Trump’s new tech policy director doesn’t want you to 'trust the science'



American science has lost its credibility, and if it’s not swiftly restored, America will never be great again. That’s the bracing upshot of major new remarks recently delivered by Michael Kratsios, the White House’s new director of the Office of Science and Technology Policy.

On his second tour of duty in a Trump administration, deeply and extensively plugged in to the tech industry, Kratsios has the outsized authority and influence needed to deliver such an unflinching message, and it’s clear neither he nor the president is afraid to put it to use.

Nevertheless, Kratsios and the crisis of scientific authority he must contend with inescapably raise a deeper and more uncomfortable underlying issue: What, really, is the difference between trusting the science and trusting in science?

The goal, noted Kratsios, is the successful completion of “three interconnected tasks in pursuit of a golden age of innovation: to maintain American technological leadership; to ensure all Americans enjoy the fruit of transformative advances in science and technology; and, a mission I believe we all share, to revitalize America’s scientific enterprise.”

But for the first time in American history, these goals, which would be familiar to citizens since the dawn of the republic, require, according to Kratsios, a fundamental rejection of what the science industry and discipline have become.

“Blindly trusting in The Science, with a capital T and capital S, is inimical to free inquiry and open debate and is thus the enemy of scientific progress. The beginning of knowledge is the knowledge of ignorance. We seek to know, despite human limitations, and to move upward from mere opinion to the truth. It is convention, dogma, and intellectual fad that resist revision and correction.”

These claims are paradoxically controversial today in many corners of professional science, where many leaders and practitioners have shamelessly capitulated to performative ideological litmus tests and rituals.

But the way in which the COVID debacle radicalized many millions of Americans regardless of partisan label has made it plain that “trusting the science” is more than an ideological mistake that simply goes away if the “wrong” ideology is excised. The absurdities and injustices of the COVID regime struck a pervasive, invasive, and long-lingering blow against the very real and embodied life of vast numbers of American citizens — from tiny children to our elderly, from the healthiest to the most infirm.

So despite the controversy, Kratsios is leading on an issue where a growing majority of Americans already, regardless of ideology, increasingly find themselves.

Nevertheless, Kratsios and the crisis of scientific authority he must contend with inescapably raise a deeper and more uncomfortable underlying issue: What, really, is the difference between trusting the science and trusting in science?

Perhaps nowhere else is trying to simply walk the clock back to the relative golden age of the 1990s more conspicuous than here.

Didn’t we get into this mess of trusting “The Science” as a result of “everyone” agreeing at the turn of the century that the only inarguable source of truth was what the scientific method produced?

Doesn’t the transformation of the art of government into “political science” lead inexorably to the belief not that science must be ideologized, but that “doing science” is the only true ideology?

That the only good, consequential, meaningful, and useful thing for us to do is to “do science” to everything? To apply the scientific method to everything? For science to “eat the world”?

It’s not just a bracing set of questions, it’s a fascinating one, too — because the long-standing modern project to make everything science was rooted even more in modern philosophy than in modern practical sciences like engineering. But since the ‘90s, science driven by intellectual theory has indeed stagnated and regressed into ideological performance, while science driven by technology has gone ahead and eaten the world.

Who needs ideology when you have technology? Who needs philosophy? Tech has made itself into the thing that must be applied to everything, most conspicuously ourselves and one another; algorithms and now AI have caused human behavior within cybernetic systems to become opaque to both the scientific and the philosophic “outside observer.”

We have quickly gone from not being able to account for our technological phenomena in terms of cause and effect to not being able to account for human — or should I say cyborg? — phenomena in those terms.

Some people cheer on this development! And others don’t really care as long as it benefits them, or doesn’t seem to affect them, or simply seems the cost of doing business or the new normal one must find a way to bear.

Surely scientists should care … but can they, like the modern philosophers, actually do anything about the uncanny fact that trusting in science as mankind’s ultimate authority has led to science refuting its own claim to ultimate authority — and to technology seizing the mantle of our new ultimate authority?

What we’ve seen already is that tech occupying these grand heights is a fundamentally spiritual, not ideological, philosophical, or rational phenomenon. Therefore the only people who can assert trustworthy spiritual authority over both people and their machines are people who can do so on a religious basis!

