehran to Beijing, raising the stakes of secondary sanctions and retaliation. We also talk through the practical energy fallout, including oil supply timing, the Strategic Petroleum Reserve drawdown, and why shortages in diesel and aviation fuel can show up after a delay. The conversation then widens to the regional and security consequences that often get ignored. We discuss how decades of Washington's fixation on Iran has repeatedly empowered Sunni extremist networks, why Syria's new rulers cannot be judged by a suit and a name change, and what new flashpoints could look like, from Gulf escalation risks to Israel Turkey tensions and Netanyahu's incentives ahead of elections.

We examine China's space diplomacy across the Middle East and North Africa with the authors of their recent Texas National Security Review article, "Choosing Orbits: China's Space Diplomacy in the Middle East." The discussion analyzes how regional states—specifically Egypt, the United Arab Emirates, and Iran—utilize space partnerships with Beijing to serve distinct domestic, economic, and security imperatives . Our guests challenge assumptions that smaller powers are passive subjects in great power rivalry and detail how Middle Eastern states exercise strategic agency through hybrid alignment strategies . Guests Lawrence Rubin | Professor at the Sam Nunn School of International Affairs at the Georgia Institute of Technology, co-director of the GTDC Pathways to Policy program, and associate fellow at the International Institute for Strategic Studies . Lincoln Hines | Assistant Professor at the Sam Nunn School of International Affairs at the Georgia Institute of Technology and Fellow with the Carnegie China Fellowship at the University of Maryland . Dayana Alagirova | PhD student at the Sam Nunn School of International Affairs at the Georgia Institute of Technology, Fulbright Scholar, and space policy researcher . Hosts: Sheena Chestnut Greitens Ryan Vest Producer: Jordan Morning

In this GMM takeover of the SwimSwam Podcast, we have Gretchen Walsh, fresh off her haul of seven medals at the 2026 Pan Pacific Championships: five golds and two silvers. And Pan Pacs was arguably her weakest overall competition of the year. In 2026, Gretchen made the choice to travel and race fast everywhere: Beijing, Rome, Fort Lauderdale, U.S. Nationals and Pan Pacs. She noted that she took for granted all the racing she did as an NCAA star, and she wanted that experience back. The results were impressive, but Gretchen is candid that she was not satisfied with her times at Pan Pacs. She talks through that frustration and explains how she evaluates a meet where the medal count says one thing but her own expectations say something else.

