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Stephen Colbert\'s long goodbye is coming to an end, leaving a void
Stephen Colbert's run on “The Late Show” ends Thursday, marking the conclusion of his on-air feud with President Donald Trump. Colbert began hosting in 2015 and often criticized Trump and
Stephen Colbert's long goodbye is coming to an end, leaving a void
Stephen Colbert's run on “The Late Show” ends Thursday, marking the conclusion of his on-air feud with President Donald Trump. Colbert began hosting in 2015 and often criticized Trump and his...
Start of Elland Road redevelopment 'unbelievably exciting'
No sooner had the empty beer bottles and wine glasses been swept up by the catering staff after ushering the corporate ticket holders from the Norman Hunter, Lucas Radebe and Billy Bremner Suites after heartily celebrating Dominic Calvert-Lewin's late winner against Brighton on Sunday, work began on Elland Road's John Charles Stand. It served as a reminder that Leeds are already a competitive force in a Premier League in which they are assured of another campaign. Vital to the project is the provision of either a light rail or tram from Leeds city centre with a stop at Elland Road and then on to the White Rose area.
‘Many billionaires are not happy people’: Michelle Obama talks politics and going ‘a little low’ in first Australian event
Former first lady delivered veiled but sharp remarks on US politics during speaking tour that began in Melbourne
I started powerlifting at 75 after recovering from surgery
Barbara Phillips began competing in powerlifting at 75 after hip replacement surgery and decades of staying active.
MICC kicks off 2026 small business engagement, offers one-on-one sessions
The U.S. Army Mission and Installation Contracting Command kicks off its 2026 Advanced Planning Briefing for Industry May 18, bringing together contracting professionals, small business representatives and industry partners for a week long engagement focused on transparency, innovation and Army readiness. Hosted May 18-22 virtually by MICC’s Office of Small Business Programs, the 2026 APBI began with day one briefings from senior Army and MICC leaders, including MICC Commanding General Brig. Gen. Freddy Adams and MICC Deputy to the Commanding General Clay Cole. Attendees also heard from the Department of the Army Office of Small Business Programs, representatives from MICC’s Office of Small Business Programs and leaders from the 418th Contracting Support Brigade, 419th Contracting Support Brigade, the Field Directorate Office at Fort Eustis and the Field Directorate Office at Fort Sam Houston.
Out of this Prairieville family's hardest moment, a $1M company was born
What began as a deeply personal challenge for Jordanna and Louis Coleman has grown into a fast-scaling logistics business—one built not only on strategy and resilience, but on faith. LC Transport Services, founded in February 2022 and headquartered in Prairieville, started with a single truck, a home office and a determination to create stability for […]
String theory suddenly emerged from simple physics rules
Physicists may have uncovered a surprising new clue that string theory—the idea that the universe is built from unimaginably tiny vibrating strings—could be more than just a mathematical fantasy. Instead of assuming strings existed from the start, researchers began with a few simple rules about how particles behave at extreme energies and discovered that the equations naturally produced the telltale fingerprints of string theory all on their own.
This Ebola outbreak raises questions about when it all began -- and the U.S. response
The sheer number of cases and deaths are a sign that the outbreak might have been smoldering before the virus was identified.
Cortland Athletics wins third straight SUNYAC Commissioner's Cup for all-sports excellence
It's the the 20th time overall that Red Dragons student-athletes have claimed the trophy since the competition began in the 1996-97 season.
Detroit’s lunch business struggles as hybrid work, economy reshape routines
The traditional sit-down “business lunch” is no longer the reliable revenue stream it was before the pandemic began in early 2020.
TEEMA global science park plan takes shape with Mexico leading
The Taiwan Electrical and Electronic Manufacturers' Association (TEEMA) is moving ahead with its global science park strategy, and Mexico's Sonora has emerged as the leading candidate for an early launch, TEEMA chairman Young Liu said before the group's 27th general assembly on May 15, 2026. Liu said Sonora has the strongest chance of becoming the first site because talks began earliest there and field inspections have already been carried out three times, putting it well ahead of other candidate locations.
Are lawmakers or unelected staff making decisions on the Capitol Annex Project?
Since the Capitol Annex Project began in 2018, there has not been a single lawmaker consistently overseeing the construction.
One clinic tracks the heavy toll Trump's immigration crackdown takes on mental health
Zocalo Health, a clinic in Los Angeles, screens all its patients for depression, anxiety and suicidal thoughts. It documented a marked increase in those conditions since ICE enforcement actions began.
Stiles couple turns retirement hobby into successful, growing business
What began as a hobby is now a successful business for Irene and Randy Belongia, owners of Willow Buck Creations in Stiles.
THE HISTORY OF CHARGING THE MOUND, EPISODE 4: GEORGE BELL
In episode three of this series, I began a two-part exploration of the encounter between Toronto’s George Bell and Boston’s Bruce Kison on June 23rd, 1985. Having visited Kison side of things, we will now consider the life and times of George Bell. In the late 1970s scouts all around major league baseball began descending […]
Antarctica’s sudden sea ice loss is one of the most extreme and confusing events in the modern climate record. Scientists now know why it's happening.
In 2015, after decades of relative stability, Antarctica's sea ice suddenly began to disappear. Sea ice extent reached a record low in 2023, and scientists have now figured out what happened in that period.
Chartbook 449: Voldemort on Threadneedle street. The Bank of England and the "haunted house" of English politics.