This is very foreign territory for Americans to be in. Indeed it is terrain hard to navigate for people certain that “dogma” is axiomatically bad and that “debate” is axiomatically good. Somehow we will have to find a way to liberate science and scientists both from the constraints of ideology and the constraints of modern philosophy’s misplaced dogma that argument alone produces truth — without letting science vanish along with everything else, including our humanity itself, into a universal black box of inexplicable technology.

Viewed through a dystopian lens, this is a scary and daunting prospect. But isn’t it interesting how much our image and fear of dystopia have come to us from British writers working in the mid to late 20th century period of high modernism, high scientism, high utilitarianism, and high rationalism?

Christians have a unique opportunity at this strange time to weigh in with a powerfully anti-dystopian — yet also anti-utopian — vision of harmony between human beings and their mechanical creations. What we face on the precipice of a new American golden age is the mysterious recognition that no golden age is without its problems — problems that, if the highest focus is on the salvation of souls, we may find it easier to accept and admit of no final solution.

Coinbase employees caught taking bribes for user data — hackers demand $20 million ransom



Coinbase received an extortionary email asking for $20 million in ransom from hackers who said they had obtained private user data.

The cryptocurrency exchange platform said a May 11 message demanded the money in return for not publicly disclosing information that was obtained through Coinbase employees.

'No passwords, private keys, or funds were exposed, and Coinbase Prime accounts are untouched.'

In a press release, Coinbase said "cyber criminals bribed and recruited" "rogue overseas support agents" to steal customer data in order to facilitate social engineering attacks.

Coinbase described the intrusion as only affecting a small subset of customers (less than 1%). However, this could still account for more than 1 million app users, given 2024 estimates that the company had ballooned to 105 million users, according to Business of Apps.

"No passwords, private keys, or funds were exposed, and Coinbase Prime accounts are untouched," Coinbase noted. "We will reimburse customers who were tricked into sending funds to the attacker."

While the company did its best to reassure its customers, a plethora of private information was swept up that users will not be happy about.

RELATED: Senate rejects cryptocurrency bill pushed by Treasury Sec. Bessent

The Coinbase headquarters in San Francisco. Photo by Christie Hemm Klok for the Washington Post via Getty Images

According to Coinbase, hackers were provided with user names, addresses, phone numbers, and emails. The last four digits of Social Security numbers, masked bank account numbers, images of government ID, and more were allegedly stolen as well.

Dean Gefen, CEO of cybersecurity firm NukuDo, told Blaze News that this kind of data breach has long-term effects that most will come to realize.

'That kind of exposure isn't just a privacy issue; it opens the door to phishing, identity theft, and long-term financial vulnerability. Most users won't feel it today, but if that data gets sold or abused, the impact will remain for years."

Gefen explained that the reason crypto account holders are so at risk is because they sit at the intersection of finance and emerging tech. These two sectors often move ahead at light speed and end up leaving security in the rearview mirror, hoping to catch up.

"Any company storing sensitive financial data needs to take this as sign to be on notice. Without the right people, training, and systems in place, this kind of breach is inevitable," Gefen said.

RELATED: Florida teens allegedly kidnap Vegas man at gunpoint, ditch him in Arizona desert, steal $4 million in cryptocurrency heist

— (@)

When asked if this was just the cost of doing business at this scale, Gefen replied, "[Only] if we accept failure as normal."

"We wouldn’t tolerate this kind of breach in a nuclear facility or defense system, so why would we accept it in our financial infrastructure?"

The cybersecurity expert added that bad actors from China, North Korea, and Russia are among the biggest threats who look at crypto platforms as attractive, decentralized targets.

Coinbase said that is working with "industry partners" and law enforcement to connect the dots, but instead of paying the ransom, it planned to establish a $20 million reward fund for information leading to the arrest and conviction of the attackers.

The crooked insiders were allegedly "fired on the spot" and referred to "U.S. and international law enforcement."

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‘From the frying pan into the fire’: Geo-engineering climate fix turns catastrophic



Like transhumanism, artificial intelligence, and nanotechnology, geo-engineering is another one of man’s dangerous attempts to play God.

By manipulating Earth’s climate via scattering particles to block sunlight or sucking carbon from the air, it gambles with nature’s delicate balance, inviting consequences we can’t possibly predict.

Lead researcher and founder of GeoengineeringWatch.org Dane Wigington, however, has dedicated his life to exposing and halting covert climate engineering operations. On a recent episode of “Back to the People,” he told Nicole Shanahan the wild story of how he became one of the world's most vocal critics of geo-engineering — an insidious threat most know nothing about.

