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November 24, 2025
Polls
Fac the Nation - President Trump's handling of the economy in our new @CBSNewsPoll shows that only 36% of Americans now approve of his handling of the economy, and 32% approve of how he's handling inflation.
Millions of Americans Are Defaulting on Loans
Newsweek - Americans are defaulting on their debts at near-historic rates, a collision between long-term structural strains and more contemporary financial pressures that some believe could shake the entire economy.
The issue was put into sharp relief by the New York Fed’s most recent Household Debt and Credit report, which showed that household debt hit a record $18.6 trillion in the third quarter of 2025, having climbed $228 billion from the second quarter.
Credit card balances alone jumped $24 billion, reaching an all-time high, while the share of balances in serious delinquency—90 days past due—climbed to a nearly financial-crash level of 7.1 percent.
Auto loans tell a similar story, with serious delinquency rates at 3 percent, the highest since 2010. And a spike in resulting defaults has triggered a wave of repossessions in 2025, with 2.2 million vehicles already repossessed, per figures from the Recovery Database Network (RDN), and forecasts of a record 3 million by year’s end.
“Delinquencies, defaults, and repossessions have shot up in recent years and look alarmingly similar to trends that were apparent before the Great Recession,” the Consumer Federation of America said in a recent report.
The issue was put into sharp relief by the New York Fed’s most recent Household Debt and Credit report, which showed that household debt hit a record $18.6 trillion in the third quarter of 2025, having climbed $228 billion from the second quarter.
Credit card balances alone jumped $24 billion, reaching an all-time high, while the share of balances in serious delinquency—90 days past due—climbed to a nearly financial-crash level of 7.1 percent.
Auto loans tell a similar story, with serious delinquency rates at 3 percent, the highest since 2010. And a spike in resulting defaults has triggered a wave of repossessions in 2025, with 2.2 million vehicles already repossessed, per figures from the Recovery Database Network (RDN), and forecasts of a record 3 million by year’s end.
“Delinquencies, defaults, and repossessions have shot up in recent years and look alarmingly similar to trends that were apparent before the Great Recession,” the Consumer Federation of America said in a recent report.
Meanwhile. . .
Independent, UK - President Donald Trump’s family fortune has fallen by about $1 billion in a matter of months due to steep declines across the cryptocurrency market, according to a new report. The First Family’s net worth now stands at about $6.7 billion, down from $7.7 billion in September, according to Bloomberg News.
Nice News - In 2013, 64-year-old retiree Ed Levien answered a call for volunteer EMTs in Bethesda, Maryland, and, after passing the physical, joined the ranks of his local rescue squad. “I called up and said, ‘I’m probably too old.’ They said, ‘If you can pass the physical, we’d love to have you,’” Levien, now 76, recalled. Over the years, he racked up more than 13,000 hours with the service and now trains the next generation.
The Hill - New York City Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani (D) said he stands by calling Trump a "fascist" despite saying they had a productive meeting at the White House on Friday.
Tatiana Schlossberg revealed that she has terminal cancer in an essay published Nov. 22. In
the same essay, she slammed her cousin RFK Jr. for how his agenda as
health secretary has and could negatively impact the treatment she has
received. Recalling how she watched RFK Jr. rise to political
power during her cancer treatment, Schlossberg called him "an
embarrassment to me and the rest of my immediate family.”
Word
RepMcGovern: Trump promised to bring manufacturing jobs
back to America. Instead, 58 thousand manufacturing workers have lost
their jobs in America since his stupid tariffs took effect. Then he lies to our faces, saying the economy has never been better.
Self driving taxis
NY Times - When self-driving cars started picking up commercial passengers in San Francisco two years ago, they were not eagerly welcomed. Protesters took to the streets demanding that the vehicles be removed, citing concerns about safety and the loss of people’s jobs.
Then an autonomous car operated by Cruise, a subsidiary of General Motors, ran over and dragged a pedestrian, not long after another Cruise vehicle collided with a fire truck. The company’s vehicles were eventually taken off the road. The future of self-driving cars in the home of the tech industry’s artificial intelligence boom looked like it was on the rocks.
But Google’s Waymo, a self-driving-car company with a more cautious approach, stuck around, and today the situation has flipped. San Francisco has, to the surprise of many and the continuing aggravation of a few, become “Waymo-pilled.”