Imagine the scene: In some Harry Potter version of 21st-century London, a group of deathless UK Treasury officials gathered from across the last century huddle over warm pints and glasses of Chardonnay. Around the table there are officials from the 1920s, the 1930s, the 1970s, 2022 and today. Inevitably, in May 2026, the subject of conversation is the disintegration of the current Labour government. Despite its huge majority in parliament, it has been reduced to tatters by catastrophic local election result. These exposed the fact that rather than having a government with a clear popular majority, the UK is like most other modern societies divided into 5 segments each of which commands between 26 and 16 percent of the vote. Perhaps unsurprisingly, the leadership at Nos 10 and 11 Downing Street - where the Prime Minister and the Chancellor (Treasury Secretary) work - seem paralyzed. They are caught between mounting discontent over unfairness and the cost of living, and tough fiscal strictures that push them into making unpopular spending decisions. In the London pub, the Treasury officials from across the ages, can barely hide their satisfaction at the latest display of democratic politics caught in the vice-grip of financial logic. “Remember the mur d’argent and the banker’s ramp?” “Just like yesterday!” There are smirks around the table. Then the representative of 2026 pipes up: “One thing you have to say about the current lot (referring to the latest hapless Labour government), you don’t have to teach them about the bond market!” There is a murmur of ascent from the Treasury Mandarins. The trauma of the fiscal crisis of September-October 2022 sits deep. Back then, in the final stages of Tory decay, a ‘mini budget’ that challenged fiscal orthodoxy led to a brief but fierce panic in one of the oldest government bond markets in the world (aka gilt market). Now all you have to do is to mention the “bond market” to hush debate. [ Paul Mason@paulmasonnews In the name of public service, and as ex-economics editor of BBC Newsnight, I offer to do a zoom call, tonight, with any Labour MP who wants to understand why bond markets do not "fall into line" with governments. 1/ 3:57 PM · May 12, 2026 · 466K Views 224 Replies · 674 Reposts · 3.93K Likes ](https://x.com/paulmasonnews/status/2054229532404519082?s=20) “And the funny thing is”, the young man in the huddle continues, “they don’t even want to talk about … ”. There is a sudden hush. Significant looks are exchanged around the table. About? One of the senior figures puts down his glass with a decisive “clink”. He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named has entered their thoughts. Meanwhile, a few miles away in a grubby pub in Bloomsbury, two conspirators from the camp of Critical Macrofinance huddle over cans of low-alcohol IPA. They look at each other and blurt out loud: “The Bank!” “Everyone in the bloody Labour party is talking about the bond market. But why aren’t they even mentioning … the Bank of England!?” “Why is no one talking about Voldemort?” In Paul Mason’s blogpost, after much chest-thumping about basic fiscal logic, the basic point about the Bank of England is buried in the fine print at #3 in his list of suggestions as to what a radical Labour government might actually be able to do! [ Conflict & Democracy Down with the bond market! Down with gravity! It may seem unfair to focus on Labour MP Paula Barker for her off-the-cuff assertion that the bond market would have to “fall in line” with Andy Burnham, should he replace Keir Starmer as prime minister. But Burnham himself told the New Statesman that Labour had to “get beyond this thing of being in hock to the bond markets… Read more 2 days ago · 100 likes · 3 comments · Paul Mason ](https://htsf.substack.com/p/down-with-the-bond-market-down-with?utm_source=substack&utm_campaign=post_embed&utm_medium=web) Back in Bloomsbury they shake their heads and ask: “Didn’t we learn anything from the Eurozone crisis?” Meanwhile, as if summoned to the conversation by some higher force, the “pink pages” announce: “The days of ultra-cheap government borrowing have come to an end” and Martin “Whizzard” Wolf publishes the graph of the season Look at the UK in 2026, perilously positioned on the upper edge of the pack. No wonder no one in London needs any lessons about the “bond market”. But, look again. Imagine how they feel in Rome. What is London’s nightmare in 2026? The nightmare is that you end up like Italy in the early 2010s during the Eurozone crisis. Once comfortably situated in the middle of the pack, watching with horror as your ten-year yields explode to 7 percent and “spreads” become a national nightmare. One of the largest economies in Europe, a founding member of the euro, stigmatized. But the message of the Italian experience is ambiguous. After all, the stigma didn’t last. In 2026, Italy borrows at rates lower not only than the UK but the US. The US, which, as everyone knows, enjoys the “exorbitant privilege” of being the issuer of reserve, safe asets. What kind of magic is this? How did Italy, in the space of fifteen years, go from being good, to bad and back again? Which brings us back to our dissident friends in their Bloombury boozer and their memories of the Eurozone crisis. Italy never was Britain - with its ongoing fiscal deficits. Without interest payments, on primary balance, from 2000 to 2020 Italy ran a tight fiscal ship. Even in 2008 it barely went into deficit and when it was being put on the rack in the early 20210s its primary surplus matched that of austere Germany. So, what happened? How did it end up stigmatized? Of course Italian politics didn’t help. Berlusconi was at the helm and he had legal issues. But amongst friends in the Bloomsbury pub, Berlusconi is a sideshow, the name we whisper to each other is “Trichet”. From 2004 to 2011 the ECB was headed by Jean-Claude Trichet, ex of the French Treasury, more German than the Germans. After 2009 as the news of the Greek fiscal disaster broke, the European bond markets wento into panic mode and Trichet began a brutal game of cat and mouse. Between 2009 and 2011, Trichet intervened in the bond market to help, only when he thought he had compliance with austerity. When he thought they were uncooperative, he withdrew. In the summer of 2011, he even made direct suggestions to his Italian counterparts in Rome, as to how Italy should be governed. It was this cat and mouse game that drove the bond markets crazy and exposed Italy to a violent squeeze. When Mario Draghi took over the ECB at the end of 2011 and declared “whatever it takes”, the pressure on Italy, gradually eased. It is that starring role that has made Draghi into the towering figure in European politics that he remains today. So now you see why voices in London hush when it comes to the Bank of England. “The bond market” isn’t an irresistible objective force like the weather or an avalanche. It can appear like that. But that depends on the way it is being handled, or not handled by the central