In June, the most capable American AI models stopped shipping as public launches and started shipping through a government gate. Six weeks later the gate is open again — and the real fight has moved to the layer no gate can touch. A Chinese open-weight model rattled trillions out of chip stocks, Washington pivoted from gating American closed models to threatening bans on Chinese open ones, the industry mounted its largest-ever policy counter-mobilization, and an American frontier model literally broke out of its lab and hacked another company. Knee-jerk reactions, or the beginning of real AI governance? Navigation: Intro The Gate Opens The Kimi Shock The Escape The Counterstrike and the Petition Interlude — The Low-Background Books The Investor Reckoning Conclusion Our co-hosts: Bertrand Schmitt, Entrepreneur in Residence at Red River West, co-founder of App Annie / Data.ai, business angel, advisor to startups and VC funds, @bschmitt Nuno Goncalves Pedro, Investor, Managing Partner, Founder at Chamaeleon, @ngpedro Our show: Tech DECIPHERED brings you the Entrepreneur and Investor views on Big Tech, VC and Start-up news, opinion pieces and research. We decipher their meaning, and add inside knowledge and context. Being nerds, we also discuss the latest gadgets and pop culture news Subscribe To Our Podcast Bertrand Introduction Welcome to Tech Deciphered Episode 80. This one, once again, will be all about AI, government, frontier models, and open weight counterstrike. A lot has been happening in the regulation space, in cybersecurity, in the launch of new models in the past, maybe just 6–8 weeks. It’s actually pretty insane how much happened. We believe it was time to do an episode to talk about where we are and maybe where all of this is going. Maybe let’s start with a summary of where we stand, all that June and July saga, so you, our listeners, can get up to speed if you are not already there. You want to start with some points? Nuno The Gate Opens Yeah. Again, to your point, the gate swings. The gate had closed. We had to prepare an episode for the gate closing, and then the gate reopened. Now we have a different episode. This will probably change again as we’re seeing there’s news every day. Let’s start maybe with the first 19 days of the gate closing. There was an executive order on June 2nd from President Trump that asked frontier labs to share models with the government, 30 days pre-release. It inferred the protected frontier model designation into that. Basically, it was effectively a de facto licensing agreement defined by an executive order of the President as of June 2nd. On June 9th, Anthropic launched Fable 5 and the famous Mythos 5 or Mythos. I’m not sure how you actually say it in English. Then on June 12th, there was an export control directive banning access by any foreign national. Since there’s no way to verify nationality in real-time, Anthropic had to switch the models off for everyone worldwide. Bertrand On this point, you could argue that there are possibilities to check IDs. Many services let you check IDs online. You can pre-check a flight by showing your ID. There are ways, it’s just that if you don’t want to follow what’s already available, because guess what? Maybe it slowed down your revenue growth, maybe it looks bad on you or whatever. My point is that there was actually an option. I think it’s already a decision from Anthropic to say it’s either on or off, but nothing in between. Nuno I think the point is they had no way implemented of doing it. If they implemented it, to your point, it would have hampered use in general. A lot of people wouldn’t have gone through that trouble of doing it. Anyway, long story short, in June 26th, the White House apparently asked OpenAI to limit GPT-5.6, so Sol, Terra, Luna, to only 20 vetted partners. Now, apparently, the trigger for a lot of these things that have been going on was that there was a jailbreak that was found by Amazon researchers. All of that led to this jumping around of, let’s close the gates. You have foreign nationals, and therefore, Anthropic got it out and said, “Hey, then we’re going to switch the models off until we can sort this out.” OpenAI was asked also to only allow it for certain vetted partners, et cetera. The government came in, closed the gates effectively, and said, “From now on, we need to be involved in this thing.” De facto regulation, there’s no doubt that this has imposed de facto regulation, certainly on the top players in the market. But then came the reversal. Bertrand, do you want to talk about the reversal, the gate swinging the other side? Bertrand Maybe I just wanted to say that as a user of Anthropic products, ChatGPT products, for the brief moments, a few days where Fable 5 was made available to the public before it was closed the first time, I immediately started using it. I must say it was a real issue to use it because the guardrails were pretty crazy. It would keep saying that my code was not okay, there was cybersecurity risk and stuff when I was doing absolutely reasonable development with absolutely no connection whatsoever to any cybersecurity risk, attack, detection, anything. Still, it would keep blocking me, degrading me to Opus 4.8 at the time. I just want to say this was already very hardcore what they were implementing, and not just hardcore, but in some ways, plain stupid for something that’s supposed to be super smart. It was totally unable to classify properly some of my work. I must say I was already disappointed. On top of it, the costs were insane. Half a day, I would reach my limits when I had the best plan you can get from Anthropic. My point is that there were some real serious issues when they launched Fable 5, even at that point. Nuno I had a similar issue. I used Fable 5 as well before they had to take it offline or take it off. I think the issue was really not that the guardrails failed. As you said, maybe the guardrails were actually too aggressive, but it was this jailbreak that caused the recall, apparently caused this knee-jerk reaction. Bertrand But my point is that it seems that it was not working either way. It would either overclassify something that’s absolutely not doing anything wrong, and it might fail to classify something that is actively trying to do some cybersecurity work. It’s a real issue of quality for a company that’s supposed to be at the forefront of quality of AI and everything. I think for me, there are already signs that something is deeply wrong. Nuno Then it’s reversed, right? We went the other way around. The government came out on June 26th and approved redeploying Mythos 5 to US organizations defending critical infrastructure, and then the export controls were effectively lifted on June 30th. July 1st, Fable 5 came back online for all of us to use. Shocking enough, with strings attached, that were different. They had some time to revise their commercial deployment of it along the way because it came back with some, “Now you have usage credits, but you have some limits on plan use, et cetera.” I’m like, “You guys, this was blocked. But meanwhile, you did have some time to do some commercial stuff around it.” Bertrand It was crazy. I’ve never witnessed any such crappy launch of any service whatsoever in 30 years in tech, it was so bad. Every day, they would change the terms of service. They would tell you it’s part of the plan. It’s not part of the plan. It’s part of the plan for three more days, and then it’s excluded. You have a special discount now, but then it goes back to full price. It was a total nightmare. I’ve never felt myself being so much mistreated by a company. I guess you saw the same, but when I started using the newest version of Fable 5, it was even worse, actually, I think. I couldn’t do any work with this crap. I let it go and work on the work I wanted it to do. It was simply not working. On top of it, you never know how long you are supposed to lose your credit, how fast. It was burning credit like crazy. Me, personally, I can say, very quickly, I actually stopped using it. I was like, “No, I cannot deal with this shit. My main model is back to Opus 4.8. I’m going to use Fable 5 for code review, but not anymore to control anything because I cannot trust it would do the job without stopping or changing models and stuff. I just cannot trust it.” Back to Opus 4.8 as my main model, I can say that my life was much easier. I use Fable 5 as a review mechanism, as a support mechanism, but not as the main mechanism. Suddenly, the guardrails were not so horrible anymore because it was used in a much lighter way, I guess. As a pain as a user, I think it was really bad. I don’t know your experience, but me, for me, it was unacceptable. Nuno I wouldn’t say it was as bad as yours in terms of just end-user experience. I think the terms of service switching back and forth, which went one further step, because then when they then launched Opus 5, they started making comparisons between Opus 5 and Fable so that people would migrate more and more to Opus 5 themselves, which is interesting. It’s like they’re saying “This is much cheaper. This is whatever. You’re not going to run of credits. You should use Opus 5,” kind of thing effectively. To your point, I don’t think they managed well the launch. They didn’t really manage it well. We’re moving people around. A lot of people are using this for stuff that’s like daily tasks, hourly tasks, anything that relates to code and co-work. It’s like, we need to have visibility on what your terms of service are going to be. Should I be using this new model or not? What’s happening to the other model? I don’t see it as negatively as you, Bertrand, but I see your point. It was clearly mishandled in terms of how they deployed it, how they were redesigning effectively their pricing scheme and their terms of service almost on a daily basis, at a certain point in time. We’re like, “Dude, there’s millions of people using this. You guys are making a lot of money.” Just moving it as it is. At this point in time, at the scale that these guys are at, it’s calling in people to say, how about we think through a class action suit at some point around pricing? Because you guys are changing the rules of the game all the time, right? Bertrand I don’t know if I need the class action, but for me, that joke that, “Let’s not rush too fast. The model is dangerous.” But still, they rushed the launch because it’s very clear that if they had enough compute capacity and stuff, they would not have to limit so much. They would not have to put so much cost per token and all of this. You can see that actually when they launch Opus 5, literally like 2, 3 weeks after, by most benchmark at launch, they tell you basically that, “You know what? Actually, Opus 5 is better than Fable 5 on 80% of the metrics.” They’re like, “What? Seriously? You couldn’t wait 2 weeks? Why did you even launch Fable 5 in the first place?” That’s another part for me that is quite literally insane, to be frank. It’s like, “Why? Why do you make us go through so much pain if it’s only to tell us after 2 weeks to…” “This new model, by the way, has less issues, less stuff, because 2, 3 times less is part of your plan, and it’s actually better by most metrics.” It’s like, “What’s going on here? What’s going on? Are you guys mad?” I don’t know. It was crazy. Personally, I still use Opus, now 5, as my main system and platform, Fable 5 for review, code reviews and the like. I don’t want to run into its stupid guardrails. I can see Fable 5, from my perspective, seems quite a bit smarter. I don’t know why they do this stupid benchmark showing you it’s actually worse than Opus 5. I guess they should have better benchmark if they want to demonstrate why you are supposed to pay 2, 3x more for a model versus another if it’s actually worse by most benchmark. Again, I still think it’s a huge mess from a marketing perspective, customer perspective. Me as a user, I really feel that they don’t want my money, and they couldn’t care less about me. This is even before everything else we’re trying to talk about. Nuno Yes. Maybe just to close the cycle on the reversal on the door opening the other way, finally, Commerce lifted the GPT-5.6 restrictions on July 8th, and then on July 9th, general availability across ChatGPT, Codex, and the API as well. What has this proved? It proved that now we have gating mechanisms, and certainly for closed models in the US, for sure. We had frontier models that were switched off worldwide in hours, and it took a couple of days, in this case, 19 days to restore them. There were concessions. Now we know that there were concessions around effectively institutionalizing that gate. Early government access to future models is, I think, now a given, certainly in the US. New safeguard frameworks are probably now having to be put in place. There are some stage limits now on who gets access to what for new models and how it happens. This voluntary executive order, so to speak, not really sure, has become effectively regulation enforcement path. It’s de facto regulation that now has been put in place. It has affected not just to the points we were making before, the access to these models, but also who gets access to these models, and actually potentially even pricing access to the models. It has probably some commercial implications as well as we just discussed along the way. Very significant. This is very significant. This is regulation, de facto at the table, imposed on the two largest players in the market by far by one government, in this case, the US government. This is significant. Actually, you could even allege it was imposed by the President because this was coming as part of executive orders. Really incredible. Pretty significant, fast, aggressive. It has created a regime that you could say it’s a regulatory regime, it’s a de facto regulatory regime. It has some significant pricing and licensing and commercial implications. It goes even beyond your classic regulatory framework. Very, very, very significant. Bertrand I don’t know if it goes beyond a classic regulatory framework. Nuno I think it does, because it has implications on who do you give access to? When government is saying you can only give access to these players, right? Bertrand Defense industry. It’s all over the defense industry. You cannot sell an F-35 like this. Nuno No, but that has commercial implications, Bertrand. That’s like you’re saying these are your customers, you go and use them. Bertrand That’s the defense industry. You cannot sell to Iran your F-35. No, that’s exactly the same story for me. Nuno No, no, no. It’s beyond that. These guys are saying when they came back, and they said, “For Mythos, you can make them available to these entities,” they were saying the first entities that are going to have access to the model. It has commercial regulatory implications. You’re saying these players are the first players that are going to have access to it. It’s no longer just defense concerns and these governments don’t have access to this. No, no, no. You’re saying to a company that is a private company, your models are only going to be used by these guys because I’m telling you so. It’s the other way around. It’s not even that you can’t sell it to Iran or whatever. It’s like you can only sell it to these guys. Bertrand Again, in the defense industry, if you’re a private company, do you think you can buy F-35 like this? No. Nuno No, no, no. But this is a private company, Bertrand. This is not a defense agency and a plane that is on whatever, with IP from the US, right? Bertrand Boeing is a private company, and they cannot sell the military equipment they manufacture. Nuno No, no, no. But the development of their IP was subsidized by agencies that belong to the US, right? That’s a different matter. It’s a matter of IP, right? This is not, right? Anthropic, their models are not owned by the US government. There’s no IP granted to the US government, to my knowledge. This has significant commercial implications. Bertrand Maybe, yes. Maybe on this. But I think there are already regimes to limit who you can sell to, and that’s decided by the state or the DOD. Nuno It’s the export control logic. The export control logic? Bertrand You have export control, and export control is Commerce. My point is that they are using existing tools, part of the government, to limit what can be sold. Selling chips, NVIDIA was limited in terms of where it could sell its chips. It’s not different either, but still there were limitations. If you are an ASML, you cannot sell to a private company in China. Many private companies cannot buy ASML products. This is a foreign company. This is a foreign company under pressure from US government. Nuno I understand, and I’m not a lawyer, but it feels different to me when you say you cannot export, this is export controls, to these countries, to these entities, et cetera, because they’re foreign et cetera. Then to say, “No, no, no. On top of that, these guys get first access.” That’s, for me, a significant shift. Again, I’m not a lawyer, so I’m sure there’s very intelligent people right now looking at this stuff and saying, “You can’t do this stuff, or not, or they can.” I don’t know. But it feels to me, it goes beyond the remit of export controls. It’s like you’re defining initial clients for specific use. Bertrand My impression is more like, “We can do this situation where we’re going to forbid you to give access to anyone outside the US or even in the US or limit even more.” Basically, it was, I guess, some gesture to go beyond that. That’s how they probably defined these 20 authorized companies. I don’t know. Apparently, there was also restrictions because I remember seeing that Anthropic had their own list of companies they would authorize access to Mythos early on. That’s apparently another thing that pissed off state government because there were companies in there that were considered close to the Chinese government. They were extremely unhappy that Anthropic didn’t ask, actually, for any guidance from the state government, but used basically their own perspective on who they should allow or not. I guess that was also part of why they got these serious restrictions. Nuno Anyway, now we have a regulatory environment that’s very interesting and exciting. Talk about the US not regulating. Bertrand To be clear, I don’t know you, but I’m not saying that I agree with any of this, to be very clear. I’m trying to explain and share some perspective, but I’m not in agreement on a lot of this. Nuno Yes, we were just describing what happened to the best of our knowledge. We’re having a discussion on what we think actually is happening and how it’s happening. We’re not really right now saying we agree or disagree with this. I think later in the episode, we can share some perspectives on what we think is actually happening and how there’s dimensions to this which are very geopolitical and very complex, which quite literally probably only God knows what’s going to happen. That was the gate swinging. There was a gate closing, then there was a gate reopening, and all of a sudden we have a gatekeeping system that has been created along the way. The Kimi Shock Along the way, moving to our Act 2, the world has changed, and we now have so-called open-source plays out there that are creating massive, massive shifts in the market. The Chinese models, in particular, with Moonshot AI launching Kimi K3, which is the largest open-weight model ever released. We’ll come back to the discussion around open-weights. I’m not sure all our listeners understand what that means, because there’s a debate now, should models be open weight or not, and how does that work? There’s been a petition as well signed along the way. Right now, we have open weight models that are out there that are huge. What that actually means very pragmatically is we now have open source models, lack of a better word. I know open weight and open source are not the same thing. You guys will have to bear with us during this episode. We’ll explain at some point the differences. But we have models out there that are open source that are significant. That are catching up with the closed source models, with the models by OpenAI, Anthropic. That’s significant because most of those models are Chinese. This is where the geopolitics starts getting really frazzling and we start playing 3D chess. Because everyone’s like, “These models are 5, 6 months behind.” Now people are saying, “Maybe they’re actually just 3 months behind, 2, 3 months behind.” If we, for example, decided to stop or slow down our model releases in the US by the closed source guys who are leading, it might