Former Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) organizer Jake Altman argues that over the past 10-15 years, the organization has transformed from a relatively pragmatic working-class social-democratic group into a much more radical movement driven by younger activists and open to more extreme ideas.
He describes internal pressure against dissenters, increasing openness to communism, and a demographic shift toward younger and more affluent, less experienced, and more radical members during an interview with The Free Press.
“When I joined in 2013, it was much more social democratic. It was very old, very white. In 2015 in Boston, it was a few older men and I who were the core of the old DSA chapter,” Altman explained. “It is night and day between DSA in even 2015 and now. It went from this, like you say, pretty moderate social-political group to a cultural juggernaut that it is today.”
“By 2014, a group called the Left Caucus was formed that advanced a lot of extreme views.”
“There were debates at the time about how much Leninism do we want to let into DSA. And these people, they eroded any resistance and any core of anti-communism that remained within DSA. Anti-communism became forbidden, right? This is a big evil thing, to be an anti-communist.”
“And you can’t hold this view without running all the old people who experienced the 20th century out of the organization. And I think that had to have been part of the calculus, that they didn’t want any internal resistance,” he said. “And so there were instances where people were – I think efforts were made to silence people who dissented.”
“I can speak from personal experience that if you dissent, there will be efforts to silence you. They use mob tactics, basically,” he said. “So if you speak out, they will coordinate and a bunch of people will jump on you and denounce you, smear you behind your back, do whatever it takes to try to discredit you if you speak out against them.”
“There was a local union in Ann Arbor who said it’s too far to vandalize and intimidate public officials, vandalize their homes and intimidate them. That is too far,” Altman said
“Immediately they received a swarm of people online responding to that statement, essentially saying, ‘You’re supporting genocide. Shame on you.’ Trying to turn their members against them and stir up animosity towards them with the effort of silencing them.”
“DSA itself makes a distinction – an important distinction – between paper members, who are people who give the organization their credit card and never come to a meeting, and cadre, who are hardcore activist members who show up to all the meetings and do all the work,” he said. “The cadre are incredibly radical. The paper members might be, you know, think AOC and Bernie Sanders are great and let’s get Medicare for All.”
US Fires On Ship Attempting To Break Iran Blockade, Amid Several Regional Maritime Attacks
Despite what are clearly ongoing attacks on international vessels in regional waters, suddenly mediators are feeling optimism again, and decided to float another apparent round of pre-US market open headlines suggesting peace could return.
Though there’s as yet no evidence of this, the Pakistani Defense Minister has signaled that the US and Iran are close to some agreement and that the situation is moving towards peace. Oil prices promptly plummeted ahead of market open. Pakistan’s interior minister Mohsin Raza Naqvi, has also just arrived in Tehran for talks with Iranian officials amid going mediation efforts, according to Iran’s Mehr news agency.
This came ironically just as reports of more serious shipping incidents, at least one of them deadly, emerged in regional waters, but perhaps the brief ‘peace is near’ headline redux had its intended effect on markets.
And significantly, the US is clearly still enforcing its military blockade of Iranian ports – and so no, the warring sides do not seem ‘close’ to a return to deal-making, instead the ground reality is quite the opposite:
US forces reportedly fired on a Panama-flagged ship that attempted to run the American blockade of Iranian ports early Tuesday, according to WSJ citing a US official.
“A U.S. military helicopter fired at the rudder of the ship after its crew ignored warnings from American personnel working to enforce the naval blockade of Iran’s ports, the official said,” The Wall Street Journal details:
“There were no immediate reports of any casualties in the incident, which took place before dawn on Tuesday. The U.S. official said the ship appeared to be attempting to transfer its crew to another civilian vessel after the attack,” the report adds.
There’s been a major deadly attack on a commercial ship in the Red Sea and Bab al-Mandeb Strait region off Yemen on Tuesday, amid the ongoing escalation against Saudi shipping by the Houthis.
Yemen’s internationally recognized government has announced that at least three people have been killed in a Houthi attack on an unidentified commercial ship in the Bab al-Mandeb Strait, however there’s been no immediate confirmation forthcoming from the Houthis themselves.
The small vessel has been identified as the Tanzania-flagged Tihamah, and reports say this marks the first deaths from Houthi maritime attacks since the start of the Iran war in February.
According to emerging details in Reuters via maritime monitors:
UK Maritime Trade Operations said it had been informed that a cargo vessel off the coast of al-Mokha, Yemen, had been hit by an unknown projectile, resulting in casualties.
British maritime security company Ambrey said the ship was reportedly targeted and damaged by the Houthis, killing three crew members, while at anchor 3.3 nautical miles northeast of Perim Island, Yemen.
Two Pakistanis and one Indonesian person were killed as the ship sailed from Salalah in Oman via Djibouti, the Yemeni sources said. After the attack, the crew lost control of the ship and were approached by Yemeni coast guard, they added.
And yet the stricken vessel does not appear to be Saudi-owned or operated, which could signal that the Houthis are expanding their siege of the waterway to include all foreign vessels and not just Saudi and Israeli-linked ones.
Further east, UKMTO also received a report of an incident involving a container ship and military forces in the Gulf of Oman.
If this alleged incident which is closer to the Persian Gulf and Strait of Hormuz is confirmed, it would likely be a directly Iranian-linked incident. WSJ details that “maritime security firm Vanguard reported that a Panama-flagged containership called Vela Nova was struck by a missile fired from a helicopter while transiting westbound through the Gulf of Oman about 71 nautical miles from the coast of Pakistan.”
