Civilisation End / AI Just Hacked One Of The World’s Most Secure Operating Systems

Trump says ‘a whole civilisation will die tonight’ if Iran does not make a deal – Middle East crisis live

23 people could stop this genocidal war criminal. That’s it. 23. 20 Republican senators and 3 republican reps in the house and he’d be out of politics forever. But they won’t. They’re addicted to power. A drug so strong they’d rather see a civilization die than give it up.

“ICE Tours VT provides guided bus tours to many of these facilities, where you will learn about the scope, scale, and history of DHS in Vermont. Think Hollywood star tours, but instead of celebrity mansions you get federal surveillance infrastructure.”

Gamage Presents “Confronting The Tax-And-Oligarchy Catch-22” Today At Toronto

David Gamage (Missouri) presents Confronting The Tax-And-Oligarchy Catch-22 at Toronto, as part of its James Hausman Tax Law and Policy Workshop Series hosted by Ben Alarie:

Why have taxes on concentrated wealth weakened across decades, even though polling typically shows strong majority support? This Article argues that the answer lies in a structural dynamic we call the tax-and-oligarchy catch-22. Taxing extreme wealth is among democracy’s most direct tools for constraining oligarchic power, yet extreme wealth reliably finances the political work of blocking, diluting, or unwinding such taxes. The catch-22 operates through political optionality. When the wealthiest households can defer tax indefinitely, they preserve capacity for campaigns, litigation, lobbying, and producing expert doubt about reforms that might reach them. Every dollar of deferred tax is a dollar available to lobby against its own eventual collection. Progressive Era reforms were designed to interrupt this dynamic. For decades they partially succeeded. But the constraints have eroded, and today’s largest fortunes face minimal effective taxation.

This Article responds with a democratic tax firewall, an approach that treats durability as a first-order design constraint rather than an afterthought. Drawing on political science, history, and recent state-level campaigns, we identify design choices that can help reforms resist quiet erosion and show how sustained technical preparation can position reformers to act when political windows open.

AI Just Hacked One Of The World’s Most Secure Operating Systems Forbes

What’s The Importance Of The Newly Revived Russian-US Interparliamentary Dialogue?Andrew Korybko

Musk invokes “rape of Europe” in anti-immigrant rant Musk 

Anyone Who Tells You That We Can’t Put Criminals in Jail Until We Win an Election Is Complicit in the Murder of Our DemocracyChris Armitage

Data centers are so hot their ‘heat island’ effect is raising temperatures up to 6 miles away and impacting 343 million people worldwide, study finds

Data centers are so hot their ‘heat island’ effect is raising temperatures up to 6 miles away and impacting 343 million people worldwide, study finds

Scientists have genetically engineered tobacco plants to produce five psychedelic compounds, including psilocybin, DMT, and psychedelic compounds secreted by the Sonoran Desert toad

 Creatine Isn’t Just for Lifting Anymore—It’s Longevity’s Supplement du Jour

Breakthrough Alzheimer’s Drug Rewires the Brain Instead of Just Clearing Plaques

Bilby boom

THIS HAPPENS A LOT. FEWER CARBS AND MORE CHOLINE CAN HELP:  I don’t drink and still got fatty liver disease. A GLP-1 changed everything.

Choline is in eggs, organ meats, all the stuff they told people to avoid for decades.

Chocolate Spiked with Potentially ‘Life-Threatening’ Amounts of Viagra Ingredients Recalled People

Federal Harms Tracker – The Federal Harms Tracker is a new data and storytelling project developed by the Partnership for Public Service to demonstrate what is at stake when the federal government is weakened from within.

Want to know which sites are selling your data?