Many years ago, Wigington built an off-grid home powered by solar, wind, and hydro energy in a remote area near Lake Shasta in Northern California. Everything was going great; his home was even featured in a major renewable energy magazine, celebrating his expertise in sustainable living.

But one day, something changed: His solar panels began losing a huge amount of power. Given his professional background in solar energy, Wigington knew that the culprit couldn’t possibly be natural.

After extensive research, he found the answer in his rainwater: It had aluminum in it — toxic levels that rose dramatically over an 18-month period.

Aluminum, Wigington explained, “is abundant in the Earth's strata; it does not exist in free form naturally — period. If it's in free form, it's been mined and refined and dispersed.”

In other words, climate engineering programs, specifically in the field of solar radiation management, were likely spraying aluminum nanoparticles into the atmosphere to reflect sunlight and cool the planet, which is deeply problematic considering “aluminum is toxic to all life forms.”

The rainwater is “killing virtually all soil microbiome. ... Our forests are completely imploding, not just in Northern California — the entire North American West Coast and most places around the world, and they blame that on beetles or a pest,” says Wigington, but “that's a symptom of a sick, dead, dying tree and ecosystem.”

“We have too many agencies trying to protect their paychecks and pensions and not willing to tell the truth.”

And that truth is: Geo-engineering, which is marketed as a means of mitigating climate change, is actually causing it.

“It’s speeding up drying,” even though “the goal is to block out the sun to keep the land from heating,” echoes Nicole.

“That's exactly what's happening,” says Wigington. “Climate engineering under the stated goal of mitigating the thermal energy buildup of the planet is actually exacerbating it, making a bad situation worse — pushing us from the frying pan into the fire.”

To hear more of the conversation, including details about Wigington’s documentary “The Dimming” that exposes the dark underbelly of the geo-engineering world, watch the episode above.

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A guide for helping your Boomer parents not get hacked



A person of sufficient years learns that the world is full of people trying to sell you something you don’t need, charge you twice for it, and have you thank them for the privilege. The only thing that’s changed since the days of snake-oil salesmen is the venue — now they pitch from glowing screens instead of horse-drawn carts. The modern con man doesn’t wear a bowler hat and side whiskers; he sends emails, texts, and pop-up warnings, all designed to pick your pocket while you’re busy trying to read the news or order a book. While this advice applies to all ages, unfortunately seniors are often targeted by these hackers.

Since I’ve always found it easier to avoid a trap when I know how it works, here’s a bit of practical wisdom for keeping your hard-earned money and peace of mind out of the hands of hackers. Think of it as street smarts for the information superhighway.

1. The phishing expedition: Don’t take the bait

Phishing — it sounds almost friendly, like something you’d do on a lazy Saturday with a can of worms and a thermos of coffee. But in this context, you’re the fish, and the bait is an email or text designed to look legitimate. It might claim to be from your bank, the Social Security Administration, or even a grandchild in distress.

The tip-off is urgency: "Act now or lose access to your account!" or "Grandma, I’m stuck in Mexico and need bail money!" Hackers count on panic overriding common sense.

What to do? Trust, but verify — or better yet, just verify. If your bank supposedly emails you about a problem, don’t click the link. Call the bank using the number on your bank statement, not the one in the email. If little Johnny is allegedly locked up abroad, call his mother. Chances are, he’s safe at home, ignoring her texts like teenagers do.

2. Passwords: The digital equivalent of door locks

Your password should be like the secret word to get into an old speakeasy — strong, complex, and known only to those who belong. Yet too many people use passwords like "123456" or "password," which are about as secure as a cardboard safe.

The best passwords are long, random, and unique for every account. I hear you groaning — “How can I remember dozens of different passwords?" Easy. You don’t. Use a password manager, which keeps them locked up tighter than Fort Knox. If that feels too technical, at least write them down — on paper, not in a file called "Passwords.doc" on your desktop.

And for heaven’s sake, don’t use your pet’s name, your birthday, or anything else someone could glean from your Facebook profile. Hackers love it when you advertise your password with a "Happy birthday to Fluffy, 10 years young today!" post.