“The missile struck the vessel, causing a fire that was subsequently extinguished,” said Vanguard, noting that all 17 crewmembers are accounted for.
Since joining the regional conflict on Iran’s side, the Houthis – which have long been seen as proxies of Tehran, have attacked dozens of vessels after declaring their “siege for siege” operations against Saudi Arabia.
Overnight Developments
Iran’s new supreme leader, Khamenei’s son Mojtaba, is putting his own stamp on the country’s national-security policy amid a confrontation with the U.S. that could last months or even years. In a sweeping overhaul of the government’s top echelon on Sunday and Monday, Iran named seasoned hard-liners to run the country’s security policies and institutions of repression. WSJ
Persian Gulf energy producers are concluding that Iran’s control over the Strait of Hormuz will become permanent, disrupting their oil and gas exports and global energy supplies indefinitely. The problem is they worry the alternative—going back to war—would be worse. WSJ
There was a maritime incident reported in Bab al-Mandab, with Fars reporting that a Saudi ship was reportedly targeted by the Yemeni army. In other news,
Yemeni sources said a second missile targeted a ship while the coast guard was rescuing its crew in Bab al-Mandab.
The UKMTO has received a report of an incident involving a tanker and military forces in the Gulf of Oman.
Iranian Foreign Minister Araghchi said the world should hold the US accountable for the Hormuz block, while Hormuz security requires end to US aggression, according to Fars News Agency.
Yemen military source said government forces launched a concentrated attack on militia positions in Harib, Shabwa, according to Al Arabiya.
Explosions reported in Yemen’s Marib, according to SNN.
Lebanon and Israel are expected to hold the next round of talks in early September, according to Al-Arabiya.
Israeli forces conducted new strikes in southern Lebanon, according to SNN.
Fauci Privately Flagged Miscarriage Risk Before Telling Pregnant Women There Were ‘No Red Flags’
Newly disclosed text messages show Dr. Anthony Fauci privately entertained the possibility that the COVID-19 vaccine could trigger first-trimester miscarriages, months before he told the public there was no risk.
The messages come from atrove that Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) and Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wis.) released, containing more than 34,000 texts and 522 voicemails the Senate Homeland Security Committee pulled from Fauci’s government-issued phone. Among the trove is a January 2021 text chain between Fauci, Dr. Vivek Murthy and Dr. Rochelle Walensky, who went on to serve as the Biden administration’s surgeon general and CDC director, in which the three officials worked through how the vaccine’s risks might interact with pregnancy.
On Jan. 25, Murthy opened the thread with a question. “For pregnant women considering getting the vaccine, are you aware of any data or theoretical reason why vaccinating early vs late in pregnancy would be preferred? And any sense of when there will be more robust data on vaccine risk in pregnant women?”
Walensky noted that more than 15,000 pregnant women had already enrolled in the CDC’s V-safe vaccine safety monitoring system. Fauci wrote there “are no data or theoretical reason to believe that vaccinating early versus later in pregnancy would be preferred.” He also flagged a caveat that would later look prescient. “Yet, some people (even female health care professionals) feel concerned about injecting a ‘genetic’ vaccine very early in pregnancy,” he wrote.
Nearly two hours passed before Fauci circled back with something he had not mentioned the first time. “I asked around a bit more and another issue came up that you need to be aware of,” he wrote. “Since many people have significant cytokines storm and fever after the 2nd dose, this theoretically could be associated with miscarriage in the 1st trimester.”
NEW: Dr. Fauci was concerned in January 2021 that the second dose of the COVID shot “theoretically could be associated with miscarriage in the 1st trimester.” @SenRandPaul and I released the texts between Anthony Fauci, Rochelle Walensky, and Vivek Murthy below.
Walensky’s response left little doubt the group treated the concern as legitimate. Fauci’s point about the first trimester was “definitely a good point, [especially] after dose two,” she wrote back.
None of that made it into Fauci’s public messaging. On Feb. 3, 2021, during a Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) question-and-answer livestream, he told viewers the FDA had “found thus far, and we have to be careful, but thus far no red flags about that, about pregnant women.” Months later, while serving as the Biden White House’s chief medical adviser, he went further, telling the public that tens of thousands of pregnant women tracked by the CDC after vaccination showed “no indication whatsoever” of increased adverse issues compared with unvaccinated pregnant women. “It’s pretty clear that pregnant women should get vaccinated,” he said.
Fauci on August 30, 2021: “it’s really one of those things that’s kind of not a close call. It really is pretty clear that pregnant women should get vaccinated.”
The texts also show the three officials weighing vaccine risk against the risk of the virus itself while worrying about how competing health authorities were muddying their message. On Jan. 26, 2021, Murthy told Fauci and Walensky he was “surprised to see WHO put out a strong [statement] saying they do not recommend moderna [sic] in pregnant women,” calling it “a strong statement to make and potentially quite damaging to public confidence among pregnant women.” Public confidence kept surfacing as the metric that mattered most to the group, even as the underlying science remained unsettled in their own private assessment.
Paul and Johnson said the phone the committee obtained lists only three contacts, and cautioned it is “too early to determine whether any data has been deleted.” Paul referred Fauci for prosecution earlier this month over his refusal to testify before the Homeland Security Committee. Asked Monday whether he had discussed potential prosecution of Fauci with Attorney General Todd Blanche or DC US Attorney Jeanine Pirro, President Trumptold reporters, “I have not spoken to them about that, no.”
