Trump warns "very bad" Google may be "shut down"

Griffin Eckstein
Sat, August 3, 2024 

Donald Trump unleashed a tirade against Google during a Friday interview with Fox Business host Maria Bartiromo, accusing the platform of refusing to apologize for blocking some results related to his attempted assassination.

In the segment, in which Trump attempted to outline the dangers of AI before Bartiromo redirected him to the subject of big tech companies, Trump went after the search engine.

Noting that Facebook representatives called him to apologize for flagging some posts featuring photos of his assassination attempt with fact checks, Trump said, “Google, nobody called from Google,” before unloading on the tech company.

In the rant, slammed by the Harris campaign as “unintelligible,” Trump seemingly, though not clearly, accused the search engine of biased search result ranking, a complaint he espoused nearly six years ago.

Trump’s less-than-succinct description, possibly referring to Google’s practice of algorithmic search result ranking, which conservatives have blasted as unfair in recent days, was followed with a harsh warning message to the tech giant.

“​​Google has been very bad. They’ve been very irresponsible. And I have a feeling that Google’s going to be close to shut down, because I don’t think Congress is going to take it,” the former president told Bartiromo. “I really don’t think so. Google has to be careful.”

Toward the end of the Fox segment, he also mulled stripping Google of its Section 230 protections and praised Elon Musk and X,  as Musk throws cash behind a PAC supporting his re-election bid.

Trump’s tenuous relationship with Silicon Valley has improved in many ways since his first term, strengthening ties with tech billionaire Peter Thiel, who groomed Trump’s VP pick JD Vance for office, and seeing bans on his accounts imposed after January 6th lifted. But Google continues to face attacks from the far-right, including accusations of suppressing Trump.

Time may not be real, but an illusion created by quantum physics, study suggests

Story by Riya Teotia • 

Time may not be real, but an illusion created by quantum physics, study suggests© Provided by WION

One of the most fundamental elements of the universe, time may not be real but an illusion created by quantum physics, suggests a new study.

The groundbreaking study shows time emerging from quantum entanglement- a weird connection between two very distinct particles.

Time has always been a tricky subject to define in Physics due to its inconsistent behaviour between the best universe theories available. Time has always led to a dead-end, preventing researchers from explaining all of the physics in the universe, what is called a “theory of everything.”

But the new study, published on May 10 in the journal Physical Review A, brings hope in solving this deadlock.

"There exists a way to introduce time which is consistent with both classical laws and quantum laws and is a manifestation of entanglement," first author Alessandro Coppo, a physicist at the National Research Council of Italy, told Live Science.
The problem of time

There are two theories on time- one in quantum mechanics and one illustrated by Einstein’s theory of general relativity.

In quantum mechanics, time is a fixed phenomenon with a unidirectional flow from the past to the present. It remains external from the ever-changing quantum systems it measures and can be seen only by observing changes to outside entities, such as the hands of a clock

But to Einstein's theory of general relativity- time is interwoven with space and can be warped and dilated at high speeds or in the presence of gravity.

Also Read | Arrakis-style spacesuits can convert urine into water within 5 minutes

This leaves our two best theories of reality at a fundamental impasse. Without its resolution, a coherent theory of everything remains out of reach.

"It seems there is a serious inconsistency in quantum theory," Coppo said. "This is what we call the problem of time."
Probable solution

To resolve this problem, the researchers turned to a theory called the Page and Wootters mechanism. First proposed in 1983, the theory suggests that time emerges for one object through its quantum entanglement with another acting as a clock. For an unentangled system, on the other hand, time does not exist, and the system perceives the universe as frozen and unchanging.

By applying this theory to two entangled but noninteracting theoretical quantum states — one a vibrating harmonic oscillator and the other a set of tiny magnets acting as a clock — the physicists found that their system could be perfectly described by the Schrödinger equation.

Also Read | A 'hot doghouse' problem is plaguing Boeing Starliner and NASA is working to fix it

They repeated their calculations twice, assuming first that the magnet clock and then the harmonic oscillator were macroscopic (larger) objects. Their equations simplified, suggesting that time's flow is a consequence of entanglement even for objects on large scales.

"We strongly believe that the correct and logical direction is to start from quantum physics and understand how to reach classical physics, not the other way around," Coppo said.

(With inputs from agencies)

A mysterious 4,000-year-old slab may be a treasure map that could point the way to long-lost Bronze Age riches

Story by Marianne Guenot •

A mysterious millennia-old slab sat undisturbed in storage for more than a century.
Scientists found it was a gigantic map, likely used by a Bronze Age prince to rule the area.

Mysterious engravings on an ancient stone slab, long relegated to the storage area of an ancient castle, might reveal the locations of long-lost Bronze Age treasure.

A new analysis of the slab, which had been forgotten since it was first discovered in the early 1900s, suggests it could mark the location of forgotten Bronze Age sites dating back to between 2,150 and 1,600 BC.

"Using the map to try to find archaeological sites is a great approach. We never work like that," said Yvan Pailler, a professor at the University of Western Brittany, told Agence France Presse (AFP), Science Alert reported. "It's a treasure map," he said.
Secrets from the Bronze Age

Paul du Châtellier, an archaeologist of the late 1800s, was clearly struck by the profound significance of the gigantic block, known as the Saint-Bélec slab, when he first uncovered it lining an ancient burial mound in Brittany, on the west coast of France in 1900.

He marveled at the "remarkable monument's" delicate engravings of cups, circles, and lines, but he didn't quite know what to make of it, per a post written about the finding published in 2021 in The Conversation.

Sadly, he would go to his grave without uncovering the secrets of the mysterious rock. The slab remained du Châtellier's castle storage and was passed on to the French Museum of National Archaeology after his death in 1911.

It's only a century later that the hidden meaning behind the prehistoric engravings may have been revealed.
It could lead to an archeological treasure

After some sleuthing to recover the lost slab, whose pictures had been shared in archaeological circles since the 1900s, experts conducted a thorough analysis of the engravings, including scanning the rock in a 3D scanner.

As we now have the technology to know exactly what an area looks like from above, the significance of the lines and bumps in the rock became immediately apparent, said Pailler, who led the analysis of the slab, per AFP.

The scientists found an 80% match with the rivers and mountains of the Roudouallec area in Brittany.

The findings, published in the peer-reviewed journal Bulletin de la Société préhistorique française in 2021, identified the map as the oldest cartographical representation of a territory in Europe.

The scientists are now hoping to uncover the last secrets of the map to find new Bronze Age archaeological sites.

"What we're missing now is the map key, the decoder," said Clément Nicolas, a lead researcher on the dig from Bournemouth University, in a post for research institute Inrap in 2021.

The cups, they believe, could be burial mounds, houses, or even mineral deposits, AFP reported.

For the past few weeks, the researchers have been excavating the site where the slab was originally found to better date the discovery, Pailler said per AFP. The dig has uncovered some lost fragments of the slab that had been snapped off and left behind.

The map was likely used by a despotic Bronze Age ruler

The map could point the way to a burial mound of a prince, per a post from the National Archaeology Museum.

It's likely that it was once used by a prince from the early Bronze Age who would have directed a small military faction to forcibly rule the area.

Such rulers were typically buried with bronze daggers, arrowheads, and sometimes golden objects.

The fact the map was carelessly broken into pieces to be used as building materials could be the sign that the prince's rule in that area had come to an end.

"The engraved slab no longer made sense and was doomed by being broken up and used as building material," said Nicolas, per AFP.

Fossil footprints found in New Mexico suggest humans existed long before we think


Fossil footprints found in New Mexico suggest humans existed long before we think© Provided by The Times of India


NEW DELHI: Recent findings from a comprehensive analysis of fossilized human footprints are challenging the long-held belief that humans arrived in the Americas around 14,000 years ago, primarily based on the discovery of Clovis points, early stone tools first found in Clovis, New Mexico, reported NPR.

