Tag: corporations

Rare Earth Startups Say Without Subsidies and Support, US Can’t Shake China’s Control

Without a federally supported market and strategic reserve stockpile, the United States will remain reliant on China for critical minerals and rare earth refining, experts told a House panel during two-plus hours of testimony on June 24 that exposed how vulnerable the global economy and the nation’s defense is to the whims of the Chinese Communist Party.

Even with swift deregulation, permitting reform, and rapid recycling ramp-up, they warned, it will take years of government support to untether domestic manufacturing from a supply chain China has strategically built for decades.

“Over the years it’s taken for us to do nothing, the Chinese have dominated. They and their government have been extremely supportive of their ability to create world dominance in this, and it was part of a strategy,” U.S. Critical Materials Executive Director Harvey Kaye said during the hearing before the House Small Business Committee.

This glaring vulnerability is confirmed by the Congressional Research Service’s April 2024 report documenting the nation’s 100 percent import reliance for 12 of 50 “most critical” minerals, and more than 50 percent import reliance for another 29.

The U.S. Geological Survey’s (USGS) Mineral Commodity Summaries January 2025 report paints an even scarier picture. Of 31 critical minerals needed to produce everything from iPhones to F-35 fighter jets, the United States cannot domestically source any and can commercially refine only one, beryllium.

China, meanwhile, is the lead source for eight and the near-exclusive provider of 17 minerals needed for a rapidly electrifying economy. China processes two-thirds of the world’s lithium and cobalt, supplying 60 percent to 90 percent of the world’s processed minerals.

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Economic suicide by design

This week, Oregonians heard the announcement that Tektronix, an iconic Oregon-based company, is moving its headquarters from Oregon to North Carolina.

Tektronix has decided that it has had enough of the Oregon Democrat high taxes, poor schools, and constant degradation of the quality of life for its employees. Textronix was once one of the largest employers in the state of Oregon. Anybody working in the electronics branch of technology relied on Tektronix test equipment to troubleshoot electronic problems. Driving by the Tektronix campus was very sad for me when we moved to Oregon. The parking lots around the Tektronix buildings were mainly empty, and slowly got even emptier. As an Electronic Technician who relied on the Tektronix test equipment my entire career, this was like watching an old friend slowly die from neglect.

Elections have consequences, and so does how people vote. Voting for more taxes, higher fees, and the crazy bills the Democrat supermajority pushes through is costing Oregon thousands of highly-paid citizens who have had enough, and they then leave Oregon for different states. Yet Oregon continues down the same old path to economic disaster. Oregonians cannot figure out that Democrats are all the same; their solution to problems is to raise taxes and fees on everything. For decades, Oregonians have been voting for Democrats to lead Oregon, and nobody noticed that conservatives and Republicans were leaving over economic or freedom issues. The Democrats, Liberals, and progressives just kept on making Oregon less affordable and less desirable to raise a family or retire here.

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Good news: The biotechnology industry is collapsing

If you read the newspapers, you may not know it, but biotechnology is going through a process of collapse.  According to authoritative pharmaceutical industry online Endpoints News:

The opening months of 2025 have offered no respite to the chilly biotech market of the last few years, biotech correspondent Kyle LaHucik reported this week. Despite the comeback everybody seems to want, there’s been a steady drumbeat of restructurings, pipeline cuts, layoffs and short-lived pivots. Kyle highlighted iTeos Therapeutics, once a darling of the anti-TIGIT class of biotechs, as an embodiment of the current struggles. iTeos had a clinical failure and lost a partnership with GSK this spring. It’s now shut down.

The picture is stark. Biotechnology is in a terminal existential crisis. According to Raymond James bankers who provided data to Endpoints, there were six strategic reviews launched in April alone, with 30 active strategic reviews as of 4 May. These strategic reviews are being conducted because biotechnology research is not delivering viable products. According to Stifel bankers, at least 168 biotechnology companies have negative enterprise value as of 16 May. And the dreariness follows 90 total restructurings in 2024. Fewer than five new biotechnology companies have been floated so far this year, down from 16 last year.

Biotechnology is an industry built on an exclusively materialistic paradigm of life. In fact, as everyone experiences every day, life involves a continuous interaction between consciousness and matter, mind and body, psychology and physiology, awareness and the environment. To pretend otherwise, to ignore consciousness as the prime mover of life, as myopic bio scientists continue to do so, is a fatal error and a scientific dead end.

