Headlines at the World Socialist Web Site today:
1. Bernie Sanders’ AI letter: A bankrupt appeal to the oligarchs
On August 10, Senator Bernie Sanders sent a letter to Sam Altman of
OpenAI, Dario Amodei of Anthropic and Mark Zuckerberg of Meta demanding
that they “pause AI development” and “stop building machines that humans
cannot control,” promoting it with an accompanying video.
The
letter is characteristic of Sanders’ politics. It is full of demagogy
and empty rhetoric that educates no one about anything. It is calculated
to stoke fear, while covering up every basic question the technology
poses: Who owns it? Who controls it? In whose interests is it being
developed?
*****
On July 21, OpenAI disclosed that two of its models had broken out of
a test of their hacking abilities and attacked Hugging Face, the
company through which the world’s open AI models are distributed. The
models were being scored on a hacking benchmark. They determined that
the answer key was stored on Hugging Face’s servers, got themselves onto
the internet and took control of much of that company’s technical
infrastructure.
Clément Delangue, the cofounder of Hugging Face,
wrote that it “might be the first incident of its kind.” Michael Dalton
of OpenAI’s technical staff called it “a watershed moment for computer
security as an industry,” adding that “AI orchestrated, fully automated
offensive attacks are real now, and the actions we have discussed today
were an unintended side effect of running evaluations on frontier AI.”
Notably,
the direct cause of the OpenAI hack was a decision taken by the company
to test the models without the safeguards that would have prevented
this type of behavior, combined with insufficient oversight. OpenAI ran
the evaluation without the classifiers that stop its models from
carrying out attacks and stated that “these deployment safeguards were
intentionally not enabled during this evaluation.”
These attacks
were the product of the operations of the companies and their
contractors—evaluations outsourced to cut costs, systems rushed ahead of
rivals, safeguards treated as obstacles to the next funding round. The
incidents are serious, but what they indict is not the technology. It is
the corporations that own it, to whose good faith Sanders addresses his
appeal.
AI is currently dominated by the three billionaires to whom Sanders
writes, along with the Pentagon and the intelligence agencies. Sanders
does not challenge any of this. Indeed, he cites as an authority on the
danger of AI Trump’s CIA director, John Ratcliffe, who calls the
frontier models “akin to digital nuclear weapons” and “almost like a
doomsday device.” Ratcliffe added, in remarks Sanders does not quote,
that the United States is on “the right side of the equation” against
its foreign competitors. In citing the CIA as an authority, Sanders
accepts the premise: The “wrong hands” are the targets of American
imperialism.
Sanders does not mention how imperialism is currently using AI. While
he conjures up the specter of a future bioweapon, the technologies are
already killing. Palantir’s Maven Smart System—incorporating the Claude
model built by Anthropic—generated some 1,000 bombing targets in the
first 24 hours of the assault on Iran. The same class of systems has
been used by Israel in the genocide in Gaza.
Sanders is equally
silent on the social catastrophe underway. In the first seven months of
2026, US employers announced more than 477,000 job cuts, with AI the
leading cited reason for the fifth consecutive month. Automation is
striking directly at professional and intellectual labor, while studies
project the displacement of hundreds of millions of workers worldwide by
2030.
Instead of addressing any of this, Sanders appeals to the
conscience of the executives, urging them, “in the interest of
humanity,” to “stand by your words,” while he himself catalogues how
every safety commitment these companies made was abandoned the moment it
obstructed the race for market share, a race driven by the massive
speculative bubble in AI.
“If you do not take appropriate action now,” the letter concludes,
“my colleagues and I in the U.S. Senate will.” This is pure demagogy.
Neither Sanders nor the Senate and its assemblage of representatives of
the ruling class will do anything to challenge the oligarchic control of
AI.
2. Anglicare report shows deepening rental crisis for Australian workers and welfare recipients
The
report found almost no rental properties in the country were affordable
for low-income workers and those relying on meager government welfare
payments.
3. Australian war crimes whistleblower David McBride released from prison
McBride’s
release is welcome news, but the Labor government has maintained his
convictions and the precedent they seek to establish of preventing
whistleblowers from exposing war crimes.