These footprints are part of a collection found in White Sands National Park, a striking natural landscape in southern New Mexico, characterised by vast gypsum dunes in the Tularosa basin. During the last Ice Age, this basin contained a lake, and the prints were preserved on its now-dry shores.

In 2021, a research team comprising experts from the National Park Service, the US Geological Survey, and others published a paper in the journal Science, presenting a controversial estimate that these footprints date back to a much earlier period, specifically between 21,000 and 23,000 years ago.

The discovery challenges the conventional timeline of human arrival in the Americas and has sparked significant debate among researchers.

"These ages were really much older than the accepted paradigm of when humans entered North America," Kathleen Springer, one of the US Geological Survey researchers who wrote the report was quoted as saying by NPR.

Video: 520-Million-Year-Old Fossil Found With Its Internal Anatomy Intact (Amaze Lab)  Duration 1:17  View on Watch

She said scientists had "thought humans might have crossed from what is now Siberia to Alaska toward the end of the last Ice Age," reported NPR.

"But if her team's analysis of the footprints was correct, maybe that was wrong, and humans found a way onto the continent even when its northern lands were still ice-bound. It opens up whole avenues of migratory pathways. How did people get here?" she added.

The overlapping tracks – and timeline – of humans and megafauna also opened new questions about how long the species coexisted, and what role humans might or might not have played in their extinction.

Critics raised concerns about the research, suggesting that the dating technique used was flawed. Another paper published in Science argued that carbon dating of seeds from the aquatic plant Ruppia cirrhosa, found alongside the footprints, could be unreliable due to the plant's ability to absorb older carbon from water, potentially skewing the results.

"I unfortunately don't share their conclusions that they have resolved the issue of timing of when people were making these footprints," Loren Davis, a professor of anthropology at Oregon State University who co-authored the critical paper last year was quoted as saying by NPR.

According to NPR, has contested that "samples of quartz came from the lowest deposit of the study area, and that the possible age range is broad. He also said that the sample was less useful because it was taken from a clay layer, that does not have footprints embedded in it".

Japan: scandals, falling sales, yet defiant automakers

GlobalData
Mon, Aug 5, 2024

The Japanese auto industry has been mired in several scandals this year. It all started in December last year when the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism (MLIT) found some irregularities in Daihatsu’s vehicle certification process. The MLIT ordered Daihatsu to suspend deliveries of all its vehicles (a total of 64 models) until it finished the investigation and re-approved the certification.

Daihatsu may not be well known outside of Asia, but it is in the Toyota Group and, along with Suzuki, is the leading Mini Vehicle manufacturer in Japan. Mini Vehicles (i.e., vehicles with engine size 660cc or less) account for almost 40% of total Light Vehicle sales in the country. Therefore, Daihatsu’s production and delivery suspension (for a few weeks to a few months, depending on the model) resulted in a severe shortage of Mini Vehicles.

Then, the MLIT found similar issues with Toyota Industry, a Toyota affiliate that manufactures diesel engines for ten Toyota models, including the Landcruiser and the Hilux. The irregularities resulted in the suspension of deliveries of those ten Toyota models for a few weeks.

Finally, in early June, the MLIT discovered problems with the certification process for 35 models at four OEMS: Toyota, Mazda, Honda, and Suzuki. Of the thirty-five models, only five are currently manufactured (three models at Toyota and two at Mazda) and their production was halted. The other thirty models (with specific model years) are no longer produced, but their sales were all suspended for a few weeks.

Since then, the MLIT has investigated the OEMs and confirmed that the affected models conform to the government-mandated technical and safety standards. The issue was with the certification process, not with the vehicles themselves. The automakers have already resumed deliveries of vehicles, except, at the time of writing, the three popular Toyota models - the Yaris Cross, the Corolla Fielder, and the Corolla Axio.

Nonetheless, the impact of the scandals was enormous. In the first half of this year, total Light Vehicle sales in Japan declined by 13% year-on-year. Sales of Mini Vehicles plunged by nearly 18% year-on-year. Daihatsu, Toyota, and Mazda registered year-on-year declines of 61%, 23% and 31%, respectively.

Source: GlobalData

So, what was wrong? The MLIT found that the automakers provided false data and/or data based on tests that were not implemented as required.

How did the automakers respond? The heads of the automakers all bowed deeply and apologised at a press conference – a familiar scene after a scandal in Japan. However, they were defiant. They did acknowledge that some tests were not conducted properly, but they all insisted that the technical and safety standards of their vehicles do meet or even exceed the certification standards – and that their vehicles are safe. For example, Toyota explained that it had conducted a crash test on two models, using a crash cart weighing 1,800 kg, instead of the required 1,100 kg, to create a more powerful collision. In another case, Toyota implemented stricter test conditions for airbags by setting a timer to ignite a fire, whereas the government-required method did not necessitate a timer. Another example disclosed was that to evaluate the movement of objects in the trunk area and their potential impact on passengers in case of a crash, Toyota used old concrete blocks, instead of the new ones that were required. Toyota’s point is: what difference would the age of the blocks make if their weights were the same?

After hearing such defiant statements, local auto analysts all stated that the automakers must comply with government regulations – any incompliance would jeopardise consumer trust in Japan and overseas. However, they were also quick to point out that the government’s cumbersome and complex certification process is a problem, too, as electrification and an increasing number of in-vehicle computer-controlled systems have made the process very time-consuming and costly for automakers.

At the press conference, Toyota chairman Mr. Akio Toyoda said without hesitation that no one in his company, including him, understands the whole picture of the complex certification process. That has aroused criticism of gross negligence in the management. Yet, many analysts are sympathetic to the automakers. Reportedly, there are over 170 items to be tested per vehicle, with each test, requiring specific and complex conditions and methods. According to Toyota Times (Toyota’s online media), the automaker conducts certification tests for about fifty models a year, and in the last ten years submitted about 7,000 test reports to the MLIT.

Then, the MLIT held a rare press conference and rebuked the criticism. The officials insisted that the Japanese certification process conforms with the UN standards under the “World Forum for Harmonisation of Vehicle Regulations (WP29)” in which most major countries in the world participate, therefore, the automakers must comply with them. Before the press conference, however, the Minister of the MLIT, Mr. Tetsuo Saito mentioned that the MLIT is willing to streamline the process whenever possible, hinting that there are bureaucratic hurdles, in the process.

Finally, how did Japanese consumers react to all these scandals? Of course, they were stunned; some may have held off on vehicle purchases. Yet, most of them will probably go ahead with purchases as soon as the vehicle of their choice becomes available. It appears that they don’t care about the scandals very much, as long as the cars are safe. And if they are to avoid the five brands in the scandals (Toyota, Honda, Mazda, Suzuki, and Daihatsu), what else is left? Thus, we expect sales will rebound quickly as soon as supply improves in H2 2024.

Meg Sunako, Senior Analyst, Economics and Topline Forecasts, GlobalData

This article was first published on GlobalData’s dedicated research platform, the Automotive Intelligence Center.

"Japan: scandals, falling sales, yet defiant automakers" was originally created and published by Just Auto, a GlobalData owned brand.

The information on this site has been included in good faith for general informational purposes only. It is not intended to amount to advice on which you should rely, and we give no representation, warranty or guarantee, whether express or implied as to its accuracy or completeness. You must obtain professional or specialist advice before taking, or refraining from, any action on the basis of the content on our site.

You can't buy a Chinese EV in the United States. But they dominate in Southeast Asia

Stephanie Yang
Mon, Aug 5, 2024

A record number of brands participated in Indonesia's largest auto show in Tangerang outside Jakarta. One-third of passenger car brands at the event were Chinese companies, drawn to the Indonesian market by the government's favorable policies to spur consumer adoption and local manufacturing. (Stephanie Yang / Los Angeles Times)

Late last year Chinese automaker BYD surpassed Tesla as the world's biggest seller of electric vehicles.

