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Researchers Have Cracked the 4,500-Year-Old Genome of a Mummy From Egypt’s First Pyramid Age

An ancient Egyptian genome has finally been unraveled after four decades of study, thanks to a sample collected from a mummy dating back to the time of the first pyramids.

The achievement marks the first complete sequencing of a genome of such antiquity collected from the region. The genetic data revealed information about the movement of people over millennia, as 80% of the individual’s DNA corresponds to ancient North Africans, while 20% is related to ancient West Asians.

The remains reveal a story of a hard life of manual labor, lived by an individual who possibly belonged to an ancient Egyptian pottery community.

A Decades-Long Genetic Quest

Forty years ago, Svante Pääbo, a Nobel Prize-winning Swedish geneticist, conducted the first successful extraction of ancient Egyptian DNA, although his work only resulted in a partial sequence. Now, scientists at the Francis Crick Institute and Liverpool John Moores University (LJMU) have conducted the first complete sequencing after working with the oldest Egyptian DNA sample ever collected.

“Forty years have passed since the early pioneering attempts to retrieve DNA from mummies without successful sequencing of an ancient Egyptian genome,” said co-author Pontus Skoglund, Group Leader of the Ancient Genomics Laboratory at the Francis Crick Institute. “Ancient Egypt is a place of extraordinary written history and archaeology, but challenging DNA preservation has meant that no genomic record of ancestry in early Egypt has been available for comparison.” 

“Building on this past research, new and powerful genetic techniques have allowed us to cross these technical boundaries and rule out contaminating DNA, providing the first genetic evidence for potential movements of people in Egypt at this time,” Skoglund added.

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Trump’s Big Beautiful Bill Could Kill Professional Gambling

The One Big Beautiful Bill Act that narrowly passed the Senate on Tuesday contains an amendment altering gambling tax rules, making it harder for winners to reap profits.

A section of the Senate‘s 940-page version of the bill limits the amount gamblers are able to deduct from their winnings to 90 percent of losses.

This means that if a gambler wins $100,000 in a tax year while also losing $100,000, they would be required to pay $10,000 in tax despite breaking even, rather than zero tax paid under current regulations.

If the amendment makes its way into the House version of the bill and is signed into law, it would reduce the ability of gamblers to turn a profit. It could also push professional gamblers to unregulated operators outside the U.S., according to American professional poker player Phil Galfond.

This could have a downstream impact on the entire industry, which brought in nearly $115 billion in revenue last year, according to the American Gaming Association.

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What Means ‘Winning’?

At one level, Iran plainly “won.” Trump had wanted to be regaled with a reality-TV style, splendid “Victory.” Sunday’s attack on the three nuclear sites indeed was loudly proclaimed by Trump and Hegseth as such – having “obliterated” Iran’s nuclear enrichment programme, they claimed. “Destroyed it completely,” they insist.

Only … it didn’t: The strike caused superficial surface damage, perhaps. And seemingly was co-ordinated in advance with Iran via intermediaries to be a “once and done” affair. This is a habitual Trump pattern (advance co-ordination). It was the mode in Syria, Yemen and even with Trump’s assassination of Qasem Soleimani – all intended to give Trump a quick media “victory.”

The so-called “ceasefire” that rapidly followed the US strikes – albeit not without some hiccoughs – was a hastily assembled “cessation of hostilities” (and no ceasefire – as no terms were agreed). It was a “stop-gap.” What this means is that the negotiating impasse between Iran and Witkoff remains unresolved.

The Supreme Leader has forcefully laid down Iran’s position: “No surrender”; Enrichment proceeds; and the US should quit the region and keep its nose out of Iranian affairs.

So, on the positive side of cost-benefit analysis, Iran likely has enough centrifuges and 450 kg of highly enriched uranium – and nobody (except Iran) now knows where the stash is hidden. Iran will resume processing. A second plus for Iran is that the IAEA and its Director-General Grossi have been so egregiously subversive of Iranian sovereignty that the Agency most likely will be expelled from Iran. The Agency failed in its basic responsibility to safeguard sites at which enriched uranium was present.

