Trump fired Anthropic for being 'leftwing nut jobs,' but the company's AI is conquering the internet



An artificial intelligence company has one philosopher in charge of teaching its chatbot right and wrong, and now her views are everywhere.

That person is Scottish immigrant Amanda Askell, who holds degrees from Oxford and NYU. Askell is in charge of the moral leanings of Claude, the state-of-the-art chatbot from Anthropic — the leading AI company Trump banned from government work for "radical left, woke" politics.

Despite the White House crackdown, however, Anthropic's products are dominating the tech sector and transforming the economic landscape, and Askell's indoctrination of Claude is spreading through the internet as its powerful applications become an emerging industry standard.

'Respecting others' values can also be harmful. Navigating this is hard.'

Askell, formerly MacAskill from a previous marriage (since divorced), is the woman who teaches chatbot Claude how to be "a good person."

According to the Wall Street Journal, Askell is instructing the AI on how to read subtle cues and to avoid being a bully or "doormat," and she compares her work to that of a parent raising a child.

To that end, X owner Elon Musk — who is indeed a competitor with his own xAI — criticized Askell as the company's choice.

"Those without children lack a stake in the future," Musk wrote in February.

Askell replied, "I think it depends on how much you care about people in general vs. your own kin. I do intend to have kids, but I still feel like I have a strong personal stake in the future because I care a lot about people thriving, even if they're not related to me."

Musk shut her down, though, stating that Askell cannot understand his point until she has a child, "anymore than someone who has never experienced true love can understand love."

Askell is not shy about bringing her philosophical or political leanings into the public spotlight for open discourse, and although she displays obvious liberal leanings, it would be hard to label her as unwilling to engage in debate.

She has often discussed ethics and morals of AI bots throughout her time with OpenAI and Anthropic, publicly posing questions about navigating cultural viewpoints for a worldwide product.

"It's easy to say you want technology to respect local values when those values are unobjectionable," she wrote in 2021. "It's harder when they include things like persecuting gay people. Imposing your values can be harmful. Respecting others' values can also be harmful. Navigating this is hard."

RELATED: Chatbots don’t run on magic. They run on your money.

Also in 2021, Askell praised the vaccination rate in San Francisco. Four years later, she seemed to call out some of the vaccine side effects:

"Getting a covid vaccine is like a surreal religious experience of chills and pain and fever dreams where you feel like you've lived a decade in a single night and gazed into something absurd and otherworldly. As a bonus, it also makes you less susceptible to covid," she claimed.

She even referred to her dosage, albeit jokingly, as the "mind-bending RNA vaccine."

Askell has also engaged in discussions surrounding reparations and said she supported governments paying off the debt for those of certain ethnicities.

"It seems more sensible for governments to underwrite some amount of debt from historically disadvantaged groups like black people in the US," she claimed. "That way you try to prevent social harms from perpetuating without legislating the burden onto a specific industry."

RELATED: The next fight over freedom will run through AI models

Askell has also frequently discussed immigration, and in addition to saying how difficult the process has been for her in the United States, she has noted an increased intolerance for illegal immigration from both sides of the political aisle.

"Legal and illegal immigration seem to basically be entirely different policy domains and I'm not sure why they get lumped together," she wrote on X in late 2024. "Americans dislike illegal immigration but are surprisingly supportive of legal immigration."

Askell's views are now being disseminated throughout the world through OpenClaw (formerly known as Clawdbot), an open-source AI bot that users are downloading for their own use to do their own bidding. This can happen locally on one's computer, be unleashed online, or both.

It is, to borrow a '90s analogy, the first burned CD of the AI chatbot world, based on Anthropic's Claude; and now it is everywhere, perpetuating Askell's views.

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Former House Speaker John Boehner gets choked up during remarks at event honoring Speaker Nancy Pelosi



Former GOP House Speaker John Boehner became emotional while delivering remarks honoring Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) at a portrait unveiling ceremony on Wednesday.

Boehner, who served as speaker from early 2011 through late October 2015, became choked up when saying, in an apparent reference to his daughters, that his "girls" told him to tell Pelosi how much they admire her.

Boehner said that no other modern speaker has lead with the "authority" or "consistent results" as Pelosi, and he described the lawmaker as "one tough cookie."

Pelosi later said of Boehner that she would have been a bit "disappointed if he did not get emotional."

LIVE: Nancy Pelosi portrait unveiled at the Capitol www.youtube.com

Pelosi is the first and only woman ever to serve as speaker of the House. While she was recently elected to another term in office, she has opted not to seek the leadership role again. She has served as a lawmaker in the U.S. House of Representatives for more than three decades.

"John Boehner crying as he paid tribute to Nancy Pelosi is the perfect symbol of uniparty pathology," Monica Crowley tweeted.

"Boehner crying in tribute to Pelosi while talking about how his daughters are Democrats is a pretty good summation of Republican leadership over the past couple of decades," Ben Shapiro tweeted.

\u201cBoehner crying in tribute to Pelosi while talking about how his daughters are Democrats is a pretty good summation of Republican leadership over the past couple of decades https://t.co/qccwcscgVU\u201d
— Ben Shapiro (@Ben Shapiro) 1671109988

"While you’re sniveling at Pelosi’s portrait reveal, conservatives are weeping for America — precisely because our country’s greatness and potential have been squandered by The Uniparty..." Tim Meads wrote.

Guy Benson tweeted, "In fairness, Boehner cries about everything."

\u201cin fairness, Boehner cries about everything\u201d
— Guy Benson (@Guy Benson) 1671128187

'You will remember where you were when you watched that': Crowder reacts to EMOTIONAL Rittenhouse testimony



There are moments in life that deserve our pause, to be human, and to have empathy because to abandon the one thread that holds people together — being human — threatens to sever the fragile thread that binds us.

In this clip, Steven Crowder reacted to a moment that worthy of pause. "You will remember where you were when you watched that," Crowder said. Crowder's comments came seconds after witnessing a "pivotal moment" in the Kyle Rittenhouse trial.

"Unless you are a sociopath, your heart goes out to that kid," Crowder said.

What happened?

Wednesday, Kyle Rittenhouse — the defendant on trial for a fatal shooting in Kenosha amid a Black Lives Matter riot — took the stand and gave testimony during which he broke down in tears. Kenosha County Circuit Judge Bruce Schroeder called for a recess to allow Rittenhouse to regain composure.

Watch the clip for Crowder's reaction to the heartbreaking moment when Rittenhouse, a kid, became overcome with emotion on the stand. Can't watch? Download the podcast here.


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