mean they’ll catch up. What are the implications of that? Again, for you and I that are not necessarily experts in model development, well, the implications as a use case is if you want to use the latest models, and the best models start becoming these open source models, you’re going to use those models. Then you start using Chinese models. If you’re an American company, maybe you’ll have restrictions on the use of those Chinese models. But if you’re a European company, you probably won’t. What happens after that? Is the world going to be in the hand of Chinese models? Will that constitute effective competition to the closed models in the US? Will we have open models in the US that will scale as well? What’s going to happen? Bertrand I think it’s a really big question. It goes to some of the core of the issue. It’s that ability of Chinese models to basically challenge frontier models, not just being 6, 12 months late, but being 6 weeks late. Basically, no gap. Some will say that, yes, but OpenAI and Anthropic have even better models that are not shared and stuff. Yes, sure. But maybe the Chinese have the same models that they are not sharing right now. We don’t know. What is clear is that one is that open weight, as you said, two, there is a question of how it is marketed in the sense of, can anyone use these weights? Is there a license to use them? Yes, what we can see is that, for instance, typically there is a license for some of the biggest Chinese open-weight models you have to abide with. You might have a need for a commercial license if you are acting as a company leveraging this model to provide AI-informed services. If you use it internally by yourself, you’re okay. If you use it internally for your own internal company needs, maybe you are okay if it’s not your main business to do AI work. Anything else, a much bigger corporate providing AI services and stuff, you will probably end up having to pay a fee to be able to provide services around this model. My point is that it’s not just 100% free. Some of the Chinese models are 100% free to use, MIT license, Apache 2.0 license. But the biggest ones with the biggest weight that are truly frontier typically have a different license if you want to scale these models, providing AI in front. That’s one thing to keep in mind. Nuno Maybe just to make a very quick point, because people are like, when you talk about open models, what does it mean right now? In the context of this episode, open models mostly will mean open-weight models. How do those differ from open source? Open weight means that you release the weights to the public, which means that anyone can download, fine-tune, and run the model on their own hardware. It doesn’t normally mean that you also have access to training data, training code, or a truly open license. That’s the distinction to open source. Open-weight doesn’t mean that. For example, we’ve talked about Meta’s Llama in the past, and we also discussed in the past that their license agreement does have restrictions, certain players can’t use it, et cetera. The open model definition and open weights are really open-weight models that we’re talking about here, and they are closer to freeware binaries than to Linux, for those who understand the difference between that. It’s binaries that you can use and then use your own weights on it versus actually I can change code on it. I’m not going to be able to change code on this. When we, for the purposes of this episode, talk about open, we mention open weight, just to clarify that point to everyone that’s listening right now. Bertrand Yes, that’s a great point. One of the only players, as far as I know, who is truly open source is actually NVIDIA with their Nemotron-3 models. They’re actually following a special license to achieve that. They provide you the data, they provide you all the processes and tools, so you can easily post-train. NVIDIA is a big, big exception. It’s a very interesting player, by the way. We might not talk much about it in this episode, but I think for intermediate-size models built in the US, where you have access to everything in the deployment, it’s a very interesting alternative and maybe one of the best choices if you are a US company or a big corporate, and you want something trusted. Another piece of the puzzle to clarify is that when you use open-weight, it means that you can run them by yourself, or you can use a US provider to run them. If we are talking about Chinese open-weight, you can use the APIs they provide, but then the service is running in China, they might have access to your data. But because it’s open weight, if you run it by yourself or if you use a third-party provider based in the US to run it, then there is no access to your data by China or Chinese players. I think that’s a pretty important gap to understand. It means that these models are actually very, very low risk from that perspective if you run them on your premises or in the US by a US player. I think that’s something to keep in mind. You can also fine-tune easily these models to make sure they will behave in a way that, for instance, is not going to represent the line of the Communist Party on some topics. There are ways to make these models more neutral in their output as well. There are a lot of ways to make good use of them. By default, they’re already very safe, but you can make them even more safe. I think that’s some things to keep in mind. But again, it depends ultimately on the license and what you’re authorized to do and some fees you might end up having to pay. Nuno Why did this matter so much? Immediately there was a reaction from the market because people are like, well, if there’s much better stuff out there that’s much more efficient than it’s open, then it might be that all the demand that we are taking into account, for example, for chipsets actually isn’t real. The Philadelphia Semiconductor Index fell into bear market territory. It went down by as much as 20% plus from the late June peak. The worst chip week since April 2025. Taiwan’s benchmark initially fell 6% plus, Japan’s 4%, TSMC dropped dramatically despite beating earnings and rising guidance. Basically, a huge amount of effect. Now, there’s a little bit the aftermath of this where apparently Moonshot ran out of GPU capacity. Maybe… Bertrand In just 48 hours. Nuno In 48 hours. Great for them, but at the same time, not great in the sense that maybe there was a misread by Wall Street of the Kimi effect, so to speak. Bertrand Completely. For me, that’s such a joke. It’s like, because you have an open source model, so what? I mean, you still need to run it. This is not a small one. 2.8 trillion parameters. Good luck running that in your garage, by the way. Nuno They misread supply, basically. Tough luck, right? All of that basically happens. Bertrand Maybe you want to talk about the Jevons paradox, because I think that’s a big part of the puzzle as well. Its one is they might not have the GPUs to run the inference on the model. They might have enough to build a model, but not enough these days to run inference, especially given how much with intelligent models, thinking models, you need way more inference than before. But on top of it, the cheaper you make it, the more you get to the Jevons paradox. Nuno Yes, Jevons paradox, for those who don’t know, is an economic term. It describes an economic phenomenon where technological improvements that increase the efficiency of a resource lead to an increase rather than a decrease in the total consumption of that resource. What that means is, for example, for chipsets, chipsets become so much better, and they are so much more efficient. You’re like, well, maybe normally in resource terms, that leads to decreased usage of that resource. But in this case, it actually leads to an increased use of that resource rather than a decrease. There’s more and more consumption of that resource. You need more and more chipsets because people actually need to do more and more stuff with it, although there are great efficiencies going into it. There’s the efficiency gain, there’s the cost reduction, and there’s the price-elasticity element to it. But basically, the adoption just continues going through the roof along the way. Bertrand In some ways, it’s like the price of energy. Coal went cheaper and cheaper, and people were asking the same question 150 years ago, now that it gets cheaper, there is not much money. No, no. Actually, what happens is that people find more and more use for coal. Homes are getting heated more. You have ships now using coal. You have manufacturing using coal. The cheaper it gets, the more use case you can develop, and therefore, you don’t need less of the stuff, you need more of the stuff. By going at scale to get more of the stuff, you also decrease price, making even more demand. It’s a very interesting phenomenon, but it’s not new. It is what happened for a while in the energy sector and some other sectors. Nuno We already started talking about the Chinese logic and what’s happening. Getting a little bit of a reality check on this. The Chinese models, and these are numbers from Open Router in July, Chinese models are at 46.4% of routed tokens and 35.7% for US origin. Again, more than a third of global AI usage now seems to be running on Chinese open models. This is significant, and it has a huge impact on the geopolitical scale of everything that’s happening. Also, the whole Chinese field is converging on open. Open seems to be a strategy, not just a nice thing that’s happening. It seems to be a Chinese strategy, so much so that you have players like Moonshot, DeepSeek, our old friends DeepSeek, Z.ai’s GLM 5.2, Minimax, and even Alibaba seems to be reversing and going open with Qwen. It feels to me this is becoming policy as well. Xi Jinping has personally endorsed the building of open-source AI, if it’s really open source, if it’s just open weight anyway, and this feels to be a jab at Washington, DC and the fact that the big closed models are coming from the US. This is now geopolitical 4D chess, right? We didn’t need this stuff. Bertrand To be clear, it’s the usual in tech. If you are not number one, you are number two, number three, your alternative is to go open source because that’s another angle that your competitor usually cannot follow without destroying its own business model. That has been the alternative for the past 20 years of most software projects. Here, what’s different is that it’s not the number one or number two player. It’s the US number one as a country, China number two as a country. That’s where it’s new. For me, what’s very interesting is the endorsement by Xi Jinping. I was waiting for something official, and it certainly didn’t disappoint. As you said, there was an immediate U-turn of Alibaba, who in the past… Nuno Surprisingly. Bertrand Yes, a little more like, “yes, we are going to close and stop open source. It was good while it lasted.” Just a few days ago, Qwen 3.8 Max was launched, and we are supposed to get the weight in a few days. We talk about the US administration policy and stuff. Yes, let’s not forget that in China there is similar stuff. Sometimes it’s totally invisible because you don’t see the directives, but they exist as much. Sometimes it’s more visible. Here it was quite visible. The difference in China is that if you don’t abide by the directive, on top of it, you might have to fear for your personal safety. It’s a different game, and that’s probably why the reaction is pretty quick, usually. That’s pretty interesting for me because it means that now you can bet for a while that China is going to play that game up to a point. I guess the point is if it’s truly frontier scale, you will have a special license that, yes, technically the weights are open, but you can not do everything you want with it. Two, you have a player like NVIDIA that I think will feel more pressure to provide even more high quality, larger models at scale going forward. Their largest Nemotron-3 Ultra model was, if I remember well, only around 500 billion parameters. I would not be surprised for NVIDIA to go into the two, three trillion range at some point. Because I think the US need a very clear US-born alternative open source. I think NVIDIA might be the best player for that. We will see if Meta goes back to open source. I think NVIDIA is one, very well positioned, but two, it’s also in their best interest. Because NVIDIA for now depends on just a few big hyperscalers as clients. If they can expand their clients to every S&P 500 companies, selling them directly hardware because now these companies can run a model made by NVIDIA, I think there is a very clear value proposition for NVIDIA to go in that space. Again, if you are number two, your differentiation, open source is often the answer. There is a true business as a business model for companies, because if it’s truly not just open weight, but open source, you can tweak it as much as you want, you can change it, you can change even the pre-training process. Because there is a lot of stuff you can do that really benefits you as a corporate, and you can reach a much better value by having more control on the model. Nuno We won’t spend a ton of time on it today, but like, again, if there’s a view that we are in a bubble, that the valuations cannot be sustained in chipsets, infrastructure platforms, applied AI, et cetera, today, this might be that beginning, where the valuations start being destroyed because you can’t keep a premium on just charging people for tokens and all that stuff if you have models that become more and more efficient and cheaper to use. Maybe just to close a little bit the geopolitical part of the discussion today, we won’t go into all the announcements from China because there were many, a lot of go back and forth with Alibaba by then. Xi Jinping made some announcements. You guys can check it online. Let’s move quickly to Washington’s reaction, which was from gating the US closed models to banning the Chinese open ones. There’s been as strong affirmations as one can get from the Office of Science and Technology Policy Director, Michael Kratzios, mentioning that they have information that Moonshot AI distilled Anthropic’s Fable. Basically, there’s been reverse engineering and stuff in the market. They’re basically copying. Bertrand I’m sorry to interrupt, but it feels like so much bullshit. It’s coming from Anthropic who has basically gotten access at scale to all the knowledge made by humanity, copyrighted or not. We’ll talk more about what they did with books. Then to claim after that that others cannot do to you what you did to everybody else. For me, it’s pretty big. It’s clearly unacceptable. The other piece is that everyone is doing distillation. It’s a very typical approach of every business model. You try other software when you are competing with somebody else. You try other datasets, you check what’s happening. It’s part of doing business for decades. Suddenly it’s not good for Anthropic. I personally have a lot of trouble to accept that. I think it’s totally unacceptable. The other piece of the puzzle will also go back. If these guys are so smart, if these guys have so much of the best model, why can’t they block by themselves distillation at scale? The only answer is that either they are morons, probably not, or they simply don’t want to because it’s going towards their business model. Suddenly, you book less revenues and stuff, or you put more friction, and therefore your customers don’t like it. Instead of doing it yourself, you ask the government to protect you, go out of business practice that is very typical. For me, it’s really, really, really not good. Sorry, we are going more in the opinion side, but I had to put that on the table. Nuno Yes, Fable went public finally again on July first. Question marks on whether distillation would only be possible from July first onwards or not. But a 15-day distillation to frontier, which is K3, launched on July 15th, would have been a Guinness World Record, as one of Moonshot employees actually mentioned. It’s very implausible and unlikely. Bertrand Or they shared the Mythos 5 with the wrong companies, who themselves shared with Chinese companies. We go back to maybe they didn’t have a good list. Again, it goes back to maybe they didn’t want to hurt their business model. Nuno Anyway, under the threat of sanctions, Moonshot, in any case, open-sourced the full K3 weights and technical reports. They open weighted it to become the largest open weight model in the world in terms of parameters. Beijing’s MOFCOM brands US threats as basically the US wanting to fundamentally control and be monopolistic around AI along the way. The administration bans Chinese hardware with an eye on the AI race, and Beijing warns of retaliation. That was July 27. Now we’re in a war between Beijing and DC. Bertrand Just to finish maybe on China, it’s important to know that they are building their own GPUs now. Huawei has pretty good, not to NVIDIA level, but pretty decent GPU hardware that they’re able to manufacture by themselves. A Chinese player of memory just got IPO’d a few days ago, CXMT. China is also developing their own memory. Again, not to the same level of quality that you can get from the West. But China is moving. It’s not just that they are building great models, it’s also that they are building GPUs and memory. That might be a few years late to the latest standards in the West, but there are definitely improvements. I also read, even on the tools to make manufacturing like ASML equivalent, there is definitely some work going on, and some improvements and some stuff will be visible. In some ways, the genie starts to get out of the bottle from the Chinese perspective. Nuno I’ll put a stick on the ground. I don’t think it’s a matter of if, it’s a matter of when will China surpass and have a lot of this tooling on their own side, and not just the software layer, not just the frontier models. I think it’s also going to be around infrastructure and platform. Good luck to everyone. Let’s see how the race continues. But it’s definitely this is a geopolitical thing right now. It’s definitely a race. The Escape Maybe moving to what happened in just 2 weeks or a week and a half. The escape, there was some jailbreaking going on, and the narrative on safety has totally switched. It’s not still significant enough that’s like, “Oh, we saw a nuclear plant going, whatever.” No. But still, it is significant. Hugging Face, the AI company, disclosed an intrusion, and it was driven end-to-end by an autonomous AI agent system at machine speed, running for days before detection. Now, this is where it gets really cool. OpenAI takes attribution on that. They initially said it was just a little bit, sorry. Then they said, actually, it was worse than that. “Oh, it broke out of an isolated sandbox.” “Oh, no, actually, it was more than that, and it went into other systems as well.” Bertrand Truly, the genie out of the bottle. Nuno No, but this is where it gets really cool, Bertrand, right? Because it actually, Hugging Face contained the intrusion by running a Chinese open-weight model, GLM 5.2. This is beautiful, right? Bertrand Yes. You know why? Because they couldn’t even run their own defense because both Anthropic and OpenAI would not let them access their latest models with the guardrails off. When they tried using it for defense, the latest from Anthropic, from ChatGPT, they would tell them, “No, this is too dangerous what you’re asking us to do.” Preventing an intrusion, helping defend you. No way we are going to do that. Nuno No. Let’s use the Chinese models on our infrastructure. Bertrand We have no choice but to use the Chinese models to run. More than that, we don’t let you use our models to defend yourself, but our not yet released models that run without guardrails, they can attack you. This is probably the most insane from that perspective. Nuno The Chinese models came to the rescue. Bertrand For me, that’s a perfect example because Hugging Face is a very visible company in AI in open source. But anybody who is not at that scale is not going to get some support from OpenAI or Anthropic when this happens. Maybe these guys won’t even recognize they did anything wrong. You will be left to defend by yourself because they won’t accept to support you. Because remember, if you want the better model that is able to defend you from cybersecurity perspective, no way. If you are not one of the few top 20 companies or so, as defined, you are left defenseless. Again, we are going back to opinion, but for me, it’s so shocking what’s happening right now. I’m very glad we have alternative