Links 7/4/2026 | naked capitalism

Dorm Life Forever? The Problem with Micro-Living JSTOR (Micael T)

This spray-on powder can stop life-threatening bleeding in 1 second Science Daily (Kevin W)

Climate/Environment

Record sea temperatures in June push world into ‘uncharted’ waters Financial Times

Scientists fear seabird die-off as El Niño looms: ‘We don’t know how bad this will get’ Guardian

Plankton Decline Across the North East Atlantic Signals Failing Ocean Health Eco Magazine

In India’s Mountains, Climate Change Is Rewriting the Map of Disease Health Policy Watch

‘We are screwed’: People near data centers dread heat wave pollution Politico

Extreme weather is affecting AI: global AI data centers face threats from extreme heat Gelonghui Finance

China?

China’s housing market free-falls as buyers wait for floor prices Asia Times

Why the West Still Can’t Decode China’s Rise Arnaud Bertrand, Beijing Review (Chuck L)

China Second-Half Outlook: AI Supercycle Cuts Into the K-Shaped Economy Citigroup

Exclusive-Inside Taiwan’s nightmare scenario: Chinese blockade, earthquake, sabotage and invasion Global Banking and Finance

Japan

Traders Plot Worst-Case Scenario for Yen If Crisis Hits Japan Times

Africa

Record number of people displaced into neighbouring countries as Sudan conflict marks three years Oxfam

Expanding conflict drives record hunger in northern Nigeria Arab News

South of the Border

Cubans face endless blackouts, collapsing salaries and empty shops – but they’re refusing to give up Sky

Israel makes another move on the westrrn hemishere Venezualanalysis (Robin K)

‘It was a massacre’: Haiti gangs carry out mass killings across the country Guardian

European Disunion

EU Court of Justice allows criminal prosecution for reposting RT videos — judgement TASS. Micael T: “We must go to war with Putler to defend our freedom to criminal prosecution for listening to other news!”

German workers banned from taking sick leave without a medical note in tough reforms. Independent

Not everyone can act like sick ministers Aftonbladet via machine translation. Micael T: “About sickness benefit day. If you fall ill you deduct a certain percentage from you salary for 1-many days. Not ministers though. The rules of neoliberalism in action.”

Old Blighty

Keir Starmer suggests Andy Burnham borrow billions for defence Guardian (Kevin W)

Bank of England to push ahead with plan to limit hedge fund leverage Financial Times

Bankers and unions set for clash over possible Burnham tax raid on UK banks Guardian

Defaults on credit cards and other loans have hit the highest level since the financial crisis as British households struggle to make ends meet This is Money

Exclusive: British Museum made false claims about its removal of ‘Palestine’ from displays Middle East Eye

Old British fridges ‘cannot cope with the heat’ BBC

Balkans

Flamingos, Jared Kushner, and Albania’s fight against Trump’s Resorts openDemocracy (Robin K)

Israel v. The Resistance

🔴The IDF’s Yellow Line in Gaza has shifted again, despite the so-called “ceasefire.” Since it came into effect, the IDF’s effective control has expanded from 53% to up to 70% of the Gaza Strip. Almost all of Gaza’s population is forced into less than a third of its territory🧵 pic.twitter.com/iOUCvHYpvQ

— Breaking the Silence (@BtSIsrael) July 2, 2026

Explaining the Numbers in Gaza Karen Kwaitkowski. Important. A well-supported analysis that concludes that “well over a million” Gazans have died in Israel’s genocide.