‘Can’t be trusted’: Reckless, improper conduct should rule former top official out for life

Confidential report found former home affairs boss Michael Pezzullo was ‘reckless’ in engagement with Liberal powerbroker

Previously unreleased report obtained via freedom of information battle says Pezzullo exceeded ‘boundaries of normal public service practice’

Rex Patrick - The mandarin who got caught. Mike Pezzullo inquiry details revealed

‘You’ll hear from my lawyer, bro’: Rich-lister’s company a suspected front for bikies

A business owned by an Australian rich-lister with a personal fortune well above $50 million is suspected of laundering money for the Comanchero bikie gang, according to a NSW Police intelligence report.

Police relied on the intelligence after the founder sued to recover a wad of cash and his mobile phone, which he said was worth $500,000 a month to the business.

Police suspected the company was a front for the Comanchero bikie gang. MATTHEW ABSALOM-WONG

Officers seized the goods after pulling over the founder, whose car they found at a standstill in a confusing intersection near Double Bay in Sydney’s east, about 1.30am on October 2.

In a backpack, they discovered a bundle of $50 notes held together by a rubber band, totalling $8450, which an officer said raised suspicion of a drug offence.

“I pay $6 million in taxes,” the founder, who cannot be identified legally, replied. “Me sell drugs is absurd. It’s absolutely absurd.” The company’s general manager, who was a passenger in the car, described the money as petty cash used to pay actors for a social media photoshoot.

The business is the biggest brand of its kind in Australia, the NSW Supreme Court heard. The founder has featured on a reputable newspaper’s “Rich List” and bought a home for well over $10 million. Searching the car was authorised because of a Firearm Prohibition Order issued to the founder in 2020, the court heard.

“You are associated with Outlaw Motorcycle Gangs,” stated the order, which referenced a drug possession offence and a past apprehended violence order. A constable on the scene also used a police database to access a recent intelligence report about the founder’s company.

“It’s highly likely that [Company X] is involved in [organised crime network] money laundering,” it said. Police had information suggesting the business was “used by the Comancheros as a front”.

The intelligence report said that after 13 “persons of interest” visited the company’s business address in September, a staff member was admitted to hospital with an injury he blamed on a fight club. The founder had declined to assist with police inquiries.

The police who pulled his car over kept his phone, which he had given them to show his digital driver’s licence. “You’ll hear from my lawyer, bro,” he said.

His lawyers asked police not to extract any data from the device and applied to the court for its urgent return, arguing that the phone was vital to the business as it was used as a two-factor authenticator to process transactions.

Justice Sarah McNaughton found on October 22 that the firearm search powers did not allow police to seize other items found incidentally. The judge found there was insufficient evidence to ground a reasonable belief that a serious offence had been committed.

McNaughton also rejected a police claim that having to seek a crime scene warrant in similar circumstances would “lead to the complete paralysis of operational policing”. NSW Police was ordered to hand back the phone and cash, which the judge accepted was to pay for photoshoot expenses.

After 16 years in power, could Viktor Orban finally be unseated?

This week, Politico has an exclusive interview with Frank Bisignano, who serves as Commissioner of the Social Security Administration and as the “newly invented” Chief Executive Officer of the IRS. Politico’s report also includes comments from six IRS employees on Bisignano’s tenure.

Next up: Bisignano’s scheduled appearance at a Tax Day Senate hearing. Links and more, below the fold.

IRS CEO defiant as Washington asks who’s running things

In an interview with POLITICO, Frank Bisignano says he’s focused on improving the tax agency’s tech capabilities and not on questions about his role at the IRS.

Nam Presents “Justice in Tax Enforcement” Today At Duke

Jeesoo Nam (USC) presents Justice in Tax Enforcement at Duke today, as part of its Tax Policy Seminar hosted by Larry Zelenak:

The IRS has limited resources with which to pursue enforcement actions against people who have underpaid on their taxes. Given such limitations, the agency can only pursue a small subset of underpayers. How should the agency decide who to pursue?