Now Waymo is getting another significant competitor in San Francisco. Amazon announced that it was beginning a free test program in the city on Tuesday for Zoox, its boxy, carriage-shaped robot taxis. The company has also been testing its robot taxis in Las Vegas since September and plans to expand to Miami and Austin, Texas. But San Francisco is the first city where the companies will compete head to head. More
Then an autonomous car operated by Cruise, a subsidiary of General Motors, ran over and dragged a pedestrian, not long after another Cruise vehicle collided with a fire truck. The company’s vehicles were eventually taken off the road. The future of self-driving cars in the home of the tech industry’s artificial intelligence boom looked like it was on the rocks.
But Google’s Waymo, a self-driving-car company with a more cautious approach, stuck around, and today the situation has flipped. San Francisco has, to the surprise of many and the continuing aggravation of a few, become “Waymo-pilled.”
Now Waymo is getting another significant competitor in San Francisco. Amazon announced that it was beginning a free test program in the city on Tuesday for Zoox, its boxy, carriage-shaped robot taxis. The company has also been testing its robot taxis in Las Vegas since September and plans to expand to Miami and Austin, Texas. But San Francisco is the first city where the companies will compete head to head. More
The game behind the Ukraine discussions
Independent UK - U.S. Special Envoy Steve Witkoff is running a shadow operation inside the White House in an effort to sideline pro-Ukraine officials, the Kyiv Independent has learned.
Witkoff — a real estate mogul with no diplomatic background before his appointment — has emerged as one of the central architects of a new Washington peace proposal that Ukrainian officials say revives the Kremlin's most sweeping demands.
A source in Ukraine's President's Office earlier said that Witkoff is shaping the plan in direct coordination with Kirill Dmitriev, Russia's top economic negotiator and an operator in Moscow's efforts to influence Washington.
"He has been doing it for months," the source said, mentioning Witkoff's 28-point plan that has been seen in Kyiv as a de facto capitulation to Russia.
The plan, approved by U.S. President Donald Trump earlier this week, includes requirements for Ukraine to cede territory, slash its military, and limit its alliances — proposals far more sweeping than those discussed in earlier negotiation rounds.
Witkoff — a real estate mogul with no diplomatic background before his appointment — has emerged as one of the central architects of a new Washington peace proposal that Ukrainian officials say revives the Kremlin's most sweeping demands.
A source in Ukraine's President's Office earlier said that Witkoff is shaping the plan in direct coordination with Kirill Dmitriev, Russia's top economic negotiator and an operator in Moscow's efforts to influence Washington.
"He has been doing it for months," the source said, mentioning Witkoff's 28-point plan that has been seen in Kyiv as a de facto capitulation to Russia.
The plan, approved by U.S. President Donald Trump earlier this week, includes requirements for Ukraine to cede territory, slash its military, and limit its alliances — proposals far more sweeping than those discussed in earlier negotiation rounds.
Gaza
NPR - Over the weekend, Israel and Hamas both accused the other of violating the ceasefire agreement in Gaza. The
ceasefire has been holding for a little over six weeks. Yesterday,
Israel also struck Lebanon’s capital, Beirut, for the first time since
June, killing a Hezbollah commander. This action has led many to worry
about the nearly year-long ceasefire in place there.
Much of the first phase of the Israel-Hamas ceasefire has been completed. The
next phase involves setting up an International Stabilization Force in
Gaza, according to NPR’s Kat Lonsdorf. But there are still many
questions about who will make up that force
and how they will be trained. Lonsdorf says it may sound contradictory
to still be discussing a ceasefire when there are so many people being
killed and both sides have accused each other of violations, but the
agreement is holding, and there hasn't been a full return to war.
Hundreds of thousands of civilians killed fighting terrorism
Daniel Mendiola, The Guardian - Researchers with Brown University’s Costs of War project ... have found that US-led interventions in the “war on terror” from 2001 to 2023 killed over 400,000 civilians in direct war violence. They also show evidence that when considering indirect deaths – for example, people in war zones dying from treatable medical conditions after clean water or medical infrastructure was destroyed – death toll estimates rise to at least 3.5m. Moreover, even beyond direct war zones, a recent study in the Lancet found that sanctions during the same period were also extremely deadly, causing as many as 500,000 excess deaths per year from 2010 to 2021.