3. Pop-ups and fake alerts: The digital shell game

You’re reading the news here on Blaze News, which means you don’t get harassed by pop-ups. But when you visit other websites, you might see a window pop up: "Your computer is infected! Call this number immediately!" It’s the digital equivalent of the three-card monte on a street corner. If you engage, the hacker either sells you useless software or, worse, takes remote control of your computer.

Rule number one: Close the pop-up. If it won’t close, restart your computer. Legitimate companies don’t alert you to viruses through pop-ups; your antivirus software handles that quietly in the background.

And if anyone claiming to be "tech support" calls you out of the blue, hang up. Microsoft, Apple, and other reputable companies don’t operate like cold-calling telemarketers.

4. Social media is the playground for con men

Facebook, Instagram, and other social media sites are wonderful for keeping up with the grandkids, but they’re also fertile ground for scammers. That "friend request" from someone you’re already friends with? Likely a hacker trying to impersonate them. The quiz asking for your first pet’s name and childhood street? It’s fishing for answers to common security questions.

Be stingy with personal information. Review your privacy settings and lock down your profile so that only friends can see your posts. If you get a second friend request from an existing friend, call your friend — his account might be compromised.

5. The too-good-to-be-true deal

You’ve won an iPad! You’re entitled to a refund from the IRS! A Nigerian prince wants to share his fortune! The classics never die — they just get digital makeovers every few years.

If an offer seems too good to be true, it is. No legitimate organization will ask for payment in gift cards or cryptocurrency. When in doubt, search for the exact wording of the message online — chances are, someone’s already flagged it as a scam.

6. Update or obsolete: Keep your software current

Think of software updates like annual checkups at the doctor's — they patch up vulnerabilities before hackers can exploit them. Ignore those update notifications at your peril. Yes, they’re annoying, but so is having your bank account drained.

Turn on automatic updates for your operating system, antivirus software, and web browser. This simple step closes many of the doors hackers love to sneak through.

7. Two-factor authentication: A second lock on the door

Two-factor authentication is like a bolt on the door. Even if someone steals your password, he can’t get in without the second factor — usually a code sent to your phone or generated by an app.

Enable 2FA wherever possible — especially for email, banking, and social media accounts. It’s a minor inconvenience for you but a major headache for hackers.

8. The phone scam: Old tricks, new medium

The telephone — that venerable instrument of human connection — has become a favorite tool for fraud. "This is the IRS. Pay immediately or face arrest!" or "Your grandson is in jail and needs bail money!"

The IRS doesn’t call people demanding money — it sends letters. And if your family members are really in trouble, they’ll call directly, not through a third party. When in doubt, hang up and call back using a number you trust.

9. Email attachments are the Trojan horse of the digital age

Opening an unknown email attachment is like inviting a stranger into your house and handing him your wallet. Even if an email appears to come from someone you know, exercise caution — hackers often spoof addresses.

If you’re not expecting an attachment, don’t open it. Call the sender to confirm he really sent it. Better safe than hacked.

10. Trust your gut

Finally, keep in mind the golden rule of self-preservation: if something feels off, it likely is. Hackers exploit confusion, fear, and urgency to cloud your judgment. Take a breath, step back, and verify.

In the end, avoiding hackers is like navigating any other part of life: Pay attention, keep your wits about you, and don’t trust a stranger who promises you the moon. The world’s always had its fair share of sharp operators — the only difference now is they come through the internet instead of down the street.

Federal Reserve revokes guidance requiring banks to gain preapproval on cryptocurrency activity



The Federal Reserve has rescinded its guidance for banks related to handling cryptocurrencies and digital assets.

In a recent press release, the Federal Reserve Board said it was removing guidance that forced banks to seek special permission before dealing with digital assets.

According to the release, a 2022 supervisory letter established an expectation that banks would provide advance notification of planned cryptocurrency activities, while updating the Reserve of ongoing ventures.

The justification for the requirements included market instability, money-laundering concerns, and consumer protection.

"Certain types of crypto-assets, such as stablecoins, if adopted at large scale, could also pose risks to financial stability," the expunged letter read.

However, the board now says it will no longer expect banks to provide notification and will instead "monitor banks' crypto-asset activities through the normal supervisory process," the press release explained.

The 2023 letter, since withdrawn, required banks to demonstrate, "to the satisfaction of Federal Reserve supervisors," that the bank had controls in place in order to conduct safe transactions surrounding cryptocurrencies. This was called a "supervisory nonobjection" where banks did not get to engage in an activity and then have it scrutinized, but rather they needed to submit their "proposed activities" to the Federal Reserve in order to move forward.