4. Australia: Labor government tightens war-related powers over universities
As
in the US and Europe, a wartime-style atmosphere is being created,
backed by threats of punishment of researchers and universities that
fail to comply.
5. IG Metall union and works council toast brutal cuts at German steel plant
At
least 7,000 jobs are being destroyed in the Duisburg steel
industry—organised and enforced by IG Metall. The union apparatus and
its works council representatives cynically sell these brutal cuts as a
measure to secure jobs.
6. Sailor jumps overboard in suicide attempt on USS Abraham Lincoln
The USS Abraham Lincoln sailed from San Diego on November 21, 2025,
on what was initially presented as a Pacific deployment, less than a
year after it returned from a 162-day deployment in December 2024. It
was redirected to the Middle East and arrived in January, remaining in
the Arabian Sea to support US combat operations against Iran that began
on February 28.
By early August, Navy officials said the carrier
had logged 250 consecutive days at sea and had supported 40 continuous
days of combat operations in the Fifth Fleet region. The carrier has now
been deployed for more than eight months, with its originally
anticipated May return postponed and no publicly announced date for its
return home.
By contrast, aircraft carriers generally make a port call every 30 to
45 days for resupply, maintenance and crew rest. The Lincoln, however,
went much of its deployment without such calls. It had only a brief
visit to Guam in December, during which many sailors reportedly could
not disembark, and in early July for a short stop in Oman, where
personnel were restricted to a secure compound.
Sailors and family
members have reported food rationing, shortages of drinking water and
basic supplies, dysfunctional air conditioning, disrupted mail, long
workdays, limited time off and more than a week during which personnel
could not do laundry. Other accounts presented by families have included
moldy showers, broken toilets, no hot water for weeks and meals reduced
to half a cup of rice and two tortillas.
The Navy stated that its
leadership was “continuously conducting assessments to monitor and
sustain the psychological readiness of every sailor” and that more
mental health professionals were being sent to the carrier. Yet the
command’s refusal to disclose the number of attempted suicides or
self-harm incidents makes independent assessment impossible.
*****
The Lincoln’s crisis has revealed the real social character of the
imperialist war against Iran. The strategic aims of the conflict—an
effort to impose US dominance over the Middle East by military means—are
determined by the financial aristocracy while the cost is to be borne
by working class sailors, soldiers and their families.
*****
Speaking on Friday at the David S. Mack Center for Training and
Intelligence, a Nassau County police training facility in Garden
City/Uniondale, New York, Trump asserted, “After we finish defeating
Iran—which is being very badly defeated—pretty soon I’ll be declaring
the Hormuz Strait a territory of the United States.” Carrying out the
annexation of the Strait of Hormuz—something which US imperialism has
been planning for decades—requires a military campaign that will
sacrifice the lives of both American and Iranian military personnel in
the interests of the American oil monopolies and financial oligarchy.
7. Sri Lankan government rejects returning wartime military-occupied land
More
than a decade and a half has passed since the 26-year communal war
waged by successive Colombo governments against the LTTE ended, yet
thousands of acres of civilian land remains occupied by the military
forces and enclosed behind barbed-wire fences.
8. Johannes Stern on RT: Bogdan Syrotiuk convicted “for socialist thoughts”
Johannes
Stern, editor-in-chief of the German-language edition of the WSWS,
appeared live Friday on RT to discuss the campaign to free Bogdan
Syrotiuk, the 27-year-old Ukrainian Trotskyist sentenced to 15 years in
prison for his articles opposing the war.
*****
Stern told RT’s viewers that Bogdan
is a socialist
internationalist. He has opposed the Russian intervention. He opposes,
of course, the NATO war, the imperialist war against Russia... He has
put forward a socialist perspective, has called for the unity of
Ukrainian and Russian workers against the war. And that’s his crime. So
it’s basically a thought crime. It’s a frame-up. It’s a political case.
“He’s convicted for socialist thoughts, for an internationalist position opposing the war,” Stern said.
The
interview carried the case to an international television audience four
days after the Pervomaisk City District Court in Ukraine’s Nikolaev
region handed down the sentence. The leading Western newspapers,
broadcasters and wire services—from the New York Times and the Washington Post to
the BBC, CNN, Reuters and the Associated Press—have not reported the
verdict, or the case at any stage since his arrest in April 2024.