Jewish-American orthopedic surgeon Dr. Mark Perlmutter, says he witnessed the aftermath of Israeli soldiers tying two Palestinian children’s hands behind their backs and burying them alive at Nasser Hospital, their cries silenced beneath the dirt. pic.twitter.com/UZbl4IXzzc

— Ramy Abdu| رامي عبده (@RamAbdu) July 1, 2026

Israel Exposed War Crimes Archive (guurst)

CENTCOM states that this air defense coordination cell was established in January, but it’s worth noting that by January of 2025 (not 2026), this regional construct was already having meetings at Fort Campbell. In fact, this coordination cell with Arab nations began forming back… https://t.co/2ZiM63p4S9 pic.twitter.com/LaiQFlKC9s

— barry with the NED (@bonzerbarry) July 1, 2026

Palestinian goalkeeper killed by Israel in Gaza as Fifa faces fresh calls to act Middle East Eye (resilc)

* * *

⚓️ Something Stupid This Way Comes

The USS Boxer has finally arrived, carrying another Marine Expeditionary Unit to augment the MEU attached to the USS Tripoli.

Including US Army units in the region, the US now has maybe 10k combat effectives with which to do something stupid. https://t.co/VzdXUjiuwO

— Will Schryver (@imetatronink) July 1, 2026

* * *

The Grand Bargain Is Ending Brandon Weichert

How Florida’s Cuban Diaspora and the Israeli Lobby Came Together — and Are Coming Apart Intercept (resilc)

Huckabee: Israel ‘the 436th congressional district’ of US Responsible Statecraft (Kevin W)

Russia and China were quietly taking over helium markets. Then Iran blew them up for everyone else Kevin Walmsley (guurst)

From Mohamed A-Bukhai @kwnn_yemen on Twitter (hat tip Chuck L). Twitter not allowing embedding “Visibility limited: this Post may violate X’s rules against Violent Speech”. Click through for full tweet.

Translated from ArabicFinal Warning Message to the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia:

This is the last chance, and it cannot tolerate any delay or hesitation. Our people’s patience has run out, and there is no longer room for the situation to continue as it is….

Saudi Arabia is evading the obligations of peace in Yemen and is blaming Washington, claiming that our support and stance on Gaza is the reason for the obstruction

We say clearly: Our options are open, and we will not stand idly by if Washington and Riyadh continue this maneuvering

To everyone who takes measures to restrict our people in their livelihood, the equation of bank for bank, airport for airport, and port for port has not been canceled, and this game will not continue, and our people will not submit to economic blackmail and will confront and thwart all conspiracies

We will impose the equation of an eye for an eye and a siege for a siegeAnd airport for airport

We warn you: Saudi airspace is approaching complete closure 🔥

New Not-So-Cold War

John Mearsheimer: The End of Russian Restraint & New U.S. Grand Strategy Glenn Diesen, YouTube

John Helmer: Ukraine Is Becoming a FIRING PLATFORM WITHOUT Any People Dialogue Works, YouTube

The NY Times Lies About Russian and Ukrainian Casualties Sonar 21 (Kevin W)

Georgia’s only oil refinery said Wednesday that it plans to stop processing Russian crude by the end of this summer in order to avoid being hit by European sanctions Moscow Times

Imperial Collapse Watch

Text – S.4367 – 119th Congress (2025-2026): Hot Rotisserie Chicken Act Library of Congress (resilc)

TRUMP’S $1BN CRYPTO FORTUNE, VANCE-TRUMP RIFT & TUCKER TO MAKE OWN PARTY — w/ Robert Barnes YouTube. Barnes: “Most corrupt in American history.” Vikas S: “Plugged-in people know this, but the details are damning.”

New Poll: Nearly Half of Americans Don’t Know What America’s 250th Is Celebrating Cato. resilc: “Isn’t it Amazon Prime week??”