The US and European intelligence services thus will lose their “eyes” on the ground – as well as forego the IAEA’s Artificial Intelligence data collection (on which Israel’s identification of targets likely was heavily dependent).

On the cost side, militarily, Iran of course suffered physical damage, but retains its missile potency. The US-Israeli narrative of Iranian skies as “open wide” to Israeli aircraft is yet another deception contrived to support the “winning narrative”:

As Simplicius notes: “There remains not a single shred of proof that Israeli (or American, for that matter) planes ever significantly overflew Iran at any time. Claims of “total air superiority” have no grounds. [Footage] up until the final day shows Israel continued relying on their heavy UCAVs [large surveillance and strike drone aircraft] to strike Iranian ground targets.”

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After Losing Their Minds for Months Over ‘Project 2025’ Democrats Are Now Crafting Their Own ‘Project 2029’

A year ago, when the 2024 presidential election was getting into full swing, Democrats and the media were freaking out about Project 2025, a conservative agenda that had been put together by think tanks on the right. Trump wasn’t even talking about it, but the left used it to try to panic voters and tie it directly to Trump.

Now, the same people are putting together their own version of it called ‘Project 2029.’

The left does this all the time. In 2004, they said they needed their own Drudge Report. In 2010, they said they needed their own Tea Party. In 2016, they started saying they needed their own Donald Trump. In 2024, they said they needed their own Joe Rogan.

Now they need their own Project 2025.

From FOX News:

Democrats take page from conservative playbook with new Project 2029

Democrats are taking a page from the conservative playbook.

A group of leading Democratic Party thinkers is beginning to collaborate on a policy agenda for their eventual presidential nominee in the 2028 election cycle.

And, as first reported by the New York Times, they’re calling it Project 2029. It’s an obvious play on the notorious Project 2025, the more than 900-page policy blueprint assembled by the conservative powerhouse Heritage Foundation think tank for the Republican Party’s 2024 presidential nominee.

Democrats repeatedly attacked Project 2025 during the previous White House race as a far-right threat to the nation. Then-GOP presidential nominee Donald Trump and his campaign distanced themselves from the document, even as many Trump allies helped draft it.

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How Israel’s ‘Operation Salted Fish’ Turned Gaza Into a Killing Field

An investigation conducted by the Israeli outlet Haaretz has uncovered that Israeli soldiers have received orders to shoot unarmed, starving Palestinians near food aid distribution centers in Gaza, even in the absence of any threat. Soldiers characterised these locations as a “killing field.” Soldiers who spoke with Haaretz indicated that the directives to fire were explicit: “shoot to deter individuals from approaching aid centres both before and after their opening”. One soldier referred to the strategy as “Operation Salted Fish”—the name of the Israeli version of the children’s game “Red light, green light,” where Palestinians are effectively killed while awaiting UN food trucks. Accounts from soldiers disclosed that the IDF employed machine guns, tanks, grenade launchers, and mortars against crowds. (Archived report)

Soldiers have reported the presence of private security contractors near aid sites tasked with demolishing homes, suggesting that individuals were killed to facilitate destruction. The aid at the various distribution centres in the Strip is managed by the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF), and operated by Israel with assistance from U.S. evangelical allies closely associated with Trump and Netanyahu. The checkpoints are open for only one hour each day. The report indicates that the IDF is actively suppressing evidence, including footage from aid centers, whilst utilising GHF as a front to maintain the facade of humanitarian assistance. The IDF has turned Gaza into a “Killing Field”, said the report—a term already used by the UN Secretary-General António Guterres during a press briefing on April 8, 2025.

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America First Legal Sues HHS, CMS, and HRSA Over Biden-Era Scheme to Prioritize Organ Transplants Based on Race and Ethnicity

America First Legal (AFL) has filed suit against the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS), and the Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA) for failing to comply with a lawful Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request related to the Biden regime’s push for racially discriminatory organ transplant policies.