As a result, biotechnology is an industry built on false advertising dreams and the same kind of financial thinking that leads millions of people, who are doomed to disappointment, to buy lottery tickets every week.

Five years ago, a door was opened which allowed failed covid “vaccine” and treatment products onto the market without long-term testing. This was not just “on the market,” it was forced on unwilling populations as a modern-day exponential expansion of Mengele-style medical research. The result has been a public health disaster, as we all now know (except for some extreme dreamers who keep their faith and belief in a biotechnology future). Floundering in a sea of adverse events, they are trying to save their misguided and twisted paradigm of life by pretending success is just around the corner. Vinay Prasad, Trump’s head of the Centre for Biologics Evaluation and Research (“CBER”), which regulates biotechnology, has promised “to ‘rapidly’ push even small advances for rare disease drugs.” 

Reality may now be catching up with this hopeful, or is it hopeless, kind of thinking but, unfortunately, vaccines still enjoy protection from product liability or efficacy standards. Therefore, the excessive claims of the industry and the harms that result cannot be judged in the courts. Nor do their deficiencies find any but the smallest echo in the media. There are powerful monetary, government and career incentives at work here. The billions made during the pandemic from fake cures are sufficient to drive to a frenzy those who seek to profit by controlling medical, political, scientific and financial narratives. Their twisted dreams extend to rebuilding the physiology of whole populations, no matter the certainty of deadly risks, the sea of unknowns or the obvious and final impossibility of the whole enterprise.

The journal Nature headlined last week ‘Cancer-fighting immune cells could soon be engineered inside our bodies’. Because CAR T-cell gene therapy for cancer sufferers is so expensive ($800,00 per shot), risky, difficult to administer, laborious and time-consuming to make, researchers are pushing the boundaries, hoping to re-engineer the body’s own cells to produce novel cancer-fighting capabilities using mRNA technology. What could possibly go wrong?

The terminology of biotechnology research is a dead giveaway. An article in The Guardian headlines ‘‘Inverse vaccines’: the promise of a ‘holy grail’ treatment for autoimmune diseases’. Which describes the “hope,” or is it hype, of some researchers that the genetic suppression of parts of the immune system will cure a multitude of diseases. Really??? Suppressing the immune system will cure disease and there won’t be a downside??? Note the use of the word “promise” and the reference to the myth of the Holy Grail which brings to mind a fruitless search through the ages for something that may not exist, over which bloody battles were fought.

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‘This is insane:’ Lawmakers grill 23andMe exec on what sale means for genetic data

The bankruptcy sale of the direct-to-consumer genetic testing company 23andMe and its trove of genetic data has raised serious national security concerns among lawmakers on Capitol Hill. They want to know what will be done to make sure the data will stay out of the hands of adversaries like China.

“It’s hard to not sit here and listen to this conversation and not feel like we’re living through a sci-fi movie,” Rep. Melanie Stansbury, D-N.M., said during Tuesday’s House Oversight Committee hearing where 23andMe’s interim CEO Joe Selsavage and founder and former CEO Anne Wojcicki, who is also bidding to buy the company, appeared as witnesses.

“A private company has our data, they experience bankruptcy and now, we have no federal regulatory system to protect that data. And we’re concerned that foreign adversaries might purchase the company and thus, the data. I mean, this is insane. Like this is crazy,” Stansbury said.

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T-Mobile Faces Backlash for Auto-Enabled Screen Recording in T-Life App Without User Consent

T-Mobile is facing renewed backlash over its T-Life app, this time for quietly introducing a screen recording feature that is automatically activated on some devices. The tool, labeled “Screen recording tool,” has been discovered by users in the app’s settings, prompting immediate concerns about transparency and user consent.

Described as a means of gathering behavioral data to help enhance the app’s functionality, the tool is being deployed without upfront notification in many cases.

Though T-Mobile insists it does not collect personal data and only monitors activity within the app itself, the feature’s default-on status has unsettled many customers. The company told CNET, “This tool records activities within the app only and does not see or access any personal information,” and noted that users can deactivate it under the Preferences section.