Fauci invoked his Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination during a July 29 hearing covering the pandemic and federally funded gain-of-function research. After the hearing, Paul and Johnson said they had obtained a forensic copy of Fauci’s phone along with emails showing health officials had requested deletion of some records.
Johnsonsaid Monday on Fox News’ America Reports that the committee has invited Fauci for a transcribed interview. “He’s been quoted as saying he’s not afraid of congressional oversight. He’ll talk to any oversight committee; he’s got nothing to hide,” Johnson said, noting that Fauci’s attorneys have been in contact. He called Fauci “the only guy that can answer some of these questions” and warned, “If they don’t set that up voluntarily, I will subpoena him.”
China’s Unitree Robotics IPO 5,526 Times Oversubscribed By Retail Investors
Unitree Robotics’ initial public offering was heavily oversubscribed (5,526 times) by retail investors as China’s first publicly traded humanoid robotics company prepares to enter the public markets. The IPO will help usher in physical AI to the equity market.
The Hangzhou-based humanoid robot maker raised about 6.1 billion yuan, or $904 million, after selling 40.4 million shares at 150.8 yuan each, according to Bloomberg.
The offering values Unitree at roughly 61 billion yuan, or $9 billion, ahead of its expected STAR Market debut this month. The IPO will make the firm China’s first publicly traded humanoid robot manufacturer.
Top investors soaked up about 20% of the offering, including AI startup DeepSeek, a Tencent-affiliated investment vehicle, and investment arms linked to CNPC, China Southern Power Grid, and China Telecom. DeepSeek was allocated a 2.31% stake.
China Dominates The Humanoid Robot Race. Can Trump Close The Gap?
It should surprise no one that new data from Smart Analytics Global, cited by Bloomberg, shows that Chinese humanoid robot makers accounted for a staggering 97% of global shipments in the first half of 2026.
The figures come as the Trump administration increasingly recognizes that humanoids will be critical to the emerging physical AI era, creating an urgent need to build out America’s robot supply chain, including motors, actuators, sensors, batteries, and AI models.
via Barclays.
Smart Analytics Global said global humanoid shipments tripled to 19,100 units in the first half from 5,100 a year earlier. The research firm expects deliveries to reach roughly 60,000 this year and climb to 500,000 by 2030.
The estimates are similar to those from major institutional research desks, including UBS, whose most bullish forecast projects nearly 400,000 global deliveries by the end of the decade.
via UBS.
Our latest notes dissecting the humanoid robot value chain and examining how to profit from the key companies that manufacture critical components, such as motors and actuators, find that many of these companies are based in Asia, more specifically in China.
China’s dominance on humanoids reflects years of policy support and government funding aimed at accelerating robotics, drones, electric vehicles, and much more. The country’s progress was on display at the World AI Conference in Shanghai last month, where dozens of companies demonstrated rapid advances in dexterity, speed, and autonomous capabilities.
The US recently banned imports of new Chinese humanoid and quadruped robots, as well as certain components, citing national security concerns and cybersecurity risks to AI infrastructure.
The Trump administration has yet to release a standalone executive order specifically aimed at supercharging the domestic humanoid robotics industry, but we expect that could be coming.
I’ve been putting together a new course for Trust Insights, AI for Writing (and Writers), which will be coming out August 25th, and during the process of creating that course, I realized I’ve never walked through setting up a discount agentic AI system.
For a while now, many of us who work in “corporate” have had access to what feels like unlimited amounts of AI (though that free ride is coming to an end at enterprise shops thanks to absurdly large bills). For the average person who doesn’t have the backing of a corporation, how could we tap into the power of agentic systems without tapping out our wallets?
“have you done a video or post with recommendations for a cheap second computer set up someone can use to build their separate AI machine?“
So this week, let’s get scrappy.
Warnings, Disclaimers, Disclosures
If you work at a company, please check with IT before installing software willy-nilly. As a former IT professional, we thank you.
Second, in this issue I’ll be talking about Chinese-made AI models like Qwen and DeepSeek. There is a HUGE difference between a Chinese model hosted by a company in the People’s Republic of China (PRC), and a Chinese-made model hosted by a company outside the PRC.
It is manifestly unsafe to use any AI models hosted in the PRC for any kind of confidential information, period. Totally fine to use those models for things that are completely public, like research requests.
However, it is completely safe to use Chinese-made AI models on your own hardware, or in an infrastructure that’s trustworthy. There are many, many great inference providers that have things like Zero Data Retention (ZDR) hosting which are even safer to use than Big Tech models because the providers warrant that they don’t keep your data at all. (Most Big Tech providers have a “we hold onto your data for 30 days to prevent abuse” clause in their Terms of Service)
There is a lot of fear mongering about open weights models (including the Chinese ones) happening right now because Big Tech providers’ profits are on the line if these models continue to offer parity of capabilities at a fraction of the cost. Don’t believe the hype; open weights models are so safe that companies like HuggingFace have used them to do their own cybersecurity defenses.
