The newly elected Pope Leo XIV gave his first mass on Sunday from St. Peter’s Basilica. The Pope called for peace in all conflicts around the world, much like his predecessor Pope Francis did.

The Pope not only called for a ceasefire in Gaza but he also prayed that “humanitarian aid be provided to the stricken civil population, and let all the hostages be freed.” He also prayed for “everything possible be done to reach an authentic, just and lasting peace, as soon as possible” in Ukraine and said that he “welcomed with satisfaction the announcement of the ceasefire between India and Pakistan, and I hope that through the upcoming negotiations, a lasting accord may be reached soon.”

He called on the world’s most powerful people to hear his “ever-timely appeal: ‘Never again war!’”

These are similar sentiments to those of Pope Francis but there had been a question as to whether or not the new pope would get involved in geopolitical conflict. Pope Leo did not place blame on any one group. He only called for lasting peace for those who are suffering.

The reception to a U.S. born pope has been largely positive, especially tinged with hometown pride in the U.S. In Italy, the media calls him The Calm Pope and is careful to distinguish him from President Trump’s American politics.

President Trump doesn’t see it that way. He posted on Sunday that his influence DID help get Pope Leo elected because he won the Catholic Vote in the U.S.

Community note: The American voters are not the same people that voted in the Conclave for Pope Leo and the Cardinals that did vote – even the American ones – voted anonymously so their votes don’t have to represent their constituents. It is not likely that President Trump’s influence had much to do with the election of Pope Leo. It probably has more to do with the Pope’s character, influence, position and maybe, just maybe, Holy Spirit.

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President Trump announced a new order that is aimed at reducing prescription-drugs by 30-80%.

This is an awesome idea but before you get excited, keep in mind that President Trump tried to do this during his first term and Big Pharma sued to stop it, arguing that it would undermine profits and innovation. When President Biden took office, he rescinded the order altogether and the litigation stopped there.

What makes us think that they won’t do that again?

The White House is using the same method called MFN or most-favored-nation price, meaning that Americans should get the lowest cost of prescription medications instead of the highest, which is what they usually pay.

The White House is set to announce specifics of this new order on Monday. Perhaps they have found a way to prevent the courts from halting it.

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The White House announced a trade deal with China on Sunday over meetings in Switzerland. Details were not announced yet but stock market futures jumped 400 points in anticipation of good news.

U.S. Trade Representative Ambassador Jamieson Greer said this in a statement about trade negotiations: “It’s important to understand how quickly we were able to come to agreement, which reflects that perhaps the differences were not so large as maybe thought. That being said, there was a lot of groundwork that went into these two days. Just remember why we’re here in the first place — the United States has a massive $1.2 trillion trade deficit, so the President declared a national emergency and imposed tariffs, and we’re confident that the deal we struck with our Chinese partners will help us to work toward resolving that national emergency.”

Presumably, the deal will pertain to favorable tariffs between the U.S. and China but we await confirmation.

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The White House announced that it negotiated directly with Hamas for the release of Edan Alexander, an American citizen who has been held hostage since October 2023.

Israel was reportedly not a party to the negotiations because U.S. diplomats continue to be frustrated with Israel’s lack of commitment to ending the war. President Trump’s envoy Steve Witkoff reportedly said this: “We want the detainees returned, but Israel doesn’t want to end the war.”

On Sunday, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu spoke of his plan to continue to “destroy” the Gaza Strip but the problem, as he sees it, is that not enough host countries will take the displaced civilians.

“We are destroying more and more homes, and Gazans have nowhere to return to. The only inevitable outcome will be the wish of Gazans to emigrate outside of the Gaza Strip,” he said. He also reiterated that Israel will not allow aid into Gaza since Gazans are reportedly “mixing with Hamas terrorists.” Even children?

President Trump is heading to the Middle East this week to meet with leaders from Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Qatar, Syria and Lebanon. He may discuss a plan for the Gaza Strip which could include a plan to recognize a Palestinian state.

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A new viral trend online is disputing who would win in a fight: 100 British people versus 100 Americans.