But you won't find its cars in the United States anytime soon. With the Chinese auto industry facing tariffs in the U.S. and the European Union, one of its most important markets is Southeast Asia.

Of the 31 passenger car brands represented last month at the sprawling Indonesia International Auto Show outside Jakarta, about a third were from China. The vast majority of those were electric vehicles.

Striding past fashion models and huge video displays, Safik Bahsein made his way to the BYD display, where he honed in on a BYD Dolphin, which promises 300 miles on a single charge and sells for the equivalent of $26,000.

Visitors look at a BYD car during an auto show last month. Chinese car companies have been gaining ground in Indonesia, particularly in EVs. (Tatan Syuflana / Associated Press)

It's one of three EV models that BYD now sells in Indonesia, the world's fourth most populous country — with more than 275 million people — and the largest car market in Southeast Asia. The company's first shipment of 1,000 EVs arrived last month.

“It’s quite beautiful,” said Bahsein, 49, who works in shipping. “Compared with European cars, I think BYD has good prospects in the future.”

In his view, the quality of Chinese cars now matches those from Europe and Japan. He said he was considering buying one for his wife, though he still prefers his Tesla Model 3, which he had to have specially imported two years ago because there are no dealers in Indonesia.

Read more: China’s highflying EV industry is going global. Why that has Tesla and other carmakers worried

The country's car market has long been dominated by the Japanese brands Toyota, Daihatsu and Honda. But Chinese companies have been gaining ground, particularly in EVs, where Japanese automakers have lagged.

Chinese brands accounted for 43% of EV sales in the first half of 2024, according to the Assn. of Indonesia Automotive Industries.

But getting people to buy EVs has been especially challenging in Indonesia, where there are many cheaper alternatives and a dearth of charging stations. Only 17,121 EVs were sold last year — just 2% of all auto sales.

"Southeast Asia, specifically Thailand and Indonesia, is the beachhead, both as a market and a production base," said Lei Xing, former chief editor of the China Automotive Review. (Tatan Syuflana / Associated Press)

The Indonesian government has created incentives for EV buyers and set a goal of 400,000 EV sales next year. But the international data analytics firm Fitch Solutions has suggested that a more realistic expectation is 56,000 by 2028.

For Goldie Liem, 24, who recently bought a Binguo EV from the Chinese carmaker Wuling, the biggest incentive was the license plate, which exempts Jakarta drivers from road restrictions meant to cut down on traffic.

That saves her time on her daily office commute, which can take up to two hours. She said she also saves on gas, and pays about $60 a year in taxes compared with $430 for her old Mazda.

Read more: Feds pump $2 billion into boosting U.S.-based EV manufacturing

“It gets me from A to B, that’s it,” she said. “I haven’t tried to take it out of town yet, because I’m not that brave, in terms of charging stations and all that.”

It would take much more to make her husband an EV convert. They couple had come to the auto show so he could check out gas-powered BMWs.

In China, the EV industry has flourished thanks to clean energy subsidies and access to comprehensive supply chains for battery technology and vehicle manufacturing. But intense domestic competition has prompted price cuts and led automakers to look overseas for growth.

Brazil, Belgium, the United Kingdom, Thailand and the Philippines are the biggest export markets this year, according to the China Passenger Car Assn. Indonesia is among the fastest growing.

Wuling, a Chinese EV brand, accounts for about 40% of EV sales in Indonesia. But electric cars still only make up about 2% of total car sales, hampered by insufficient charging infrastructure. (Stephanie Yang / Los Angeles Times)

"Southeast Asia, specifically Thailand and Indonesia, is the beachhead, both as a market and a production base," said Lei Xing, an independent auto analyst and former chief editor of the China Automotive Review. "It's not like you’re going into Europe and competing against the Volkswagens and the BMWs. Now with the EV opportunity, Chinese brands are jumping on that."

BYD recently announced plans to build a $1.3-billion EV plant two hours from Jakarta that will begin operations in 2026, joining other Chinese brands Neta and Wuling to build electric cars in Indonesia.

It's no coincidence that Indonesia also happens to be one of the world’s leading producers of nickel and other minerals needed in EV batteries.

China has already invested billions of dollars in Indonesian nickel mines in order to procure the strategic metal. Now Indonesia is trying to attract more Chinese funding to process its natural resources and build cars at home.

In an op-ed this year for China Daily, a state-run newspaper, a senior Indonesian transportation official declared his country’s EV industry “open for business.”

The official, Rachmat Kaimuddin, the deputy coordinating minister of transportation and infrastructure, also encouraged Chinese carmakers to take advantage of the “golden opportunity” of recently announced tax incentives for international car brands producing in Indonesia.

For brands like BYD, building more facilities in other countries is a critical part of global expansion, particularly as the U.S. and EU have threatened to implement harsher policies to keep cheap Chinese models from pushing out their own domestic manufacturers.

Leading Chinese automaker BYD delivered its first 1,000 EVs to Indonesian consumers this year, as it expands its manufacturing and sales in one of Southeast Asia's biggest auto markets. (Stephanie Yang / Los Angeles Times)

Last month, the EU announced tariffs of up to 37.6% on Chinese EVs. In the U.S., President Biden raised the existing 25% tariff on Chinese EVs to 100%.

BYD has also opened a plant in Thailand, and has announced investment plans for Turkey, Hungary and Mexico, which could help the automaker sidestep foreign import taxes in the U.S. and Europe on Chinese goods.

Read more: Editorial: China embraced electric vehicles. The U.S. didn't. Now we're paying the price

“These are very strategic locations,” said Xing, the auto analyst. “In order to be global, I think the U.S. and Europe are the last two frontiers.”

In the meantime, there is Southeast Asia. At the auto show, Ricky Aristin, 23, spent two hours browsing cars that could potentially replace his Honda Accord. The highlight was climbing into the driver's seat of a BYD Seal, an electric sedan that sells for about $44,000.

“It feels like an expensive car,” Aristin said. “It’s a good experience from the car with the lowest price.”

Nonetheless, he decided he wouldn't buy an EV until Jakarta has more charging stations.

This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.


EV costs on track to match gas guzzlers as early as next year as battery prices drop 'dramatically'


Ines Ferré
·Senior Business Reporter
Sun, Aug 4, 2024


The higher cost of owning an electric versus a gas-powered vehicle is a sticking point for many would-be buyers of EVs. Now, the price of a key EV component is falling, raising hopes that automakers could close the gap as they grapple with waning demand.

Batteries make up about one-third to one-fourth of the cost of producing an electric vehicle, according to Goldman Sachs analysts. The firm predicts the global average cost to automakers for batteries in 2024 will average about $115 per kilowatt hours, about 23% lower than last year. Prices are expected fall another 20% in 2025.

Tesla CEO Elon Musk (TSLA) recently noted costs have come down for lithium-ion cells used in EV batteries, a big reversal from the "massive spike" during the pandemic when car manufacturers put in "giant, giant orders."

Musk said at the company's shareholder meeting in June that "battery cell suppliers have increased their supply, and the orders from other car manufacturers have declined."

The drop in demand has impacted the price of lithium. The essential mineral used to make current EV batteries has plunged more than 70% over the past year.

"Raw material prices are a significant factor in the overall cost of EV batteries. As battery prices decrease due to technological advancements, the contribution of raw material costs becomes more significant," Kieran O'Regan, co-founder of battery data and software company About:Energy, told Yahoo Finance.

To be sure, batteries are just one factor in how much EVs cost, which includes everything from research and development to assembly and manufacturing. But it's one of the most important components as the industry races to catch up with China, where the cost to own an electric vehicle is already cheaper than a gas-powered car.

An EV charging station is seen Thursday, May 9, 2024, in San Antonio. Many Americans still aren’t sold on going electric for their next car purchase. High prices and a lack of easy-to-find charging stations are major sticking points. (AP Photo/Eric Gay) (ASSOCIATED PRESS)

Alan Taub, director of Michigan Materials Research Institute at the University of Michigan, says the battery industry has already come a long way toward bringing down the price of EVs.