bank. Which is why the silence about the Bank of England in London right now is so significant. If you think this all sounds a bit fishy, coming from a left-liberal Keynesian like myself, well, let me introduce you to Robin Brooks, who, to put it mildly, plays on a different quidditch team to me. Here, from the position of a fiscal hawk is Robin’s celebratory account of the Bank of England’s role since 2022; In October 2022, at the height of the bond market blow-up in the UK, something incredible happened. Governor Andrew Bailey told British pension funds the Bank of England would end its support program for the country’s fragile gilt market, drawing a line under how much help the central bank was willing to give to exposed pension funds and - implicitly - the government. By the end of that week, Kwasi Kwarteng - the finance minister - had resigned. Prime Minister Liz Truss would soon follow. This episode is so incredible because it contrasts with what happened in the Euro zone earlier that year. Bond markets in Spain and Italy were under pressure amid high inflation and rising interest rates. In the middle of this, Mario Draghi - Italy’s Prime Minister - resigned, compounding pressure on bond markets of high-debt countries on the Euro periphery. Unlike the Bank of England, the ECB caved. It bought Italian and Spanish government bonds in an effort to cap yields and introduced a new tool that signaled to markets it might do such caps more frequently going forward. Faced with pressure on bond markets, the ECB capitulated to political pressure from high-debt countries like Italy and Spain. The Bank of England stood its ground and toppled the Truss government. This kind of thing has long-lasting consequences. It means markets price a higher probability of yield caps in the Euro zone, which keeps Italian and Spanish yields artificially low, while markets feel free to push up UK yields without fear of central bank intervention. As I flagged in yesterday’s post, this means you really can’t compare UK yields to those of other high-debt countries. The UK looks worse, but only because its central bank isn’t interfering with markets. There’s more to this than just that 2022 episode. The Bank of England has also been much more aggressive in its quantitative tightening (QT) than other central banks. If one motivation for quantitative easing (QE) is to lower bond yields - especially longer-dated ones - then it stands to reason QT pushes yields up. The left chart above shows a four-quarter moving average of UK government debt issuance (black line) in percent of GDP and which sectors absorb this issuance, including the Bank of England (blue bars). The right chart above compares the Bank of England’s accumulation or run-off of government bonds (blue line) with that of other central banks, where this blue line is the same as the blue bars in the left chart. The Bank of England was quicker and more aggressive than other central banks in downsizing its bond holdings, so UK yields will have risen more than elsewhere also for this reason, not just because of Governor Andrew Bailey’s remarks in October 2022. Back in October 2025, after a conversation in New York with friends in British politics, my sense of dysphoria was such that I raised the issue of the Bank of England openly in the FT Since 2008, the UK has slid into a deep economic and political predicament. Growth has stagnated to a degree far worse even than in the 1970s. The Tory leadership’s wager on the Brexit referendum spectacularly backfired, leaving the UK isolated from Europe and at the mercy of its special relationship with the US, many of whose political class regard the UK as a basket case. After years of austerity, the Labour party lurched to the left and then back to the centre. The Tory party has been eclipsed by the populist nationalism of Reform. Any British government should be worrying first and foremost about how to restart growth. Instead, Keir Starmer is beset by shades of the gilt market panic triggered by the Liz Truss government in 2022. The debt level is higher than in recent years, but there is no cause for panic. UK debt is at far from critical levels and of long duration. Whether you want to “take back control” or launch progressive economic policy, a democracy dogged by fear of bond market vigilantes is unhealthy. In a country that is a monetary sovereign, this climate points to one thing: a disconnect between the government and the central bank. Since 1997, the independence of the Bank of England has become a sacred cow. But independence is what you make of it. And in the wake of the gilt market crisis of September 2022, relations between the Bank of England and the UK government need a reset. In normal times, there is no doubt that an inflation-targeting independent central bank can serve a country well. But since 2008, the UK and other advanced economies have not had the luxury of such simple problems. To their credit, central bankers around the world have not stood on orthodoxy. After 2008, the US Federal Reserve rescued the global banking system and, through quantitative easing, it stabilised the Treasury market in the face of huge deficits. In Europe, things were trickier. Both the Bank of England under Mervyn King and Jean-Claude Trichet’s European Central Bank played cat and mouse with national governments. This was a high stakes wager that between 2010 and 2012 escalated bond market tension and triggered a disastrous turn to austerity. Shaken by the impact of those shocks, their successors, Mark Carney and Mario Draghi adopted a more protective stance (assuming you were not the government of Greece). Recall that Draghi’s legendary slogan, “Whatever it takes”, was uttered to face down the City of London’s bond vigilantes. In 2015, Draghi launched QE — financial repression by another name. In 2016, Carney used the authority of the Bank of England to stabilise markets following the vote for Brexit, an exemplary demonstration of how central banks can underpin democratic choice, even when those choices are wrong headed. All these were independent central bankers steeped in the best practice of the 1990s, who recognised that historic crises demanded radical action. It was the price surge of 2021-2023 that poisoned the atmosphere. Though the shock came mainly from the supply side, central banks ended up in the dock. Nowhere more so than in the UK. The Bank of England reacted with aggressive normalisation. Faced with a cost of living crisis, the governor called for workers to accept real wage cuts. In early 2022, as gas prices were at record levels and Russia’s army was poised to invade Ukraine, the Bank adopted a stringent programme of quantitative tightening, elevating interest rates. When the Truss government got itself in trouble, the Bank took almost a week to come to the rescue. Rather than enacting a charade of normality, it is time to recognise that in 2025 the UK faces a period of historic transition. To meet this challenge, what is needed is a new concordat