This was not a form of an approval process either, though, but rather a "nonobjection."

Taking off more reins

The Federal Reserve board also said it would be working with the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency to determine if additional guidance to support innovation with crypto-asset activities is needed.

According to Crowdfund Insider, the OCC announced in March that it would be making its own changes to its Comptroller's Handbook booklets and guidance. On change from the federal agency, which works within the Treasury Department, was that it would no longer examine institutions for "reputation risk."

"The OCC’s examination process has always been rooted in ensuring appropriate risk management processes for bank activities, not casting judgment on how a particular activity may fare with public opinion," said Acting Comptroller of the Currency Rodney E. Hood.

"The OCC has never used reputation risk as a catch-all justification for supervisory action. Focusing future examination activities on more transparent risk areas improves public confidence in the OCC's supervisory process and makes clear that the OCC has not and does not make business decisions for banks."

President Trump recently signed an executive order aimed at establishing a strategic Bitcoin reserve, which at the same time forbids the acquisition of other digital assets except through forfeiture proceedings.

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Heat death of the discourse?



There’s an undeniable feeling of the air coming out of the balloon of discourse on x.com. Some of this is natural enough. We can’t be at a fever pitch all the time, and now that the most important election of all time is over, we’ve all earned at least a breather.

But there’s a deeper, more sweeping effect at work.

The Perfume Nationalist just laid it out as well as anyone in a long and bracing X thread. “It may have taken seven years but I've reached this point,” he begins. “The plot lines are so utterly repellent because it ended, we won. The things you all fight about are completely made up. We won and you can just let Trump do everything.”

Trump’s win shifted the center of political gravity away from the ideological intelligentsia toward not just 'tech' but to the agentic, whether human or machine.

“I don't need to know which malignant groupchat dirtbag leftist who was based-curious in 2021 has written a substack renouncing their dalliance with the right,” he goes on, subtweeting a raft of right-wing-disenchanted online personalities whose grievances and disappointments were recently aired out by a lefty New York Times columnist. “You should've known they were bad at the time. You didn't trust the plan. We won. The side of good won. There was a happy ending. The big Snow White book closed on the page that said THE END. You're free now you can go read a book. There's nothing here since it ended.”

The rant expands from there. “Everyone is supposed to be happy at THE END like Beauty and the Beast where the household appliances are changed back into people. But here you chose to stay household appliances."

"Everyone anonymous has an incredible real job as a lawyer or a censor at the libtard factory. You don't even have to shill your wares here.”

What is going on is that “the right” or the “anti-woke” rebel alliance became so intellectually top-heavy during the bad old Biden years that many of its leading and most popular figures defined the identity of the movement as an intellectual one, a talking one, one that not only won by talking but could only talk, not do — at best, have ideas and then talk about them.

So it became extremely important to have the right ideas, the very best and most correct ideas. But at the same time, paradoxically, it became essential to the movement and its leading online figures that their incredibly superior ideas also be strangely ineffective or unpopular — in a constant state of existential threat and crisis, demanding perpetual belligerent defense and pedantic exposition.

Trump’s win shifted the center of political gravity away from the ideological intelligentsia toward not just “tech” but to the agentic, whether human or machine. What is especially interesting is that this shift not only imperils the identity and the lifestyle of the perpetually arrogant and embattled “wrongthinker” who is ackshually right about everything; so too does it undermine the basic value proposition of X as the so-called “global public square” — transparently an onboarding scheme to achieve a new cyborg sort of “collective consciousness.”

There is a lot of talk in certain online circles about the antichrist-like vibe of this swarm consciousness and the identity that arises from it, but the naive or practical version of the notion must also be acknowledged, namely that our human consciousness is always already relational — and so far, at least, the printing press and the television have done a lot more than digital technology to encourage and accelerate violent, destructive substitutes for the shared spiritual consciousness of Christian communion.

And whereas print and television unleashed an overwhelming world war on words, Trump’s win amid today’s digital conditions augurs the paradoxical corrective that, if we’re headed into a golden age, perhaps it’s because we’re rediscovering how silence is golden.

That leaves the question of what will become of X, the internet, or AI itself if the blather and discord subside and the bots become heirs to a desertified digital commons … and who will actually care!