"The cost is dropping dramatically through technology," said Taub. "Right now, there's nothing that looks like the Achilles heel of 'you can't get there.'"

This year automakers in the US have scaled back their electric vehicle rollout plans amid waning demand. Price is one reason for the tepid enthusiasm, along with range anxiety and consumer preference for hybrids.

Car companies have tried to make EVs cheaper for consumers through financing deals and cash incentives, according to a report in the Wall Street Journal.

Still, prices in the US haven't come down enough to make it cheaper to buy an EV than a gas-powered vehicle.

The average cost of an electric vehicle sat at $56,371 in June, compared to gas-powered vehicles at $48,644, according to Kelly Blue Book.

Visitors look over a 2024 Cybertruck in the Tesla display at the Electrify Expo, Sunday, July 14, 2024, in north Denver. (AP Photo/David Zalubowski) (ASSOCIATED PRESS)

Part of the reason for the price disparity is US drivers' tendency toward bigger cars that require larger, more expensive batteries. There's also a delay between when battery costs come down and when they're incorporated in pricing of new vehicles.

"There is a time lag that we need to account for here and that's why 2024 is still a tough year from an EV demand perspective, but we do see catalysts opening up in 2025 from a demand perspective," Nikhil Bhandari, co-head of Asia-Pacific natural resources and clean energy at Goldman Sachs, told Yahoo Finance.

Goldman Sachs analysts estimate a breakeven point between EVs and internal combustion engine (ICE) cars, without accounting for government subsidies, will be achieved in the US between 2025 and 2026 as battery prices fall further next year. The cost of ownership not only includes the price of the actual vehicle but also fuel or battery charging, repairs, and maintenance over the lifetime of a car.

Goldman's timeline appears to coincide with comments made by Elon Musk during the company's latest earnings call when he said "we are on track to deliver a more affordable model in the first half of next year."

Interest rate cuts by the Federal Reserve along with government electrification incentives will also likely play a role in spurring demand.

Once prices go well below breakeven, “then [the electric vehicle] actually becomes a cash machine,” said Tom Narayan, RBC Capital Markets global autos analyst, highlighting the cost benefit of not having to include catalytic converters, engines, or transmissions, which are found in ICE vehicles.

Ines Ferre is a senior business reporter for Yahoo Finance. Follow her on X at @ines_ferre.

Uranium Miners Say Australia to Miss Out on Nuclear Boom


Paul-Alain Hunt
Mon, Aug 5, 2024

(Bloomberg) -- Uranium explorers are calling on Australian state governments to lift bans on mining the fuel, which is set for a long-term jump in demand as decarbonization spurs a nuclear energy revival.

Australia boasts nearly a third of known uranium ore deposits worldwide, but only two of the nation’s eight states and territories — South Australia and Northern Territory — allow the mining of it. There are currently only two operating projects, both in South Australia, with environmental and safety concerns dissuading other states from embracing the industry.

The dearth of activity comes after uranium prices more than tripled this decade in anticipation of a surge in consumption for the fuel that’s the major ingredient in nuclear power plants. Major economies including the US, Japan and France were among 22 nations that pledged late last year to triple nuclear energy capacity by 2050.

Uranium was a key talking point at the annual Diggers & Dealers conference that started Monday in Kalgoorlie. The gathering attracts hundreds of resources executives and financiers to the Outback town in Western Australia, which banned mining of the fuel in 2017, while exempting four previously approved projects yet to reach production.

“The bans in some states like Western Australia, which is known for its mining history, is nonsensical and leave the nation at risk of missing out on soaring global demand,” said Jonathan Fisher, chief executive officer of Cauldron Energy Ltd., a Sydney-listed explorer for the fuel. “The time is now to remove these bans — there’s a real economic cost to not doing it,” he said in an interview before the conference.

Australia’s role as a uranium producer has been limited by environmental concerns. While the Chernobyl and Fukashima disasters linger in the global memory, toxic leaks from the Ranger project in the Northern Territory, operated by Rio Tinto Ltd., are still being cleaned up more than a decade later.

The country’s two operating uranium mines — BHP Group Ltd’s Olympic Dam project, where uranium is a byproduct of the copper operations, and the Boss Energy Ltd.-operated Honeywell — produce around 9% of the world’s disclosed output.

Mining approvals are decided on at the state level in Australia, but the Labor-led federal government has so far not taken steps to encourage mining of the nuclear fuel, despite it pushing for Australia to step up production of critical minerals key to the energy transition.

Peter Dutton, who leads the federal government’s main rivals the Liberals, attended the conference on Monday and told reporters the reluctance of Western Australia’s Labor government to remove the ban on uranium mining was costing the state.

“It’s ideologically based and we’re going to do ourselves out of thousands of jobs,” Dutton said. “Uranium is an obvious one where there will be significant demand that Australia has a natural advantage and should take advantage of that.”

Australia’s uranium industry plays an important role in global energy security and the net zero transition for like‑minded countries, said a spokesperson for Federal Resources Minister Madeleine King. Any decisions regarding the future of uranium mining regulation or prohibitions are primarily a matter for relevant state governments, the spokesperson said.

Still, the re-opening of the Honeywell mine last month — about a decade after it mothballed due to falling uranium prices — has boosted industry hopes for more project approvals. Uranium prices have dropped from a peak of around $106 a pound in early February, but are still above $80.

Those levels are unsustainable for rapid uranium exploration and mine creation, but prices are likely to go up again, said John Borshoff, chief executive officer of Deep Yellow Ltd., which is developing the Mulga Rock project in Western Australia. “Country after country has declared renewables aren’t going to achieve their targets and that nuclear will be a big component to reach net zero.”

However, Borshoff said years of depressed prices coupled with political instability had taken a toll on miners’ ability to get new mines off the ground in Australia.

“The exploration industry died post-Chernobyl,” he said “A lot of the expertise in terms of engineering and geology, those assets and knowledge just disappeared to other commodities,” he said.

--With assistance from Ben Westcott.

UK

Home Office knew migrants at hotel targeted in riots were at risk from far-Right last year

Neil Johnston
Mon, August 5, 2024 

Violence flared outside the Holiday Inn Express in Manvers, Rotherham - Christopher Furlong/Getty Images


The Home Office knew migrants at a South Yorkshire hotel attacked in Southport-linked riots were at risk of being targeted by the far-Right more than a year ago.

The department said last year that it would review the use of the Holiday Inn Express in Manvers, Rotherham, as accommodation for asylum seekers following trouble in which two people were arrested last year.

However, when a mob of far-Right demonstrators turned up outside the hotel over the weekend, it is believe that about 200 migrants were still being housed there despite the concerns that had been raised.

Dozens of masked and hooded thugs, many carrying England or Union flags, began throwing missiles at police. With officers quickly outnumbered, the mob began hurling planks of wood and bricks at police, who used riot shields to protect themselves.

Hotel staff and residents cowered as the mob chanted “Get them out”, “We want our country back” and “Yorkshire”.

After smashing several ground-floor windows, the rioters then attempted to set the hotel on fire, torching bins and then using them to blockade the exits.

A rubbish bin is hurled onto fire outside the hotel - Reuters

At least 10 officers were injured, including one who was knocked unconscious, South Yorkshire Police confirmed, saying one person had already been arrested and others involved should “expect us to be at their doors very soon”.

Police on horseback attempted to disperse the crowd, but a large number made their way to the hotel entrance and got inside after windows were smashed.

Riot police moved in to clear the burning debris, but found themselves under attack from a group throwing rocks and other missiles.

Asylum seekers inside said they were terrified and feared for their lives, after having come to the UK because they thought it was a “safe country”.

One man said: “We were told to stay in our rooms, the staff locked the hotel. We then heard them breaking in. We could hear the breaking of mirrors, glass and doors. It was terrible. We only knew the fire had started when the fire alarms went off. It was so terrible for us, and this is the first experience we’ve had like this.”