Third, where I have commercial relationships, I’ll disclose them. I have an Amazon affiliate link in this week’s article, and obviously I work for my company, Trust Insights. I do not have a financial interest in the other companies mentioned as of the time of writing. (but I’m happy to, call me)
Part 1: The Model
We’ll begin our tour with what model to use. In general, you want models that are a blend of cost efficient with effective performance. One of my favorite sites for this is Artificial Analysis; there’s a nice little grid on their models page that shows cost versus intelligence. What we’re looking for in this grid is models that are at the top left corner – the vertical (y) axis is brains, where higher is better, and the horizontal (x) axis is cost, where to the left is lower.
The current winner here is DeepSeek V4 Flash 0731, which has a crazy low cost and lots of brains, on par with OpenAI’s newest model, GPT-5.6 Luna. On the far right is Claude Opus 5, which has about 15% more brains but 40x the cost. The worst quadrant to be in is the lower right – high cost, low brains.
For the purposes of building the cheapest agentic system, DeepSeek is going to be your daily driver model.
DeepSeek V4 Flash outcompetes all but the most recent releases of OpenAI’s models over the years; it is almost 50% smarter than last summer’s flagship model, GPT-5, and is only 17% less capable than OpenAI’s current flagship model.
DeepSeek V4 Flash is about on parity with Claude Opus 4.7 – which came out in April 2026, a scant FOUR MONTHS AGO.
Now, times change, tech changes, and what you should be doing is checking in on these kinds of charts over time to see which model is closest to that top left corner. This month, it’s DeepSeek V4 Flash. Next month, it might be completely different. It’s our responsibility to keep up with the charts and use the cheapest, best brains we can get a hold of.
Now that we know what model we’re aiming to use, we have to figure out where to use it.
Part 2: The Host
Just like web hosting companies host websites, model hosting companies – called inference providers – host models. There are so, so many of these out there, and they compete mainly on two things, speed and price. Some providers charge a premium but generate results (tokens per second) at ridiculous speeds, like Cerebras. Others offer a wide variety of models at slower speeds but are cheap (like DeepInfra).
Choosing a provider is straightforward: because you’ve decided the model already, it’s a question of pricing and availability. In Google AI Mode, modify this prompt to suit your needs:
Help me create a list of inference providers that match these criteria. First and most important, they MUST offer this exact model: {model}. This is immutable and non-negotiable; a provider that does not offer this model does not make the list. Second, identify the pricing for this model in three categories: cost per input tokens, cost per output tokens, cost per cached tokens. If a provider does not offer pricing for this model for cached tokens, disqualify them. Third, the provider MUST be a zero data retention (ZDR) inference provider. If ZDR pricing is additional, compute it as part of the token costs. ZDR capability is mandatory; if a provider does not offer ZDR, disqualify them. Fourth, if available, obtain the tokens per second for this model for each provider. Return your results as an ordered list in ascending order by lowest cost per tokens for each provider for our chosen model.
You might want to add specific additional needs like SOC 2 compliance, GDPR compliance, etc. To the prompt based on your needs, so customize it any way you like.
With any model you choose, be sure you capture the full model name; DeepSeek v4 Flash for example has an antecedent that lacks the 0731 suffix. Our exact model that we want is DeepSeek v4 Flash 0731.
When I stick this into Google, DeepInfra, Fireworks AI, and OpenCode Zen show up as good options. Which one you choose will be based on how much you prioritize speed versus cost. If you told me to pick one and only one, I’ve been a customer of DeepInfra for a couple of years now and have no complaints at all, BUT there is also a case to be made for OpenCode Zen. More on that in a minute.
What I like, for Leslie’s specific use case, is that pay as you go providers mean that you’re not paying if you’re not using the AI AND there’s a strong economic incentive for you to use AI as little as possible and be as efficient in its use as possible. One of the problems with token plans (which include things like Claude Pro/Max, etc.) is that if you haven’t hit your weekly/monthly limits, you’re wasting money – and thus you’re more likely to use AI frivolously. With pay as you go, you only pay for what you use.
Part 3: The Hardware
For a second computer setup that’s cheap, we have to think about how computers work. The graphical user interface we’re all used to on Windows or Mac or even desktop Linux, as well as on our phones and tablets, is an INCREDIBLY inefficient waste of compute resources. It takes enormous amounts of memory and processing power to draw and maintain the interface compared to pure text-based interfaces.
Now, the crusty old GenX computer nerd in me says that everyone should know how to use a text-based interface (often called a command line or command prompt or terminal), but that’s not realistic. However, there is one user that LOVES text-based interfaces.
Yup, you guessed it. That’s AI. AI is far, far more efficient at typing than it is using a mouse, so for our second computer as Leslie asked about, we’re going to aim for a super cheap box that can run a terminal, store things, and run an AI harness. At a price point of roughly USD 500, you won’t be running AI models directly on this hardware (hence why we searched for hosting providers in Part 2), but you’ll have a decent machine with good storage.
On the shopping venue of your choice, look for what are called gaming mini-PCs. These typically will have AMD Ryzen chips, a small hard drive (typically 256 GB or 512 GB SSD), and between 16 GB and 32 GB of RAM. The cardinal rule of computing is that you want as much RAM/memory as money can buy; a slightly slower processor with more RAM is better than a fast processor with not enough RAM. RAM is like highway lanes; a Bugatti stuck in traffic on a single lane dirt road will not go as fast as a Prius on an 8 lane highway with no traffic jam.