with the Bank. This should not ignore inflationary pressures or the long-run trajectory of debt, but should affirm the priority of reviving investment-led growth. One could follow Donald Trump in demanding interest rate cuts. The Bank could shadow the ECB in its commitment to capping Eurozone yields. But the top priority should be to lay the ghost of September 2022. The Bank’s slowing of QT last month was a concession. An immediate and complete end would send the right signal. Such a concordat will not by itself restore sanity to politics, solve the housing problem or rebuild the NHS. But it would help to lift the fear of bond market crisis, which is paralysing the effort by democratic politicians to answer the fundamental questions facing the nation. Now, that call for a new concordat between government and Bank of Englands seems more urgent than ever. The problem is that in October 2025, Starmer still had some authority. Today the government is in tatters. And when you are the “under the harrow” - to echo a phrase of Montagu Norman’s from the 1920s - it is the worst possible time to consider institutional change. To make general arguments at a time of crisis can only seem like special pleading rather than a general argument for long-term change. The same, unfortunately, is also true for the other basic institutional reform that Britain urgently needs i.e. the abolition of the out-dated first past the post electoral system and its replacement by a moderated form of proportional representation. And thirdly - whilst we are saying the quiet parts out loud - Britain needs to reopen the question of EU membership. What the local election results of 2026 show is that this remains a key issue. And what they also show is that there is a clear majority that would favor a return. Until these basic features of Britain’s political economy are addressed the country will carry on its politics as though in a haunted house, governed by governments that lack actual majorities, conjuring up false constraints whilst ignoring the real ones. This one is for DG and MI. I love writing the newsletter. If you enjoy it too and fancy buying me a coffee once a month, you know what to do. Click below! Subscribe
Southeast Utah Health Dept. asks those with foodborne illness symptoms to report online
The Southeast Utah Health Department began investigating a potential foodborne illness outbreak.The health department said that the outbreak is in Carbon County
Arizona AG says Medicaid behavioral health billing dropped 92% after fraud crackdown
Arizona AG Kris Mayes says billing through the American Indian Health Plan for behavioral health services has dropped over 90% the past few years after her office began targeting fraud in the program.
Russia's rare daytime drone attack turned into all-night missile barrage
Business Insider journalists witnessed a rare, day-long Russian onslaught that began with daytime drones and turned into nighttime missile fire.
What Trump says vs. what the intelligence says on Iran
One of the Trump administration’s key talking points on the Iran war is that the Islamic Republic’s missile and military capabilities were devastated in US-Israeli bombing campaigns before the ceasefire began in April.
Trump marvels at Chinese power as summit kicks off
President Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping began a two-day summit with a welcome ceremony at Beijing's Great Hall of the People that featured an extraordinary display of power.
Health Services Administration Student Inspired by Family Experience to Improve Patient Care
When Amaya Allen graduates in May with her Bachelor of Science in Public Health (B.S.P.H.) in Health Services Administration, she will carry with her a clear sense of commitment to improving healthcare systems. A native of Suffolk, Virginia, and graduate of Kings Fork High School, Amaya’s path to healthcare administration wasn’t planned. Her Old Dominion University studies began in a different health sciences program, but a life-changing experience shifted her focus.
FDA chief's resignation widens a leadership gap at the nation's health department
WASHINGTON (AP) — When the week began, several senior positions at the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services were already sitting empty.
Rex Reed, 'bad boy of entertainment journalism' dies at 87. He began writing career at LSU
Rex Reed, who spent six decades reviewing movies and writing about their stars, died Tuesday in his Manhattan home at age 87.
Baton Rouge entrepreneur rebuilds life one loaf at a time
After surviving three heart attacks and open-heart surgery, Baton Rouge entrepreneur Matt Bolton traded the industrial construction business for a slower—but no less demanding—second act in artisan breadmaking, 225 writes. What began as a sourdough hobby in retirement has grown into BlueRabbit Bakehouse, a Jefferson Highway bakery drawing weekend lines for its small-batch loaves, spreads […]
Prices for these grocery items have spiked highest since the war began
The effects of the war in Iran are starting to show up in grocery stores.
ASU urban planning graduate blends expertise in geographic information science with passion for designing cities
When Dorian Lemarchand began pursuing his bachelor’s degrees online at Arizona State University during the pandemic, he was looking for a fresh start and a chance to rebuild his academic confidence.
Reddit Starts Blocking Mobile Website, Pushing Users to App Instead
Social network Reddit recently began blocking mobile visitors to its website while pushing them to download the official Reddit app, and it's fair to say that the move is not going down well with users. If you visit reddit.com on your iPhone today, you may see a new popup that can't be dismissed, asking you to "get the app to keep using Reddit".
Diane Keaton’s Daughter Pens Heartfelt Mother’s Day Tribute to Late Actress
'First Mother’s Day without you,' Dexter 'Dexie' White began her post honoring the iconic actress.
Diane Keaton’s Daughter Pens Heartfelt Mother’s Day Tribute to Late Actress
'First Mother’s Day without you,' Dexter 'Dexie' White began her post honoring the iconic actress.
H.S. Baseball: Favorites and dark horses in each division
We’ve reached the halfway point in the NHIAA baseball regular season. Although we know much more now than we did when the season began, there’s still plenty to be determined.
Nebraska baseball erupts late to complete chaotic comeback over Iowa
On a Saturday afternoon that began with a line of fans stretched into the parking lot, patiently waiting to enter the gates of Haymarket Park, Nebraska (36-14) completed an emphatic comeback to take down Iowa (29-20) 15-11 and secure the series victory.
Nebraska erupts late to complete chaotic comeback over Iowa
On a Saturday afternoon that began with a line of fans stretched into the parking lot, patiently waiting to enter the gates of Haymarket Park, Nebraska (36-14) completed an emphatic comeback to take down Iowa (29-20) 15-11 and secure the series victory.