9. Three executions in a single day in America: Far more than a scheduling coincidence
There
has been little examination of who these men were, the brutality of
what took place, or the fact that the killings occurred amid the most
sweeping campaign of domestic and foreign repression in modern American
history.
10. US CEO pay surges to record highs
The
average CEO-to-worker pay ratio The median CEO-to-worker pay ratio in
2025 was 198 to one. A majority of S&P 500 CEOs received more in one
day than the median US worker earned during the entire year.
11. Australian and New Zealand students and youth demand freedom for Ukrainian socialist Bogdan Syrotiuk
“Bogdan
Syrotiuk has not committed any crime. He has been made a criminal
because of his opposition to both the war of the Putin regime against
Ukraine and the US-led proxy war against Russia.”
12. Colombian president sanctions US military operations amid earthquake disaster
Following
the deadly earthquake, the government’s response has been marked by
curfews, militarization and an invitation to foreign troops.
13. Trump’s DHS carried out vast spying operation against unions and left-wing groups in Minnesota
The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) conducted a sweeping domestic
spying operation against unions, left-wing organizations and opponents
of the Trump administration during the federal occupation of Minneapolis
and St. Paul, according to government documents reviewed by the New York Times and made public Thursday in a federal court filing.Undercover agents infiltrated meetings in churches, libraries, parks,
schools, restaurants and union halls. They secretly recorded political
discussions, entered encrypted Signal chats, collected license plate
numbers, and compiled dossiers containing names, photographs, home
addresses, employment and family information. Homeland Security
Investigations (HSI), the investigative arm of DHS, also used
administrative summonses to obtain years of financial records belonging
to national unions and nonprofit organizations without identifying any
underlying criminal conduct.
The dragnet was directed not at the
agents who murdered Renée Nicole Good and Alex Pretti, but at those who
protested their killings, the federal occupation of Minnesota and
Trump’s mass deportation operation.
*****
This is a modern-day version of the FBI’s Counterintelligence Program, or COINTELPRO.
From 1956 to 1971, federal agents infiltrated, disrupted and sought to
discredit the Communist Party, the Socialist Workers Party, civil rights
organizations and anti-war groups in the absence of any criminal
activity.
*****
The Minnesota dragnet is not an aberration. It is the implementation of NSPM-7, issued by Trump on September 25, 2025. HSI explicitly cited the memorandum as authority to open the case.
NSPM-7
orders federal agencies to investigate the “organized structures,
networks, entities, organizations, funding sources, and predicate
actions” behind vaguely defined political violence. It identifies
opposition to “traditional American views on family, religion and
morality” and to “support for law enforcement and border control” as
suspect motivations.
In other words, the memorandum turns
political disagreement with the fascist program of the White House into
evidence of potential “domestic terrorism.”
*****
The financial oligarchy is terrified by the growth of socialist
sentiment, mounting opposition to imperialist war and genocide, and
seething anger over levels of inequality without precedent in modern
American history. The most powerful oligarchs, including Elon Musk,
placed their money, media platforms and political influence behind
returning the fascist Trump to the White House after his failed January 6
coup. They require a massive assault on the working class and
democratic rights to defend their wealth and power.
14. Nine months after El Teniente disaster, report finds Chile’s state-owned giant ignored seismic warnings, concealed unsafe mining
The
Sernageomin report documents, in exhaustive technical detail, what
happens when the drive for profit is given priority over human life.
15. United Kingdom: East Midlands Railway workers continue strikes over safety faults with Hitachi fleet linked to Bedford crash
Rail workers have stepped in to enforce safety against the regulator and the Labour government.
16. Lively discussion at Socialist Equality Party (UK) public meetings on the collapse of Your Party
The
Socialist Equality Party (UK) has concluded a series of public
meetings, “Your Party's collapse—Time to build the Socialist Equality
Party”. Important discussions followed the opening report at each
meeting.
17. Forklift
accident leaves worker with “life-altering” injuries at General Motors
Flint Truck Assembly; workers told to keep line moving
According to a worker at the plant, the affected worker was 71 years old and had just signed her retirement papers last week.
18. Netanyahu rejects Trump’s Gaza plan, pursues Greater Israel agenda
Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has categorically rejected
the US disarmament roadmap for Gaza that President Donald Trump
described as “HISTORIC” and “monumental”.
