Harlan Crow Maxed Out Campaign Donations to John Fetterman

Harlan Crow Maxed Out Campaign Donations to John Fetterman (Laura)

The author writes, “Billionaire Republican megadonor Harlan R. Crow gave the maximum allowed contribution to the campaign for Sen. John Fetterman, D-Pa., according to a new filing with the Federal Election Commission [last] Wednesday. Crow — magnate of a Texas real estate empire, longtime Republican donor, and past dual citizen of St. Kitts and Nevis — has come under increased scrutiny in recent years after ProPublica reported that he financed luxury travel for and bought property from conservative Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, who did not disclose the dealings. Crow also reportedly paid tuition for Thomas’s grandnephew at a private boarding school in Georgia.” 

ICE Shared Medicaid Data It Wasn’t Supposed To Have With Palantir (Sean)

The author writes, “After Medicaid officials improperly shared data about millions of people in January with immigration officials, ICE then shared that data with the data analytics firm Palantir, according to new court filings. Palantir operates an app called ELITE that is used by ICE agents to show the addresses of noncitizens who may be subject to deportation. That revelation was made public in a motion filed Thursday by more than 20 Democratic attorneys general who sued the Trump administration last year over its data-sharing agreement between the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services and ICE.”

Generative AI Is an Engineering Disaster (Bethany)

From The Atlantic: “The problem with generative AI, in the industry’s own jargon, is that it does not scale. The cost of growing from, say, a thousand users to a million is a key factor that venture capitalists examine when they evaluate start-ups. They want to see that the cost of adding each new user decreases over time, so that the company can support millions of users and make increasing profits. This is achieved partly through the careful engineering of computer systems that can efficiently handle more users who want to post photos, hail Ubers, or stream music. With generative AI, the work of building efficient, scalable systems has not been done. And the problem is exacerbated by the ever-larger generative-AI models, which have grown from 175 billion parameters in 2020 to more than 1 trillion today.”

Molten Salt and Human Sweat: The Weird Batteries That Could Store Renewable Energy (Reader Jim)

From The Guardian: “As traditional lithium-ion batteries push boundaries in size and scale, alternative battery types could provide the same vital role in harnessing low-carbon energy — but without the scramble for critical minerals such as lithium, cobalt and nickel that have raised concerns for environmental protection and vulnerable communities.” 

Here’s How Your Peanut Butter Jar — And Nearly Everything Else — Can Be Recycled (Dana)

The author writes, “Judging from my inbox, Climate Coach readers have a burning question: Do I need to clean my peanut butter jar before I recycle it? You may laugh. But the peanut butter jar — sticky, messy and, for the recycling inclined, guilt-inducing — represents what’s vexed and broken about our recycling system.”

Hairy Situation: Washington Biologists Using Hair Snare Corrals To Study Black Bear Population (Reader Steve)

From The Spokesman-Review: “There’s nothing fancy about the corrals wildlife biologists use to snag bear hair. All it takes is two strands of barbed wire and a few trees that happen to have grown in convenient spots. In the middle, they make a pile of branches and small logs and soak it in something rancid. The Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife uses a mixture of cattle blood and fish oil. It goes like this: A bear catches a whiff and decides it has to know more. It figures out that the stench is coming from the wood pile, so it climbs over or through the fence, paying no mind to the sharp barbs plucking off bits of its hair. Once it discovers the odor was a ruse, the bear will leave. Its hair, however, will stay on the barbs until someone shows up to collect it.”