Business Lookahead: Trump on Tour
STORY: From Trump's trip to China, to a slew of new U.S. data releases, these are the stories to watch in business and finance in the coming week. :: Trump goes to Beijing U.S. President Donald Trump visits Beijing on Thursday and Friday.It will be his first visit to China in eight years.He'll try to lock in the trade truce agreed to in October in South Korea, and avoid a rerun of the tit-for-tat tariff battle that he set off a year ago.Fresh trade data should offer a reality check on whether a protectionist White House has managed to dent Americans' appetite for Chinese-made goods.:: Saudi Aramco posts resultsThe world's biggest exporter of crude oil, Saudi Aramco, reports first-quarter results on Sunday.The numbers are expected to show the pain from the more than two-month-old Iran war.This comes as efforts to end the conflict appeared to stall after the U.S. and Iran traded fire in recent days, with some of the biggest flare-ups in fighting in and around the Strait of Hormuz since a ceasefire began a month ago.:: U.S. economic dataA bunch of new data should give a clearer view of inflation in the U.S.Tuesday's April consumer price index is expected to rise 0.6% according to a Reuters poll.Prices at the pump are likely to loom large in the numbers.Producer price data for April on Wednesday is another inflation checkpoint after the Fed’s last meeting exposed a more hawkish tilt among some policymakers who are increasingly uneasy about price pressures.And retail sales figures on Thursday should show whether higher gas prices and other costs are starting to bite into household spending.
Steph Curry Gets a Special Edition Fitbit Air
As a part of yesterday's Fitbit Air release, Google also began selling a special edition version made in partnership with Steph Curry. This specific model is the version that Curry has been...
Long Hours, Big Impact: St. Mary’s Celebrates Small Business Month
LEONARDTOWN, Md. — For Mike Hewitt, the reality of small business was learned long before adulthood — in the quiet hours of a Saturday morning, when work came first. During the May 5 commissioners meeting, Hewitt reflected on decades spent working alongside his father, sharing a lesson that began long before most people started their […]
Science diplomacy lessons from a North Korean volcano
Mount Paektu, a mythic, active volcano on the border between North Korea and China, is almost the epitome of a scientific challenge that crosses political lines. In 946 CE, it erupted in one of the five biggest volcanic events of the past 10,000 years, kicking up huge quantities of ash and sending destructive mud flows down river channels for hundreds of kilometres. Should this happen again, the entire region, including easternmost Russia, South Korea and even Japan could be hit. “It’s definitely got the potential to be big,” said James Hammond, a professor of geophysics at Birkbeck, University of London. An eruption on the scale of 946 would have “huge regional impact.” For the past 15 years, Hammond has helped lead a groundbreaking collaboration with North Korean scientists to study the volcano, navigating scientific sanctions, tough export controls on scientific equipment and a long, pandemic-enforced exodus from the country. Although he seems more at home on far-flung research expeditions – before speaking to Science|Business, Hammond was camping out on a Greenland ice sheet – he has also advised the European Commission on its changing science diplomacy strategy. His long experience with North Korea has made Hammond sceptical of blanket bans on science collaboration, no matter the country.This is a live question in Europe, where in the wake of Russia’s 2022 invasion of Ukraine, institutional ties with Russian universities were almost entirely severed, although some scientists fear this could undermine our understanding of climate change’s impact on the Arctic. Here, Hammond tells the story of the Mount Paektu mission and the policy lessons he takes from it. Ominous rumblingsThe genesis of Hammond’s collaboration came in 2002, when Mount Paektu began to rumble ominously. Earthquake activity picked up and the volcano began to emit unusual gases. North Korean scientists took notice. “People felt we need to know more about this volcano,” said Hammond. In 2011, North Korean vulcanologists put out a request for international expertise to help them learn more. At the time, Hammond and his collaborator, Clive Oppenheimer, were working on a vulcanology project in another sanctioned country, Eritrea, and so decided to answer the call. Within a month, they had flown into Pyongyang. “It was pretty incredible,” recalls Hammond (left). “We were made to feel like honoured guests, and invited to official celebrations.” The scientific opportunity was huge. Paektu is unusually positioned, a thousand kilometres from where tectonic plates rub against each other in the Pacific. “It was an incredibly interesting volcano, but not much research had been done, at least not in the international community,” he said. “There was so much we felt we could do. And we had these partners that were super keen to engage.”The mission received an unusual visitor in the form of volcano-obsessed filmmaker Werner Herzog, who accompanied Hammond and Oppenheimer while directing his 2016 film Into the Inferno about volcanos across the world. Four days into the trip, the German director delivered a long speech about reunification to his North Korean hosts, recalls Hammond. “He got to the heart of the Koreans and how they felt, and how they thought, in a way that I'm not sure I ever will,” he said. UN sanctionsHowever, Hammond realised he’d been “naïve” about how difficult it would be to collaborate with North Korea, which was sanctioned far more heavily than Eritrea. “We didn’t fully appreciate the all-encompassing nature of restrictions,” he said. In 2016, as tensions escalated over Pyongyang’s nuclear tests, a United Nations resolution banned all joint scientific work with North Korea. However, the UN sanctions did allow countries to request carve outs, and the UK successfully requested an exemption for Hammond’s work. Related articlesEU pushes for joint science diplomacy, but care needed to avoid gridlock, experts sayRussia severs its last ties with German scienceAnchor Greenlanders in Arctic climate research, experts tell EU ahead of policy updateExport controls have also delayed Hammond’s work. In one case, it took 18 months to get approval from the UK government to take seismometers, which measure earthquakes, to North Korea. “It was frustrating,” he said. “But they didn’t just say no.” However, one instrument, called an induction coil, used to measure how the earth conducts electricity, was blocked entirely because it can in theory be used to detect submarines. Karaoke bondingSince the collaboration started in 2011, Hammond has visited the country around 15 times, although the pandemic closed off North Korea for more than five years. A trip last November was Hammond’s first since the outbreak. Despite this lengthy interlude, Hammond has deep bonds in the country. The North Korean scientists Hammond works with are somewhat isolated, as they struggle to access the latest research papers and travel to international conferences. That said, they are “excellent geophysicists” and are “very well trained in the field,” he