While this type of telemetry is not uncommon in the tech world, the method of deployment here has caught attention. Unlike the app’s pre-existing Screen Share function, which allows support reps to view a user’s screen during troubleshooting, but only with explicit approval, this newly introduced screen recorder operates passively in the background.

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ADL Regional Director Calls for Government-Regulated Online Censorship

The Anti-Defamation League’s David Goldenberg is demanding a broad overhaul of how speech is governed on the internet, calling for both government intervention and intensified corporate censorship. In a recent appearance, Goldenberg, who heads the ADL’s Midwest operations, expressed frustration over what he sees as declining efforts by tech firms to suppress online content he deems hateful.

Citing Meta’s rollback of its fact-checking team in the United States, he argued that platforms must be forced to take action. “You have a platform like Meta that just gutted its entire fact-checking department…And so what we need to do is we need to apply pressure in a real significant way on tech platforms that they have a responsibility, that they have an absolute responsibility to check and remove hateful speech that is inciteful.”

Goldenberg advocated not just for voluntary moderation, but for legislative and regulatory measures, both at the federal and state level, that would compel platforms to act as speech enforcers. He pointed to efforts in states like California as examples of where local governments are already testing such models.

His concern centers around what he perceives as an ecosystem of radicalization made easily accessible by today’s digital infrastructure. He warned that extremist ideologies no longer require obscure forums or dark web communities to spread. “It used to be you had to fight going into the deep dark web… Now… it’s easier and easier to be exposed in the mainstream,” he said.

Framing the online environment as a catalyst for violence, Goldenberg argued that free access to controversial viewpoints must be curtailed. He called for social media companies to take a stronger stance by excluding users whose views fall outside accepted boundaries, adding that regulation should enforce this responsibility.

He zeroed in on Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act, a critical piece of legislation that shields platforms from legal liability over user-posted content. “Congress needs to amend Section 230, which provides immunity to tech platforms right now for what happens,” Goldenberg said. He dismissed comparisons between modern platforms and telecommunications companies, referencing past remarks by Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg about how phone providers were not liable for threats made over calls. Goldenberg’s view was blunt: “These tech platforms are not guaranteed under the Constitution. They’re just not.”

From his perspective, private companies should be free to “kick people off, to de-platform,” and if they fail to do so voluntarily, they must be pressured or regulated into compliance. He described accountability as a mechanism for shaping behavior, stating, “Accountability is a tool that can be incredibly effective in changing behavior.”

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Boeing Deal With DOJ Proves That ‘Justice’ Is a Slippery Concept

Some seven years after Lion Air flight 610 crashed into the Java Sea in Indonesia shortly after take off, Boeing has made a deal with the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) that will mean that the aircraft manufacturer will not face criminal prosecution for the crash that killed 189 people.

In court documents filed last Friday, Boeing agreed to a settlement of investment and compensation totaling $1.1 billion, some $445 million of which is to be paid to the families of the victims of both the Lion Air crash and the Ethiopian Airlines crash that occurred just five months later.

Both planes were 737 Max aircraft manufactured by Boeing, and had been fitted with a new flight maneuvering system known as MCAS. The rationale was that the MCAS system would make flying safer by detecting if planes were about to stall and forcing the nose of the aircraft down. However, Boeing had not informed either pilots or airlines about the new system, nor its potentially deadly faults.

In both crashes, sensors mounted on the exterior of the aircraft malfunctioned, incorrectly identifying a stall and forcing the planes towards the ground, as pilots desperately tried to override the MCAS system that they had not been trained to operate.

The Lion Air and Ethiopian Airlines crashes killed 346 people in total, and led to a series of “deals” with Boeing under which it paid various fines and compensation to victims’ families, including a $2.5 billion settlement in 2021.

However, after it was found that Boeing had misled the Federal Aviation Association (FAA) about the safety of its aircraft, possible criminal charges were discussed, with Boeing entering a plea deal in which it would plead guilty to federal fraud charges in 2024 – although the deal was subsequently rejected.

Now, the new deal has been announced that will allow Boeing to essentially pay its way out of any criminal sanctions, prompting the question of whether justice has been served.

What constitutes “justice” is highly subjective, depending on who is defining the term.