The disorder continued well into Sunday night, with rioters launching fireworks at officers and the hotel and lighting a bonfire in the middle of the road.


Rioters had picked the hotel because it was known that asylum seekers were staying there. Hundreds of anti-immigration and counter-demonstrators also gathered outside.

After a demonstration in February last year, for which South Yorkshire Police had mounted a large-scale operation, Robert Jenrick, then the immigration minister, said a review of the use of the accommodation was due later in the year.

At the time, John Healey, the local Labour MP who is now the Defence Secretary, said: “I will make a formal submission to Robert Jenrick as part of this review, when I will again set out our local concerns about Manvers being utterly unsuited for such accommodation and our wish to see our hotel being released back for ordinary paying customers.”

Downing Street condemns Elon Musk for claim ‘civil war is inevitable’ in UK amid far-right riots and attacks

Andy Gregory and Millie Cooke
Mon, August 5, 2024

Downing Street has condemned Elon Musk for his claim that “civil war is inevitable” in Britain, saying there is “no justification for comments like that”.

The spokesperson added: “We’re talking about a minority of thugs that do not speak for Britain.”

Elon Musk said he “fully” endorses Donald Trump after the Republican presidential candidate was rushed bleeding from the stage of a rally in Pennsylvania (Drew Angerer/AFP via Getty Images)

Misinformation on Mr Musk’s social media platform X has been blamed for helping to fuel racist far-right riots and attacks.

Following lies about the identity of the suspect in the Southport knife attack, disorder continued across the weekend as racist mobs clashed with police in Hull, Halifax, Liverpool, London, Southport and Rotherham, and started fires at hotels housing asylum-seekers in Manvers and Tamworth.

Follow our live blog for the latest updates

A car burns in Middlesbrough, during an anti-immigration protest (Owen Humphreys/PA)

With posts featuring misinformation on X garnering millions of interactions, Mr Musk - who bought the platform in 2022 for £38bn – responded to a post on Sunday sharing footage of the violence, which claimed disorder is the “effects of mass migration and open borders”.

“Civil war is inevitable,” the Tesla and SpaceX founder replied. It marks the sixth time since October that Musk has claimed civil war is brewing in Europe.

On Monday, Downing Street reiterated that social media companies have “can and should be doing more” to counter misleading or dangerous material hosted on their platforms, adding that they have a responsibility to ensure the safety of their users.

Mr Musk drew criticism from across the political spectrum for his remarks, with Tim Montgomerie, editor of the Conservative Home website, saying: “Extraordinarily irresponsible from Elon Musk. We need leaders to deescalate, not raise fears.”

Michael Stephens, a senior fellow at the Foreign Policy Research Institute, said: “Proof if ever it was needed that making electric cars and space rockets does not equal political understanding. Civil War is absolutely not inevitable. The UK is a small space filled with a lot of people. We all have to make it work.”

The Thick of It writer Armando Iannucci, said: “Tomorrow morning you’ll see the people who live here tidy these streets up. Small gangs of thugs do not a mass movement make. You’ve been taken in by your own platform, which amplifies noise at the expense of facts.”

(Getty Images)

But such inflammatory claims have been echoed by other public figures, with actor-turned right-wing activist Laurence Fox seeking to cast prime minister Keir Starmer as a “traitor” on the side of “immigrant barbarians”, adding in an X post “liked” nearly 60,000 times: “Fine. Then it’s war.”

As calls emerged for greater regulation of social media, Professor Marc Owen Jones, a disinformation researcher at Doha’s Hamid bin Khalifa University, said: “X has been weaponised to spread rumours and hate speech, particularly targeting minorities, people of a Muslim background, to inflame tensions.”

“Unfortunately social media companies make it all too easy for potential bad actors to set up anonymous accounts and spread rumours,” Prof Jones told BBC News.

A police officer walks past a fire during clashes between police and rioters in Rotherham (Danny Lawson/PA)

“The idea with a disinformation campaign, if you have someone acting in bad faith, they will spread falsehoods and then other people in good faith, regular Joe, might pick it up because they believe that person to be credible, and then spread it. And that’s what we’re seeing in Southport,” he said.

Since buying Twitter in 2022 in and rebranding it as X, Musk has allowed many previously banned figures back onto the platform, including Tommy Robinson, with whom Mr Musk interacted on X as the former EDL leader was accused of inflaming tensions in the UK from a hotel in Cyprus.

Hours earlier, Sir Keir had issued a message to social media firms during a press conference in Downing Street, saying: “Violent disorder, clearly whipped up online, that is also a crime, it’s happening on your premises, and the law must be upheld everywhere.”

Painting himself as a champion of free speech, as many users report increased hateful and extreme content on X, Musk has also endorsed Republican candidate Donald Trump in the upcoming US elections and has spoken about wanting to destroy the “woke mind virus”.

The Independent has contacted Mr Musk for comment.

Elon Musk's UK 'civil war' post criticised by No 10

BBC
Mon, August 5, 2024 

A police car was set on fire amid protests in Sunderland on Saturday [Getty Images]

Downing Street has criticised comments by Elon Musk, who said in a post on X, formerly Twitter, that "civil war is inevitable" following unrest in the UK.

Mr Musk made the remarks in response to a video showing people aiming fireworks at police.

The prime minister's spokesperson said there was "no justification" for Mr Musk's comments, adding there was more that social media companies "can and should be doing".

It comes after the Prime Minister told an emergency meeting about the violent disorder in UK cities and towns that people who incite violence online will be prosecuted.

"The law applies online, so if you're inciting violence, it doesn't matter whether it's online or offline", Sir Keir Starmer said.

And his spokesperson said social media firms "have a responsibility" to ensure criminal activity - including from those outside the UK - is not being shared online.

"Clearly we have seen bot activity online, much of which may well be amplified with the involvement of state actors amplifying some of the disinformation and misinformation that we've seen," they said.

But they would not say which countries the government believes are behind the posts.

Earlier the Home Secretary Yvette Cooper said social media firms needed to take action over "shocking misinformation", online agitators and the "organisation of violence".

She told the Today programme social media firms are not acting quickly enough to remove "criminal material" after days of protests in UK towns and cities.

The BBC has approached X, Meta, TikTok and Snap for comment.

Protestors clashed with police in towns and cities across the UK over the weekend [Getty Images]

The home secretary said social media companies need to "take responsibility" over online posts encouraging criminality.

"There's been some shocking misinformation that has escalated some of this, but then there's also been the deliberate organisation of violence as well," she said.

"You can't just have the armchair thuggery of the people being able to incite and organise violence and also not face consequences for this."

Offences concerning incitement under UK law predate social media, and are listed under the Public Order Act 1986.

This may include provoking violence and harassment, as well as engaging in rioting.

Meanwhile the Online Safety Act, which became law in 2023 but has not yet fully come into effect, will require social media firms to "take robust action against illegal content and activity", including "racially or religiously aggravated" offences as well as inciting violence.

The criminal offences introduced by the act will cover sending "threatening communications" online, and sharing "false information intended to cause non-trivial harm".
Online agitators

Ms Cooper said social media firms are failing "recognise the impact" of online agitators, with some online posts about the unrest including "things which are clearly already criminal".

“There are crimes that have been committed on social media in inflaming this and encouraging and promoting violence," she said.

"There are areas where the social media companies do have clear requirements at the moment to remove criminal material and should be doing so, but sometimes take too long to do so."

Ms Cooper said there are other areas where firms have "made commitments around their terms and conditions that are supposed to be enforced" - but posts are not being removed.

She said the government was “pursuing this” with social media companies this week.