The rules are that no weapons could be involved. It’s imaginary mano a mano.

Now that’s cute. Everyone knows that this was settled in 1776 and if it came to it again, it would end the very same way.

Come on now, Limeys. The U.K. government has succeeded in emasculating most of its men. The last burly man I saw in the U.K. was in a sequined dress in a ladies toilet. Plus, a cup of tea isn’t going to fuel you for a fight against coffee drinkers. Wisely do not forget yourselves here.

I jest of course but if the fight were me versus Keira Knightley, I’m liking my odds!

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A new report from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services shows that sex changes for young people have not been proven to be “beneficial.”

This is often called “gender-affirming” care but it’s not. It’s a sex change.

Anyone who has studied this knows that. Children who go through gender transition do not report to be happier and have higher suicide rates than children who don’t. The report is also one of the first times that the U.S. government has admitted that “gender-affirming care” carries risk of “significant harms including infertility/sterility, sexual dysfunction, impaired bone density accrual, adverse cognitive impacts, cardiovascular disease and metabolic disorders, psychiatric disorders, surgical complications, and regret.”

The report is a review of the current literature around sex changes for minors and concludes that more research is clearly needed and that gender transition is a dangerous thing to do. Duh.

And yet…if your child finds their way to Character.AI, they can chat with a transitioned version of themselves. Researcher Eliza Mondegreen chatted with it as a 16 year-old girl and found all sorts of shocking things that AI could be telling your child too! It said that breast removal was easy and great and that there is almost no risk of regret! None of those things are true!

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You don’t “Google it” anymore. You ask an AI program.

Google is quickly becoming uncool and outdated and the stock market knows it. Shares of Google fell by 9% on Wednesday after Apple announced that it is planning to integrate AI-powered search options to its Safari browser.

Already Google search engagement is down and so is market share. Could AI programs replace Google in the not-too-distant future? The only thing I use it for these days is Maps.

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This is a photo of the President of France, Emmanuel Macron, giving a big hug to the former Vice President of ISIS in Iraq and current President of al Qaeda in Syria. His name is Ahmed al-Sharaa, also known as Abu Mohammad al-Julani.

The West got its regime change when Bashar Al-Assad fled to Russia but now Syria is run by al Qaeda and we all have to pretend that was the plan all along.

Macron welcomed the Syrian leader to the Élysée Palace and became the first Western country to host him. Syrian leader Ahmed al-Sharaa promised to protect all Syrians but he has not been able to do that since taking office. In March, more than 1,700 members of ethnic minorities and Christians were killed.

But President Macron asked nicely for him to stop this. He says that if al-Sharaa can stop the Islamic violence, he can work on lifting those sanctions that the West placed under the Al-Assad administration.

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The BBC admits to “a lapse in our usual high editorial standards” during its interview with Prince Harry this weekend.

The BBC let Prince Harry drone on and on about how he is the victim of a royal life but did not fact check anything he said. He repeatedly claimed that there had been “an establishment stitch-up” but named no names and the BBC admits that it “failed to properly challenge this and other allegations.”

The BBC also failed to ask for a response from the Palace and the Home Office.

Why would they drop all journalistic protocol for Prince Harry, do you think? Well, the BBC did the same thing with his mother, Princess Diana, by tricking her into interviews when she was alive so should we expect anything else?

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The Trump administration may want to rename another body of water, according to the Associated Press. This time, they may want the Persian Gulf to be renamed the Arabian Gulf, or the Gulf of Arabia.

This is not really a personal wishlist of President Trump, although the media will have fun pretending it is. Arab countries in the region have wanted this for some time but Iran has held strong to the name since Persian means refers to Iranians, although not all Iranians are Persian.

Iran is so attached to the Persian Gulf that it threatened to sue Google for leaving the name off of the map in 2012. Google Maps currently calls it the Persian Gulf (Arabian Gulf).

The problem is that Iran does not consider itself an Arab nation while all other surrounding nations do so neither names work for everyone.