This Article argues that the answer to this question depends on a fundamental issue of justice. Is the decrease in well-being that underpayers experience when tax laws are enforced against them good or bad from the standpoint of justice? When taxpayers underpay, they are illegally keeping money that they should have paid to the government to instead spend on themselves. When the government enforces the law, it deprives such underpayers of the use of their illegally gotten gains. Surprisingly, theories split on whether this deprivation is intrinsically good or bad. On a desert-based theory of justice, when people underpay on their taxes, they take for themselves more than they deserve. Thus, depriving underpayers of illegally appropriated cash is good from the standpoint of justice. It brings those underpayers back to the level of well-being they deserve. On a welfarist theory of justice, such deprivation is bad because all deprivation is bad, even deprivation of illegally gotten gains. This Article teases out the implications of these competing perspectives for the question of how the IRS should choose who it targets in its enforcement actions.

 

Taxing times for Albanese and Taylor as parties seek to match voter expectations

What I learned from my first few weeks as a Green MP? Most politicians have no clue how tough things are out there

Hannah Spencer

Want to know which sites are selling your data?

ZDNET – “This free privacy tool gave me answers. Data is gold, and some companies go to great lengths to collect it, store it, and sell it. But you can put an end to it.

 [Note – sort of] There’s a service called Global Privacy Controlthat offers extensions and/or links to browsers and apps that support the cause. This service began in 2020 and was inspired by the California Consumer Privacy Act, which gives California residents the right to opt out of any business that would sell their data. Currently, GPC is available for:

• Brave Privacy Browser
• Disconnect
• DuckDuckGo Privacy Browser
• Mozilla’s Firefox (currently, this only applies to the Nightly release)
• Privacy Badger
• Global Privacy Control (GPC) Inspector(Chrome extension)

Prominent Convicted Tax Shelter Lawyer Fails on Appeal in CDP Case Involving Restitution Based Assessments 

I start with a caveat: although this posting is on April 1, sometimes called April Fools Day, this is intended as a serious discussion.

“If Artemis II is successful, the astronauts will be the first humans to reach the moon’s orbit in more than 50 years, and their path around its far side will take them farther into the universe than any human being has previously traveled.”

Gamage Presents “Confronting The Tax-And-Oligarchy Catch-22” Today At Toronto

David Gamage (Missouri) presents Confronting The Tax-And-Oligarchy Catch-22 at Toronto, as part of its James Hausman Tax Law and Policy Workshop Series hosted by Ben Alarie:

Why have taxes on concentrated wealth weakened across decades, even though polling typically shows strong majority support? This Article argues that the answer lies in a structural dynamic we call the tax-and-oligarchy catch-22. Taxing extreme wealth is among democracy’s most direct tools for constraining oligarchic power, yet extreme wealth reliably finances the political work of blocking, diluting, or unwinding such taxes. The catch-22 operates through political optionality. When the wealthiest households can defer tax indefinitely, they preserve capacity for campaigns, litigation, lobbying, and producing expert doubt about reforms that might reach them. Every dollar of deferred tax is a dollar available to lobby against its own eventual collection. Progressive Era reforms were designed to interrupt this dynamic. For decades they partially succeeded. But the constraints have eroded, and today’s largest fortunes face minimal effective taxation.

This Article responds with a democratic tax firewall, an approach that treats durability as a first-order design constraint rather than an afterthought. Drawing on political science, history, and recent state-level campaigns, we identify design choices that can help reforms resist quiet erosion and show how sustained technical preparation can position reformers to act when political windows open.

Confidentiality of Information - Treasury documents reveal mixed views on audit regulation in PwC aftermath

“ … But ultimately, we will always choose Earth. We will always choose each other.”  