According to the complaint, AFL submitted a FOIA request in April 2023 seeking records related to the Biden regime’s “equity” agenda infiltrating the nation’s organ donation system.

At the heart of the legal battle is President Biden’s February 2023 executive order directing all federal agencies to embed “equity” into their operations. HHS and its subordinate agencies responded by advancing race-based audits, race-conscious data reporting, and a “Modernization Initiative” that includes plans to break up the United Network for Organ Sharing (UNOS) — the non-profit entity responsible for administering the national organ transplant system — for the alleged purpose of addressing “racial inequities.”

AFL warns this is not just bad policy — it’s unlawful. Under the National Organ Transplant Act of 1984, organ allocation must be determined by medical criteria, not skin color.

Despite repeated attempts to clarify and narrow their FOIA request, AFL was met with silence, shifting personnel, and empty promises. At one point, HRSA admitted it had collected over 201 gigabytes of records — the equivalent of over 20 million pages — but still failed to produce a single document.

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Trump Rolls Over for a New War

It is generally believed that American voters elected Donald Trump president at least in part due to their embracing his lies that he was a peacemaker who would not involve the United States in the pointless wars that have proliferated since 9/11. Trump’s predecessor the hapless Genocide Joe Biden had entangled the US deep in a conflict involving nuclear armed Russia and had also armed, funded and politically protected war criminal Israel in its openly declared objective to eliminate the Palestinians. Neither conflict could be justified based on actual American interests. So Trump looked like a better bet than a witless giggler like Kamala Harris, though voters would have benefited from looking at the Trump record during his first term in office where he was little more than Israel’s mouthpiece after being heavily bribed during his campaign by Nevada casino magnate Sheldon Adelson. Trump and his ambassador in Israel David Friedman endorsed the oppression of the Palestinians on the West Bank and in Gaza and also illegally approved moving the US Embassy to Jerusalem. Trump also allowed Israel to annex part of the Syrian Golan Heights and ordered the assassination of Qassim Soleimani, commander of the Iranian Revolutionary Guards and regarded as a major enemy by Israel, killing the man when he was in Baghdad Iraq for peace talks. Trump, like his successor Joe Biden, never said “no” to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

Be that as it may, the past five months have demonstrated that searching for an honest man (or woman) in Washington would require Diogenes and his lamp, with little hope of coming up with someone who was not alternately a bad joke, an incompetent, or a screaming psychopath. The last several weeks illustrate just how bad things are, though the real fear must be that they can actually get worse if Trump joins Israel when it ignores the current ceasefire and attacks Iran once again. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Trump will no doubt have to construct a new big lie to explain their belligerency as it is now clear that Iran had no nuclear weapons program.

Even given the horrors being perpetrated by the United States as a bosom buddy ally of Israel, one is nevertheless particularly taken by the malapropisms and the verbal slurs and even threats of physical abuse increasingly being hurled about by the buffoon who pretends to be the president of the United States. Trump, pretending to negotiate with Iran, also saw fit to threaten to “eliminate” the Iranian Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, if Iran did not submit to unconditional surrender. He claimed to know the “secret location” where Ali Khamenei was hiding but “won’t kill him for now.” Trump also called out Representative Thomas Massie, one of the most principled men in Congress, on social media, calling him a “LOSER” after Massie posted a social media post criticizing the president for unconstitutionally bombing Iran’s nuclear facilities on Saturday night without a declaration of war. Worse still, Trump also engaged in screaming fits focused on two women journalists who questioned his claim that he had “completely and totally obliterated” Iran’s nuclear program, demanding that CNN’s White House correspondent “Natasha Bertrand should be FIRED from CNN! I watched her for three days doing Fake News. She should be IMMEDIATELY reprimanded, and then thrown out like a dog.”