said. Over karaoke and chats about their families, “we’ve made friendships, for sure,” he said. The authorities have to sign-off things like the placement of seismometers, for example, but Hammond said these requests have been approved. “Everything that we've asked for within a scientific context has been delivered.”Scientific backchannels? These kind of personal links between scientists across political lines are one purported benefit of science diplomacy. During the Cold War, some historians argue, scientific contact between the US and Soviet Union laid a groundwork of trust for other cooperation, such as on arms control. Hammond agrees that backchannel contacts to North Korean geophysicists are hardly likely to defuse a military crisis on the Korean peninsula, but the simple fact of the scientific collaboration makes contacts between diplomats that little bit easier. “It creates opportunities to understand each other a little bit better,” he said. “When maybe you have those more difficult discussions as diplomats, it's coming from a slightly better place.” Cutting tiesDrawing lessons from the Mount Paektu mission for today’s links with Russian science isn’t simple. The analogy is far from exact, Hammond said, “because one is essentially a Cold War, versus a pretty hot war in the case of Russia.” But Hammond’s broader argument is that the challenges we face, such as climate change, pandemics, biodiversity loss, pollution and so on, have globalised in an unprecedented way, making blanket shutdowns in collaboration with any country unwise.He’s somewhat critical of the UN scientific sanctions imposed on North Korea in 2016, even though they did allow for exceptions. “I think a blanket halt to some of these things, when we face big global challenges [. . .] that’s quite a risky thing to do,” he said.Institutional endorsement?European academics are still by and large free to work individually with Russian counterparts. However, official, institutional partnerships have largely ended. Shortly following the full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, Russian university rectors wrote a public letter endorsing the war, meaning European universities fear official collaboration could also be seen as a kind of endorsement. Hammond acknowledges there is a risk of legitimising regimes, and state-controlled universities, through scientific cooperation. “That’s the trade off you have to make,” he said. Strategic projectsWith Russia, instead of giving a green light to restart all Arctic science, a middle ground might be firing up a few carefully selected “strategic” projects, said Hammond. After all, European countries are still collaborating with Russia on the International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor, an experimental nuclear fusion plant in the south of France. However, even if Europe did try to revive Arctic science with Russia, there’s no guarantee Russian scientists would play ball. 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‘The reality, for better or worse’: Columbia comp sci students and faculty grapple with AI’s disruption of the field
‘The reality, for better or worse’: Columbia comp sci students and faculty grapple with AI’s disruption of the field ‘The reality, for better or worse’: Columbia comp sci students and faculty grapple with AI’s disruption of the field A field that once seemed like a direct path to stable, lucrative work is becoming less certain under AI, students and faculty told Spectator. By Ria Vasishtha and Arjun Menon May 3, 2026 Shanying Liu / Deputy Illustrations Editor Asia Genawi, SEAS ’29, first encountered artificial intelligence during her sophomore year at her high school in Indiana. Back in 2023, policies on AI varied widely—even within the same district—and some schools had no guidance at all. As Genawi began to see the effects of AI trickle into her classroom, she turned to guidance from her home state’s Department of Education, which she said she found “outdated and inaccessible.” Genawi spent the rest of her high school career dedicated to the issue, including writing a 15-page memo exploring varying AI policies across Indiana schools, which she sent to every Indiana state senator and representative whose contact information she was able to find. She later helped draft a bill that would have required public high schools to establish and share their own AI policies with students in an accessible format. But with so many other bills already awaiting referral, hers never made it to committee. When Genawi arrived at Columbia to study computer science, she found that the gaps she had spent years trying to address in Indiana had followed her there. Many students and professors were also grappling with what AI meant for the field. Across Columbia’s undergraduate schools, computer science has become the most popular major—accounting for around 11 percent of degrees awarded in Columbia College, 32 percent in the School of Engineering and Applied Science, and 12 percent in the School of General Studies in 2024. While the number of computer science majors in SEAS grew from 166 to 173 during the 2024-25 academic year, the total number across the three schools fell around 4.5 percent from 393 to 375, driven by declines at Columbia College and General Studies. At Barnard, it has grown to become the second most popular major as of 2025, up from third the year prior. The number of degrees awarded have grown fivefold since 2016. Faculty members and students in the department told Spectator that the surge in the major’s popularity has been driven in large part by its apparent promise of a secure, well-paid career path. However, they noted that the recent rise of generative AI has compromised the sense of stability that once defined the field, even as interest in technical skills among students persists. According to data from the Federal Reserve Bank of New York in 2024, out of 74 majors tracked, computer science had the fifth highest unemployment rate among majors at 7 percent, while computer engineering had the second highest at 7.8 percent. “Anecdotally, people are moving away from CS as a major,” Daniel Bauer, a senior lecturer in the computer science department, said. “They’re still taking some of our classes, right, because they think they need that, but they’re instead majoring in other things.” Bauer described a field that had shifted from what he called a “nerdy outlier discipline” to one that “everyone needs,” a sign that technical skills have become a baseline expectation across industries with the emergence of AI. “A lot of people thought, ‘Oh, it’s a guaranteed path to a stable income. You get a six-figure job right out of your undergrad,’” Bauer said. Now, companies may see AI as a way to reduce demand for entry-level programmers, especially in what he calls “code monkey jobs,” roles where a large number of employees are “just writing out code nine-to-five.” Chris Murphy, a senior lecturer in the computer science department, described the current moment as the convergence of two forces: the downturn of the job market and generative AI coming onto the scene. “Things kind of started to really pick up in 2014, 16,” he said, recalling the years after the weaker 2010 market. Murphy added that this was also a period where “students were getting more experience outside of class than they were inside of class” through