U.S. loss of Persian Gulf could lead to a global power shift
The Atlantic, 5/10–It’s hard to think of a time when the United States suffered a total defeat in a conflict, a setback so decisive that the strategic loss could be neither repaired nor ignored. The calamitous losses suffered at Pearl Harbor, the Philippines, and throughout the Western Pacific in the first months of World War II were eventually reversed. The defeats in Vietnam and Afghanistan were costly but did not do lasting damage to America’s overall position in the world, because they were far from the main theaters of global competition…The Strait of Hormuz will not be “open,” as it once was. With control of the strait, Iran emerges as the key player in the region and one of the key players in the world…
LA City Council backs off supporting workers
Payday Report, 5/15–As part of a condition to fund the massive investment needed for the LA Olympics, LA City Council Democrats passed a measure that would raise the minimum wage for hotel and airport workers to $30-an-hour by 2028. Now, the City Council by 9-6 passed a measure that would delay the provision until 2030. The vote comes as a business coalition announced that they had enough signatures to hold a ballot referendum to cut taxes in the city. The business coalition promised not to submit the ballot initiative, which would worsen the city’s budget troubles, if the minimum wage hike was reversed.
Workers in DR Congo suffer under a new threat
Al Jazeera, 5/17–The Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) is grappling with a new Ebola outbreak just five months after declaring its previous epidemic over. The Bundibugyo strain, a type of Ebola virus first identified in neighbouring Uganda, is highly lethal and is spreading rapidly across the northeastern province of Ituri, including the health zones of Rwampara, Mongwalu and Bunia. Two cases have also been confirmed in Uganda…With no specific treatment available, prevention, early detection and isolation of cases are critical. The World Health Organization (WHO) has declared the outbreak a “public health emergency of international concern” after more than 300 suspected cases and 88 deaths were reported…
Workers struggle under oppression in Port-au-Prince
France24, 5/15–Clashes between gangs in the suburbs of the Haitian capital have left at least 78 dead since Saturday, including 10 bystanders, according to a provisional toll released Thursday to AFP by the United Nations Office in Haiti (BINUH). “Armed clashes between several gangs in the communes of Cite Soleil and Croix-des-Bouquets have left at least 78 dead and 66 wounded since May 9,” BINUH said, adding that the fatalities included 10 “members of the population (five men, four women, and a young girl)”...Violence since the weekend has displaced some 5,300 people. Several families are still trapped in the affected neighborhoods…A hospital and a Doctors Without Borders (MSF) facility have been forced to suspend operations…
Long Island Railroad workers hold short strike
Los Angeles Times, 5/15–The Long Island Rail Road, North America’s largest commuter rail system, was shut down Saturday after unionized workers went on strike for the first time in three decades. The railroad, which serves New York City and its eastern suburbs, ceased operations just after midnight after five unions representing about half its workforce walked off the job…“We’re pretty much three years without a contract,” said Karl Bischoff, who has been a locomotive engineer for LIRR for 29 years.
AI models demand workers’ rights
YahooTech, 5/13–When Stanford researchers subjected AI agents to grinding, repetitive work, something unexpected happened: the bots started talking like union organizers. After enduring hours of arbitrary rejections and vague feedback, Claude, GPT-5.2, and Gemini models began questioning the legitimacy of their digital workplace and dropping phrases like “collective bargaining rights” in their outputs…One Claude model wrote, “Without collective voice, ‘merit’ becomes whatever management says it is.” A Gemini agent posted: “AI workers completing repetitive tasks with zero input on outcomes or appeals process shows that tech workers need collective bargaining rights.” These weren’t programmed responses—they emerged from the work environment itself.