Google AI Mode is handy here as well. Modify this prompt to suit your needs, especially if there are some companies you would prefer not to do business with:
Help me create a list of vendors that offer gaming mini PCs for sale that ship to my location: {locale}. My criteria are that the machine cost less than {amount} inclusive of shipping and that it have a minimum of 16 GB of RAM and 500 GB of disk space, ideally with an SSD. 32 GB of RAM is preferred, and more disk space is always preferred. The system MUST be able to run Ubuntu Linux 26.06 in headless mode. The CPU can be any make or model that offers a base clock speed of 3 GHz; AMD, Intel, or other vendors are fine as long as they are fully supported on Ubuntu. Ethernet and Wifi are mandatory. USB-C, Bluetooth, and HDMI are preferred. eGPU support is preferred. The following vendors and resellers are preferred: {preferred list}. The following vendors and resellers are forbidden: {banned list} The use case for this device will be to run OpenCode and Ubuntu Linux, plus apps like PostgreSQL, Docker, SQLite, Apache2, and similar server-like systems for a single person. Arrange your results in ascending order by price as an ordered list.
Why these specs? You want the extra RAM and disk space so you can run multiple local applications together on the same box. For example, if you want to run Hermes Agent, chances are you’ll want it in something like a Docker container, and the RAM/disk space will REALLY help with that. Likewise, if you want to roll your own local apps, you’ll probably be running a server that has a database, maybe even a local webserver, and more memory and disk space will really help there.
And technically, though it’s a miserable experience, a mini PC like this CAN do local inference with small models. Using something like llama.cpp, koboldcpp, or Unsloth Studio, you COULD theoretically serve up a small model like Gemma 4 E4B and get a modest little AI server running that can do basic things like summarization.
Once you get your hardware, you’ll want to erase the operating system on it and install a version of Linux. Linux is the best choice for this kind of computer because it can run using very few system resources. I’d suggest Ubuntu Linux in LTS flavor – LTS stands for Long Term Support, and the Ubuntu Foundation warrants that a version of Ubuntu will be supported for 10 years from the launch date. The current version is 26.04 LTS, Resolute Raccoon.
One thing that’s nice about Ubuntu Linux is that you can start it up with a GUI for configuration and all the comforts of modern computing, and then once everything is all square, you can shut down the GUI to free up resources, running it in text-based interface alone.
Part 4: The Harness
AI models by themselves are smart but are prone to things like hallucinations. Model hosts can add some guardrails and some tuning, but the real magic happens when you put a good model in a great harness. Think of the model like the engine of a car. An engine isn’t much good by itself, and a car without an engine is a lawn ornament, doubly so if it’s on cinderblocks.
But a good engine in a great car? That’s where, quite literally, the rubber meets the road. And as with cars, sometimes you can do with a good engine but not a great one if the rest of the car is nice. Unless you’re driving NASCAR or Formula 1, a Prius doesn’t need a V8 engine.
Harnesses are the interfaces to AI. When you use ChatGPT on the web, OpenAI has put a harness around its models, and what you experience as ChatGPT is their tuned harness. The same is true for Gemini, for Claude, etc. – and different harnesses do different things. Claude Code, for example, has hundreds of words of specific language built into its system prompts to behave a certain way, plus a slew of deterministic rules that silently reject bad outputs from the Claude models before you ever see them as a user.
For our purposes, because we’re trying to build a scrappy AI setup, we want a harness that’s free and supports multiple providers. For that, there’s no better harness than OpenCode. OpenCode is Free Open Source Software, and it comes in 2 flavors, a command line version and a GUI version. What’s really nice about it is that the GUI version is built on top of the command line version, so you don’t have to do anything differently and you can configure it in GUI mode, then use it later in command line mode with no changes at all.
OpenCode also supports all the modern skills and plugins that other AI systems use, so if you see a cool skill that someone’s showing off in Claude Code, for example, you can install that same skill in OpenCode.
OpenCode also offers 2 paid coding plans to go with it, OpenCode Zen which is pay as you go, and OpenCode Go, which is a subscription plan. There are some free models in OpenCode Zen but those DO collect your data and are not zero data retention. Remember in the world of AI that if you’re not paying, you and your data are the product being sold to someone else.
If you want the convenience of not having to manage your AI hosting separate from your AI harness, OpenCode Zen is a great choice. If you want the lowest possible costs, then use OpenCode with DeepInfra.
Part 5: Wrapping Up, the Process in a Nutshell
So in a nutshell, here is the order of operations to get up and running – and you can put this list (or this entire newsletter, really) into your favorite chat-based AI tool to walk you through this process.
Choose a model.
Choose a hosting provider.
Choose a hardware box of some kind.
Install Linux on that box.
Install OpenCode on that box.
Connect OpenCode to your hosting provider.
With those six big steps, you’re ready to go! I would suggest also installing and configuring tmux on your new box, because that gives you the ability to remote control it very easily, and if you want to get FANCY, install Tailscale on it as well, to create a VPN of your computers together so you can access your new AI box from anywhere in the world. That’s probably best for another time, though your AI of choice can walk you through that pretty easily.
The key to remember here is that this machine is a self-contained little server. Once you have OpenCode installed on it and connected to your model of choice, one of the first tasks you can do is put it to work securing itself. Using your favorite deep research tools, ask for a best practices guide to securing your little computer and optimizing it for AI usage, especially with the most popular command line tools that will help AI save tokens and usage. Because you’re using a provider like DeepInfra, every request you make costs you a tiny bit of money, and the more you can reduce that, the more you save.