In short, we have already spent decades terrorizing civilian populations around the world in the name of fighting terror. This is well known, and yet the Trump White House is reinvigorating the “war on terror” anyway. Still more, it is trying to do it with even less oversight on the president’s license to kill than has been exercised in the past.
In short, we have already spent decades terrorizing civilian populations around the world in the name of fighting terror. This is well known, and yet the Trump White House is reinvigorating the “war on terror” anyway. Still more, it is trying to do it with even less oversight on the president’s license to kill than has been exercised in the past.
The Trump Mobile phone is nowhere to be found
NBC News - In June, Trump's two eldest sons held an event where they touted a new made-in-the-USA mobile phone with an American flag on its back, plus a new wireless service called Trump Mobile. Months after its stated August release, there are no signs the phone has become a reality.
NBC News placed an order for a T1 phone in August, paying the $100 deposit for the purposes of tracking the $499 phone’s development. What followed was a series of delays with little explanation or updates.
Since the original announcement, plans appear to be in flux. The Trump Mobile website has scrubbed any mention of a specific release month, but continues to collect $100 down payments on the promise of availability "later this year." It’s also posted conflicting photos of what the phone looks like. More
NBC News placed an order for a T1 phone in August, paying the $100 deposit for the purposes of tracking the $499 phone’s development. What followed was a series of delays with little explanation or updates.
Since the original announcement, plans appear to be in flux. The Trump Mobile website has scrubbed any mention of a specific release month, but continues to collect $100 down payments on the promise of availability "later this year." It’s also posted conflicting photos of what the phone looks like. More
Shoppers plan to cut Black Friday weekend spending
People - As the holiday shopping season starts to kick into high gear, Americans are balancing Black Friday deals with lingering concerns about their own finances. Consumers are looking to shell out less this holiday season, new data from Deloitte shows, in a reversal of previous trends. The survey shows shoppers overall plan to spend 4% less than last year between Black Friday and Cyber Monday, citing higher costs of living and more fear of the economy.
The pullback is expected from shoppers of all income levels as climbing inflation stings wallets. Consumers making less than $50,000 a year are expected to spend 12% less than last year, according to the business services firm. Shoppers making more than $200,000 a year say they’ll cut their spending by 18%. More
WalletHub - With the hectic holiday season fast approaching, I wanted to drop you a quick note to make sure you didn’t miss any of WalletHub’s recent holiday studies and reports, highlights of which you can find below.
- JCPenney, Belk and Kohl’s are 2025’s Best Places to Shop on Black Friday, offering an average discount of at least 45%.
- Around 10% of items at major retailers will be more expensive on Black Friday than their current Amazon.com prices.
- Consumer packaged goods will offer the most value on Black Friday 2025 relative to their current prices, while furniture is expected to have the least rewarding deals.
- Nearly 2 in 3 Americans say the economy will make the holidays less fun this year, according to WalletHub’s 2025 Holiday Shopping Survey.
- Sephora, Target and Starbucks top the list of 2025’s Best Gift Cards.
- Consumers can save $200+ with one of 2025's Best Credit Cards for Holiday Shopping.
- Some consumers already have access to little-known credit card benefits that can come in handy over the holidays, including price-drop protection and coverage for damaged or stolen items.
- 100%
of store credit cards do not charge an annual fee, and the average card
with an initial discount for new cardholders gives 19.51% off,
according to WalletHub’s 2025 Store Card Landscape Report.
- 80% of the major retailers offering 0% financing use a dangerous feature called deferred interest, which has the potential to make holiday purchases up to 27.5 times more expensive than expected.
How A.I. and Social Media Contribute to ‘Brain Rot’
Brian X. Chen, NY Times - Last spring, Shiri Melumad, a professor at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, gave a group of 250 people a simple writing assignment: Share advice with a friend on how to lead a healthier lifestyle. To come up with tips, some were allowed to use a traditional Google search, while others could rely only on summaries of information generated automatically with Google’s artificial intelligence.
The people using A.I.-generated summaries wrote advice that was generic, obvious and largely unhelpful — eat healthy foods, stay hydrated and get lots of sleep! The people who found information with a traditional Google web search shared more nuanced advice about focusing on the various pillars of wellness, including physical, mental and emotional health.