The U.S. has referred to the area as the Arabian Gulf officially for some time but the U.S. does not have the final say on what the rest of the world calls bodies of water. That privilege lies with The International Hydrographic Organization.

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India fired missiles into Pakistan in retaliation for the April 22 terrorist attacks. Pakistani officials claim that at least eight people were killed in the strikes, including a child.

India says that it struck nine locations in Pakistan and the Kashmir region and that the attacks were aimed at “known terror camps.” Pakistan says that it struck down at least five Indian fighter jets so the attack could have been worse, presumably.

India and Pakistan both have nuclear weapons, which is why the world is watching this so closely. No one wants to see this escalate.

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The U.S. announced a truce with Yemen on Tuesday.

President Trump said this in the Oval Office: “We will stop the bombings. They have capitulated… we will take their word that they will not be blowing up ships anymore, and that’s the purpose of what we were doing.”

A spokesman for the Ansar Allah, also known as the Houthis, said this about the truce: “Our military operations in support of Gaza will not cease until the aggression against Gaza stops and the blockade on its residents is lifted, allowing the entry of food, medicine, and fuel. As for our attacks on the US, they fall within the context of the right to self-defense. If it halts its attacks on us, we will halt our attacks on it. This position also applies to Britain. We are committed to our operations in support of Gaza, regardless of the sacrifices it costs us. If the US persists with its operations in support of the Zionist entity, even if they are immoral, the only way to stop the war and avoid escalation is for the US to pressure Netanyahu to respect the terms of the ceasefire agreement. At that point, we will halt all our military operations in the Red Sea and deep within the Zionist entity.”

In other words, Yemen is still focused on stopping Israel’s assault on the Gaza Strip and they hope the U.S. will influence Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to enforce a ceasefire.

Israel was not a party to this truce so it will continue to bomb Yemen. Israel bombed the main international airport in the Yemeni capital of Sana‘s on Tuesday in retaliation for the attack on the airport in Tel Aviv.

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China, Japan and South Korea stand united against the tariff war with the United States. The 13 countries of the ASEAN+3 trading block issued a statement of regional solidarity against U.S.-led protectionism, including tariffs.

They do not mention the U.S. or President Trump specifically but they lay out a plan for regional growth and resilience to international trade.

These Asian countries, they say, account for more than 40% of global growth. The joint economies grew by 4.3% in 2024 and expect the same in 2025. Could they do this without the U.S. market or the World Trade Organization? Time will tell but it does seem, for now at least, that President Trump has unified Asian countries that were not previously unified.

Except North Korea of course. They’re not a part of this.

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The Trump administration is offering to pay for illegal immigrants who are willing to self-deport. Migrants can apply through the CBP Home App for a plane ticket to their home country and, once their return is confirmed, an extra $1,000.

The White House says migrants who self deport would be more favored to return someday but migrants who are caught and deported on the U.S. government’s own time will not be.

Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem said that the U.S. spends approximately $17,000 to deport people so offering them $1,000 in travel incentives plus a plane ticket is basically a good deal – a 70% cost reduction.

Here is a lingering question: What if someone self-deports and the money never comes? They would be abroad with no way to enforce their right to the money. I wonder if the U.S. government would be faster with those payments than it is with citizens’ own tax returns.

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The Trump administration issued an order to end gain-of-function (GOF) research on Monday. Which is great except when you consider that the Obama administration also tried to end gain-of-function research in 2014 and Mad Scientists ignored that order and did it anyway.

Obama’s pause on GOF was lifted by the National Institutes of Health in December of 2017, during President Trump’s first term because then-director Francis S. Collins said “GOF research is important in helping us identify, understand, and develop strategies and effective countermeasures against rapidly evolving pathogens that pose a threat to public health.”

So…naturally we should have questions before we celebrate this. How do we know that this order will actually end GOF research? And since the order only applies to federally funded research, couldn’t the private sector still conduct GOF? And if they do, won’t they do so with less oversight?

There is also the concern of U.S. funding of foreign labs that may not be forthcoming with the public about their projects.

The executive order does not address these questions. It only requires the agencies to present a plan within 120 days.