Everything’s bigger in Texas — especially Nvidia’s new $500 billion AI factories



Nvidia, the AI chip manufacturing giant, recently announced plans to build new AI factories in Dallas and Houston. These plans represent a significant advancement in the production of AI supercomputers entirely within the United States.

In its announcement, Nvidia revealed plans to partner with Wistron in Dallas and Foxconn in Houston. Other partners include TSMC, Amkor, and SPIL. Wistron is a Taiwanese information and communications technology company headquartered in Taipei, while Foxconn is the world’s largest electronics manufacturer, focusing on research and development.

This announcement marks Nvidia's latest step in its long-term plan to produce half a trillion dollars' worth of AI infrastructure in the coming years. The move underscores a growing push to relocate critical high-tech manufacturing back to U.S. soil, amid rising global tensions and increasing demand for secure, domestic supply chains.

Nvidia’s AI supercomputers, billed as “the engines of a new type of data center,” are anticipated to serve as the hub of AI manufacturing, all based in the United States. While the TSMC factory in Arizona is already producing the Blackwell chip, these new factories are the first of the “tens of gigawatt AI factories” expected to be built in the near future.

Nvidia's founder and CEO, Jensen Huang, said, “The engines of the world’s AI infrastructure are being built in the United States for the first time.” He continued, “Adding American manufacturing helps us better meet the incredible and growing demand for AI chips and supercomputers, strengthens our supply chain, and boosts our resiliency.”

As Huang explained in his keynote address at the GTC 2025 conference last month, the next step in AI manufacturing is scale and efficiency. One solution to the massive logistical challenges that accompany this type of manufacturing in these “AI gigafactories” is the “digital twin” model: “We use the digital twin to communicate instructions to the large body of teams and suppliers, reducing execution errors … ensuring a future-proof AI.” Essentially, the digital twin is a computer copy of the factory and its millions of parts, allowing for clear communication across the supply chain and for readily available “what if” scaling experiments.

Huang also announced that the next generation of chips will play an increasingly important role in the rollout and scaling of these new U.S.-based gigafactories and AI supercomputers. This chip is called the Vera Rubin super chip, named after the astronomer who discovered dark matter. As he demonstrated in his address, this chip is dramatically more efficient and inexpensive to produce. It also represents a leap in sustainability, consuming far less energy than its predecessors — critical for powering the next wave of generative and reasoning AI and machine learning applications across industries.

In a statement, the White House claimed credit for this onshoring trend in manufacturing: “It’s the Trump effect in action." The statement said, "Onshoring these industries is good for the American worker, good for the American economy, and good for American national security — and the best is yet to come.” The administration emphasized that such investments are laying the groundwork for a new industrial revolution, centered on American technological dominance.

Chinese factories are using TikTok  to work around retailers and tariffs — big brands say the videos are fake, sort of



Chinese factories are promoting themselves through TIkTok videos and asking American consumers to buy directly from them at a lower cost than retailers.

With President Trump recently raising tariffs on China to 245%, videos have gone viral in recent days of Chinese factories offering products in bulk and/or direct to the consumer from factories that say they supply U.S. retailers.

For example, factories claiming to supply Lululemon and Louis Vuitton have offered products at minimal costs.

As reported by the Independent, one video that garnered 10 million views said it was selling yoga pants from Lululemon for $5 instead of $100, the apparent listed price in the U.S.

Another video reportedly showed a man in a factory who claimed his Louis Vuitton bags can be sold directly to consumers across the world for $50.

Both companies reportedly told the outlet that their products are not finished in China, which raised the question of what "finished" means. Of course, many of these products and factories could be producing counterfeit products, but they also could legitimately be product suppliers that are meant to maximize profits for international retailers.

For Italian products to be labeled "100% Made in Italy" (according the official certification website), a product must be made with "exclusive designs" from Italy, built entirely in Italy, made with Italian semi-finished products, and a have a traceability process.

However, at least some of Louis Vuitton's products do not contain an official seal and simply say "made in Italy."

A Louis Vuitton handbag's tag that says 'made in Italy'

The Independent noted that it found at least one video that falsely claimed to be a Lululemon supplier. However, a Lululemon spokesperson told the outlet that just 3% or thereabouts of the company's finished goods are manufactured in mainland China.

