Germany's Merz Admits "Disaster" After AfD Victory As CDU Crash Out Of State Parliament

America's Next Military Contractors Could Be Hackers Washington may soon outsource part of its cyberwarfare operations to private companies, according to a new report from Bloomberg.  Language tucked into the Senate’s 2027 defense bill would create a pilot program allowing the Pentagon to hire outside cybersecurity firms to penetrate computer networks chosen by the US military. Contractors would operate under US Cyber Command and Pentagon supervision. Bloomberg writes that the authority would initially be relatively narrow. Private operators could establish access to targeted networks, but the Senate language stops short of authorizing...

Saudi Arabia At The Breaking Point Authored by Larry C. Johnson via Sonar 21, For most of this war, Saudi Arabia has been the shock absorber of the world oil market. When Hormuz closed, Riyadh pushed crude west through the East-West pipeline to Yanbu on the Red Sea and kept at least part of its exports moving. That bypass is now under attack. Ansar Allah has seized islands at the mouth of the Red Sea, declared a "maritime ban" on Saudi shipping and claimed strikes on Saudi airports, and in September...

"Emergencies" Requiring Coal Plants To Stay Open Need Not Be Imminent, DOE Tells Court By Ethan Howland of UtilityDive The U.S. Department of Energy’s secretary has broad authority under the Federal Power Act to declare emergencies to keep power plants from retiring, and those emergencies don’t have to be imminent, DOE told a federal appeals court last week in response to challenges over its orders keeping a Michigan coal plant online. “The statute’s text grants the Secretary discretion to determine that an emergency exists,” DOE said in a March 17 brief...