The tech industry tells us that chatbots and new A.I. search tools will supercharge the way we learn and thrive, and that anyone who ignores the technology risks being left behind. But Dr. Melumad’s experiment, like other academic studies published so far on A.I.’s effects on the brain, found that people who rely heavily on chatbots and A.I. search tools for tasks like writing essays and research are generally performing worse than people who don’t use them.
“I’m pretty frightened, to be frank,” Dr. Melumad said. “I’m worried about younger folks not knowing how to conduct a traditional Google search.”
The people using A.I.-generated summaries wrote advice that was generic, obvious and largely unhelpful — eat healthy foods, stay hydrated and get lots of sleep! The people who found information with a traditional Google web search shared more nuanced advice about focusing on the various pillars of wellness, including physical, mental and emotional health.
The tech industry tells us that chatbots and new A.I. search tools will supercharge the way we learn and thrive, and that anyone who ignores the technology risks being left behind. But Dr. Melumad’s experiment, like other academic studies published so far on A.I.’s effects on the brain, found that people who rely heavily on chatbots and A.I. search tools for tasks like writing essays and research are generally performing worse than people who don’t use them.
“I’m pretty frightened, to be frank,” Dr. Melumad said. “I’m worried about younger folks not knowing how to conduct a traditional Google search.”
Trump regime
New Republic - It was here for a bad time, not a long time: The U.S. Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE, has been officially disbanded.
The shady department led by tech billionaire Elon Musk that laid off scores of workers and gutted parts of the federal government has faded away into oblivion, according to an exclusive from Reuters.
When Reuters journalists asked about the department, which set out to reduce government spending but fell short on its promises while creating chaos in the federal workforce, the Office of Personnel Management Director Scott Kupor said, “That doesn’t exist.”
DOGE is no longer a “centralized entity,” he added.
The Trump administration has been signaling the end of DOGE since the summer, according to the report, and the president generally talks about it in the past-tense. Many of DOGE’s staff have since found jobs elsewhere in the government, like Acting DOGE Administrator Amy Gleason, who is now an official advisor to RFK Jr. at the Department of Health and Human Services.
Washington Post - The case of a felon who paid lobbyists nearly $1 million to seek a Trump pardon
November 23, 2025
Word
Robert Reich - Around 70% of the U.S. economy depends on consumer spending. As wealth concentrates in the richest 10%, the rest of America can’t afford to buy enough to keep the economy running.
Ukraine
The Signal - On Wednesday, the U.S. administration delivered a 28-point peace plan to Ukraine with a message and a deadline. President Volodymyr Zelenskyy had until Thanksgiving—six days—to accept terms that would cede Ukrainian territory to Russia, limit the size of Ukraine’s military, and bar the country from NATO membership. If he refused, Ukraine risked losing American support. “You’re going to have to like it,” President Donald Trump told reporters when asked about Zelenskyy’s response.
The plan itself reads like a diplomatic artifact from another era. The United States would recognize Russia’s control of Crimea and the Donbas “de facto.” Ukraine would withdraw from parts of Donetsk it still holds, creating a demilitarized buffer zone. A “Peace Council” chaired by Trump would monitor compliance. The United States drafted the entire framework exclusively with Russian input. No one consulted European allies.
Watch what happened to produce this moment. Trump began his second presidency in January by threatening Russia with “further sanctions and high tariffs” if President Vladimir Putin refused to negotiate. By May, he was publicly accusing Putin of spreading “bullshit.” In July, he announced a major deal to send Patriot air defense batteries to Ukraine and threatened Russia with new sanctions. In August, he hosted Putin in Alaska—without inviting Zelenskyy—and discussed territorial concessions. In October, he declared that Ukraine “can win all of Ukraine back in its original form.” Now, Ukraine gets the ultimatum. Read on
The plan itself reads like a diplomatic artifact from another era. The United States would recognize Russia’s control of Crimea and the Donbas “de facto.” Ukraine would withdraw from parts of Donetsk it still holds, creating a demilitarized buffer zone. A “Peace Council” chaired by Trump would monitor compliance. The United States drafted the entire framework exclusively with Russian input. No one consulted European allies.