The specific nature of the remark is indeed for a reason, as the provided list of manufacturing partners on the Lululemon website revealed that manufacturers from "China Mainland" were categorized separately from "Taiwan."

Other locations like Korea, Cambodia, Vietnam, and Sri Lanka appeared many times on the list of partners.

Other widely circulated video included $100 alleged Gucci products sold for just $1.49, while another factory boasted laundry pods being sold at a rate of 20 units for $1.

One auto-parts factory promoted a woman in a grime-covered location around dozens of engines who sang, "Many auto parts in my factory, if you need auto parts you can find me."

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Upgrade to a dumbphone



I will spare you the argument against smartphones and go directly to the part where you redesign your life and your engagement with tech by switching to a dumbphone.

You’re going to come to a place and time when, as with the redeemed crackhead, the Spirit compels you to turn from your addiction and drop the pipe and the rock for good because all the myriad justifications have worn thin and have shown themselves to be empty.

There are innumerable manuals, studies, and paths related to dropping addiction. Or, if you prefer a gentler euphemism, building new habits.

Or you won’t — and, in the best-case scenario, your life will be characterized by an internal war you wage against your better self as directed by a set of parasitic algorithms.

So here's a list of suggestions about how to get into the dumbphone.

Find an alternative (for now)

If you want to go full cabin-in-the-woods, there are ways and means. Good luck out there, and meet me at the tree line. However, if you decide that staying in phone (voice and text) contact with the world of men is necessary or wise, then you’re likely looking at what we lovingly refer to as the dumbphone. We are stepping back into 2004.

We all know the Nokia stands out. (No one is sponsoring this article.) They are cheap and rugged, and the plans are flexible. Get one.

Backstop expectations

Employers, loved ones, and almost everyone else expect you to have a phone and everything that comes with it. Cut them off at the proverbial pass by building in some alternatives to those few features of the phone that are (sort of) useful.

Get a small flashlight. Buy a dumbphone with a half-decent camera.

Pick up an atlas or "Thomas Guide." If that’s not enough, perhaps it is worthwhile to retain or install some equivalent navigational aid or app in your vehicle.

Advice: Once the dopamine circuits in your brain have been stabilized, you can go back and refine your replacements. Escape need not be perfect. You’re going to find yourself on the outside; the world is now weird. Just keep refining your alternative methods.

Pick a time

As you design your way out of the smartphone trap, what’s frustrating is that almost no one is going to sympathize or know how to help. You’re on your own.

It’s quite a world where you need to justify your choice not to participate in something so strongly correlated with depression, dissatisfaction, isolation, and lifestyle choices generally at odds with those proven over huge stretches of time. (You don’t need the studies if you lived through 2008 ... or 2016 ... or 2020 ... or ...)

Pick a long weekend or vacation to make the initial change. This at least gives you some leeway to flop around and bemoan flagging levels of dopamine and do the interior work of shoring yourself up to carry through the operation.

Call in some favors

As with the above, it’s wise to tell your loved ones — especially your spouse — that your communications situation is changing. There are mixed reports regarding the value of “accountability partners” (individuals to whom you report your progress in some difficult personal change), but again, if you’re going all in, why not throw everything you’ve got at it? No doubt, husband and wife picking up the dumbphone together is only sensible.

Lay in provisions

It is always best to keep that "Thomas Guide," those comforting snacks, and the other considerations mentioned above close to hand and mind, but there are other problems to address, too. For example, there are decisions to be made about whether to keep sundry smartphone apps and resources and, if so, which ones.

The big question for many potential dumbphone users will be about social media use. As it stands, the vast majority of users are stuck to their phones for their X or Instagram fix. Both of these and probably many similar platforms are available in a desktop version. Getting used to the differences in the interfaces (assuming you’re keeping some tether to them at all) is a worthwhile preparatory step.

The situation extends, of course, to crypto wallets and apps and any other phone-based software you care to hold on to — it may be easier to let go of the smartphone if much of its supposed utility can simply be stored on a laptop or a desktop.

Power through

There are innumerable manuals, studies, and paths related to dropping addiction. Or, if you prefer a gentler euphemism, building new habits. The issue, of course, is that the modern mind, when pressed, excels at justification.

The truth of our predicament is likely that the smartphone is a symptom of a much deeper, more subtle malaise. Will reverting to a dumbphone make it feel worse? In the short term, it’s quite common in situations like these for our lives to feel even emptier without whatever was sustaining the illusion of having a genuine experience of being.