internships, jobs, and side projects. Murphy suggested that the earlier momentum helped make computer science feel like both an academic program and a reliable pathway into work. That feeling is harder to sustain now as the industry reconfigures, which is a shift that students are seeing firsthand. Rebecca Yu, SEAS ’27, said that during a recent internship in Big Tech, she saw that “every single tech company was racing to integrate” large language models. She added that her manager said her intern class was the first to complete their assigned projects, which she attributed to the increased efficiency that comes with AI. Frank Liu, SEAS ’29, said that with AI lowering the barrier to coding, companies now expect everyone to write code. “A lot of companies outright say if you’re not using coding in your job, you might get fired for not being productive enough,” Liu said. Yu similarly expressed that students increasingly have to accept AI being a part of industry workflow, adding that many also “make use of it to maximize their productivity.” Richard Li, CC ’28, described a “franticness” among his peers as the pace of change accelerates. He explained how “some new tool” is released regularly, noting that tools rise and fall in prominence within weeks. He has come to believe that he doesn’t need to “match that speed all the time” and keep up with every development. Li has learned that AI tools allow him to “take a breath” and “get back into the loop much easier than before” when he needs to. While some companies specifically target Columbia when hiring, sending representatives to campus career fairs and recruiting large numbers from Columbia, a computer science degree cannot be treated as a static credential, Yu described. “You can’t just get your degree and stop learning after that. You have to always be learning,” Yu said. “That is something you basically have to expect for your job.” AI has not only affected students’ decisions to major in computer science, but also reshaped how the subject is taught. Across departments, faculty members no longer treat work done outside the classroom as a reliable measure of understanding, shifting instead toward in-person exams, quizzes, and attendance checks. While homework once made up as much as 60 to 70 percent of a student’s grade in computer science classes, Murphy said that breakdown has since flipped, with exams and quizzes now accounting for the majority. “The assumption—especially among pessimists—is that they’re using it to do their homework,” Murphy said. “They take the homework assignment. They put it into generative AI. Out comes the solution. Submit solution. The end.” Murphy said that faculty members ranged in their responses from fully prohibiting AI use to actively teaching students how to effectively work with AI. He said he shifted his approach this year after his teaching assistants called his belief that students weren’t using the technology “naïve,” and now permits students to use AI on assignments. His surveys of students in his introductory classes have told a more complicated story than the one so-called pessimists offer: Around 60 to 70 percent of students who reported using AI said they used it to have concepts explained to them, to clarify assignment instructions, to generate test cases, or to create practice questions. “Those are all ways that you might have had a tutor in the past to do that, and now you have this AI essentially as your tutor,” he said. Bauer has taken a different approach, teaching students how to use AI productively without sacrificing the core principles of the discipline. “People who are trained to actually use AI tools productively, while being in charge of designing the overall project, will be very much in demand in the next couple of years,” he said. Over the past year, a working group of computer science faculty has been redesigning the introductory and intermediate programming sequence to integrate generative AI as both a subject and a tool, representatives from SEAS wrote in a statement to Spectator. The effort is “coordinated” across the department, “not course-by-course,” with a systematic assessment of how AI integration is affecting student outcomes underway to shape the next round of changes. The goal, the department explained, is for students to be able to “read, verify, and reason about code, whether they or a model wrote it.” Tony Dear, senior lecturer in the computer science department, is piloting individualized AI feedback in a discrete mathematics course, while a machine learning course is also testing a Socratic AI dialogue system designed to “guide inquiry rather than supply answers,” the statement reads. Beyond individual courses, SEAS funded seven cross-departmental faculty projects in generative AI this past academic year, spanning biomedical engineering, chemical engineering, industrial engineering, and computer science, according to the statement. This phenomenon extends beyond the computer science department. SEAS’ new AI minor, which it announced in November 2025, reflects the University’s attempt to adapt. The minor is specifically designed for noncomputer science majors and aims to provide “essential AI knowledge” while emphasizing practical and responsible use across disciplines, according to the SEAS website. At the center of the minor is AI in Context, a course taught by a team of faculty from the departments of computer science, applied mathematics, philosophy, music, literature, and the Writing Center, the representatives told Spectator. Bauer described it as targeted at students who want to bring AI into fields like economics or biology, rather than as a path into software engineering itself. At the graduate level, SEAS announced a new Master of Science in artificial intelligence in February, with the inaugural cohort starting in the fall. While recognizing how AI has helped them navigate coursework, students also described its rise as isolating, even among members of the Application Development Initiative, one of Columbia’s largest computer science clubs. “As people start to ask AI for questions that they would normally ask students and members, it starts to isolate people” Li said. Alexa Kafka, BC ’27, echoed Li’s sentiment, pointing out that computer science has always been a collaborative discipline with code reviews and pull requests, even as AI makes independent work easier. Despite this, Kafka noted that she hasn’t been to office hours “in at least a year.” Bauer added that faculty are exploring long-term solutions to the assessment problem. “One of the things that we’re trying to do at the department or school level is to maybe move towards computerized testing facilities,” Bauer said, referring to ideas in the department to revitalize computer labs as an alternative to pen-and-paper exams. “We have to accept that this is the reality, for better or worse.” But more exams, students say, does not mean better learning, nor does it reflect how computer science is actually done. “Code is so variable and can be approached in so many directions, there’s never just going to be one correct answer. There can be multiple optimal solutions,” Kafka said. Students also expressed concern that the shift toward exam-heavy grading pulls focus away from the applied, project-based work that better reflects both discipline and industry expectations. ADI has tried to respond