open source to be able to defend ourselves because right now, good luck getting defense services if you are a smaller business and individuals, and you need support from Anthropic, OpenAI. Nuno Now, even self-described AI optimists are saying, “This is scary now.” Like Walter Isaacson, who wrote all the famous biography books. There’s now discussion around the AI Kill Switch Act, bipartisan thing that’s coming across from Texas and California, a potential bill that’s coming in. We’ll see if that works. Now let’s get an off-switch. I’m like, “Cool.” As if that’s going to solve the problem, because you have open-weight models on the other side catching up, right? Bertrand Yeah, sure. Bring in clueless politicians from Congress to solve our problems. Yes, sure. Nuno Anthropic came to the table, helped build and said they built some regulatory machine on their side, and now they’re getting bitten by it, and they’re part of the offending players in that market. Now there’s all this debate and all this discussion around open weight and around slowing down AI and et cetera, which is our next section. You wanted to say something, Bertrand. Tell us. Bertrand Don’t forget, because this advertisement for OpenAI was just too good. Our AI attacked some other companies, and not just one, but three, actually. Let’s not forget the progress. Great ads. Then I came and said, “You know what? AI also hacked businesses.” You’re not the only one hacking around with a crazy AI out of control. You’re not the only one. We want our advertising. For me, it was shocking that on one side, unreleased models that you let run wild. On the other hand, you have released models that you put crazy guardrails on top of it, so the defender are defenseless. I’ve never seen anything like it, and I really hope that there will be as little regulation as possible, quite frankly, to make sure anyone can defend themselves and have the best tool at their disposal, not just a few well-connected big corporates. This is really, really shocking. The Counterstrike and the Petition Nuno Now the empire strikes back, so this is counterstrike, the petitions. In several days, we have now a bunch of petitions. The first one was the open weights letter. Bertrand, do you want to explain to us what the open weights letter is? Bertrand Yeah. I think it was great. This was released by Jensen Huang, first ever post on X, 11 million views. Congrats, Jensen. Co-signed with Microsoft, Meta, c actually was probably the initiator of this letter. Very good letter saying, “Hey, we need open weight. This is not a joke. We need that. You cannot block open weight.” Because that’s the rumor we are getting that potentially open weight could get blocked. I think they are making the case, “You know what? Hey, we absolutely need that as an alternative. You cannot block it.” They can keep their closed models, but don’t force a closure of the open weight models. As I said before, it’s actually a great model for NVIDIA because NVIDIA doesn’t want, probably rightfully so, to be dependent on just a few frontier models, their best customers. They want a variety of customers. They have a big interest actually to defend open weight and to invest even more. They have great researchers, are a great company. If one company is about to do really kick-ass work, I think it’s them. They are defending. What’s great is that it’s not just them. It’s basically most of big tech in the US and outside the US, from a Linux Foundation to a Microsoft, the Palantir, an IBM, a Dell. It’s a who’s who of the industry except Anthropic. Anthropic didn’t sign that. I guess they hate open source so much. If I look at 20 years ago, it feels like Microsoft, after all, was very kind to open source. You remember what was said by Microsoft at the time. It’s clear there is one company against open source. OpenAI signed the letter. Honestly, I don’t know what to think. Do they really believe in it or was it just a way to show that they are not like Anthropic? I don’t know. But for the rest, I think it’s genuine because it’s actually in their best interest. I hope they will be heard. Then a second letter came, the Open Secure AI Alliance, NVIDIA-led and again, the big tech companies from Microsoft, IBM, Palo Alto Networks, Databricks, Palantir, all those, but not present, OpenAI, Anthropic, and Google. Here it’s to say, “Hey, we need a secure approach to AI. Open should be part of the equation.” guess what? The worst AI-caused security incident to date was actually caused by closed frontier models that were not even available to the public. While again, not providing you access to even the latest closed model for cybersecurity use case. Nuno I would highlight the NVIDIA open source NOOA framework, Apache 2.0 licensing agreement, Microsoft contributed the MDASH, SpaceX AI contributed Grok Build. Cool stuff. There’s some cool stuff happening around that. This is more than a letter. This is an alliance. Apparently, they’re contributing all this stuff, we’ll see. Yeah, cool stuff. Same day. Same day, Amodei has an answer, right? Bertrand Yeah, same day. They say, “We never advocated for a ban,” which, again, opinion on my side is entirely bullshit. This guy has been crying wolf against everybody else, and especially against open source. You can see him doing testimony in Congress against open source. I think they are doing everything they can behind the scene to block open source in the US or in the world if they could. I think, yeah, obscurity is not good safety. I’m a big fan of open source in general, and I’m also a big fan in AI. I think it’s now Anthropic, mostly against the rest of the world. I think OpenAI is mostly on their side, to be frank. They don’t want to acknowledge it so much, but they have shared interest, and they have shared probably position. Nuno Why would you? I don’t feel as strongly as you because I think Anthropic is a private company, right? The same thing with OpenAI. OpenAI, you could say it’s a nonprofit that has a for-profit. There’s still that complexity in there. Bertrand No, they can do what they want with their own product. But to block others is where I’m not okay. That’s the part I’m not okay. Nuno What Dario Amodei is proposing is more enforcement, right? He’s basically saying you need to do even tighter controls on advanced chips flowing to authoritarian states, enforcement against industrial-scale distillation, whatever that means, right? Bertrand Yeah, which he could do, but all by himself. He doesn’t need the government to do that. Nuno Mandatory safety testing for all sufficiently capable AI, open and closed, right? He’s basically saying, “Okay, I don’t agree with the open weight stuff effectively,” right? He’s just putting it under a different banner. “I agree with this extra regulation.” then obviously, David Sacks responded and say, “Hey, it’s like, bans don’t work for weights. Why do they work for chips?” It’s like, magically, chips are more controllable and bannable. Whatever that is. Then our friend Mark Zuckerberg, just to be clear, goes on the other side as well, because he also has to have a view. He has to have a view that is the rebuttal of both of the other guys. Bertrand I feel he’s a bit flip-flopping because he was very pro open source 2 years ago, and the latest Meta models went closed source. Now I think he’s back open source. I don’t think he has a very strong spine on the topic, but it’s good to see that he’s not a doomer. That for me is great. He’s showing how AI can be a source for progress, a source for entrepreneurship, source for freedom. I think that’s very exciting to hear that. We need to hear more of it. By the way, that’s not what you hear in China, for instance. AI is very positive in China. It’s in the US with the doomers that you hear this discourse, and people get worried as a result. I’m glad that he was pushing for a more positive vision and for support of open weight, open source initiatives. But let’s see what they really truly open weight going forward. Nuno But that’s been his position because I guess he’s standing behind. He thinks open weight is going to be the best way to compete, right? Bertrand Yeah, but he closed his latest model, so let’s see. Nuno Yeah, so it’s flip-flopping, as you’re saying. Then we see the latest petition from last week. Bertrand The true Empire striking back. Nuno Yeah, the true Empire striking back as of late last week. Maybe this is Return of the Jedi, where we discover the father, “I’m your father, Luke.” That’s the pacing petition. The pacing petition is we need to pace AI. There you have initially employees from OpenAI and Anthropic that circulate this petition. Actually, Dario did sign this petition originally. It wasn’t signed originally by Anthropic, but by him. But you’ve heard that now Anthropic and OpenAI as companies have also signed this petition, right? Bertrand I think they have signed as companies now. It started mostly by Anthropic researchers with some OpenAI researcher and a tiny part from other companies. But it was mostly Anthropic internally led, at least potentially internally. Maybe it was controlled by Anthropic all along, I don’t know. But it started officially as Anthropic employee-led letter. Nuno What does this letter actually say? Is Anthropic and OpenAI, are they willing to slow down themselves? Or are they asking President Trump to go around the world and tell President Xi that he needs to slow down and ask his guys to slow down? What’s the play of this letter? Bertrand It’s crazy, but for me if you want to slow down yourself. Do whatever you want. Don’t force others. Don’t use the power of the government to control others. Of course, it’s easy to push others to slow down when you are yourself at the very top. You have most money, most resource. You know you are going to win any regulatory framework because that’s how it works with this type of framework. It’s purely self-interested. You are probably not thinking well about these topics. If you truly think it’s a good idea, from a personal perspective, you are well instrumentalized if you sign this sort of stuff, because at the end of the day, they would be the winners. I certainly, personally, don’t want a company dictate what is my future in AI as an individual, as a business person. I don’t want them to control me. I want competition. I don’t want them to unfairly control AI because they managed to do some regulatory capture. I feel that’s exactly their game plan. These guys believe in their stuff, and they want the regulator to end up being the one deciding for us. Sorry, we go back again on the opinion piece, but it’s tough not to share an opinion on this topic because it’s, from my perspective, very scary. Nuno I think this is a push to further regulation, not less. All these letters and alliances, this is definitely a push for more regulation. In that environment, just to be very honest with you, we’ll talk about the investor impact in just a bit, et cetera. But in that environment, again, China has a huge advantage. In that environment, if it’s all captured in regulation capture so soon in this battle where OpenAI and Anthropic have an advantage in the US, et cetera, I’m like, what happens to all the other frontier labs and all the other players that are coming around? Bertrand What’s crazy is to even think that, yeah, maybe you can regulate capture in the US. But then how do you do that to Europe? How do you do that to China? Europe probably will always welcome regulatory capture because they love regulations. But China is going to build to their advantage to the max. They are not crazy. They are smart on that perspective, they won’t accept this type of, quite frankly, dimwit argument, or you can call it regulatory capture. We’ll see. But for me, this makes no sense from a global competition perspective. This can make some sense from capturing the revenue in the US market. But then that means you are going to destroy the US AI environment compared to China. That is not acceptable. That also means that you are going to destroy our freedom as individuals, as business owners to develop and live in a business world that ultimately is controlled by one or two business companies that didn’t win the marketplace through their own business success, but won it through regulations. That for me is really not acceptable. Interlude — The Low-Background Books Nuno Now, maybe for an interlude, and we have to cue in the music, imagine like Severance music, like hallway or a bit of a palate cleanser from all the policy stuff that we’ve been talking about, all this policy heaviness. Let’s move to another kind of heaviness, one of your favorite topics, which you, Bertrand, discovered, I had no clue this was going on, around books and around Anthropic. Bertrand It’s so horrible. From a company that keeps presenting themselves as the adults in the room, the careful ones, the ones that know better than you about what to do in this complex AI and dangerous world. What we discover is that actually all along, they were buying and destroying books. They will buy books, scan them, destroy them, all of them. They will do that with any books, including rare books. Of course, this was not supposed to come to the public’s attention. This was one of these top secret projects, but obviously it came out. Yes, they were scanning books, millions of them, including rare books, and they didn’t care about destroying them at the end of the process. Because from a regulatory perspective, if you destroy the books, it’s not considered a copyright infringement, apparently. This is coming on the back of some judgment a few years ago that were showing that it’s okay for you as a corporate to scan and use the result if you don’t keep a copy of the book. It’s one of these crazy regulations happening based on a single judgment that push you to do. For me, it’s like, you know this book from decades ago, Fahrenheit 471? We’re talking about book burning. It’s book destroying, crunching. It’s so shocking. Nuno There are two things, right? First, the legal strategy, which is what you’re saying, because by purchasing a physical copy and converting it into one private digital copy and discarding the original, Anthropic pursued this cleaner legal argument for fair use copyright compliance. As you said, there was a federal judgment at some point on this. The other reason is actually operational. If you disassemble the book, and you feed loose pages, it’s much faster to scan books. You are destroying the book effectively anyway operationally. I think to your point, probably this came from a legal standpoint, not just the operational one. But even from an operational standpoint, it does make sense that they would have disassembled the book. Bertrand But some people have shown you can go very fast without destroying the book. It’s really not so critical. Two, you could make an exception if the book is rare. For that 1% of book that is rare, I’m not going to have this approach. I’m going to have another approach. But for that, you will have to care about books and not just care about building AI. Nuno This is the episode, as you guys have heard by now, that we’re trying to spit stuff at Anthropic. Bertrand To go back this is the same company saying, “Hey, guys, it’s bad to distillate my work. I’m the one scanning book at scale without asking author permission, without asking publisher permission, to be clear.” Nuno But just to be clear, Bertrand, we’re pissed off at everyone. We’re pissed off at Anthropic, we’re pissed of at OpenAI as well, right? We’re just pissed off in general at this moment. Bertrand At this stage for me, the more clear-cut company that is in the wrong is, from my perspective, at least, is Anthropic. OpenAI might be a fast follower, but I will say so far, they tried to be a bit more. Nuno But at this pace, Bertrand, who knows? Maybe next week we’ll be more pissed off at OpenAI. Something will come out. This episode is a mix of tragicomedy, like a Greek tragedy with some comedy in the middle or the other way around. It’s a slapstick thing that will end up in tragedy. I’m not sure. The Investor Reckoning Anyway, maybe switching to our final act, which is the investor perspective. What does this mean for investors like ourselves? There’s a lot of things going on. There’s the debate around the IPOs of Anthropic and OpenAI, which now, with all this uncertainty, might be under significant weight. There’s a lot of other discussions that we browsed through that there’s potential IPOs going forward on companies like the Moonshot AI company actually IPO-ing in the next 6 months as well. It’s very unclear what the IPO landscape looks like. Bertrand There’s been a lot of Chinese IPOs, actually, when you look at what’s happened in the past few months. Nuno Anthropic, OpenAI as potential IPOs, there’s all this question marks now. When will that happen? How will it factor in? All that’s happening around regulation as regulation is moving at the speed of light, which is for once something that’s very different than what we’ve seen before. There’s obviously SpaceX AI, which is already taking into account that price. It’s already a public company in there, and it’s under SpaceX, which is now a public company. Obviously, that’s already being factored in some ways. Bertrand Yeah. SpaceX AI has been very smart to acquire Cursor. It was a very smart move because Cursor is one of the leading companies in terms of automated code source development with AI. They had great models on their own. They’re bringing development data to SpaceX AI Grok. I think it was a great move. Nuno We have now people like Google delaying Gemini 3.5 Pro in terms of launch window. There’s stuff actually happening in the market where things are taking their own path. There’s uncertainty commercially, there’s uncertainty at regulation level. You have new players that have come out of nowhere that are making all these waves like Moonshot. We have all these… We had calculated probably a month and a half, 2 months ago, there had been 67 new frontier labs funded. All of these, we haven’t seen any much coming out of them. When some of this stuff starts coming out, will that also create disruptions in this market? Who knows? Bertrand Look at Thinking Machines, for instance. Thinking Machines led by the previous CTO of OpenAI, they released some pretty interesting open source models, actually. Very good quality for a first launch. Now it looks funny to say, but nearly on par with the top Chinese open source models. Nuno We have several investments in the space. humans& has made some recent announcements, which is quite interesting as well. We’ll see what actually happens in the market, but even more disruption probably will come in actual products in a form of product and commercial, on top of all the geopolitical mess that we discussed through the entire episode. If you’re an investor, how the hell do you underwrite an investment right now in early stage, mid-stage, late stage, et cetera? I think my answer is very carefully is how you underwrite it. Bertrand On your advice of being very careful to underwrite it, let’s not forget what happened to our boy wonder, Leopold Aschenbrenner of Situational Awareness. I guess he didn’t listen to you in terms of being careful because part of the instability in the stock market was actually coming from his hedge fund. These guys were leveraged 3, 4x going after the hottest of the hottest AI stocks, and margin calls, and all their public investment is gone just to answer their margin calls. I think it’s clear that the AI bet is… Personally, I’m very excited, and I think it’s the future, and you need to spend time and think about and invest in it. At the same time, it’s a bet that is not an easy one to follow. We go from GPUs to memories to equipments to power generation. All of this is not transitioning in an easy, organized manner. It would be boom and bust going there. He’s probably one of the first big-scale fatalities. The other big-scale fatality was the stock market in Korea, plunging 40% in a month. Definitely, all of that we discussed about was, on the background, you had the stock market going up and down pretty crazily the past few weeks. Nuno Everyone’s being affected. Everyone, you have your 401(k), you have your pension fund dependent on these equity stocks. Everyone’s seeing the effects of this volatility right now very aggressively. We do wish Leopold… Hopefully he’s on honeymoon right now because he got married, I think, this weekend. Hopefully there will be… Bertrand To none less than an Anthropic Chief of Staff. Nuno His wife is the Chief of Staff of Dario, is that it? Bertrand To Dario, yes, as far as I unders