Watch what happened to produce this moment. Trump began his second presidency in January by threatening Russia with “further sanctions and high tariffs” if President Vladimir Putin refused to negotiate. By May, he was publicly accusing Putin of spreading “bullshit.” In July, he announced a major deal to send Patriot air defense batteries to Ukraine and threatened Russia with new sanctions. In August, he hosted Putin in Alaska—without inviting Zelenskyy—and discussed territorial concessions. In October, he declared that Ukraine “can win all of Ukraine back in its original form.” Now, Ukraine gets the ultimatum. Read on
Politics
The Hill - Legal experts and White House critics are worried the Justice Department
(DOJ) could become a piggy bank for those with grievances as President
Trump and a number of his allies pursue million-dollar settlement
claims.
While Trump’s push for $230 million in compensation for two probes into his conduct would be the most lucrative of the suits, others in his orbit are also seeking millions from the DOJ.
While Trump’s push for $230 million in compensation for two probes into his conduct would be the most lucrative of the suits, others in his orbit are also seeking millions from the DOJ.
AI's infiltration of the arts
Axios - AI's infiltration of films, music, painting — even sculpture — is inspiring new resistance to tech in art, and putting a premium on work that's purely human.
Art has long been seen as a uniquely human endeavor, making AI's advance into this realm especially unsettling, Axios' Erica Pandey writes.
"There's a feeling of existential dread in the air in Los Angeles," says Charlie Fink, a longtime Hollywood producer and professor at Chapman University in Orange County, California.
"AI is coming, and nobody knows how. It makes you anxious if you're looking at something AI made and thinking: 'Well, that's a movie.'"
Case in point: "The Brutalist" — nominated for 10 Oscars in January and winner of Best Actor for Adrien Brody — used generative AI to make actors' Hungarian accents sound more authentic.
The most-downloaded country song in America is written and sung by AI alone.
AI is being used to generate paintings and sculptures, some of which are selling for thousands of dollars, BBC reports.
AI could even "lead to a new golden age of independent cinema" by giving smaller filmmakers the tech to compete with big production houses, Fink says.
But resistance is building:
"Breaking Bad" creator Vince Gilligan has a note in the credits of his new show, "Pluribus," which debuted this month: "This show was made by humans." Gilligan told Variety recently: "Who wants to live in a world where creativity is given over to machines?"
"Thee Stork Club," a live music venue in Oakland, California, recently banned artists from using AI-generated fliers to promote shows, the San Francisco Chronicle reports.
More than 200 musicians — including heavy hitters Billie Eilish, Katy Perry and Smokey Robinson — signed an open letter to AI developers last year to "cease the use of artificial intelligence to infringe upon and devalue the rights of human artists," Axios' Sara Fischer reports.
In a recent survey by Ipsos and the French streaming service Deezer, 97% of respondents couldn't distinguish between human-made and AI-generated songs — and 52% said they felt uneasy that they couldn't tell the difference. Share this story.
Car thefts down
Newsweek - Reports of vehicle thefts have fallen in every state but one. Puerto Rico had the biggest drop in thefts, down 43 percent from the first half of 2024, followed by Washington State at 42 percent and North Dakota and Louisiana at 32 percent.
The only state to have a rise in reported vehicle thefts is Alaska, which saw a 26 percent rise compared to the first half of 2024. The NICB states this is largely driven by theft in the Anchorage metropolitan area.
But while the vehicle theft rate is down nationwide, some areas remain hotspots for the criminal activity: here are the 10 worst states for car theft across the US.
District of Columbia: The D.C. area had the highest amount of vehicle thefts in the first half of 2025, at a rate of 373.09 per 100,000 residents.
California: California was second, with vehicle thefts reported at a rate of 178.01 per 100,000 residents.
Nevada: Nevada had the third-highest reported vehicle thefts in the first half of 2025, at a rate of 167.68 per 100,000 residents.
New Mexico: Vehicle thefts in New Mexico were reported at a rate of 167.54 per 100,000 residents.
Colorado: Colorado was fifth-highest in the list, at a rate of 167.54 per 100,000 residents.
Missouri: In sixth place was Missouri, at a rate of 142.17 per 100,000 residents.
Maryland: Maryland had a car theft rate of 136.48 per 100,000 residents.
Texas: Texas had a car theft rate of 123.83 per 100,000 residents in the first half of 2025.
Alaska: Despite being the only state with a rise in car thefts, Alaska was only 9th on the list, with a rate of 117.41 per 100,000 residents.
Washington: Washington state had a vehicle theft rate of 115.20 per 100,000 residents.