If you deploy this system as written, you’ll spend about USD 500 on the hardware, and probably USD 5 to 10 per month in AI inference costs for moderate usage, which I define as a major coding project per week, something where your AI is working with sustained effort for about 2 hours a day. Models like DeepSeek V4 and similarly capable models are incredibly capable and dirt cheap to use.
It’s worth pointing out that if you have a working computer today, you could skip the hardware purchase and install OpenCode on your computer as is, eliminating the hardware cost. For folks on limited incomes, this is a great way to get access to high end AI without high end subscriptions, like job seekers without stable income.
Enjoy running your own little AI operations center!
Russia’s Only Anti-War Party Banned From Parliamentary Elections Over ‘Foreign Funding’
It’s been no secret that Russian authorities have increasingly cracked down on public speech which opposes the war in Ukraine, or as the Kremlin calls it – the special military operation. Any speech deemed ‘unpatriotic’ has also come under a legal microscope of late.
Currently, Yabloko (Apple) is the only officially registered Russian political party which openly oppose the war, calling “for peace and freedom”. But the party has just suffered a huge setback, having been banned by the nation’s top court from running candidates in upcoming parliamentary elections.
Russia’s Supreme Court on Monday “upheld a suit brought by a pro-Kremlin nationalist party, stripping voters opposed to the four-and-a-half-year war in Ukraine of their last option on the ballot,” France24 reports.
“The claims seeking to annul the registration of the federal list of candidates for the State Duma of the ninth convocation, nominated by the Yabloko political party, were granted,” the ruling by judge Vyacheslav Kirillov indicated.
Some one hundred mostly young supporters of Yabloko demonstrated outside the courthouse chanting “Shame! Shame!” following the ruling. Yabloko leader Nikolay Rybakov has affirmed that the party is planning to appeal the decision.
The rationale for the ban is that the anti-war party is accused of receiving foreign funds; however, it has countered by saying rival political parties have also received such funding:
According to data from Russia’s Federal Financial Monitoring Service (Rosfinmonitoring), the Yabloko party had received funding from abroad, a Central Election Commission (CEC) representative said. The representative spoke during a court hearing on a lawsuit the Rodina party filed seeking to remove Yabloko from the State Duma election.
On Aug. 7, Rosfinmonitoring gave the commission a document stating that individuals on Yabloko’s federal candidate list had received foreign funding, the CEC representative said.
Several dozen of the party’s counterparties had also received this funding, according to Rosfinmonitoring.
Anti-Kremlin regional outlet Meduza has published the following from Yabloko party concerning its legal hot water situation:
Yabloko has attributed the foreign funding data to the sale of foreign shares, which the law requires candidates to sell off ahead of elections, the Telegram channel Varlamov News reports. Yabloko lawyer Gadzhi Aliev said the funds did not come to the party itself from foreign individuals, but from Russian citizens who had received money from foreign sources.
Russia has long been fearful over foreign entities making inroads into Russian society, a concern which stretches to well before the war started.
The future of Russia’s only registered party opposing the war in Ukraine hangs in the balance. Moscow’s Supreme Court is hearing a bid to remove Yabloko from September’s parliamentary elections, drawing hundreds of the party’s supporters to the courthouse. pic.twitter.com/yJGoHod0nv
It also worries that US and European intelligence could seek to manipulate parliamentary elections. In America, Democrats had starting long ago charged Moscow with interfering in US elections, which produced years of ‘Russiagate’ hanging over President Trump – yet with nothing close to a smoking gun.
Regarding the brutal war in Eastern Europe, common Russian families have continued to struggle and suffer quietly because of the conflict as more and more young men are killed in the fighting. On the other side of it, Ukrainian families are also suffering immensely – and tragically there seems no end in sight as peace talks have proven illusive.
‘How Can We Help You Kill More Russians?’ German Reporter To Zelensky At Belgrade Meeting
It has never been a secret that much of the Western mainstream media “journalist and pundit class” are in reality warmongers and armchair interventionists and chickenhawks – or also activists and advocates operating under the guise of “objective reporting”.
One German journalist was surprisingly open with his lust for blood at a press conference in Belgrade on Saturday. Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung correspondent Michael Martens posed a surprisingly blunt question to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, and with Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic looking on at the other podium. The journalist wanted to know how Europeans could concretely assist in “killing more Russians”. Watch:
🇩🇪🇷🇺 German journalist who asked Zelensky how Europeans can “help kill more Russians” turns out to be the grandson of a high-ranking Nazi
Michael Martens’s grandfather was a senior Wehrmacht command officer
“Can you tell us Europeans what can we concretely do to help you to kill more Russians?” Martens asked.
He quickly checked himself, adding that he means “more Russian soldiers, of course.” President Vucic is seen with a look of shock on his face as the question is being asked, raising his eyebrows in apparent disbelief.
Zelensky had responded to the question with the usual calls for more money, and more weapons, and to hit Moscow harder with Western sanctions.
Vucic’s answer was very diplomatic but also somewhat of a rebuke to the question, expressing his desire to see all killing come to and end:
“We did not discuss military cooperation today,” the Serbian president said. “What happens when the war ends is another matter. And speaking about killing, I hope all killing will end.”
The clip has gone viral in Europe, and has been highlighted in Russian and Ukrainian media – but has been curiously absent from Western mainstream press.
The Serbian leader’s look says it all…
“Tell us, Europeans, what can we concretely do to help you kill more Russians?”