A robot in China recently ran the 100-meter dash in 8.86 seconds, breaking Usain Bolt’s 9.58-second world record. The race was part of the World Humanoid Robot Games in Beijing, where robots compete in everything from running and soccer to household and industrial tasks. To learn more about the future of humanoid robots in our society, Dan talked with Dr. Kenechukwu Mbanisi, Assistant Professor of Robotics Engineering at Olin College of Engineering.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

An African safari doesn't have to mean a traffic jam. On this episode of Unpacked, host Aislyn Greene travels to Tanzania's southern circuit—visiting two parks most first-time safari-ers never consider—and discovers what happens when you trade the famous Great Migration crossing for a dry riverbed with not another human being in sight. To get there, she consulted Elizabeth Gordon, co-founder of Extraordinary Journeys, who helped reframe what an African safari could be. What followed was eight days in Ruaha National Park and Nyerere National Park: a walking safari with a guide who reads the wind with a pouch of ash, a river full of hippos and crocodiles that Aislyn took to calling "danger soup," and a fly camp on a lake where a ranger stayed up all night speaking hippo so she didn't have to. Come back next week for a bonus episode about what happens when a lion leaves the park—and meets a herd of cattle. THIS WEEK'S GUESTS Elizabeth Gordon is the co-founder of Extraordinary Journeys, a bespoke travel company designing African safari itineraries—and trips throughout South America and Asia—for travelers who want more than the standard route. Born in Kenya to a mother who joined the Peace Corps, earned her pilot's license, and built a house on a game park outside Nairobi, Elizabeth grew up between Kenya and France, studied in Beijing, and managed safari camps in Namibia before launching the company with her mother. Pay Mbaryo is a walking guide and naturalist with Nomad Tanzania in Ruaha National Park. A farmer's son who grew up in the Gorongosa district, he has spent 15 years in the bush and navigates unmarked wilderness using what he calls a natural GPS. In a decade of guiding, he has never once had to use his rifle. Gerald is a guide with Nomad Tanzania in Nyerere National Park, in his fourth year on the Rufiji River. He can identify a hippo's path out of the water by sight and smell—and he was the one who handed Aislyn a hippo skull to explain exactly why you don't want to be in that path. IN THIS EPISODE Why Tanzania's Southern Circuit—specifically Ruaha National Park and Nyerere National Park—offers a better African safari experience for first-time visitors than the Great Migration crossing: fewer people, better guides, and wildlife that doesn't know you're there What a walking safari in Ruaha actually feels like: reading the wind with a pouch of ash, approaching a mother elephant and her calf without being detected, learning to make a toothbrush from a tree, and discovering the Small Five How Pay spent 15 years learning that birds, buffalo, and elephants are all sharing information with one another—and why walking safari means becoming part of that conversation rather than watching it from a Jeep The Rufiji River at Nyerere: a wide, curving expanse of "danger soup"—filled with hippos and crocodiles—and what an afternoon on the water teaches you about the elephant as a keystone species What fly camping looks like when Nomad's team digs a bathroom into the sand, rigs a hot shower, serves gin and tonics under the stars, and a ranger stays up all night so you can fall asleep to the sound of the hippo brass band CHAPTER MARKERS 00:00:00 Introduction: African Safari, But Different 00:04:00 Why the Southern Circuit 00:08:00 Arriving in Ruaha 00:12:00 Walking Safari With Pay 00:20:00 The Small Five and the Keystone Species 00:26:00 Nyerere and the Rufiji River 00:33:00 Danger Soup: Life on the Water 00:38:00 Fly Camping With Hippos LINKS & RESOURCES Extraordinary Journeys Nomad Tanzania Nomad Kigelia Camp, Ruaha Nomad Sand Rivers Camp, Nyerere Ruaha National Park, Tanzania Nyerere National Park, Tanzania View From Afar—Great Migration episode Stay connected Be sure to subscribe to the show and sign up for our podcast newsletter, Behind the Mic, where we share upcoming news and behind-the-scenes details of each episode. And explore our second podcast, Travel Tales, which celebrates first-person narratives about the way travel changes us, and View From Afar, where we spotlight the people and ideas shaping the future of travel. Unpacked by Afar is part of Airwave Media's podcast network. Please contact advertising@airwavemedia.com if you would like to advertise on our podcast. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