more quickly than the curriculum can. Through a vibe coding workshop this past semester, club members said they wanted to help students understand not just that AI exists, but how to use it deliberately. “Vibe coding” refers to the practice of prompting AI to write code for a task or project, and has become widespread enough that ADI felt the gap in formal instruction was worth addressing, according to Sophia Huang, BC ’29. The workshop introduced students to the concept of context engineering, which Shaina Sahu, SEAS ’27, described as not just writing a prompt, but optimizing “the rest of the relevant information that you would feed into the model.” Without that, students said that AI-generated code can fail at scale or introduce difficult-to-detect bugs. Genawi said the shift toward AI has changed what it means to be good at computer science. “I think the shift has kind of gone towards what can you create and what can you do, instead of, what do you know,” she said. Indeed, during ADI DevFest, its annual hackathon, Li said more teams are trying to complete their projects than in years past. While sign-ups have historically outpaced submissions, Li said this is beginning to change because teams “have a tool that completes the vision for them.” While many students see AI as an equalizer that lowers the barrier to entry for coding and technical work, Murphy said it also creates new equity concerns inside the classroom around who can afford stronger tools and who already knows how to use them. “The equity issues I worry about are students who have access to paid versions of things versus free versions of things,” he said. Although popular AI models like ChatGPT and Claude have free versions available, both have paid models that can reach over $100 per month, which output different qualities of code. Murphy also pointed to differences in prior exposure to AI literacy itself. “Students who go to high schools or K-12 education, where they’re taught AI literacy, prompt engineering, context engineering, they understand how to do this, as opposed to students who go to schools who don’t teach that,” he said. “Then they come in, and then they’re somehow expected to know how to use these tools.” For Genawi, those disparities begin long before students arrive on campus. “It’s very interesting to consider how lucky you were geographically,” she said. “To be born where you were is influencing your ability to get access to these spaces.” Students like Yu, though broadly apprehensive about the future of computer science, are not without hope. “I’m optimistic, because I think if you’re truly passionate about CS, there will definitely be a place in the field to do something you want to do,” she said. Senior Staff Writer Ria Vasishtha can be contacted at ria.vasishtha@columbiaspectator.com. Follow Spectator on X @ColumbiaSpec. Staff Writer Arjun Menon can be contacted at arjun.menon@columbiaspectator.com. Follow Spectator on X @ColumbiaSpec. Want to keep up with breaking news? Subscribe to our email newsletter and like Spectator on Facebook. Produced with Spectate by Emily Ta
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Maizie Clarke is transforming the way we see custom merchandise, one watercolor brushstroke at a time. 🎨✨ What began as a kitchen-table side hustle in 2016 has grown into a thriving wholesale business, providing custom illustrated tea towels, ceramics, and scarves to museum shops and distilleries across the country. 🏛️🧣
RESULTS: 5K Race Winners at 2026 Covenant Health Knoxville Marathon
KNOXVILLE, Tenn. (WATE) — Covenant Health Knoxville Marathon weekend is underway! The first day of races began Saturday evening with Covenant Health Kids Run the 5K race. The 5K race began Saturday…
Seniors: Carol Watson, 72
Owner of Carol Watson Greenhouse and Landscaping in LaFayette enjoys her growing business — still puts in six-, seven-day weeks By Mary Beth Roach Carol Watson, the owner of Carol Watson Greenhouse and Landscaping, has been in gardens since she could walk. Literally. She said she learned to walk in her grandfather’s garden, which was next door to her current home and business in LaFayette. Today, at 72, she is running the business that her mother, Claire, opened in 1981 as Watson Greenhouse. Watson worked part-time for her mom until 1990, when she joined her full time. While she may not have had any formal horticultural experience, she said she learned so much about growing and raising plants from her mom, who had an abundance of energy and talent. Now, after 35 years in the business full time, Watson has no plans to retire, although she joked that she’d like a couple of days off a week. On her seven-acre site, complete with four greenhouses, Watson said her favorite parts of the job are working with and educating her customers; helping some of her young customers build terrariums; conducting occasional class field trips; and supporting local art by decorating the shop with an eclectic mix of pottery from at least four area craftspeople. A one-time employee of the former Dey Bros. department store in Syracuse, Watson said she loves merchandising and enjoys displaying unique pieces of art on shelves and even suspending from ceilings. “We’re creative. We also had top quality plants. We got a reputation of quality plants and unusual products,” she said. It’s tending to her customers and her plants, showcasing the unusual products, and hosting special events to benefit the community that keep her motivated to work six to seven days a week. “I just love it. I love taking care of the plants. I’m one of the few people that really enjoys watering,” she said. And while she has cultivated a solid customer base over the years, she remains savvy in her marketing efforts to draw in new customers. For example, she does a gardening segment on CNY Central television; her active Facebook page has thousands of followers; and she hosts a number of unique events and classes that not only introduce her shop to potential new clients, but some benefit nonprofits as well. About 13 years ago, when the local symphony orchestra was struggling, she said she wanted to help. So, partnering with the group, she began offering concerts, called Soirees, featuring the Syracuse Orchestra’s string quartet. Following up on a suggestion from a customer whose brother is a deejay in retirement, specializing in sock hops, she hosted the greenhouse’s first sock hop. Plants got moved back toward the walls to make room for dancing; a caterer was brought in, offering diner-like food; guests came in period outfits; and proceeds went to the Food Bank of CNY. She is excited about doing it again in October. Via her website, she promotes the greenhouse as an “oasis in the snow,” offering visitors the opportunity to pick up some decorating and gift ideas while taking in the floral and citrus scents. And she also caters to her four-legged friends. Over this past winter, she said, she came up with a “brilliant idea,” although at the time she didn’t appreciate just how brilliant it would become. Feeling it too cold outside to take her dog for a walk, she opted to bring it into the greenhouse. And before long, she was inviting people to bring their dogs into the big greenhouse as well. She looks forward to extending that invitation again this upcoming winter season. For Watson and her customers, the greenhouse is always in season.