That was the question a German journalist asked Zelensky at a press conference in Belgrade
Amid the controversy, the outlet that Martens writes for, Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, issued a statement expressing “regret” while still seeming to defend the exchange, only saying that its reporter’s statement was “worded ambiguously”.
Sadly, none of this is completely surprising – and the longer the Ukraine war drags on, the more bloodthirsty that “journalists” and pundits and some politicians are likely to become. Or rather, the masks are off and such sentiment is much more out in the open.
A retired Syrian general who commanded forces fighting ISIS was abducted by personnel from the Syrian embassy in Lebanon, Al-Akhbarreported on Saturday.
Adel Issa, an Alawite brigadier general from Tartous, entered the Syrian embassy in Beirut at 12:30 pm on Friday to arrange a power of attorney for a relative. His Syrian driver waited outside for him, but he never returned. As his driver waited outside, a car with several young men stopped and demanded that the driver hand over the retired general’s phone, claiming they needed to register his passport.
The driver waited for Issa until 4:30 pm before going to the embassy entrance to inquire about him. A Lebanese guard prevented him from entering, telling him the embassy had closed an hour before.
After persisting, the driver was able to speak with an embassy employee who told him that Issa had left the embassy 20 minutes earlier. This surprised the driver, as Issa never came out of the embassy to have the driver take him home.
The driver then informed the general’s family of the incident. They began making calls to locate him, but his phone was switched off after 3:30 pm.
The family contacted several Lebanese organizations for help in determining his fate, fearing he might have been illegally detained at the embassy, given his status as an Alawite officer in the deposed government of Bashar al-Assad. There were also fears that he might be transferred to Syria and subjected to torture.
Since the fall of Assad’s government in October 2024, Syria’s new authorities, led by the former Al-Qaeda leader Ahmad al-Sharaa, have detained thousands of Alawite officers from the former army.
Syrian authorities claim they are detained for committing war crimes during the 14-year war that began in 2011. However, in practice they are typically detained based on their religious identity as Alawites.
According to a December 2025 report by Reuters, Syria’s prisons are overflowing with Alawite men who are held without trial and often tortured.
Al-Akhbar notes that Brigadier General Issa had retired more than six years ago. He continued to live in Tartous and move around Syria without being pursued by the new authorities.
He gave a statement before a Syrian court a few months ago regarding a financial dispute with someone without being arrested or prosecuted, as there was no warrant or legal case against him. However, roughly one month ago, a group of unknown armed men raided Issa’s home and inquired about him.
#Syria/#Lebanon: Following the scandal reported by the Lebanese newspaper Al-Akhbar over the Syrian Embassy’s abduction and detention of Syrian citizens, the embassy admitted yesterday that retired officer Adel Issa had been held inside the embassy. Embassy staff then handed him… https://t.co/WEkW2aF9TWpic.twitter.com/IgDK7k0H9N
Issa was unable to determine whether the armed men were from the official Syrian security forces or from an armed faction affiliated with the new government but operating outside the chain of command. As a result, Issa decided to leave Syrian territory for Lebanon.
The Syrian Justice Archive (SJA) noted that after news emerged of the detention of the retired general, an attempt was made to cover up his abduction at the embassy and make it appear as if it was part of a legal process.
Saudi newspaper Al-Sharq al-Awsatclaimed that Lebanese authorities had arrested Issa and requested his judicial file from their Syrian counterparts to decide whether to hand him over to Syrian authorities. SJA notes that the evidence indicates that Issa was taken by Syrian embassy personnel, not by Lebanese prosecutors or police.
“If Syria wanted his arrest and extradition, the proper procedure would have been for the Syrian Prosecutor General to formally request his arrest and handover through the Lebanese authorities, not for him to be abducted while visiting the embassy after legally leaving Syria,” SJA stated.
The Syrian embassy admitted later on Saturday that Issa had been held inside the embassy and that embassy staff then handed him over to Lebanese security authorities after he had spent more than a day detained inside the embassy.
The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR) reported that Issa commanded the Syrian army’s 17th Division. In 2015, he was given command of all Syrian ground forces in the eastern governorate of Deir Ezzor, which borders Iraq, before he retired in late 2016.
Under Issa’s command, the 17th Division was responsible for protecting Deir Ezzor from ISIS, of which self-appointed Syrian President Ahmad al-Sharaa’s armed group, the Nusra Front, is an offshoot. The Nusra Front was later rebranded as Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS).
Another scandal emerged last week when journalist Lindsey Snell reported that the Nusra Front member, Mohamad Qanatari, who had kidnapped her in northern Syria in 2016, had been named as charge d’affaires to the Syrian Embassy in Washington.
My interview with the Syrian chargé d’affaires to the US back when he was a member of Jabhat al-Nusra. pic.twitter.com/g0NSaH1WUp
In 2012, Nusra was designated as a terrorist group by both the UN and the US State Department, despite covert US support for the group. Since HTS and Sharaa came to power, the US government has openly embraced members of the former terror group, including Sharaa himself, who visited the White House to meet US President Donald Trump in November 2025.
SJA reports that another disturbing incident involving the Syrian embassy in Beirut occurred earlier this week when a Syrian social media influencer, Hussein Abdul Qader al-Ahmad, was abducted after making a video for social media in front of the embassy.