Trump’s Team Didn’t Care That Deadly Boat Strikes Could Be Illegal
New Republic - The Trump administration repeatedly overlooked and pushed past lawyers who questioned the legality of its deadly strikes on alleged “drug” boats, according to a new report.
On Saturday, The Washington Post released an investigation that sheds new light on the process behind the controversial attacks that have left more than 80 people dead and angered Americans across the political spectrum, including some of President Donald Trump’s base.
According to government officials who were familiar with the situation, the administration initially planned for the CIA to conduct the strikes—but when CIA lawyers pushed back, they pivoted to using the U.S. military. The Trump administration’s justification for the lethal attacks is that the U.S. is engaged in an armed conflict with “designated terrorist organizations.”
But many national security experts, both inside and outside of the administration, told the Post that this justification “does not stand up to facts.”
What’s more, many of the lawyers who raised concerns or attempted to institute guardrails had either left the government, or had been reassigned or removed from their positions. The National Security Council’s full-time legal staff was completely gutted by this summer, including former Pentagon general counsel Paul Ney, who had raised concerns about the legality of the strikes, according to former officials.
Meanwhile, over at the CIA, some people are worried about blowback from these covert operations, like with the Iran-Contra scandal of the 1980s.
“The question is, is it legal just to kill the guy if he’s not threatening to kill you and you’re outside an armed conflict? There are people who are simply uncomfortable with the president just declaring we’re at war with drug traffickers,” one former senior official told the Post.
The new report confirms what other top military lawyers have been saying: that Trump’s strikes against alleged drug boats could be considered extrajudicial killings.
On Saturday, The Washington Post released an investigation that sheds new light on the process behind the controversial attacks that have left more than 80 people dead and angered Americans across the political spectrum, including some of President Donald Trump’s base.
According to government officials who were familiar with the situation, the administration initially planned for the CIA to conduct the strikes—but when CIA lawyers pushed back, they pivoted to using the U.S. military. The Trump administration’s justification for the lethal attacks is that the U.S. is engaged in an armed conflict with “designated terrorist organizations.”
But many national security experts, both inside and outside of the administration, told the Post that this justification “does not stand up to facts.”
What’s more, many of the lawyers who raised concerns or attempted to institute guardrails had either left the government, or had been reassigned or removed from their positions. The National Security Council’s full-time legal staff was completely gutted by this summer, including former Pentagon general counsel Paul Ney, who had raised concerns about the legality of the strikes, according to former officials.
Meanwhile, over at the CIA, some people are worried about blowback from these covert operations, like with the Iran-Contra scandal of the 1980s.
“The question is, is it legal just to kill the guy if he’s not threatening to kill you and you’re outside an armed conflict? There are people who are simply uncomfortable with the president just declaring we’re at war with drug traffickers,” one former senior official told the Post.
The new report confirms what other top military lawyers have been saying: that Trump’s strikes against alleged drug boats could be considered extrajudicial killings.
Dem Lawmakers Get Bomb Threats
New Republic - Five out of the six Democratic lawmakers who urged the military to “refuse illegal orders” from the Trump administration have received bomb threats, as of Saturday. The new threats come after President Donald Trump accused the Dems of “seditious behavior” that was “punishable by death” in a post on Truth Social earlier this week.
Word
Jennifer Welch, MS NOW - JD Vance is married to a woman of Indian descent. He has mixed race children. So to all of the MAGA voters out there, if this man will not defend his wife and will not defend his kids, do you think he gives a crap about you?
November 22, 2025
Your unpredictable editor
Sam Smith - Given a birthday party coming up and a visit by one of my two sons, Undernews service may be less than normal through November 25.
The real rules about the military disobeying false orders
Mark Hertlin, The Bulwark - Here’s the truth, learned on the first day of service by every enlisted soldier, sailor, airman, Marine, guardian, and coast guardsman, and learned but sometimes not recognized by the young officers who first take the oath: There is not one military oath. There are two. And the differences between them explain exactly who is responsible for refusing illegal orders, why the system was designed that way, and what it means for this moment.
One reason the debate keeps going sideways is that the public keeps talking about “the military” as if it were a single, undifferentiated mass of people with identical obligations. It isn’t. The Constitution and Congress deliberately created two different oaths—one for enlisted personnel, and one for officers. That structure is not bureaucratic trivia; it is grounded on the bedrock American civil–military relations. Ignoring it leads to the misleading assumption that everyone in uniform bears equal responsibility when confronted with an unlawful command.