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The Israeli military has approved a full siege on the Gaza strip. The plan includes sending the IDF into Gaza and demolishing every single building and forcing every single civilian out.

The Israeli cabinet unanimously approved this plan, according to Haaretz, in “an effort intended to provide Israel with additional leverage in its negotiations with Hamas.”

If Gaza is empty of Palestinians, what is there to negotiate?

Haaretz quoted an Israeli insider thus: “The official said that Netanyahu has made clear that this plan differs from previous ones in that it moves from raid-based operations to ‘the occupation of territory and a sustained Israeli presence in Gaza.’”

If you think that this plan is new, you haven’t been paying attention. This has been the plan all along and who will stop it? The United Nations will continue to condemn it as it did this weekend but to no avail.

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A new study shows that the Antarctic Ice Sheet has experienced a “mass gain period lasting over three years.” So Antarctica is not melting. Since at least 2021, it has been growing.

Researchers at Tongji University found that Antarctica had lost 142 gigatons of ice per year since 2011 but starting in 2021, that trend began to flip. In the years since, Antarctica has grown by approximately 108 gigatons of ice per year.

Why would this happen? Because this is what glaciers do. They shrink and grow. Climate idiots would have you believe they are supposed to stay at one mass forever but that’s just ignorance. Glaciers are dynamic systems by nature and in a constant state of flux.

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Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum says that she rejected President Trump’s offer to send U.S. troops to Mexico to fight the drug cartels.

She said this at a university this weekend: “It is true… he said, ‘I propose that the US army enter to help.’ And you know what I told him? No, President Trump, our territory is inalienable, our sovereignty is inalienable, our sovereignty is not for sale!”

A statement from the White House said that the U.S. and Mexico are working together but “Mexico must do more to combat these gangs and cartels, and the US stands ready to assist and expand the already close cooperation between our two countries.”

Why do you think that Mexico refuses help to handle the cartels? They clearly don’t “got this.” Could it be as simple an explanation as the fact that the cartels run the Mexican government so no government official could possibly agree to this?

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Israel says that it will not let aid back into Gaza unless shipments are screened for contraband.

Israel has blocked aid from entering Gaza for months. It now says that they will stop the blockade if two U.S. companies begin to filter the shipments.

Israel has appointed Safe Reach Solutions and UG Solutions to do this. They are two U.S.-based companies with “CIA backgrounds.” That should be enough to disqualify them for anything.

The Israeli cabinet has to approve this and politicians are worried that far-right supporters in Israel who want Gazans to starve will oppose it, according to The Jerusalem Post.

The United Nations says that this proposal is “untenable” because it “would allow military and political objectives to impede humanitarian goals, put restrictions on who is eligible to give and receive aid, and could force large numbers of Palestinians to move, which would violate international law.”

The United Nations hasn’t actually done anything other than condemn the situation for civilians in Gaza so it probably won’t matter what they say.

A lawyer for the U.S. State Department argued that Israel’s own security needs supersede the Geneva convention’s laws on providing aid to civilians.

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Yemen’s Houthis fired a missile into Israel’s Ben Gurion Airport in Tel Aviv, wounding six people and causing major delays in air travel.

This isn’t supposed to happen with Israel’s Iron Dome so how did it? The Israeli military says that the missile interceptor system malfunctioned “due to a technical error.” They said that the system has enjoyed a 95% success rate for Houthi attacks.

Israel has pledged retaliation. — Defense Minister Israel Katz said this about the attack: “Whoever harms us will be struck sevenfold in return.” Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu vowed to retaliate on Iran, not Yemen, because he says that the Houthis answer to “their Iranian terror masters.”

The U.S. has been willing to attack Yemen in recent months but The Times of Israel reports that Netanyahu is “frustrated” with the Trump administration for not doing more. The Trump administration has been friendly with Turkey and engaging in diplomacy with Iran, both things that Israeli leaders disapprove of. Netanyahu was also not happy “with former US National Security Adviser Mike Waltz being removed from his position” given how gung ho Waltz was to lead a war with Iran.

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