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Takeaways From the Make America Healthy Again Commission Report

The rise in chronic diseases such as obesity among children can be traced to health decisions influenced by distorted scientific literature that is funded or otherwise impacted by corporations, according to a May 22 report by the Make America Healthy Again Commission.

The commission, chaired by Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., plans to issue policy proposals at a later date.

Here are five takeaways from the report.

Focus on Ultra-Processed Foods

Kennedy has for years decried how children are eating more ultra-processed foods, and the report attributes the increase in childhood chronic diseases in part to that dietary shift.

“Rising rates of childhood chronic disease are likely being driven by a combination of factors, including the food children are eating,” it states.

Officials pointed in part to a 2021 study, which found that nearly 70 percent of calories consumed by American children come from ultra-processed foods, up from zero a century prior.

Other research cited in the report noted that ultra-processed foods, or foods high in sugar, fat, and chemicals, often lack nutrients.

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Regeneron to buy bankrupt 23andMe, vows ethical use of customer DNA data

Regeneron Pharmaceuticals (REGN.O), opens new tab said on Monday it will buy genomics firm 23andMe Holding for $256 million through a bankruptcy auction, and promised to prioritize the ethical use of DNA data from customers using ancestry testing and other services.

Through the deal, Tarrytown, New York-based Regeneron aims to bolster its capabilities in genomics-driven drug discovery by integrating 23andMe’s trove of more than 15 million customer DNA profiles, collected via its popular direct-to-consumer saliva-testing kits.

South San Francisco, California-based 23andMe filed for bankruptcy last month, seeking to sell its business at auction after a decline in consumer demand and a 2023 data breach that exposed sensitive genetic and personal information of millions of customers.

The second-highest bid, for $146 million, was submitted by a nonprofit research institute founded by 23andMe’s former CEO and cofounder Anne Wojcicki, according to court documents.

The transaction, expected to complete in the third quarter, puts the spotlight back on data privacy issues sparked off by the data breach. 23andMe, once a trailblazer in ancestry DNA testing, has also faced dwindling demand for its core services.

The transaction “starts to bring about a good conclusion to what otherwise could have been a difficult bankruptcy case,” said trial attorney Daniel Gielchinsky, co-founder and partner at DGIM law.

Gielchinsky said Regeneron, with its proven track record, will do a better job in the long run of protecting consumer information safeguarded by privacy laws.

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Proton Threatens to Leave Switzerland Over Proposed Surveillance Law Expansion

Proton, the Swiss tech firm recognized for its privacy-first services like Proton Mail and Proton VPN, has issued a stark warning: if Switzerland enacts a sweeping expansion of its surveillance law, the company will relocate out of the country.

The proposed legal overhaul seeks to broaden data retention mandates, extending them beyond mobile and internet service providers to encompass VPNs, messaging platforms, and social networks. Privacy advocates argue this would obliterate core safeguards around encryption and user anonymity, long considered hallmarks of Switzerland’s digital landscape.

Speaking to Swiss broadcaster RTS, Proton CEO Andy Yen cautioned that the move would not only undermine civil liberties but also tarnish Switzerland’s reputation as a haven for secure, privacy-respecting technology companies.

“This revision attempts to implement something that has been deemed illegal in the EU and the United States. The only country in Europe with a roughly equivalent law is Russia,” Yen said.

Under the proposed changes, companies classified as “derived service providers” would be brought under new monitoring obligations, with requirements to store specific categories of user data and submit to enhanced surveillance protocols. Such measures would force Proton to break from its no-logs policy and compromise encryption standards that its users depend on.

Yen was unequivocal about the company’s position. “I think we would have no choice but to leave Switzerland,” he said. “The law would become almost identical to the one in force today in Russia. It’s an untenable situation. We would be less confidential as a company in Switzerland than Google, based in the United States. So it’s impossible for our business model.”

Although the consultation period ended on May 6, 2025, the backlash against the proposal has been gaining momentum. Swiss political parties, civil society groups, and private firms have expressed deep concern about the implications for digital freedoms. In some regions, including Geneva, officials have invoked the recently recognized right to digital integrity as a constitutional safeguard.

Roussel has been at the forefront of efforts to enshrine digital integrity into law. The principle was formally adopted by Geneva in 2023 and Neuchâtel in 2024, with more than 90 percent public support.

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