And when asked specifically about posts made by English Defence League founder Tommy Robinson - real name Stephen Yaxley-Lennon - Ms Cooper said she had seen videos posted by "a series of agitators", and would not comment on "individual pieces of material that may well be subject to a police investigation or a criminal investigation".
Social media involvement

Anne Craanen, Senior Research and Policy Manager on Extremism at the ISD think-tank, said the relationship between online activity and offline violence is "very hard to assess" - but amid recent unrest "the relationship is abundantly clear".

"Platforms have developed crisis response protocols for responding to terrorist and mass-casualty events but continue to struggle with violent incidents which may lead to disinformation that may inspire further violence," she said.

"Platforms, in the case of Southport, did not enforce their own Terms of Service adequately or in a timely fashion."

The prime minister recently criticised the role social media has played in the unrest, telling firms last week - and "those who run them" - that "violent disorder clearly whipped up online" is a crime.

Just three days after the prime minister's comments, Mr Musk made his post calling civil war in the UK "inevitable".

Mr Musk's comments have drawn ire from some online, with satirist Armando Iannucci saying the billionaire had been "taken in by your own platform, which amplifies noise at the expense of facts".

Meanwhile Sunder Katwala, director of think tank British Future, said the post was "spreading a narrative that is crucial to socialising people with fairly extreme view towards condoning violence to protect their group".

He said there needs to be "strong responses from government, Ofcom, and parliament" to the comments.

An Ofcom spokesperson told the BBC it is "moving quickly" to implement the Online Safety Act, so it can be enforced "as soon as possible".

"When it comes fully into force, tech firms will have to assess the risk of illegal content on their platforms, take steps to stop it appearing and act quickly to remove it when they become aware of it," they said.

"We expect the illegal harms duties to come into force from around the end of the year... and the additional duties on the largest services in 2026."

Hotel workers' 'absolute terror' at mob violence

Far-Right and Muslims clash in fresh riots

Nick Gutteridge
Sun, August 4, 2024 

Asian men join the disturbance in Bolton on Sunday - Phil Taylor / SWN

Violent clashes broke out between far-Right rioters and Muslim counter-protesters on Sunday in a sixth day of unrest on Britain’s streets.

The disorder that has spread since the Southport killings showed no sign of abating over the weekend amid escalating community tensions.

In Rotherham, a hotel used to house asylum seekers was set ablaze, and another in Tamworth was targeted by anti-immigration protesters.

In Bolton, Muslim groups shouting “Allahu Akbar” clashed with far-Right rioters.

A mob in Middlesbrough shouted “smash the p—s” and “there ain’t no black in the Union Jack” while targeting the homes of migrants, while footage on social media from elsewhere in the city appeared to show groups of Asian men attacking white men.

In an emergency address from Downing Street, Sir Keir Starmer warned the rioters would regret taking part and vowed to do “whatever it takes to bring these thugs to justice as quickly as possible”.

Police stand guard against counter-protesters - Belinda Jiao/Reuters

He said: “The police will be making arrests. Individuals will be held on remand. Charges will follow. And convictions will follow.

“I guarantee you will regret taking part in this disorder. Whether directly or those whipping up this action online, and then running away themselves.”

He added: “This is not protest. I won’t shy away from calling this what it is – far-Right thuggery.”

The Prime Minister was warned not to be “selective” in his response to the groups involved in the disorder.

Robert Jenrick, a frontrunner to become the next Tory leader, said the Prime Minister must not show any “squeamishness or selectivity” in tackling all those responsible.

He said the streets should be flooded with tens of thousands of police, with all leave cancelled and officers diverted from unaffected areas to riot hotspots.

“The ringleaders should be arrested, swiftly prosecuted and jailed for the longest possible time,” the former immigration minister told The Telegraph.

“Groups that gather in town or city centres that become violent must be immediately dispersed, with violent thugs arrested.

“If force is needed to achieve this, it should be used. There must be no squeamishness or selectivity whatsoever to robust law enforcement.”
‘Law breaking is not the answer’

Nadhim Zahawi, the former Chancellor, also warned that there must be zero tolerance for anyone taking part in riots, including those “taking matters into their own hands”.

He said: “There needs to be a clear, consistent message for all those rioting, even if they think they are ‘taking matters into their own hands’; law breaking is not the answer and there must be a zero tolerance response.

“The Government needs to realise that there is legitimate frustration and pain felt in communities across the country, with recent murders and other violence becoming emblematic of people feeling that their society is becoming unrecognisable. But the violence must be punished.

“Similarly, the Government needs to say to those thugs who hijack Islam that it will not be tolerant of intolerance. If you settle in Britain like I did, you respect its values and traditions, integrate and be proud of this country, otherwise you must go somewhere else.”

Protests broke out in the wake of the Southport killings after false information was spread online that the suspect was an asylum seeker.

On Sunday, around 700 rioters descended on the Holiday Inn Express in Rotherham, which has previously been used to house asylum seekers.


After smashing several ground floor windows, the attackers then attempted to set the hotel on fire, torching bins and then using them to blockade the exits.

Mosques have been targeted on previous days of the unrest and the Home Office on Sunday announced that extra police and security forces will be deployed to protect mosques after they were targeted by far-Right rioters.

Amid escalating community tensions, in Bolton there were scuffles on the town’s streets between anti-immigration protesters and Muslim counter demonstrators.

By early afternoon the counter-protesters, who were mostly Asian and many in Muslim dress, outnumbered the anti-immigration protest by two to one.

Footage on social media also appeared to show groups of Asian men attacking white males in Middlesbrough.

Counter-protesters outnumbered the anti-immigration protest by two to one - Belinda Jiao

A reporter for Channel 4 News said groups of Asian and white men were on the streets of the town “looking for trouble”.

Tommy Robinson, who is the subject of an arrest warrant issued by a judge after failing to turn up to court last Monday, was reported to be stoking the riots through his social media posts while on holiday in Cyprus. He denies encouraging or orchestrating violence.

Sir Keir is under increasing pressure to bring the violence under control.

In his statement on Sunday, he opened the door to tougher prison sentences for rioters and announced suspects will be held on remand and locked up immediately after being charged, mirroring action to tackle the 2011 riots when he was Director of Public Prosecutions.

The Prime Minister will lead a meeting of the Government’s emergency Cobra committee on Monday alongside Cabinet ministers and senior police figures.

However doubts have been raised over whether there are enough jail places available for Sir Keir to mount a 2011-style response to the unrest.

Labour inherited a system that is running at almost full capacity, with only around 700 spaces available in male prisons around the country.

Around 150 arrests have been made across England since Saturday evening, the National Police Chiefs’ Council said, with that number expected to rise.

Yvette Cooper, the Home Secretary, on Sunday night warned rioters they would face a “reckoning” and that police have the Government’s backing to take the “strongest possible action”.

Writing in The Times, she said: “Make no mistake, there will be a reckoning for the individuals who took part in this violence, those who whipped them up on social media and in online chat forums and those who have felt emboldened by this moment to stir up racial hatred.”

Cassia Rowland, a researcher at the Institute for Government, said locking up all the rioters was “not an option” unless more prisoners are released.

She said: “The situation in prisons is desperate. We simply don’t have the prison spaces available for mass arrests like we saw in 2011.”

The Government has announced that, as of Sept 10, thousands of prisoners will be freed when they have served 40pc of their sentence to free up cells.

But that date has been written into law, meaning the scheme could only be brought forward if Parliament were recalled from recess to amend the legislation.

Government sources insisted that internal modelling of prisoner numbers showed there would be enough space to lock up all the rioters.

No 10 was forced to scotch rumours that Sir Keir was planning to go on holiday on Monday insisting he would be working at Downing Street all week.

The Prime Minister is now facing demands to recall Parliament so that MPs can debate his response, as Lord Cameron did at the same point during the 2011 unrest.

Sir Iain Duncan Smith, a former Tory leader, added that Sir Keir “needs to bring people back to explain what he’s doing”.

Meanwhile officials were forced to dampen down speculation they could call the Army in if police forces are stretched to breaking point in the coming days.