They don’t. And that distinction matters.
Enlisted members swear to support and defend the Constitution, and to “obey the orders of the President of the United States and the orders of the officers appointed over me, according to regulations and the Uniform Code of Military Justice.” And the UCMJ makes crystal clear that the service member’s obligation is to obey “lawful” orders, and that no enlisted member is permitted to carry out an unlawful order. But the enlisted oath is also intentionally anchored in obedience of the chain of command. The accountability lies one level up.
Which brings us to the officer oath—shorter in words, heavier in weight. Officers swear to “support and defend” the Constitution; to “bear true faith and allegiance” to it; and to “well and faithfully discharge the duties” of their office. They also affirm that they “take this obligation freely, without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion.” What they do not swear to do is equally important: Officers make no promise to obey the president and the officers above them.
That omission is not an oversight. Officers give orders, evaluate legality, and act as the constitutional circuit breakers the Founders intended. They are expected—by law, by professional ethic, and by centuries of tradition—to exercise independent judgment when presented with a questionable directive. Officers are duty-bound to refuse an unlawful order. It is not optional. It is not situational. It is their job.
One reason the debate keeps going sideways is that the public keeps talking about “the military” as if it were a single, undifferentiated mass of people with identical obligations. It isn’t. The Constitution and Congress deliberately created two different oaths—one for enlisted personnel, and one for officers. That structure is not bureaucratic trivia; it is grounded on the bedrock American civil–military relations. Ignoring it leads to the misleading assumption that everyone in uniform bears equal responsibility when confronted with an unlawful command.
They don’t. And that distinction matters.
Enlisted members swear to support and defend the Constitution, and to “obey the orders of the President of the United States and the orders of the officers appointed over me, according to regulations and the Uniform Code of Military Justice.” And the UCMJ makes crystal clear that the service member’s obligation is to obey “lawful” orders, and that no enlisted member is permitted to carry out an unlawful order. But the enlisted oath is also intentionally anchored in obedience of the chain of command. The accountability lies one level up.
Which brings us to the officer oath—shorter in words, heavier in weight. Officers swear to “support and defend” the Constitution; to “bear true faith and allegiance” to it; and to “well and faithfully discharge the duties” of their office. They also affirm that they “take this obligation freely, without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion.” What they do not swear to do is equally important: Officers make no promise to obey the president and the officers above them.
That omission is not an oversight. Officers give orders, evaluate legality, and act as the constitutional circuit breakers the Founders intended. They are expected—by law, by professional ethic, and by centuries of tradition—to exercise independent judgment when presented with a questionable directive. Officers are duty-bound to refuse an unlawful order. It is not optional. It is not situational. It is their job.
Immigrants
Washington Post - A federal judge on Friday blocked the Internal Revenue Service from sharing data with immigration enforcement officials, ruling that the tax agency violated federal law and the rights of tens of thousands of individuals in its attempt to participate in President Donald Trump’s mass deportation campaign.
NBC News - A federal judge issued an order blocking the IRS from sharing taxpayer information with ICE.
Sharing food while eating out
Nice News - We often hear about how technology is driving us further apart, but according to a recent report, it may actually be bringing us closer together in
one area: eating out. After analyzing responses from 1,000 U.S. diners,
reservation platform Resy found that “dining in 2025 was all about
connection” — partially thanks to restaurants employing technology to enhance customer experience.
How exactly was this sense of connection reflected among patrons? One way was through shared plates, which Resy says are no longer “unique to tapas restaurants.” In fact, over 94% of respondents (and over 97% of Gen Z) said they’re likely to share their meal when eating out.
“Sharing food is one of the best ways to enjoy good company, especially at the kind of thoughtful restaurants this city does so well,” New York City restaurateur Steve Wong said in the Resy report. Ninety percent of Gen Z also enjoyed dining at communal tables, with 63% of those surveyed noting that they’re a great way to meet new people.
And helping restaurants streamline daily operations are innovative tech integrations, which automate manual processes and allow multiple systems to communicate without requiring staff assistance. “The goal is a more connected digital ecosystem that saves time, reduces friction, and creates more space for operators to focus on what hospitality is really about,” said Resy COO Junaid Shams. Learn more about this year’s dining trends, plus predictions for 2026.