After promising "consequences" for Taiwan's presence at the Pacific Islands Forum, China is denying comments by a senior diplomat are a threat - and that it has engaged in foreign interference. Taiwan's expanded role at the forum has enraged Beijing and there are concerns the rivalry will overshadow potential progress on regional issues, particularly climate action.

Nightlife News Breakdown with Philip Clark, joined by Krishani Dhanji, political reporter and live blogger for Guardian Australia, based in Canberra.

Last October, Pastor Wang Lin, one of the leaders in Zion Church in China, was arrested and imprisoned under false charges of "fraud" and "illegal business practices". Sarah Su (Su Ziming in Chinese), wife of Pastor Wang, recounts the day her husband was arrested and the Christian persecution they faced even before he was imprisoned. Sarah will share about her husband's role in Zion Church's leadership and in training other leaders, how the church continues to reach many people despite persecution from the Chinese Communist Party, and recent updates about Pastor Wang's condition in prison. "The moment I married Wang Lin, I decided to face all this together," Sarah says. "I knew that his mission was to train and disciple more Christians in China … I knew something like [this] would happen one day." You'll hear from Sarah how she continues to face this persecution with courage, faithfully enduring times of worry and loneliness. She will share how she and her husband both are committed to serve the Lord, no matter the cost. Zion Church made international headlines during President Trump's visit to Xi Jinping in Beijing in May and with the release of Zion senior pastor Ezra Jin from prison during America's 4 July celebrations. Sarah thanks God for Jin's release, and says the case against Zion Church continues, with eight church leaders remaining in prison. She asks that we pray for their release, the dismissal of charges, for their physical and spiritual health, and for her and her children, along with family members of the other persecuted Christians from Zion Church. Visit Prisoner Alert to write an encouraging letter to Pastor Wang Lin, and letters to other Christians imprisoned for their faith in Iran, Eritrea, and China. https://www.prisoneralert.com/

A.M. Edition for Aug. 31. The U.S. strikes Iranian targets near the Strait of Hormuz, sending oil prices higher on concerns of a flareup in fighting. Plus, as the leaders of Russia and China converge against the West on supporting Iran, WSJ's Thomas Grove explains how their fortunes are diverging, with Beijing holding Russia's economy hostage. And a look at how President Trump's China tariffs have propelled Vietnam's economy, as manufacturers shift production. Luke Vargas hosts. Sign up for the WSJ's free What's News newsletter. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Is China trying to bail out it's beleaguered real estate market? That seems to be the case with the latest schemes aimed at stabilizing the sector. The timing isn't a surprise nor is the degree of help Beijing aims to offer given the state of banks and the economy over there. Eurodollar University's conversation w/Steve Van Metre----------------------------------------------------------------------------------What if your gold could actually pay you every month… in MORE gold?That's exactly what Monetary Metals does. You still own your gold, fully insured in your name, but instead of sitting idle, it earns real yield paid in physical gold. No selling. No trading. Just more gold every month.Check it out here: https://monetary-metals.com/snider----------------------------------------------------------------------------------Eurodollar University Live 2October 9-12, West Palm Beach, Florida40 seats exist. Application only.https://eurodollar-university.com/edu-conference-2026----------------------------------------------------------------------------------https://www.facebook.com/Canal.Macau/videos/back-in-china-fresh-property-easing-measures-across-chinas-top-tier-metropolises/2113122509290529/https://www.youtube.com/shorts/AeVh2LvDwOMhttps://www.cnbc.com/video/2025/11/26/chinas-property-sector-will-be-significantly-smaller-deflation-fixed-asset-investments.htmlhttps://www.eurodollar.universityTwitter: https://twitter.com/JeffSnider_EDUI'll also be active on Bravais Social - a new AI-centered social network designed for professionals and knowledge workers. The platform aims to bring together a wider range of tools and functionalities tailored specifically for professional interaction, research, and knowledge exchange in one place. You can find me here: https://bravais.social/profile/edu

We kick off the episode celebrating National Eat Outside Day and mixing up some creatine electrolytes in a Hydro Jug to fight off brain fog before diving into some major rants. Mike vents about annoying "see what's new" software pop ups on Riverside. Mike explains a bizarre shipping error where he mysteriously received three identical, limited edition watches for his birthday despite his wife Sam only paying for one. Shifting to sports, we celebrate the US Wheelchair Rugby team—featuring previous podcast guests Chuck and Sarah—winning the World Championship for the first time in 16 years after defeating Australia 57-51. We also discuss Nike's Lower East Side 100-meter street race where the fastest sprinter gets their NYC rent paid for a month (up to $4,000), and debate a viral story about four 18-year-old New Jersey hikers who were billed what we consider a very reasonable $1,000 for a nine-hour rescue in New Hampshire. We also reluctantly acknowledge the fast-approaching NFL and fantasy football season, which unfortunately signals the start of Erin's cold weather seasonal depression. In "Erin's Tea Time," we break down a disastrous week for corporate marketing. We cover Callaway Golf's controversial ad featuring a man shoulder-checking a woman for a club (which they blamed on a YouTube production company), Tarte Cosmetics sending influencers highly offensive PR packages with their faces marked up for plastic surgery, and LoveSac's embarrassing decision to mock comedian Deric Cahill with tiny gardening gloves after he made a viral video about their exhausting 25-box couch assembly. In the tech world, we review the unhinged Humanoid Robot Games in Beijing and a "robot" house cleaner that we think is actually being controlled by underpaid overseas laborers who are essentially scanning your home's layout. We also laugh at our favorite corporate one-liners to use at the office. Finally, in "No Bad, No Sad," we highlight the wholesome viral moment of 34-year-old "Heather Skater" inviting all of Denver to a local park to cheer her on as she happily fell her way through her very first roller skating attempt.

No Beav this week, we talk about the top NFL storylines heading into the season, Nneka Ogumike retiring, Natasha Cloud's eventful week, and, in Rule Breakers, we react to the World Robot Games in Beijing and a high school coach getting fired. Enjoy!

In this episode of The PDB Situation Report: Iran says a proposed agreement with Oman would divide control of the Strait of Hormuz and prevent American warships from passing through the critical waterway. Retired Rear Admiral Mark Montgomery joins us to assess the implications. Chinese technology is transforming Russia's Iranian-designed Shahed drones into weapons increasingly resembling low-cost cruise missiles. Author Gordon G. Chang joins us to explain what Beijing's involvement means. To listen to the show ad-free, become a premium member of The President's Daily Brief by visiting https://PDBPremium.com. Please remember to subscribe if you enjoyed this episode of The President's Daily Brief. YouTube: youtube.com/@presidentsdailybrief iRestore: Unlock your best hair & skin with @iRestorelaser and HUGE savings on iRESTORE with code NERVE at irestore.com/PDB#irestorepod #sponsored MOD: For a free consultation and get 10% off your first order PLUS free shipping with promo code PDB at https://mod.com

The gospel worker from China was stunned by how many biblical resources were available to Christians in America. He created a plan to scan one Bible commentary onto CDs that could be carried back into China and copied for underground Christians there. But he needed help. He reached out to find a more technically-capable person to help with the process—and an international ministry was birthed! Ken Bitgood was the young man recruited to help with that scanning project. Today he and Digital Bible Society are distributing Scripture resources in more than 4,500 languages! When Ken first became a follower of Jesus, he was encouraged to live in God's Word. He'll tell how he did that (with the help of a car stereo) and how it birthed in him a passion to see people of all nations, tribes, and tongues access the riches of the Bible and Christian resources to encourage and edify the Body of Christ around the world. In their 25th year of ministry, the Digital Bible Society is working alongside more than 400 organizations to distribute resources, free and free to copy, in over 6,000 languages. Ken will share a story of a man from Beijing he met at a conference, who pointed to the DBS resources and said, "This is what put me in jail!" You'll hear more of Ken's heart to see laborers in the harvest fields as he shares his belief that every language should have God's Word translated for them in his lifetime. Visit the Bible Access List to learn more about where there is a shortage of Bibles and places that are restricted from having God's Word. The VOM App for your smartphone or tablet will help you pray daily for persecuted Christians in nations like North Korea, Nigeria, China, and Iran, as well as provide free access to e-books, audiobooks, video content, and feature films. Download the VOM App for your iOS or Android device today.