Humza Yousaf, a former Scottish first minister, and Tobias Ellwood, an ex-Armed Forces minister, were among those urging Sir Keir to use the military.

Mr Yousaf warned the UK was experiencing “far-Right race riots” which amounted to “pogroms against the Muslim community, against people of colour”.

Neil Basu, a former assistant commissioner at Scotland Yard, said the riots had made him feel afraid to be black for the first time in decades.

He said: “I was born a few weeks before Enoch Powell made a speech that changed my parents’ lives. I am the son of immigrants and I am not a white person.

“I spent 30 years as a police officer feeling pretty secure in my ability to handle myself, I don’t feel like that this week and that is a terrible thing for a man in his 57th year to say.

“But I remember growing up in the 1970s, I watched the National Front march down streets, and this feels very much like that.”

Starmer Calls Emergency Meeting After Riots Flare Across UK

Andrew Atkinson, Alex Wickham and Lucca de Paoli
Mon, August 5, 2024





(Bloomberg) -- Prime Minister Keir Starmer called an emergency security meeting in a bid to quell anti-immigrant protests that rocked communities across the UK and threatened to plunge his month-old government into a polarizing cultural debate.

Violence erupted in towns and cities including Rotherham, Blackpool and Bristol over the weekend in the first major test for the new Labour government. The disorder has been fueled by an online misinformation campaign since an attack a week ago left three young girls dead in Southport, northwest England. Far-right activists falsely claimed the suspect was a Muslim migrant to stoke anti-immigrant and Islamophobic sentiment.

In Rotherham, South Yorkshire, protesters on Sunday attacked a hotel they believed was housing asylum seekers and started a fire, injuring around a dozen police officers. Home Secretary Yvette Cooper told BBC radio on Monday that hundreds of arrests have been made in England’s worst rioting in over a decade.

“We have seen truly appalling criminal violence and thuggery in some of our cities and towns; it is a total disgrace,” Cooper said. “There has to be a reckoning; they have to pay the price for their crimes”

Speaking from Downing Street on Sunday, Starmer blamed the far-right for the violence and said those who took part will face “the full force of the law.” On Monday, he is due to hold an emergency Cobra meeting with senior ministers and police chiefs, Cooper said.

The prime minister is preparing emergency court sittings, getting prosecutors to work longer hours and weekends to process cases, and the redeployment of police if necessary.

Authorities have yet to point the finger at specific named groups, and there is no apparent unified structure to those behind the violence. Disparate groups of far-right activists appear to have mobilized online, including using Twitter and Telegram to call for protests in towns and cities across the country. Far-right agitator Tommy Robinson, whose real name is Stephen Yaxley-Lennon, has used Twitter posts to stoke tensions, while Reform UK Party Leader Nigel Farage has questioned whether police withheld the truth in the Southport attack.

Asked specifically about Robinson, Cooper declined to comment on individual cases, but said “if there is criminal provocation online, that needs to be addressed.”

“There is definitely criminal material online, and that needs to be pursued,” Cooper said. “You can’t just have the armchair thuggery of people being able to incite and organize violence and also not face consequences for this. There does also need to be action by the social media companies.”

The violence is the worst in England since the summer of 2011, when rioting raged for five days following the police killing of a Black man in north London. That led to the prosecution of thousands of people and lengthy prison sentences. Starmer was the director of public prosecutions at the time and is expected to take a similarly tough approach to the latest unrest, according to the official.

Cooper announced additional measures to protect the mosques and pledged “full backing” for the police in dealing with the unrest.

Tensions have been rising since the stabbing attack at a Taylor Swift-themed dance party in Southport, near Liverpool, on July 29. Police have said the suspect, Axel Rudakubana, 17, was born in Britain in an attempt to counter false claims spread on social media that he was a Muslim migrant.

Around 300 people were involved in disturbances in the Walton area of Liverpool on Saturday night, according to Merseyside Police. The force, also responsible for Southport, said that a local convenience store was set on fire and that a library was damaged, while firefighters who attended to the scene had a missile thrown at their vehicle.

In Hull, demonstrators gathered outside a hotel that houses asylum seekers, a number of windows were smashed and bottles thrown. In videos uploaded to social media many of the protesters can be heard chanting “stop the boats,” a reference to crossings made from the European continent by migrants attempting to get to Britain.

Many police forces across the country have issued so-called dispersal orders to try to break up and deter rioters. There have also been disturbances in Leicester, Stoke-on Trent, Nottingham, Manchester, Middlesbrough and Sunderland, as well as Belfast in Northern Ireland.

“We will do whatever it takes to make sure that people can get through the court system,” Diana Johnson, the policing minister, said Sunday in an interview on Sky News. Courts could sit through the night to deal with the large number of people arrested if necessary, she added.

For the UK’s strained justice system, haste could prove difficult.

Since 2010, when the Conservatives took office, funding cuts have left much of the court system struggling to process even their regular workload. More than half of magistrate courts, which deal with lower-level offenses, closed during the Tories’ 14 years in power. Those courts are now working with a backlog of around 387,000 cases as of April this year, a figure that has surged since the pandemic.

The unrest comes just days after the House of Commons rose for the long summer recess. Priti Patel, a former home secretary who is now vying to succeed Rishi Sunak as Conservative Party leader, has called for Parliament to be recalled.

--With assistance from Alex Morales

 Bloomberg Businessweek


Massive Attack call out the UK government and media amid violent, racist far-right riots across Britain

Paul Brannigan
Sun, August 4, 2024 


Credit: Marco Prosch/Getty Images

Massive Attack have shared a powerful statement calling out successive UK governments, the current Labour administration and the UK media for “years of state sponsored Islamophobia and racism“ under-pinning the violent far-right riots currently sweeping across Britain.

The past week has seen riots and on-going racist violence in Southport, Sunderland, London, Belfast, Rotherham, Hull, Liverpool, Middlesbrough, Nottingham, Bolton and a number of other towns and cities.

147 arrests have been made over the weekend as violence escalated for a sixth day across Britain in the wake of the murder of three young girls in Southport last week.

In the aftermath of the horrifying attack upon children attending a school holidays Taylor Swift-themed dance class, false rumours were spread online that the individual responsible was a Muslim asylum seeker who had arrived in the UK in 2023 illegally by boat.

The outrage sparked by these untrue claims led Judge Andrew Menary KC to take the unusual decision to name the Cardiff-born teenager arrested and charged with the killings: Axel Muganwa Rudakubana, 17, from Banks in Lancashire, is now facing three counts of murder and 10 counts of attempted murder. Despite these facts contradicting the false far-right narrative, there have been numerous anti-immigration demonstrations across the UK, many escalating into violent disorder, with attacks on mosques, Muslim-owned businesses, the police and, today in Rotherham, Yorkshire, a sustained assault upon a Holiday Inn hotel where asylum seekers are believed to be housed.

Today, August 4, UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer vowed that those involved in the violence will be brought to justice, stating, “People in this country have a right to be safe, and yet we've seen Muslim communities targeted, attacks on mosques, other minority communities singled out, Nazi salutes in the street, attacks on the police, wanton violence alongside racist rhetoric... I won't shy away from calling it what it is: far-right thuggery.“

This same afternoon, Massive Attack shared a statement from the Runnymede Trust, the UK's leading race equality think tank. It reads: “This violent racism has long been simmering under the surface. What is happening is the direct result of years of normalised racism and Islamophobia, enabled by politicians and the British media.

“As far-right mobs threaten mosques, intimidate and harass people, and throw Nazi salutes, we offer our utmost solidarity to people of colour, and Muslim communities in particular.

“Even in their responses to this violence, our Prime Minister and Home Secretary fail to centre Muslim people, or call out racism for what it is,“ the statement continues. “What we are seeing unfold is more than 'thuggery', it is violent racism. This is an inevitable outcome of years of state sponsored Islamophobia and racism, where Muslims, people of colour and migrants are scapegoated as a distraction from decades of economic hardship and political failings.