How exactly was this sense of connection reflected among patrons? One way was through shared plates, which Resy says are no longer “unique to tapas restaurants.” In fact, over 94% of respondents (and over 97% of Gen Z) said they’re likely to share their meal when eating out.
“Sharing food is one of the best ways to enjoy good company, especially at the kind of thoughtful restaurants this city does so well,” New York City restaurateur Steve Wong said in the Resy report. Ninety percent of Gen Z also enjoyed dining at communal tables, with 63% of those surveyed noting that they’re a great way to meet new people.
And helping restaurants streamline daily operations are innovative tech integrations, which automate manual processes and allow multiple systems to communicate without requiring staff assistance. “The goal is a more connected digital ecosystem that saves time, reduces friction, and creates more space for operators to focus on what hospitality is really about,” said Resy COO Junaid Shams. Learn more about this year’s dining trends, plus predictions for 2026.
Climate change
Inside Climate News - Rachel Morello-Frosch, an environmental-health disparities expert at the University of California, Berkeley, and co-author on the study, has spent the past several years evaluating climate pollution’s likely impacts on low-lying industrial regions and vulnerable populations.
Burning fossil fuels makes flooding not only more destructive, by destabilizing the climate and supercharging waves, storms and high tides, but also more dangerous, by releasing toxic substances like petroleum and untreated sewage in the path of roiling floodwaters.
Morello-Frosch worries that toxic floodwaters are more likely to imperil low-income communities of color like Richmond because decades of discriminatory housing, lending and employment practices have left residents stuck living near polluting industries without the means to mitigate harm when disaster strikes.
To help communities and policymakers prepare for future threats, the research team conducted the first national assessment of unequal risks from flooded hazardous sites related to sea level rise. Of nearly 48,000 U.S. facilities that store, handle, produce or release harmful substances, they identified 5,500 that are likely to experience a 1-in-100-year flood event—that is, an uncommonly large flood that has a 1 percent chance of happening in any year—by 2100. Nearly 3,800 sites are likely to flood by 2050.
Curbing emissions would spare a few hundred sites by 2100, the team found. But past climate pollution has “locked in” projected flood risks over the short term.
“Over 5,000 facilities are projected to be at risk of a 1-in-100-year flooding event in 2100 if we don’t do anything, and we just learned that we’re failing to meet the 1.5 degree Celsius benchmark,” said Morello-Frosch, referring to the Paris Agreement target to avoid potentially irreversible effects of climate change.
About two dozen coastal states plus Puerto Rico are likely to see at least some hazardous facilities flood. But the vast majority of at-risk facilities are concentrated in just seven states. Topping the list is Louisiana, with its dense concentration of oil and gas wells, followed by Florida, New Jersey, Texas, California, New York and Massachusetts.
Inside Climate News reviewed temperature studies of heat conditions at Auburn University,
the University of Alabama and Mississippi State University, and
collected its own temperature measurements during two games in October,
one at the University of Alabama in Tuscaloosa and the other at
University of Alabama at Birmingham.
An Inside Climate News analysis of data
from inside these southern stadiums found that temperatures can spike
for hours, from 10 to 16 degrees Fahrenheit higher than outside heat,
depending on the venue. Concrete surface temperatures in seating areas
of the Tuscaloosa stadium measured over 130 degrees Fahrenheit.
Those high temperatures had consequences. Auburn University averaged
well over 100 emergency calls per game in 2024, with the majority being
heat-related. Halfway through the 2025 season, Alabama was averaging 60
to 65 medical calls per game, with 50 to 75 percent of calls during day
games related to heat, according to interviews with medical personnel,
though university officials provided lower numbers.
NBC News - As representatives from nearly 200 nations wrapped up talks at the United Nations' COP30 climate summit, where the U.S. was not in attendance, the Trump administration introduced a series of proposals to roll back environmental protections and encourage fossil fuel drilling.
The U.N. Climate Change Conference ended yesterday in the Brazilian city of Belém, where delegates gathered to hammer out a roadmap to phase out fossil fuels, boost climate action and limit global warming.
For the first time in the summit's history, the U.S. — one of the top emitters of greenhouse gases — did not send a delegation. Instead, the Trump administration announced a plan to open up new oil drilling off the coasts of California and Florida for the first time in decades and proposed rule changes to weaken the Endangered Species Act and limit the Environmental Protection Agency's authority to protect wetlands and streams.
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