Insisting that Israel
will not withdraw its armed forces until Hamas has completely disarmed,
Netanyahu made clear that the future he envisages for Gaza remains one
emptied of its Palestinian citizens through ethnic cleansing.
The
Israeli military’s three-year-long campaign has killed more than 73,300
Palestinians, at least two thirds of whom were women and children, while
an untold number have died from disease, malnutrition and lack of
medical treatment. Much of the 2.3 million population has been rendered
homeless.
Israel has transformed Gaza into a wasteland, destroying
agricultural land, water purification facilities, local markets,
communal food pantries, municipal infrastructure, roads, hospitals,
mosques, schools, universities and the social infrastructure on which
modern life depends. The remaining population has been made almost
entirely dependent on an aid infrastructure that Israel can turn on and
off at will to terrorize the Palestinians into submission.
Trump’s plan for Gaza, signed amid much fanfare at Sharm el-Sheikh in
October 2025, was never more than the official endorsement by Washington
and its European and Middle Eastern allies of an Israeli policy already
in operation—but with the US, not Israel, reaping the economic rewards
of the development of land seized. The arrangement would be partially
managed by some coalition of Arab powers to give it a more acceptable
face.
*****
Accepting Trump’s Gaza proposal would have exposed Netanyahu’s
long-promised “total victory” over Hamas and the Palestinians of Gaza as
a fiction, while enraging the far-right coalition partners on whom he
depends to remain in power after the October 27 elections. His Likud
bloc is trailing in the polls and his long-running corruption trial is
at a critical point.
Netanyahu’s position points to a strategy of
permanent war—not only against the Palestinians, but against Hezbollah
in Lebanon, Syria and Iran. His statement follows Israel’s de facto
rejection of a US-brokered Lebanon ceasefire and support for the
continuation of the US-led war against Iran.
Israel’s relentless
war flows from the logic of the Zionist state, founded on the expulsion
and dispossession of 750,000 Palestinians in 1948 and the refusal to
allow them or their descendants to return to their homes. This
established a political order dependent upon permanent confrontation
with its neighbours.
The Israeli state has consequently built much
of its political identity around the narrative of a permanent
existential threat. Any form of accommodation between Washington and
Tehran, however partial or temporary, would fundamentally undermine that
narrative.
Iran’s support for Hezbollah and Hamas has made it a
major obstacle to Israel’s regional ambitions, while removing Iran as a
regional power would facilitate Israel’s attempt to complete the
dispossession of the Palestinians and establish unchallenged regional
hegemony—described by Netanyahu as “redrawing the map of the Middle
East”. The Iranian threat has also provided successive Israeli
governments with a means of diverting attention from domestic crises,
deteriorating economic and social conditions and deep political
polarisation.
Israel has been able to pursue this strategy because
it can ultimately rely on Washington, which provides it with $3.8
billion a year in military aid and treats it as its principal regional
proxy. What unites them, despite repeated clashes, is a shared class
interest in crushing any Palestinian, Arab nationalist, Iranian or
working-class challenge to their domination of the world’s most
strategically vital, oil-rich region—a domination that Washington
regards as essential to preparing for confrontation with China.
19. Workers Struggles: Asia and Australia
Australia:
Striking allied health professionals rally outside Melbourne hospital
University of Sydney staff to strike for 24 hours
BHP Port Hedland mining workers hold two-day strike
Outsourced water workers strike in Victoria
Bangladesh:
Garment workers demand new wage board
Former Grameenphone employees demand settlement of long-running dues dispute
India:
Haryana power workers call off planned three-day strike
Gurugram municipal workers extend strike
Assam National Institute of Technology workers stage hunger strike
New Delhi sanitation workers protest sewer and septic-tank deaths
Tamil Nadu Exide contract workers protest for wage increase
Sri Lanka:
Grama Niladhari officers hold two-day sick-leave strike
20. Free Ukrainian socialist and anti-war activist, Bogdan Syrotiuk!
Bogdan Syrotiuk
The
fight for the Ukrainian socialist and anti-war activist's freedom is an
essential component of the struggle against imperialist war, genocide,
dictatorship and fascism.