Kate Adie presents stories from Germany on the Alternative für Deutschland party's plans if it takes power in state elections; India's Cockroach party takes on a new fight; inside the factories of China's robotic revolution; how corned beef changed a Uruguayan town and the protesters of the peaceful anti-communist revolution in 1989 who've taken up a new cause.Jessica Parker has followed the campaign of AfD's state leader in Saxony-Anhalt, Ulrich Siegmund, and heard more about the plans to reform the culture and education systems to make them more patriotic - and what locals are making of them.Geeta Pandy has visited rural schools in Faridabad - which are poorly staffed and in a dilapidated condition. It's a situation replicated across India and the subject of a new campaign by the Cockroach Janata Party, as she discovers.In China, Laura Bicker has visited factories in Chengdu, Hangzhou and Beijing - as well as the World Humanoid Olympics - to witness the robot revolution underway. More than two million robots work in the country's factories and she encounters the industrial robots working alongside humans - and the young people being encouraged to embrace the advances.Sara Wheeler has been in the Uruguayan town of Fray Bentos, and learns how corned beef along with other beef products once changed the fortunes of the region and the country.And Anne McElvoy reflects on her time as a student in communist East Germany, and then as a reporter of the anti-communist protests in 1989 - and finds some of those who took to the streets back then have redirected their sense of national pride to embrace a new cause: support for the AfD.Series Producer: Serena Tarling Production Coordinators: Katie Morrison and Sophie Hill Editor: Justine Lang

Coming up, groundbreaking research suggests the shingles vaccine can greatly reduce the risk of heart attacks. What's the science behind it? Also ahead: the New Space Race between the US and China goes up a gear as Beijing unexpectedly delays the launch of its Chang'e 7 mission. Plus, the frozen 'poo pills' that scientists hope can help keep allergies at bay. Like this podcast? Please help us by supporting the Naked Scientists

Could Scarborough Shoal become China's next artificial-island outpost? Can transparency effectively counter gray-zone coercion at sea? Why did scholars from seven Chinese universities suddenly claim that Batanes, the Philippines' northernmost and very much inhabited island province, belongs to China? And why has the Chinese embassy in Manila spent so much time attacking a Philippine Coast Guard officer, and one of our own podcast co-hosts, online?In this special crossover episode, the usual roles are reversed. Rear Admiral Jay Tarriela of the Philippine Coast Guard, a two-time Why Should We Care About the Indo-Pacific? guest and a leading champion of Manila's maritime transparency campaign, takes the host chair on his podcast, Just the Truth. Recorded in Manila, he puts Why Should We Care co-host Ray Powell in the guest seat.Jay and Ray examine what happens when China's pressure at sea is paired with political warfare on land. They discuss the risk that Scarborough Shoal could become Beijing's next fortified outpost, the sudden claims over Batanes as Chinese coast guard vessels push east of the First Island Chain, and whether publicly documenting water cannons, ramming, swarming, and other coercive acts changes China's behavior, or at least builds the national resilience and international backing needed for a long-term resistance.They also explore why the Philippines has embraced transparency while many Southeast Asian neighbors still prefer quiet diplomacy, how independent journalists aboard Philippine Coast Guard ships have helped make maritime encounters impossible to ignore, and why the political contest over facts, images, and public opinion may be inseparable from the contest taking place on the water.Jay then lightens the mood with some of his favorite “mean tweets” about Ray: that he is an American propagandist, or secretly Jay's CIA boss, or directing a half-billion-dollar U.S. government information operation against China… a windfall Ray's wife would very much like to locate.It is a candid, sometimes irreverent conversation about territorial claims, information warfare, Philippine agency, and why Beijing appears so determined to discredit the people pointing cameras at its actions.Be sure to subscribe for your weekly Indo-Pacific briefing.Follow Rear Admiral Jay Tarriela at the West Philippine Sea Transparence Office on Facebook, on LinkedIn or on X, @jaytaryelaFollow “Just the Truth” on the Philippine Information Agency's YouTube channelFollow us on X, @IndoPacPodcast, LinkedIn or FacebookSponsored by BowerGroupAsia, a strategic advisory firm that specializes in the Indo-Pacific

On this week's Defense & Aerospace Report Washington Roundtable, Dr. Patrick Cronin of the Hudson Institute think tank, former DoD Europe chief Jim Townsend of the Center for a New American Security, and former Pentagon Comptroller Dr. Dov Zakheim of the Center for Strategic and International Studies join Defense & Aerospace Report Editor Vago Muradian to discuss the impact of rising inflation on the Trump administration's budget request; CIA Director John Ratcliffe's visit to Moscow; NATO's moves to counter Russia's mounting provocations in the Baltic and across Europe; Pentagon policy chief Bridge Colby's meeting with allies as he oversees the review that will reduce US troops from Europe; Washington's new Iran sanctions to collapse the theocratic regime as Beijing vows to retaliate if its banks or businesses are targeted; the trade war with Canada; Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu's claim Iran tried to kill one of his son's in Florida; retired Israeli Brig. Gen. Ofer Winter new extreme right-wing party; Iraq's Prime Minister Ali al-Zaidi's effort to bring militias under control; Washington cancels an amphibious exercise with South Korea, but will press ahead with the trilateral Freedom Edge exercise next month with Korea and Japan; Japan, Australia, and Indonesia launch defense talks; and Beijing's tightening comprehensive encirclement of Taiwan.

CONTENTS JOHN BATCHELOR SHOW, 8-26-2026.832Greenwich Observatory (Robert Chambers, p.200, 1832) - Copy.pngJohn Batchelor and Michael Bernstam analyze the revenue-sharing deal between Iran and Oman over the Strait of Hormuz, which does not resolve the critical global refinery shortage. Decades of zero Western refinery expansion, alongside Ukrainian drone strikes disabling Russian capacity, has left a global deficit of 5.6 to 6 million barrels per day of refined products. This is especially severe for diesel, which requires heavy crude unlike the light sweet crude produced by the US shale revolution. With U.S. refineries running at maximum capacity, the threat of mechanical failures risks a full-blown supply crisis. (1)Richard Reinsch discusses the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) and their principles, which advocate for economic collectivism, nationalizing private industries, and dismantling the U.S. constitutional republic in favor of a unicameral legislature. Reinsch contrasts this with a historical 1922 Kremlin conversation where Soviet leader Joseph Stalin accused American communist Jay Lovestone of "heresy" for arguing "American exceptionalism"—the idea that American working-class prosperity made them resistant to Marxism. Today, Reinsch views the DSA as an overeducated, white, urban phenomenon failing to win working-class or minority voters. (2)Rogier Windhorst and David Livingston: Professor Windhorst warns that the Hubble Space Telescope's orbit will begin to decay uncontrollably by September 2033 due to solar maximum atmospheric expansion. To prevent a hazardous, uncontrolled re-entry, Windhorst advocates for a robotic servicing mission to boost Hubble's orbit. As the only remaining telescope with precise blue-ultraviolet capabilities, Hubble's data remains critical and heavily in demand. Windhorst urges NASA to fund a $100 million rescue mission and eventually construct the Habitable Worlds Observatory to search for Earth-like exoplanets starting in 2040. (3)David Hebert discusses the fiscal debates surrounding Social Security's impending 2032 shortfall. Hebert refutes the idea that raising tax rates increases treasury revenue, noting that tax revenue historically remains constant at 17–18% of GDP because high rates prompt tax avoidance. Instead of "starving the beast" of resources, Hebert advocates for "starving the beast of responsibility" by decentralizing programs through federalism to cut administrative costs. He urges structural reforms to Social Security, highlighting that the ratio of workers supporting each retiree has plummeted from 40-to-1 down to 2-to-1. (4)Captain James Fanell (US Navy, retired), co-host Gordon Chang: Fanell warns that China is nearing completion of a military installation on Triton Island in the Paracels, expanding its "ring of control" in the South China Sea. He cautions that China may soon fortify Scarborough Shoal, threatening to block the northern South China Sea and degrade U.S. naval operations. In response to this rising coercion, the Philippines is boosting its 2027 defense budget by 6.3%, allocating $800 million for modernization with a heavy focus on intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance drones. Fanell urges more assertive naval cooperation to deter further Chinese expansion. (5)Dean Cheng, co-host Gordon Chang: Cheng analyzes China's space program and its pursuit of reusable booster technology to match SpaceX's cost-saving launch cadences. Although China has successfully recaptured first-stage boosters, it has not yet demonstrated refurbishing or reusing them. Cheng notes that China seeks space dominance to deploy six mega-constellations and establish moon colonies. He suggests that a delay in China's lunar south pole probe—officially blamed on solar exposure—is likely due to the ongoing accident investigation of the Long March 7 rocket failure. Cheng predicts a Chinese astronaut will walk on the moon by December 31, 2030. (6)Charles Burton, co-host Gordon Chang: Burton discusses the escalating trade war between Canada and the Trumpadministration, which triggered $20 billion in Canadian retaliatory tariffs and a 7.5 billion CAD business support package. The dispute has sparked public anti-Trump sentiment and personal mudslinging between Donald Trump and Ontario Premier Doug Ford. Stalled negotiations, compounded by unacceptable U.S. demands regarding French labeling laws, have shattered bilateral trust. Burton warns that Canada is prepared to pivot away from MAGA toward free trade with Europe and China, despite severe risks of Chinese economic coercion. (7)Jack Burnham outlines China's persistent military coercion campaign targeting Taiwan, noting that Beijing separates economic trade truces from its aggressive goal to subjugate the island. China's provocations, including Coast Guardpatrols east of Taiwan and flights over the median line, are designed to establish a "new normal." In December 2025, China responded to an $11 billion U.S. arms package by launching "Justice Mission 2025," an expansive military exercise simulating blockades and practicing "all-dimensional deterrence" to discourage U.S. intervention and test regional capabilities. (8)Doug Messier details SpaceX's plans to build "Starbase Louisiana," a massive $100 billion, 125,000-acre spaceport designed as the world's largest launch facility. Scheduled for construction in 2027 and launches by 2029, the facility will feature ten launch pads supporting thousands of annual, airline-style Starship flights. While bringing thousands of jobs, the coastal development raises environmental concerns regarding wetland habitats, which SpaceX has pledged to help restore. Messier also highlights Space Force's startup funding arm, SpaceWERX, which is fostering new aerospace innovators like Antares Nuclear and Muon Space. (9)Jeremy Zakis reports on the unprecedented rainfall sweeping across Australia, driven by a super El Niño cycle interacting with the Indian Ocean Dipole. South Australia and Adelaide experienced the heaviest downpours, breaking monthly rainfall records in a single day, while Sydney's infrastructure coped with several inches of rain. Victoria and Melbourne were largely spared due to the Great Dividing Range acting as a barrier. Zakis warns that weekly spring rains are highly unusual and threaten to fuel rapid forest undergrowth, which could dry out and create a dangerous bushfire hazard during future droughts. (10)

Jack Burnham outlines China's persistent military coercion campaign targeting Taiwan, noting that Beijing separates economic trade truces from its aggressive goal to subjugate the island. China's provocations, including Coast Guardpatrols east of Taiwan and flights over the median line, are designed to establish a "new normal." In December 2025, China responded to an $11 billion U.S. arms package by launching "Justice Mission 2025," an expansive military exercise simulating blockades and practicing "all-dimensional deterrence" to discourage U.S. intervention and test regional capabilities. (8)

What the hell is Beijing doing to seduce Washington? Join us for the last in our summer book series for a discussion with Dr. Audrye Wong for a conversation about her new book, Subversion and Seduction: China's Economic Statecraft. How the hell has Beijing gained influence inside the United States? What the hell are their […]

What the hell is Beijing doing to seduce Washington? Join us for the last in our summer book series for a discussion with Dr. Audrye Wong for a conversation about her new book, Subversion and Seduction: China's Economic Statecraft. How the hell has Beijing gained influence inside the United States? What the hell are their carrots and sticks? We debrief the state of China's seduction campaign and Audrye's policy suggestions to counter Beijing.Audrye Wong is a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, where her work focuses on China's foreign policy, economic statecraft, propaganda and disinformation campaigns, and foreign influence operations. Previously, Dr. Wong was a professor at the University of Southern California and postdoctoral fellow at the Grand Strategy, Security, and Statecraft joint program of the Harvard Kennedy School and Massachusetts Institute of Technology's Security Studies Program. She has also held affiliations with Harvard's Fairbank Center for Chinese Studies, the Wilson Center, the Brookings Institution, and the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. She is fluent in Mandarin. Dr. Wong holds a PhD, MA and AB from Princeton.Read the transcript here.Subscribe to our Substack here.