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Russian forces discover cache of Ukrainian chemical drone munitions – FSB

Russian troops have discovered a makeshift chemical lab and vials containing banned toxins at a former Ukrainian hideout in the Donetsk People’s Republic, the Federal Security Service (FSB) announced on Tuesday. The cache, found near the village of Ilyinka during an advance by Russian forces, marks the second such discovery this year, the agency said.

In footage released by the FSB, personnel in chemical protection gear are seen handling the vials, which reportedly contain chloropicrin – a choking agent prohibited under the Chemical Weapons Convention. According to the agency, the substances were packaged with plastic explosives and rigged into improvised munitions designed to be dropped from drones.

“This year we have discovered two caches with munitions intended for drone strikes on Russian positions. These munitions were a mix of chloropicrin and plastic explosives, to maximize the area of effect,” an FSB officer stated.

The official further claimed that the use of prohibited warfare methods by Ukrainian forces has become “commonplace,” recalling prior discoveries of a lab for producing hydrogen cyanide in May 2024 and a chloropicrin stockpile uncovered last October.

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Sheriff Marceno says he has ‘zero tolerance’ for street racing. Here’s a video of Sheriff Marceno street racing.

Call it a case of highway hypocrisy.

After Lee County deputies arrested an 18-year-old on a street racing charge last week, Sheriff Carmine Marceno put out a press release on social media that included the teen’s mug shot and a statement about the sheriff’s abhorrence for racing cars on public roads. 

“I have zero tolerance for street racing in Lee County,” Marceno said of the first-degree misdemeanor crime punishable by up to a year in jail. “Driving an [sic] excessive speed and putting yourself, your passengers, and others on the road at risk is an incredibly selfish decision. My deputies will continue to patrol the roads of Lee County, ensuring drivers make smart choices or they will face the consequences.” 

It was an unambiguous statement from Marceno, himself a well-known connoisseur of fast cars, but video evidence obtained by the Florida Trident shows his intolerance of street racing doesn’t necessarily extend to his own behavior behind the wheel. 

The video, which can be seen here, shows Marceno driving south on six-lane South Tamiami Trail in a black Lamborghini Huracan convertible with the top down on a sunny day in Estero. Shooting the video is Marceno’s former friend, Bonita Springs jeweler Ken Romano, who drives in the lane to the right of the sheriff in the same direction. The brief race begins at Romano’s prompting.

“Juice that m—-f—-!” Romano tells Marceno. 

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This Russian radio signal might end the world. Scared? Maybe you should be

At 4625 kHz, a dull mechanical buzz echoes endlessly – day and night, winter and summer, across borders and decades. The sound is steady, almost hypnotic. Sometimes it falters. A brief pause. Then a voice emerges through the static: “I am 143. Not receiving any response.”

Then – silence. And the buzz resumes.

No one has officially claimed responsibility for the transmission. There are no station identifications, no explanations, and no confirmed purpose. But it’s been broadcasting, almost without interruption, since the late 1970s. Radio enthusiasts around the world call it ‘The Buzzer’.

Over the years, the signal has inspired a growing mythology. Some believe it’s part of a Soviet-era dead man’s switch – a last-resort nuclear system designed to retaliate automatically if Russia’s leadership is wiped out. Others think it might be a tool for communicating with spies, or perhaps even extraterrestrials. Theories range from the plausible to the absurd.

Echoes from the Deep

Like all good Cold War mysteries, its real power lies not in what we know – but in what we don’t.

Like the Kola Superdeep Borehole – the real Soviet drilling project that inspired urban legends about ‘sounds from hell’ – The Buzzer lives in that fertile twilight between fact and fiction, secrecy and speculation.

In the West, Cold War history is often well-documented and declassified. But Soviet-era experiments remain buried under layers of myth, rumor, and deliberate silence. That opacity has given rise to a unique genre of post-Soviet folklore – eerie, atmospheric, and deeply compelling.

And few stories illustrate that better than the one about a drilling rig in the icy Siberian tundra, a descent into the Earth’s crust, and a scream from the abyss.

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