For many of us, we’ve already run the gamut of self-improvement and hacks. Dropping the phone is a choice near the tail end of that progression. It’s easy to play the aforementioned game of justification with respect to order of tasks. But it may also be necessary to address other issues before taking up the path of the dumbphone ...

Wi-Fi is winning — so why is Congress still stuck in the 1990s?



Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick is right: Expanding access to spectrum will benefit consumers, businesses, and the broader economy. The most effective way to do this — while promoting innovation and competition — is to embrace shared spectrum and Wi-Fi, two proven models for commercial use.

For decades, the United States has focused on one approach: high-power licenses held almost exclusively by the three nationwide carriers that can afford to outbid competitors. But treating spectrum solely as a revenue source overlooks its broader role in driving innovation, economic growth, and national security.

We can continue leading the world in wireless innovation while pushing back against China’s centralized, export-driven digital strategy.

That’s why efforts to advance spectrum policy through the congressional budget reconciliation process come with serious risks.

Reconciliation is a legislative tool designed for budgetary matters — not for shaping complex, long-term policy. Yet some lawmakers are considering using it to push through spectrum policy, favoring high-power auctions simply because they bring in the most revenue.

That’s a mistake.

Spectrum policy should be developed through careful, strategic planning aimed at serving the public interest — not driven by short-term budget targets. Locking the Federal Communications Commission into a one-size-fits-all approach for the next decade would limit innovation and competition.

Mandating high-power auctions through reconciliation would sideline alternative models, such as spectrum sharing, which allow multiple users to access the same frequencies. It would also jeopardize the continued expansion of Wi-Fi, the primary way most Americans connect to the internet today.

Congress should resist the urge to treat spectrum like just another line item. The stakes — for innovation, economic growth, and consumer access — are far too high.

The success of the Citizens Broadband Radio Service shows what’s possible when spectrum policy embraces flexibility and innovation. In the CBRS band, commercial users share spectrum with incumbent naval operations through a dynamic access framework. This approach has allowed a wide range of users — including small businesses, schools, airports, wireless providers, and rural communities — to benefit from spectrum access without displacing government users.

The CBRS has also positioned the United States as the global leader in private wireless networks. Its flexible licensing model proves that spectrum sharing can drive commercial innovation while preserving national security.

Now, policymakers are studying the lower 3 GHz band — located just below the CBRS — for similar shared use. This opens the door to future spectrum policy that goes beyond the traditional model of exclusive, high-power auctions.

The CBRS makes one thing clear: National security and commercial innovation don’t have to compete. With smart policy, we can advance both.

Wi-Fi offers a great example of how shared-spectrum policies drive innovation. More than 62% of U.S. internet traffic flows over Wi-Fi, which relies on unlicensed spectrum accessible to any device that meets basic interference protections. That far surpasses the 8% carried by mobile networks.

The economic value is staggering. Wi-Fi contributes more than $1 trillion to the U.S. economy every year. It fuels innovation, expands broadband access, and strengthens U.S. leadership in wireless technology. It’s also a distinctly American success story — built on U.S. intellectual property and made possible by the openness of our economic and regulatory systems.

China, by contrast, takes a rigid, top-down approach. Its spectrum policy relies on exclusive licensing aimed at controlling global 5G infrastructure and driving demand for Chinese-made hardware.

The United States pioneered spectrum auctions in the 1990s, but that was 30 years ago. Technology has evolved, and our policies should evolve with it.

With today’s advanced spectrum-sharing tools, we no longer have to choose between efficiency and openness. We can continue leading the world in wireless innovation while pushing back against China’s centralized, export-driven digital strategy.

Simply put, spectrum sharing broadens access and boosts competition. Instead of limiting access to a handful of major players, it opens the door for hundreds of companies to participate. That lowers the cost of entry and helps expand broadband in rural and underserved communities.

Shared-spectrum models also reduce the need for costly and time-consuming relocations tied to exclusive auctions. At the same time, they protect critical national security operations by minimizing interference.

The spectrum decisions Congress makes today will shape America’s digital future for decades. By prioritizing coexistence through shared spectrum and Wi-Fi, lawmakers can adopt a more competitive, resilient approach — one that maximizes public benefit while preserving national security and U.S. leadership in wireless innovation.