With Apple and Nvidia unleashing hardware that makes powerful local AI a reality, this episode unpacks the tech arms race changing how we run models at home and in business. Are we witnessing the end of the GPU monopoly and the start of real AI independence? (538) Qwen on X: "⚡Meet Qwen3.8-Flash, a multimodal MoE and an early preview of the Qwen4 architecture, now open-weight! The production version Qwen3.8-Flash will be available soon via QwenCloud API at just $ 0.16/1M input tokens and $ 0.47/1M output tokens. 125B parameters + 51B N-gram https://t.co/SScnmzWS7O" / X Thomson Reuters built its own AI model on Chinese open-source tech to slash AI costs Now introducing Gemini Enterprise for Legal Meta reaches $16.68 billion settlement over social media harms to children Twitch and Amazon hit with lawsuit for training AI with streamers' content Three Takeaways From Bill Gates's 5,784-Word Warning on AI: 'There Is No Plan' (214) Breaking911 on X: "WATCH: A humanoid robot training for the "Robot Olympics" in Beijing runs too fast, fails to stop, slams into a safety cushion, and breaks at the waist https://t.co/WEHdYCiPlO" / X Nvidia Is Spending $6 Billion to Build a Powerful U.S. Alternative to Chinese AI A Drone Killed Three Ukrainians. It Was Guided Entirely by A.I. Inside Musk's First Address to Cursor: Grok Is Falling Behind Introducing Butter Box | Butter | Life without internet made smoother. Silicon Valley's Newest Status Symbol Is a Super-Rare Sam Altman Swiss Watch Hosts: Leo Laporte and Jeff Jarvis Co-Host: Christina Warren Download or subscribe to Intelligent Machines at https://twit.tv/shows/intelligent-machines. Join Club TWiT for Ad-Free Podcasts! Support what you love and get ad-free audio and video feeds, a members-only Discord, and exclusive content. Join today: https://twit.tv/clubtwit Sponsors: outsystems.com/twit scribe.how/machines framer.com/machines

With Apple and Nvidia unleashing hardware that makes powerful local AI a reality, this episode unpacks the tech arms race changing how we run models at home and in business. Are we witnessing the end of the GPU monopoly and the start of real AI independence? (538) Qwen on X: "⚡Meet Qwen3.8-Flash, a multimodal MoE and an early preview of the Qwen4 architecture, now open-weight! The production version Qwen3.8-Flash will be available soon via QwenCloud API at just $ 0.16/1M input tokens and $ 0.47/1M output tokens. 125B parameters + 51B N-gram https://t.co/SScnmzWS7O" / X Thomson Reuters built its own AI model on Chinese open-source tech to slash AI costs Now introducing Gemini Enterprise for Legal Meta reaches $16.68 billion settlement over social media harms to children Twitch and Amazon hit with lawsuit for training AI with streamers' content Three Takeaways From Bill Gates's 5,784-Word Warning on AI: 'There Is No Plan' (214) Breaking911 on X: "WATCH: A humanoid robot training for the "Robot Olympics" in Beijing runs too fast, fails to stop, slams into a safety cushion, and breaks at the waist https://t.co/WEHdYCiPlO" / X Nvidia Is Spending $6 Billion to Build a Powerful U.S. Alternative to Chinese AI A Drone Killed Three Ukrainians. It Was Guided Entirely by A.I. Inside Musk's First Address to Cursor: Grok Is Falling Behind Introducing Butter Box | Butter | Life without internet made smoother. Silicon Valley's Newest Status Symbol Is a Super-Rare Sam Altman Swiss Watch Hosts: Leo Laporte and Jeff Jarvis Co-Host: Christina Warren Download or subscribe to Intelligent Machines at https://twit.tv/shows/intelligent-machines. Join Club TWiT for Ad-Free Podcasts! Support what you love and get ad-free audio and video feeds, a members-only Discord, and exclusive content. Join today: https://twit.tv/clubtwit Sponsors: outsystems.com/twit scribe.how/machines framer.com/machines

CONTENTS THE JOHN BATCHELOR SHOW, 8-25-2026COVER OF FANTASTIC MAGAZINE OCTOBER 1961Liz Peek, columnist for The Hill and Fox News, discusses the surprising resilience of the American economy, noting that small businesses are reporting strong hiring and profitability growth based on broad National Federation of Independent Business and Bank of America data. While consumer spending remains robust, recent data reveals a K-shaped economy, where higher-income homeowners spend extensively on renovations while lower-income consumers trade down at Walmart. Rising interest rates present a critical challenge, slamming the housing market and significantly increasing interest payments on the massive national debt. Lastly, the administration's tariff conflict with Canada is criticized as a major, highly unfortunate, and economically damaging political mistake. (1)Jonathan Schanzer, Executive Director of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, evaluates the Treasury's initial tranches of secondary sanctions targeting entities trading with Iran, including firms in China and the UAE. Although these measures stop short of targeting major Chinese banks, they provide President Trump with leverage ahead of his Washington summit with Xi Jinping. Within the Middle East, Schanzer warns that regional powers are hedging their bets. Saudi Arabia may be negotiating a separate peace with the Houthis and Iran, which could undermine US sanctions. Additionally, the US controversially rescinded Syria's state sponsor of terror status following the rapid rise of former al-Qaeda commander Ahmed al-Shara. (2)Mary Kissel, Senior Fellow at the Hudson Institute and former Senior Advisor to the Secretary of State, analyzes Trump's "maximum pressure" campaign against Iran, asserting that its success relies on penalizing large Chinesefinancial institutions. However, Beijing holds significant economic and military leverage over the US, including export controls on critical minerals. Regarding North America, Kissel describes the escalating trade war with Canada as a "loser's game" driven by domestic politics. She stresses that the 50% tariffs on essential materials like Canadianaluminum and auto parts disrupt deeply integrated supply chains. Consequently, this trade conflict severely harms ordinary consumers and threatens Republican control of key Senate seats in critical border states of Maine and Michigan. (3)Colonel Jeff McCausland, US Army (Retired) and Visiting Professor at Dickinson College, warns that the US foreign policy process has collapsed under President Trump, who relies on personal loyalty over expert advice. This is illustrated by Trump's sudden decision to reduce joint US-South Korea military exercises without notifying allies. McCausland argues this undercuts South Korea while offering concessions to a nuclear-armed dictator, Kim Jong-un, who actively supplies weapons to Russia for the Ukraine war. Furthermore, he criticizes the "economic D-Day" against Iran as highly insincere given key delays in sanctioning China, and strongly condemns the trade war against Canada, a loyal ally with a rich military history. (4)Gregory Copley, editor of Defense & Foreign Affairs, argues that the US sanctions regime against Iran is strategic signaling that makes Washington look weak, as it ignores China's trade dominance and threatens relations with India. He also views the Canadian trade dispute as a strategic failure that weakens the NORAD treaty and forces Canada to act independently in the Arctic. This unpredictability has alienated European allies, who are now bypassing the US to negotiate directly on Ukraine. Additionally, Copley analyzes post-Petro Colombia, detailing how the energetic new president faces massive domestic security issues, narco-trafficking networks, and the grounding of critical disaster relief aircraft under sanctions. (5)Thaddeus McCotter, former US Representative from Michigan and columnist for American Greatness, details the severe political and economic fallout of Trump's trade war with Canada, noting that insulting rhetoric like the "51st state" remark has politically boosted Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney. He explains that border states like Michigan and Maine share deep commercial integration, meaning 50% tariffs will directly harm their local economies. This unvetted policy blindsided senior Republican legislators, including Susan Collins, who openly opposed the tariffs and avoided a campaign rally with Vice President Vance. Ultimately, McCotter warns that these tariffs jeopardize critical Senate seats in highly contested swing states, giving rival Democrats a very major campaign advantage. (6)Judy Dempsey, Senior Scholar in Berlin for the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, with co-host Thaddeus McCotter: Dempsey describes European Baltic and Nordic leaders flocking to Kyiv, yet warns that "moral outrage" lacks a cohesive strategic plan to negotiate an end to the war. She highlights the rising prominence of the pro-Russian, far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) party in state elections. Interestingly, an ideological rift has emerged as radical AfD factions in East Germany sour on MAGA due to Trump's policies on Iran. McCotter delivers a severe critique of the MAGA-AfD relationship, arguing MAGA should never have "played footsies" with neo-Nazis, and asserting the AfD is fundamentally aligned with Vladimir Putin rather than the United States—their temporary embrace of MAGA merely a superficial attraction. Although West Germans have abandoned historical sentiments toward Russiadue to the Ukraine invasion, East Germany remains deeply split, harboring lingering sentimental pro-Russian views and separate post-unification cultural dynamics. (7)Note: segment 7 came with a separate co-host block for McCotter, so I've folded his critique into the single paragraph after Dempsey's material — flag me if you'd rather run his commentary as its own standalone file.

Mary Kissel, Senior Fellow at the Hudson Institute and former Senior Advisor to the Secretary of State, analyzes Trump's "maximum pressure" campaign against Iran, asserting that its success relies on penalizing large Chinesefinancial institutions. However, Beijing holds significant economic and military leverage over the US, including export controls on critical minerals. Regarding North America, Kissel describes the escalating trade war with Canada as a "loser's game" driven by domestic politics. She stresses that the 50% tariffs on essential materials like Canadianaluminum and auto parts disrupt deeply integrated supply chains. Consequently, this trade conflict severely harms ordinary consumers and threatens Republican control of key Senate seats in critical border states of Maine and Michigan. (3)

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China, the biggest buyer of Iranian oil, says it opposes "illegal" unilateral sanctions after the US warned that countries that continued to do business with Iran would face consequences. A foreign ministry spokesman said economic warfare and maximum pressure tactics did not help resolve problems but would only fuel further conflict. Also: At least 47 people are killed in a gang raid on a hillside community in Haiti. A new report predicts extreme rainfall and flooding in east Africa caused by El Nino that could leave up to three million people displaced. Why China is spending hundreds of billions of dollars to grow its robotic workforce, and Australia bans chart music made mostly by artificial intelligence. The Global News Podcast brings you the breaking news you need to hear, as it happens. Listen for the latest headlines and current affairs from around the world. Politics, economics, climate, business, technology, health – we cover it all with expert analysis and insight. Get the news that matters, delivered twice a day on weekdays and daily at weekends, plus special bonus episodes reacting to urgent breaking stories. Follow or subscribe now and never miss a moment. Get in touch: globalpodcast@bbc.co.uk Photo: Chinese President Xi Jinping looks on during a meeting with U.S. President Donald Trump (not pictured) on the sidelines of their visit to the Zhongnanhai Garden in Beijing in 2026. Credit: Reuters