The statement concludes: “We demand political leadership that recognises that challenging the far right is not simply a question of tackling online misinformation, or increased police surveillance. Instead, we urgently need our leaders to challenge the conditions that embolden the far right. These scenes should be unimaginable in 2024.”

More protests are expected across the UK in the coming week.

'Concrete cancer' ruining pools for hundreds of Central Texans

Claire Osborn, Austin American-Statesman
Mon, August 5, 2024 

Neeley Ramey first noticed the cracks in her then-4-year-old pool in 2021 and thought they were a result of the deadly freeze that winter in Central Texas. But the fissures kept spreading for months.

Now she knows what hundreds of other swimming pool owners in Central Texas counties have unfortunately discovered: Her pool has "concrete cancer" and has to be demolished because of a defect in its building materials.

"Now I get quoted $150,000 to $170,000 just to rip the concrete out," said Ramey, who lives in Southwest Austin and paid $60,000 for her pool. She said her pool builder told her he couldn't help her because the problem caused him to go broke.

"I'm just sick over it," Ramey said.

She is now part of a multidistrict litigation lawsuit originally filed in 2021 in Travis County that includes more than 120 plaintiffs, she said. Multidistrict litigation combines multiple civil cases involving one or more common questions but pending in different districts.

Sachin Patel examines cracks in the family's concrete pool in Leander as his daughters, Rayna, 7, and Zara, 5, play nearby. Patel found out the pool has a defect called "concrete cancer," otherwise known as an alkali-silica reaction. He said his family is swimming in the pool until the cracks make it unusable.

These cases point to concrete being the issue with failing pools.

Concrete is made by mixing sand, cement and water. Concrete cancer, formally known as alkali-silica reaction, or ASR, causes concrete to swell internally and to crack when it comes in contact with water. It happens when there's a chemical reaction between alkalis in the cement and certain types of silica in the aggregates, or sand.

The problem has affected Central Texas property owners who had pools installed between 2017 and 2022, according to law firms and pool builders.

The way to prevent ASR is to add fly ash, a byproduct of burning coal, to the mix before the concrete is poured, officials said.

There has been a shortage of fly ash in recent years, people involved in the pool industry said. John Ford, who owns his own pool company, Front2back Custom, and other builders blamed U.S. Environmental Protection Agency regulations for reducing the number of coal-burning plants, and said the problem was made worse during the COVID-19 pandemic when demand for pools boomed.

Austin attorney Michael Lovins said he is representing about 18 pool owners from Travis, Hays and Williamson counties in the multidistrict litigation lawsuit. It was not clear from the litigation whether pool owners from other Central Texas counties are included in the lawsuit.

"I'm not ready to say why it's a Central Texas problem because I'm still trying to figure it out," Lovins said. "The basic theory of the case is that the standard of care, meaning what a responsible company does that supplies aggregates, is to test the pH balance and that tells you if you need to add fly ash. I think at every step in the supply chain, the people in charge chose not to do a batch test of the pH balance."

Lovins said he has sued pool builders and cement providers for his clients.

"I have a few pools where I know the company is still in business but quite a few pools where the pool builder is out of business," he said. "I believe that ASR is a major factor for pool builders going out of business."

Mike Church, the president of Cody Pools, said pool builders at the time didn't know there was no fly ash in the concrete they received.

"None of us knew it was being cut," he said.

Cody Pools is not one of the defendants in the multidistrict litigation lawsuit.

Neeley Ramey sits beside the defective swimming pool at her Southwest Austin home. "I'm just sick over it," she says of the cracks in the pool.

Church said his theory, based on research by engineers, is that three to four quarries in the Bastrop area provided the sand and rocks that reacted with cement to cause ASR. He said the issue also involved three providers of shotcrete, which is concrete that is sprayed at a high velocity through a hose. A small number of Cody Pools were affected by ASR and the company has set up a response team to support affected customers and canceled contracts with the shotcrete providers involved in the cancer concrete issue, Church said.

The defendants in the multidistrict litigation that provided materials include Bastrop Sand Supply, Easy Mix Concrete Services, Travis Materials Group and Texas Lehigh Cement Co. None of their representatives or lawyers replied to a request for comment.

Easy Mix said in a court document that it was not responsible for any defects in pools because it purchased all its materials from Travis Materials and Texas Lehigh Cement Co.

Travis Materials and Texas Lehigh Cement Co. both said in cross-claims filed against Easy Mix that the material they provided to the concrete company was not defective.

"If any defect exists in the concrete formulated and manufactured by Easy Mix, the defect resulted from Easy Mix's faulty design and manufacture of the concrete," their claims said.

Part of the problem, Ford said, is that Texas pool builders are not required to be licensed. "It's the wild, wild West out there," he said. "Anyone can be a pool builder."

"Now I get quoted $150,000 to $170,000 just to rip the concrete out," says Neely Ramey, who paid $60,000 for her pool that is now cracking from "concrete cancer."

He said the only way to diagnose if a pool has ASR is to drill a core sample from the pool and take that to a lab to be analyzed. He said he has been providing the service for three years for $4,500.

There is no fix for ASR, and pools have to be demolished, Ford said.

"A lot of people want to put a Band-Aid on the outside of the pool, but what they don't understand is the pool isn't cracking from the outside in," he said. "ASR is forming capillaries on the inside, and those capillaries start deteriorating on the inside of the pool."

Lakeway resident AJ Miller said he started a Facebook page for pool owners with ASR after his pool was ruined by the problem. "My backyard went from my oasis to my hellhole," he said.

Miller said he estimates, based on responses to his Facebook page, that there are at least 1,000 Central Texas pool owners whose pools have ASR.

His advice to people who think they have ASR problems is to contact their pool builder, find out who the concrete maker was and what date the concrete was poured, Miller said. People interested in building pools should make sure their builders understand what ASR is, he said. Potential pool owners should ask to see a report of what is in the concrete mix, called the batch report, before the concrete is poured, Miller said.

Leander resident Sachin Patel said that when he first noticed cracks on the surface of his pool in early 2021, he wasn't concerned but started to worry later in the year when cracks appeared on the outside of the aboveground structure.

Sachin Patel holds a chunk of concrete that came off the side of his concrete pool. Patel said he probably cannot get his money back from the builder or the concrete maker because both are bankrupt.

His pool builder "kind of acknowledged" the pool had ASR in 2022, but the builder's insurance company said it didn't cover it, Patel said. He said he learned about ASR from Miller's Facebook page. Patel said his lawyers recently told him that he probably couldn't recover any money for his pool because the builder and the concrete supplier have gone bankrupt.

"I spent $73,000 in 2020 to build the pool and it has a spa," said Patel. "I think the same pool will cost $125,000 to $130,000 because of inflation."

He said he and his children are trying to make it through the summer by still using the pool that is leaking about half an inch of water per day.

Former Cedar Park Mayor Corbin Van Arsdale filed a lawsuit in July against pool builder Precision Watershapes and Easy Mix claiming that his pool was ruined by defects including ASR. Van Arsdale did not respond to a request for comment.

Precision Watershapes has not yet filed a response to Van Arsdale's lawsuit.

The company also was sued by several people in the multidistrict litigation lawsuit. Precision Watershapes said in response to one of those lawsuits that it was not responsible for the defects in the pool, according to a third-party petition. The defects were due to negligence by a concrete subcontractor, the petition said.

ASR is a huge financial stress for pool owners, said Lovins, the attorney.

Pool owners paid an average of $125,000 for a pool during the pandemic, but the cost to demolish it and rebuild is now about 2½ times more, he said.

"That's a ton of money unless you are Elon Musk," Lovins said. "People built these because it was sort of an escape and an oasis for family and kids, and now instead of having a place to laugh and play and have a good time, they have an empty hole in the ground they have to put a yellow fence around."

This article originally appeared on Austin American-Statesman: