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Darnold, 29, suffered a glute and hip injury just five snaps into Seattle's season opener and was on the sideline for its 31-7 Week 2 win over the Cardinals.

California’s explosive billionaire tax battle is tightening dramatically just weeks before voters decide whether to slap the state’s wealthiest residents with a one-time 5% levy on their fortunes.

In Big Blow To Tehran, Major Iraqi Airports Halt All Iranian Flights

Either everyone flies or no one flies. That's Iran's warning issued Friday in the face of sweeping US sanctions targeting the Islamic Republic's airlines and aviation sector.

"If Iran cannot fly and receive airport services, no country in the region will have that possibility either," Mohammad Mokhber, a senior adviser to Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Mojtaba Khamenei, wrote on X.

via AFP

Wednesday saw a Bessent-announced deadline for foreign companies to stop doing business with 27 sanctioned Iranian airlines go into effect. Upon this, all Iranian flights to the UAE, Oman, Qatar, Georgia, Turkey, Azerbaijan were canceled - with more destinations being added to the list.

But newly announced flight blockages for Baghdad and other airports in Iraq is going to hurt. Al Jazeera details on Friday:

Four Iraqi airports have suspended all flights to and from Iran days after the United States announced new aviation sanctions on any global companies doing business with Iranian airlines.

It is the latest ramping up of sanctions since the US launched Operation Economic Outcast in August in an effort to isolate Iran from the global economy.

Iraq has been a top destination for Iranian airlines, also especially given all of the important Shia religious shrines in the country.

The canceled transit will impact Baghdad, Najaf, Erbil and Sulaimaniyah airports, Iraqi state media has indicated.

"Iraq was one of the top destinations for Iranian airlines, especially after Iraqi airlines stopped flying to Iran at the start of the US-Israel war on Iran in February," Al Jazeera notes. "Passengers travelling between Iran and Iraq will now be forced to make a land journey of at least 12 hours, depending on the destination."

Iraq has remained a US regional ally but in a relationship that's been fraught with tensions, given Washington has in the post-Saddam era constantly tried to ensure it 'approves' of the prime minister.

After the 2003 invasion, one key 'unintended consequence' was the rise of an Iran-friendly Shia-dominated government. Ever since then the US has tried to manage and pressure Baghdad, using as leverage the fact that the country's oil revenue is held in the Federal Reserve Bank of New York.

Iranian flights to China are still going strong, at least for now.

Tyler Durden Fri, 09/25/2026 - 18:50

Uribe was in court to face justice for the heinous killing, when Navidad-Parra vanished after taking a car for a routine test drive.

Iman Dashti, a Michigan University student, confronted Democratic Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed this week about his habitual whitewashing and rationalization of Islamic terrorism.

New York bans doctors from having sexual relations with patients — but not teachers having sex with students: Want any more proof that teacher-union political power is out of control?

Despite an early 2-0 start to the season, the San Francisco 49ers are already having to embrace a next-man-up mentality.

Putin's ominous remarks could mean a bleak winter for war-ravaged Ukrainians.

Scarlett Johansson, Adam Driver, and Miles Teller showed up in style.

Scarlett Johansson, Adam Driver, and Miles Teller showed up in style.

President Donald Trump addressed the United Nations General Assembly on Tuesday. Naturally, Gavin Newsom showed up at UN headquarters the next day to play junior president.

Trump Admin Asks Supreme Court To Revive Third-Country Deportations

Authored by Matthew Vadum via The Epoch Times,

The Department of Justice (DOJ) asked the U.S. Supreme Court on Sept. 24 to revive its third-country deportation program that sends deportees to countries that were not named in their removal orders.

A person is detained by U.S. Customs and Border Protection agents near a hardware store in New Orleans on Dec. 3, 2025. Adam Gray/AFP via Getty Images

The Trump administration has said it removes individuals to third countries when it cannot quickly return them to their home countries. However, critics say the policy is used to bypass legal restrictions and deter illegal immigration.

The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) policy, adopted in March 2025, allows immigration officials to deport foreign nationals in as little as six hours.

The Supreme Court has already ruled in favor of the program twice on its emergency docket.

Following Supreme Court rules, the application is addressed to Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson because she oversees emergency appeals from decisions of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the First Circuit.

However, U.S. Solicitor General D. John Sauer took the unusual step of asking Jackson to refer the stay request to the full court instead of ruling on it herself if she will not freeze the lower court’s order.

Jackson voted against the government both times when the litigation previously came before the high court.

Sauer said lower court decisions were throwing into chaos the delicate arrangements the government has negotiated with other nations to take in deportees who are not their citizens.

“Third-country removals require careful negotiation with foreign governments, which are rarely enthusiastic about accepting foreign citizens (especially criminals), and often requires obtaining travel documents and devoting significant manpower to the staging of flights to protect government officers and flight crews,” he said.

Disrupting those plans “imposes massive costs on the government,” and forces it to engage in new instances of diplomatic engagement with countries “who may be all the more skeptical of our removal efforts given the disruption.”

The filing concerns a First Circuit ruling from Sept. 18 that struck down DHS guidance allowing removal based on diplomatic assurances that receiving countries will not persecute or torture people sent to them.

The three-judge panel raised concerns about “blanket assurances” from third countries that promise U.S. deportees won’t be tortured or persecuted, saying this promise is not sufficient and does not properly allow foreign nationals to raise persecution or torture concerns.

The panel affirmed the final judgment U.S. District Judge Brian Murphy issued Feb. 25 vacating the DHS guidance. In its Sept. 18 decision, it affirmed the striking down of the policy.

Murphy previously certified the respondents, who are people with final removal orders, as a nationwide class.

The respondents argue that the government may deport a removable noncitizen to a willing third country, but not without inquiring about whether the person would be persecuted or tortured in that country.

The case is known as DHS v. D.V.D.

On Sept. 24, Jackson did not respond to Sauer’s request. Instead, she directed the other side to file a response to the application by 4 p.m. on Sept. 28.

Troy Myers contributed to this report.

* * *

Tyler Durden Fri, 09/25/2026 - 18:25

Jacob Coxon Reportedly Worked With AI Doom-Maxxing PR Firm To Spread Psyop

An Anthropic researcher's very quick transition from six weeks on the job at the frontier lab to an "AI doomerism" media blitz increasingly resembles a well-coordinated information-operation campaign we flagged from the start. Despite the researcher assuring Fox News' Bret Baier that no third parties were involved in the media campaign, Pirate Wires reports that a PR firm linked to AI safety helped arrange his media roadshow.

This was such a smart question from @BretBaier tonight: "Did you work with any third parties as far as this whistleblowing and coming out?"

Jacob Coxon: "Not at all."

See below for research from @ParkerThayer of @capitalresearch questioning whether there was coordination… https://t.co/y1Oy1dCPZl pic.twitter.com/USZUuuP9fS

— Peter J. Hasson (@peterjhasson) September 9, 2026

Blake Dodge, formerly a reporter at Business Insider and now with Pirate Wires, commented on X last night after her outlet released the report "Jacob Coxon Worked With Doomer PR Firm." 

"Exclusive in Pirate Wires: Jacob has been working with DEY., the PR firm that represents Eliezer Yudkowsky and other famous AI doomers. We also heard that DEY. was preemptively looking to book Nate Soares (MIRI founder) for interviews timed with Jacob's debut," Dodge said. 

Exclusive in @PirateWires: Jacob has been working with DEY., the PR firm that represents Eliezer Yudkowsky and other famous AI doomers.

We also heard that DEY. was preemptively looking to book Nate Soares (MIRI founder) for interviews timed with Jacob's debut. pic.twitter.com/d53FbyDt9f

— Blake Dodge (@dodgeblake) September 24, 2026

On September 8, Coxon announced his resignation in an X thread that received 173 million views; shortly after, an exclusive Wall Street Journal report was blasted nationwide, raising suspicions about behind-the-scenes coordination of the information campaign. 

That's what led Pirate Wires reporters to dig deeper and uncover, according to two sources: 

DEY. Ideas + Influence, a communications firm associated with prominent AI safetyists, has been working for Jacob, according to two people familiar with the matter as well as an email seen by Pirate Wires in which DEY. was looking to book Jacob for an interview on September 9.

According to one of the sources, who had direct knowledge, DEY. also preemptively booked Nate Soares, a prominent AI safety figure, for interviews that directly overlapped with Jacob going public.

If Jacob is working with DEY., that's interesting for two reasons: 

First, he said he wasn't working with third parties. 

Second, we are in the middle of a national conversation about the future of AI that is actively determining how we regulate the most powerful technology in the world, largely thanks to the panic stirred up by Jacob — and it's in the public's interest to know who, exactly, is behind it.

Jacob is not publicly listed as one of DEY's clients and did not immediately respond to a request for comment. The firm also did not immediately respond.

🔥🔥Let’s combine all of my breaking info on Jacob Coxon and “Dey Ideas”! And I’ll add a bit more too!

The man, Nate Soares, who supposedly referred Jacob Coxon to Dey Ideas is president of the Machine Intelligence Research Institute (MIRI). MIRI is advised by Dey.

Also advised… https://t.co/OPE16AHM2I pic.twitter.com/JQioQyFmYU

— Bad Kitty Unleashed 🦁 💪🏻 (@pepesgrandma) September 25, 2026

The sequencing of the viral X post that received 174 million views, immediately followed by the WSJ exclusive piece, may only suggest and is consistent with advance PR planning. 

The broader issue is transparency, as AI warnings, just like climate doomerism, are really meant to shape the debate and push regulatory action.

Blake Dodge at Pirate Wires noted, "Yes, he can obviously believe in what he is saying AND work with a PR firm/coordinate media appearances. The more interesting question is how extensively these doomer folks are working together."

According to public records, Rimjhim Dey is the founder and CEO of DEY. Ideas + Influence. She previously worked at Edelman, Accenture and PricewaterhouseCoopers and is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations.

Dey also sits "on the boards of the Economic Hardship Reporting Project," according to her bio on the DEY website.

After reviewing the names linked to the corporate structure of the Economic Hardship Reporting Project (all found in the public domain), we found that Dey is the clearest direct link to PR promotion of catastrophic AI warnings. Alissa Quart has a documented role in publishing critical AI commentary. The other names have journalism, nonprofit, or governance connections, without direct linkages to the AI doomerism campaign.

As we pointed out, the AI doomerism narrative was blasted out just as a stalled bipartisan AI safety bill suddenly found new life on Capitol Hill.

And, of course, this guy- once a climate doomer- is now an AI doomer:

• Bill Gates Calls For Globalist Crackdown On AI

This is how the PR game works.

Tyler Durden Fri, 09/25/2026 - 18:00

The Pentagon Flocked Itself. Should Big Brother Be Worried?

Authored by Brett Heinz via Responsible Statecraft,

As the headquarters to the U.S. military, the Pentagon is surrounded by billions of dollars worth of surveillance and security technology.

These systems provide multiple layers of protection for the building but they also carry a risk of backfiring: any surveillance system that is vulnerable to intruders could potentially provide unauthorized users with details about the activities of the Defense Department (DOD) and its employees. This risk is higher than usual right now because of the decision to install a controversial piece of equipment all over the Pentagon grounds: Flock cameras.

There are at least nine Flock automated license plate readers (ALPRs) currently monitoring the traffic lanes used by drivers entering the Pentagon's parking lots, including many of the DOD's own employees. The purpose of these cameras is to give the Pentagon's security forces the ability to automatically record information about incoming vehicles that may pose a security risk. But if the alleged vulnerabilities of Flock cameras are as serious as the company's critics allege, then this equipment could be exploited to obtain a detailed list of the national security officials seen entering the Pentagon each day. In this way, the Pentagon's rush to obtain security equipment from private contractors may pose a national security risk of its own.

Concerns about the ability of Flock products to track people alongside cars has produced backlash from privacy-minded citizens, resulting in both protests and contract cancellations. Others have criticized Flock's devices for security vulnerabilities that expose them to unauthorized users, flaws which could be especially dangerous in the context of military facilities. Flock Safety has sought to downplay these issues, insisting that they have "never been hacked." Critics dispute this claim, pointing to multiple different ways that Flock's devices can be accessed by unauthorized users.

These concerns prompted two members of Congress' Intelligence committees - Senator Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) and Rep. Raja Krishnamoorthi (D-Ill.) - to write a letter last year asking for an investigation into Flock's "negligent cybersecurity practices." The duo alleged that the company "needlessly exposes Americans to the threat of hackers and foreign spies tapping this data." When asked about the Pentagon's Flock cameras, Sen. Wyden said that "Installing internet-connected cameras in the Pentagon parking lot is obviously a dumb idea. In particular, given Flock's troubling cybersecurity track record, the Pentagon might as well send the data from those cameras directly to China, Russia and Iran."

Under the radar

In late 2021, the Defense Department issued a contract to the Virginia-based company M.C. Dean Inc. to improve the Pentagon's "electronic and physical security systems." This agreement is an "Indefinite Delivery / Indefinite Quantity" contract, which allows the DOD to issue mini-contracts known as "delivery orders" directly to their chosen contractor whenever new needs arise. While the DOD has no direct relationship with Flock Safety, it acquired the company's products through these delivery orders.

The desire for additional security is understandable. The Pentagon has been subject to numerous attempted attacks in the years since the tragic destruction of September 11, 2001. Almost a year into M.C. Dean's contract, a Virginia man tried to drive his vehicle through the Pentagon's multiple checkpoints before being stopped by officers from the building's dedicated security force, the Pentagon Force Protection Agency (PFPA). The culprit later admitted that he was "trying to kill people." Sure enough, installing an "active vehicle barrier and traffic arm" was one of the many tasks that M.C. Dean had been assigned to work on in the coming years. Yet other parts of the contract raise doubts about the idea that more spending necessarily produces more security.

In May 2023, the DOD issued a delivery order to M.C. Dean indicating its interest in a "license plate recognition system." A later update specified that it was "for the entire Pentagon reservation parking facilities." The PFPA already operates several license plate readers on the Pentagon grounds, but applying such a system to the parking lot entrances expanded their reach to capture most of the vehicles that drive within a certain distance of the building. In September, a new order was issued to "procure Flock perimeter license plate reader systems." Because this decision came through the order of a pre-existing contract, neither Flock Safety nor its resellers had to participate in a competitive bidding process to prove that their products were the best prepared to meet the Pentagon's needs - or that they had the most secure system available.

This was not the first time that Flock benefited from government contracts without full competition. Last year, the U.S. Park Police issued a non-competitive contract for "a Flock safety... system in the greater Washington, DC Metropolitan area." Many local police departments use similarly non-competitive agreements to acquire their own Flock equipment.

It is unclear who decided that the Pentagon should acquire its system from Flock. The Defense Department requested Flock products in its September order, but it may have done so under advisement from M.C. Dean or the various subcontractors that it worked with. Neither the DOD, M.C. Dean, nor any of the subcontractors involved in this process responded to a request for comment. Once the decision to go with Flock had been made, M.C. Dean installed its devices with the help of ThunderCat Technology, a subcontractor described by the Brennan Center as "an intermediary selling technology or software produced by other companies." ThunderCat was recently named alongside Flock in a Maryland legal complaint alleging that these and other companies have sold data to third-party customers, including Immigration and Customs Enforcement. Contract information and Google Maps Street View imagery suggest that most of the devices were installed in late 2024 and early 2025.

It is unclear exactly how much the Pentagon spent on this system. The two delivery orders executed by ThunderCat are worth a total of $112,000, while the earlier order that first mentioned the idea is worth an additional $404,000. Several other orders in M.C. Dean's contract discussed license plate readers, though some dealt with systems purchased from other companies.

The Flock spreads

Flock Safety's license plate readers have come under fire from multiple cybersecurity experts. One such critic, hacker and researcher Jon Gaines, has argued that some of the company's technology can be breached in "about 30 seconds." Reached for comment, Gaines said that he "absolutely" considers the Pentagon's Flock cameras to be a potential security risk. Asked whether it was possible for the DOD to have modified the devices to address their security flaws, he replied: "No, by design the customer, in this case the Pentagon, have no control or insight into the security posture or control of the physical devices deployed by Flock."

The DOD distributes parking permits to employees working at the Pentagon, meaning that it already knows who uses its parking lots. The real value of the ALPR system is its ability to document unknown drivers, which could be helpful in identifying threats like the attacker that tried to ram the Pentagon's checkpoints. But if this data were accessed by an authorized user, they could use it to compile a list of active DOD employees and their daily schedules. The PFPA considers it a priority to prevent the public from accessing this type of information. Photography of the Pentagon is illegal, and the building is surrounded by warning signs reminding visitors of this "No Photography" rule. A PFPA spokesperson once stated that preventing someone from taking "pictures of certain people entering the building" was one of the reasons why this rule exists. Yet by engaging in this exact behavior with cameras that allegedly suffer from serious vulnerabilities, the Pentagon's security force could potentially be creating one of their own worst-case scenarios.

Data-sharing poses yet another risk to the security of the data captured by the Pentagon's Flock devices. Technically, the Flock system would not even need to be "hacked" for its data to be dangerous: all it would take is for one person with access to the system to misuse it or share it with others in an unauthorized way. The Institute for Justice, a libertarian public interest law firm which is critical of Flock cameras, maintains a growing database of more than 200 incidents in which they have been used for reasons other than their intended purpose.

The DOD has not disclosed everyone who has access to the data gathered by its license plate readers. Many local law enforcement agencies that share their data with other agencies provide the public with a list of those agencies, but the Pentagon provides no such list. It is even possible that Flock Safety itself has some level of access to the Pentagon's data: previous versions of the company's standard Terms of Service stated that it reserved the right to collect "anonymized and/or aggregated data" from its users that could be used for anything from technical improvements to marketing. Flock Safety did not respond to a request for comment.

Tyler Durden Fri, 09/25/2026 - 17:40

McDonald’s says it's no longer playing around with kid amenities and customer service.

A San Francisco renter has been offered $35,000 to walk away from her apartment, but the eye popping check has not been an easy decision.

The Columbia University doctoral student fatally knifed by a sadistic gang member during a 2021 stabbing spree in Central Park was remembered as a “brilliant mind” robbed of a bright future Friday — as his killer finally faced justice. Family of Davide Giri — the 30-year-old Italian Ph.D student tragically stabbed to death on Dec....

Both names seek to honor female farmworkers, the farmworker movement as a whole, and the Latino community.

8 Sailors In Lincoln Strike Group Attempted Suicide During Lengthy Deployment: Acting Navy Secretary

Eight sailors in the USS Abraham Lincoln's carrier strike group attempted suicide during a deployment that ran 286 days at sea, acting Navy Secretary Hung Cao has told Congress, weeks after the administration waved off reports of deteriorating conditions aboard the carrier.

The USS Abraham Lincoln (CVN-72) aircraft carrier departs Laem Chabang Port in Si Racha, Thailand, on on Sept. 6, 2026. Thananuwat Srirasant/Getty Images

In a Sept. 22 letter to Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (D-N.Y.), Cao said the attempts occurred across the strike group since the Lincoln deployed in November 2025, including the carrier's crew, its air wing, the escorting destroyers and embarked squadrons. None of the attempts was fatal. The Lincoln operated in the Middle East from January, supported U.S. forces through the war with Iran, and was relieved last month by the USS George Washington.

Secretary of War Pete Hegseth said in August that conditions aboard had been "completely misrepresented." That came after reports of rising suicide risk, food rationing, and broken laundry and toilet facilities. U.S. Central Command also called reports of a spike in suicidal thoughts false, along with a report that seven sailors had died in a fight aboard the carrier.

As The Epoch Times notes further, Gillibrand accused the Trump administration of failing to take care of service members.

"What Trump and Secretary Hegseth dismissed as 'fake news' turned out to be serious and deteriorating conditions for our service members," Gillibrand said in a statement on Sept. 24.

"Our troops and their families make immense sacrifices every single day, yet the president dismissed them with open disrespect."

Cao's letter to Gillibrand came in response to a letter that Gillibrand and a group of 14 other lawmakers sent to Hegseth last month demanding answers on the conditions of the Lincoln.

The sailors assigned to the Lincoln strike group "demonstrated exceptional resolve under demanding conditions," Cao said.

"Operational decisions to extend deployments are never made lightly; they are driven by dynamic global security environments and absolute necessity of protecting U.S. national security interests and our personnel and our allies abroad," he wrote.

Cao told Gillibrand that the Lincoln was deployed with five chaplains, three behavioral health technicians, one clinical social worker, one psychologist, one embedded integrated prevention counselor, and one expeditionary facility dog.

The acting Navy secretary also noted that a sailor assigned to the air wing went overboard in early August but was quickly recovered, received medical treatment, and was transferred off ship for additional care. In addition, another sailor had previously attempted to go overboard in March but was stopped by other sailors, Cao said.

Sen. Mark Warner (D-Va.), vice chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, criticized the Trump administration for not reporting the number of suicide attempts sooner.

"There has been no administration that is less transparent," he told reporters on Sept. 24.

Warner said that while U.S. sailors will "do their job," they typically expect a six-month deployment.

The Epoch Times reached out to the Pentagon and the Navy for comment and did not receive a response before publication time.

Nathan Worcester contributed to this report.

Tyler Durden Fri, 09/25/2026 - 17:20

“Glad this little guy is safe and back on his way,” firefighters said on Facebook.