~  Artemis II astronaut Christina Koch

 

Michael Pezzullo was sacked in November 2023 after an inquiry found he breached the APS Code of Conduct at least 14 times, including failing to maintain confidentiality regarding dealings with Ministers and staff. He regularly disclosed sensitive, confidential information to lobbyist Scott Briggs, who held no security clearance

Rex Patrick - The mandarin who got caught. Mike Pezzullo inquiry details revealed

 

‘Can’t be trusted’: Reckless, improper conduct should rule former top official out for life

Confidential report found former home affairs boss Michael Pezzullo was ‘reckless’ in engagement with Liberal powerbroker

Previously unreleased report obtained via freedom of information battle says Pezzullo exceeded ‘boundaries of normal public service practice’

Treasury documents reveal mixed views on audit regulation in PwC aftermath

Profession

07 April 2026 

Emma Partis 

Treasury documents recently released under FOI laws have revealed fresh details about stakeholder views on audit regulation in the aftermath of the PwC tax leaks scandal.

Treasury consultation documents from mid-2024 indicated that big four firms, professional accounting bodies, small and medium firms (SMEs), regulators, think tanks and academics largely agreed that enforcement and standard setting in the audit sector needed to change.

Following its consultation, Treasury concluded that current regulatory oversight of audit quality in Australia was inadequate and that ASIC’s surveillance and enforcement activities were not seen as a strong deterrent to poor conduct.

It also unearthed regulatory gaps and uncertainties that muddied the regulation of audit work, especially at the firm level.

“There is a regulatory gap in which professional standards, regulations & laws apply only at the individual registered auditor level,” Treasury documents read.

“While the management of audit partnerships make decisions affecting audit quality, relating to independence and audit resourcing, it is difficult (for regulators) to take action against an audit partnership for misconduct, either relating to an individual’s conduct or partnership conduct.”

In 2022, it came to light that PwC’s international tax chief, Peter-John Collins, had breached confidentiality by sharing sensitive government client information on upcoming multinational tax laws, tipping off multinational clients to the new laws.

The scandal rocked the consulting industry and led to tighter regulations, most notably for tax agents under the updated Tax Agent Services Act (TASA) 2009. Since then, ASIC has also declared audit regulation as one of its top enforcement priorities.

Treasury launched its consultation into the regulation of accounting, auditing and consulting firms in direct response to the PwC tax leaks scandal. It revealed uncertainty amongst stakeholders regarding who was responsible for governing different aspects of the audit sector.

“There is ambiguity and uncertainty among stakeholders as to the various roles, responsibilities and remits of organisations within the shared regulatory framework governing audit, including standard setting bodies, professional associations and ASIC,” Treasury noted.

“The professional bodies do not see themselves as a 'front line' defence, or a 'quasi-regulator', but as supplementary to the existing regulatory framework.”

During consultation, professional accounting bodies refuted the assertion that self-regulation via professional bodies may not be fully effective. The bodies added that it would be critical to clarify and strengthen ASIC’s jurisdiction to regulate audit firms, including standards that laid out firmwide responsibilities.

Big four stakeholders argued that the existing regulatory frameworks effectively mitigated audit risks, including the management of conflicts of interest with regard to the provision of audit and non-audit services. In contrast, regulators said the current system’s individually-focused penalties failed to effectively incentivise firm-wide compliance.

They added that there was a need for firm-level regulatory action and supported the potential implementation of registration or licensing regimes.

SMEs raised concerns about any additional regulatory burdens, with some arguing that compliance and quality management standards were costly for mid-tier firms, causing many to be priced out of smaller audits.

All stakeholder groups largely agreed that there was a need for greater transparency, public information and reporting requirements surrounding audits. Big four firms supported minimum public disclosure standards, while regulators and academics called for standardised, searchable digital reporting.

With respect to enforcement and standard setting, the Big Four firms noted that ASIC “could and should be doing more” as a regulator of auditors, while the professional bodies said there was an “urgent need” for the government to clarify the intended roles of government and professional audit regulators.

Regulators and standard setters said that the effectiveness and independence of the professional bodies’ quality review programs could be enhanced by placing oversight with a new regulator, while think tanks argued that policymaking and standard setting should be separate from oversight and enforcement.

Stakeholders were also largely in agreement that whistleblower protections needed to be strengthened and made to apply more consistently across different firm structures.