New York Times: “Ask the power brokers in Washington, and they will tell you it is a vital national imperative for NASA astronauts to return to the moon before China gets there.”
“But if you ask people on the street what they think NASA should be doing, they might not put sending astronauts to the moon at the top of the list of priorities.”
“Indeed, it might be near the bottom.”
“But when it comes to space policy, the opinions of the power brokers usually win.”
Growing majorities of Americans say they fear AI technology will take away their jobs and hurt education, according to a new Quinnipiac poll.
Fifty-five percent of Americans say AI will do more harm than good in their day-to-day lives, an 11% increase since last April.
“Iran-linked hackers have broken into FBI Director Kash Patel’s personal email inbox, publishing photographs of the director and other documents to the internet,” Reuters reports.
“A U.S. federal judge on Thursday halted the Trump administration’s designation of Anthropic as a supply-chain risk, issuing a ruling that the government trampled free-speech protections when it classified the artificial-intelligence company as a security threat and barred government use of its models,” the Wall Street Journal reports.
New York Times: “The day before President Trump began attacking Iran, more than 150 bettors correctly predicted that the United States would do so on Feb. 28. At least 109 of those accounts on Polymarket, one of the largest prediction markets, raked in over $10,000, and 16 accounts profited more than that.”
“The proliferation of such bets has raised concerns among members of Congress in both parties, who are pressing to enact legislation that would crack down on policymakers placing wagers on prediction markets.”
“A 20-year-old woman prevailed in another landmark social media trial this week against Meta Platforms and Google’s YouTube in which the companies were accused of designing their apps to be addictive and harmful to adolescents,” the Wall Street Journal reports.
Bloomberg: “The verdict… highlights the financial risk facing the companies from thousands of other suits which claim that Instagram and YouTube are intentionally designed to addict young users without regard for their well-being.”
“The beautiful Army blonde Jessica Foster has posed with an F-22 Raptor fighter jet, donned camouflage in the desert and walked a tarmac with President Donald Trump on the first day of the strikes on Iran,” the Washington Post reports.
“The slew of photos and videos depicting the patriotic life of the MAGA dream girl have led her Instagram account to explode, gaining more than a million followers since she began posting four months ago.”
“But Foster is an illusion — a fake woman who experts say was probably created by an artificial intelligence image generator.”
“The FBI is buying up information that can be used to track people’s movement and location history, Director Kash Patel said during a Senate hearing Wednesday,” Politico reports.
“It is the first confirmation that the agency is actively buying people’s data since former Director Christopher Wray said in 2023 that the FBI had purchased location data in the past but was not doing so at that time.”
“Iran pulled off likely the most significant wartime cyberattack against the U.S. in history, leveraging its hacking powers to cause major disruptions at a global medical-equipment firm that struggled to bring itself back online in recent days,” the Wall Street Journal reports.
“The attack brought a conflict that until now had been largely confined to the Gulf region to the American homeland and offered a preview of the potential for how Iran may broaden its response to the U.S. and Israeli military campaign.”
Bloomberg: “The department’s efforts to build an AI-enabled fleet of drones that can attack by air and sea have been marked by false starts, missed deadlines and strategic incoherence.”
“The Trump administration is set to receive a roughly $10 billion fee from investors in the recently completed deal to take control of TikTok’s U.S. business, delivering it a windfall for keeping the popular social-media app alive in America,” the Wall Street Journal reports.
“The $10 billion payment would be nearly unprecedented for a government helping arrange a transaction, historians have said.”
A new NBC News poll finds majority of registered voters, 57%, said they believe the risks of AI outweigh its benefits, compared with 34% who said the opposite.
What’s more, a plurality of voters view AI negatively and don’t believe either Democrats or Republicans are doing a good job handling policy related to the rapidly advancing technology.
Just 26% of voters say they have positive feelings about AI, compared with 46% who hold negative views.
“New kinds of aircraft, sorts of ‘flying cars’ that can take off and land with little space like helicopters but function like airplanes, will start operating in U.S. airspace as early as June, the U.S. Department of Transportation announced on Monday,” Wired reports.
“The White House is preparing an executive order formally instructing the federal government to rip out Anthropic’s AI from its operations,” Axios reports.
Saahil Desai: “Polymarket traders swap crypto, not cash, and conceal their identities through the blockchain. Even so, investigations into insider trading are already under way: Last month, Israel charged a military reservist for allegedly using classified information to make unspecified bets on Polymarket…”
“How did a Polymarket user know that Lady Gaga, Cardi B, and Ricky Martin would make surprise appearances during the Super Bowl halftime show, but that Drake and Travis Scott wouldn’t? Shady bets on war are even stranger and more disturbing. They risk unleashing an entirely new kind of national-security threat. The U.S. caught a break: The Venezuela and Iran strikes were not thwarted by insider traders whose bets could have prompted swift retaliation. The next time, we may not be so lucky.”
Anthropic sued the Pentagon, alleging its designation as a “supply chain risk” violates the company’s First Amendment rights and exceeds the government’s authority, Axios reports.
Wall Street Journal: “In designating Anthropic a supply-chain risk for the Pentagon and directing agencies to cut ties with the company, the administration went beyond its statutory authority with harsh retaliation because Anthropic didn’t agree on how AI should be used by the Defense Department.”
“The U.S. and Israeli attacks on Iran have unfolded at unprecedented speed and precision thanks to months of planning, a massive assemblage of military force and a cutting-edge weapon never before deployed on this scale: artificial intelligence,” the Wall Street Journal reports.
“AI tools are helping gather intelligence, pick targets, plan bombing missions and assess battle damage at speeds not previously possible. AI helps commanders manage supplies of everything from ammunition to spare parts and lets them choose the best weapon for each objective.”
“Within hours of declaring that the federal government will end its use of artificial-intelligence tools made by tech company Anthropic, President Trump launched a major air attack in Iran with the help of those very same tools,” the Wall Street Journal reports.
“Commands around the world, including U.S. Central Command in the Middle East, use Anthropic’s Claude AI tool.”
“The command uses the tool for intelligence assessments, target identification and simulating battle scenarios even as tension between the company and Pentagon ratcheted up, the people said, highlighting how embedded the AI tools are in military operations.”
For members: No Principles Allowed
Taegan Goddard is the founder of Political Wire, one of the earliest and most influential political web sites. He also runs Political Job Hunt, Electoral Vote Map and the Political Dictionary.
Goddard spent more than a decade as managing director and chief operating officer of a prominent investment firm in New York City. Previously, he was a policy adviser to a U.S. Senator and Governor.
Goddard is also co-author of You Won - Now What? (Scribner, 1998), a political management book hailed by prominent journalists and politicians from both parties. In addition, Goddard's essays on politics and public policy have appeared in dozens of newspapers across the country.
Goddard earned degrees from Vassar College and Harvard University. He lives in New York with his wife and three sons.
Goddard is the owner of Goddard Media LLC.
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