We became the late 18th Century British. What now? Responsible Statecraft (resilc)

How Many People Have Ever Lived in the United States? Davis Fetz (resilc)

The Pitfalls of a ‘Middle Ground’ Strategy Daniel Larison

Trump 2.0

Trump refuses to renew US-Canada-Mexico trade pact he once championed Guardian

Air Force major arrested after calling for Trump impeachment outside Capitol The Hill (resilc)

U.S. Olympic canoeist David Hearn charged with damaging Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool NBC (Kevin W)

Federal nuclear agency moves to relax radiation exposure rules Washington Post

Our No Longer Free Press

Public Opinion: Cornered by the Many, Controlled by the Few Finn Andreen (Micael T)

Economy

The world is lurching from one economic crisis to the next. What should we expect from our government? Guardian

Global monetary tightening and the fragility behind it ODI Global

U.S. adds just 57,000 jobs in June, a worrying sign as wage growth remains slow NBC

Mr. Market Needs a Therapist

Yet another ‘quant tremor’ strikes systematic investors Financial Times

AI Bubble Fears Grow as Michael Burry, Top Economists Sound Alarm FirstPost

AI Debt Deluge Makes Credit Market Look Safer While Masking Risk Bloomberg

AI hopes and fears dominate global central bank meet Reuters

Retail dip-buying is reaching historic extremes:

Average daily equity purchases by retail investors during S&P 500 down days are running at nearly 3.5 times the daily average seen since 2020, the highest on record.

This is +56% higher than during the meme stock mania in 2021.… pic.twitter.com/4Mj6406C6F

— The Kobeissi Letter (@KobeissiLetter) July 2, 2026

AI

The AI Race Nobody Can Win Foreign Affairs. Robin K: “Toward the end when the discussion turns to corporate governance, bubbles, inflation, and central banks, things seem to go wobbly.”

Watching this full 18-minute interview with Palantir CEO, Alex Karp is enough to teach you more about Ai than any institution would ever teach you: pic.twitter.com/DuaI1yYSXI

— ₕₐₘₚₜₒₙ (@hamptonism) July 1, 2026

Programmer “Productivity”: CHART OF THE DAY Brad DeLong. Important tidbit at the top of how the “The brand-new VW ElectricMicroBus that replaces the 22-year-old Subaru” makes driving more difficult.

Claude Helped a Hacker Find a Way to Issue Tickets to Almost Every US Music Festival Wired (resilc)

Ambani-Trump Jr. investigation encountered a Google AI surprise ProPublica. “Google, the proprietor of the world’s primary research tool, has rolled out AI Overviews that can indiscriminately take in fake material and authoritatively spit it back out as real.” (Kevin W).

The Bezzle

SpaceX Is Junk. That’s What the Bond Market Says Bloomberg

S2 Capital dissolves $400M first fund with “no return of capital” TheRealDeal (albrt)

Private Credit Keeps $14 Billion Trapped in Bid to Outlast Storm Bloomberg

What Private Credit Is, and Why Investors Are So Worried About It New York Times (resilc)

Guillotine Watch

Police hunt Ukrainian woman over Monaco bombing Agence France-Presse

Musk demanded proof people died from USAID cuts. He got it — and lost it. Judd Legum

Class Warfare

Inside the Luddite Festival Harnessing Gen Z’s Rage Against Big Tech Wired (resilc)

The Fun Shortage Is Real, and It’s Making America Miserable Bloomberg

We Crunched the Data: There’s a Grocery Price Emergency in America New York Times (resilc)

Average New Car Prices Hit Record High Of $51,974, But People Are Still Rushing To Buy Them Jalopnik (resilc)

This Is RUINING the Trades… YouTube (resilc)

Antidote du jour (Tracie H):

And a bonus (Chuck L):

Dude is rock climbing when a mountain goat casually pulls up beside him. Honestly insane that these animals just live like this. pic.twitter.com/UBblWGGhLi

— Dudes Posting Their W’s (@DudespostingWs) June 30, 2026

A second bonus:

He was so fancy for no reason 😂 pic.twitter.com/pMRAp6zmuO

— Nature Unedited (@NatureUnedited) June 30, 2026

And a third:

❤️🤣🤣 pic.twitter.com/nsf8YKJEhc

— The Figen (@TheFigen_) July 1, 2026

See yesterday’s Links and Antidote du Jour here