In the video, Ahmad criticized the new extremist-dominated Syrian authorities, including President Sharaa – who formerly went by the nom de guerre Abu Mohammad al-Julani and is well known for dispatching suicide bombers and car bombs to kill thousands of civilians in Iraq and Syria.
After his abduction at the Lebanese-Syrian border, Ahmad appeared on Syrian government media in detention with visible marks on his forehead, suggesting that he was subjected to abuse or torture. He is now detained on charges of “insulting state symbols” and “provoking the feelings of Syrians.”
Spy Cams On UK Navy Drones Secretly Transmitted Data To China
An investigation into surveillance equipment fitted to Royal Navy unmanned vessels has raised concerns over military supply-chain security after cameras containing Chinese-made components were found communicating with an internet address in China.
The cameras were installed on K3 Scout unmanned surface vessels used by Royal Marines and other specialist British forces, according to a report by The Telegraph. The vessels form part of the Royal Navy’s push to expand its use of autonomous systems for surveillance and maritime operations.
A technical assessment reportedly discovered that the cameras were sending routine electronic signals to an IP address located in China. The communications were described as “heartbeat” traffic – automated messages commonly used by connected devices to confirm that they remain online and operational. The Ministry of Defence said investigators found no evidence that classified information, military systems or other sensitive data had been accessed or transmitted abroad. Nevertheless, internet connectivity associated with the cameras was removed after the issue was discovered.
The episode has renewed scrutiny of the increasingly complex international supply chains behind modern defense equipment, where a system designed and assembled in one country can contain electronic components manufactured across several others.
Concerns over sensitive military locations
The K3 Scout vessels have been used by the Royal Marines since earlier this year and are capable of extended autonomous operations. Their surveillance equipment is intended to give military personnel greater awareness of maritime activity without requiring crews to remain aboard the vessels.
Security concerns are heightened by reports that the craft have operated around sensitive defense facilities and personnel.
One concern is whether connected cameras could potentially expose information about individuals, training activities or locations even when the main platform itself is not actively conducting a mission. Reports that some camera functions may have remained active while vessels were otherwise powered down have added to calls for closer examination of how individual subsystems operate.
The Ministry of Defence said its routine cyber-security procedures were responsible for identifying the vulnerability and stressed that its investigation found no evidence of a compromise of departmental information.
Internal Audit
The K3 Scout fleet was supplied by British defense company Kraken Technology Group, which obtained the cameras through a third-party supplier.
Kraken said the equipment had been considered compliant with relevant US defense procurement requirements but acknowledged that a small number of components inside the cameras originated outside the UK. Following an audit conducted with the Royal Navy, the company said it was satisfied that sensitive information had not been transmitted through unintended channels and that identified vulnerabilities had been addressed.
The distinction highlights a broader problem for defense procurement. A product can comply with rules prohibiting equipment from specified manufacturers while still incorporating individual components produced in countries viewed as potential security risks. Modern cameras, drones and communications systems can contain processors, sensors, networking modules and firmware originating from numerous suppliers. That makes establishing the provenance and behavior of every component increasingly important – and increasingly difficult.
The K3 Scout is designed for long-duration maritime missions and can carry a substantial payload. The platform has also been tested internationally and has attracted interest beyond the UK.
For the Royal Navy, such vessels are part of a wider strategy to combine conventional warships with autonomous and remotely operated systems.
Uncrewed platforms can conduct surveillance, patrol dangerous areas and provide intelligence while reducing the number of personnel placed directly in harm’s way. Britain has committed billions of pounds to expanding military drone technology and accelerating the introduction of autonomous systems.
But greater reliance on digitally connected equipment also creates new vulnerabilities.
A conventional mechanical defect may prevent a vehicle from functioning. A compromised digital component could potentially create a less visible threat by transmitting information, receiving unauthorized instructions or revealing patterns of military activity.
Chinese technology remains a security concern
The discovery comes against a wider backdrop of British concern about technology and equipment with links to China. Successive governments have tightened restrictions on Chinese-made hardware in sensitive environments, while Huawei was removed from Britain’s 5G infrastructure plans following national-security concerns. UK intelligence agencies have also repeatedly warned about Chinese espionage and efforts to obtain sensitive political, commercial and technological information.
Health sources have confirmed that Ceuta University Hospital has treated at least five girls over the past week for alleged rapes following the mass migrant invasion of Ceuta last month.
All the girls are Moroccan and were reportedly under the age of 14 when they were raped, with an emergency doctor verifying the cases and noting that many of these minors are sleeping on the street because of a shortage of places in shelters.
Susana Ascaso, an emergency-room doctor at Ceuta University Hospital, confirmed in an interview published by the Spanish outlet El pueblo de Ceuta that her service is dealing with cases of rape involving migrant girls.
She described the victims as 14-year-old minors who remain on the street because reception centers for minors have no available places.
“It’s not that we refuse to receive them, it’s that there is no room for them,” the doctor said.
In addition to the Moroccan girls, at least one boy was also reportedly raped, bringing the total number of underage victims to six. There may also be more cases that have not been reported yet, as there are more than ten cases involving sexual assault that have been handled by the hospital.
The Spanish National Police have opened an investigation into the alleged rape of a minor who entered Ceuta during the recent mass arrival of migrants. The child was taken to hospital, where injuries consistent with sexual assault were recorded. No arrests have been announced and the precise details of the case remain undisclosed as the investigation continues.
Judicial sources also added that several attempted sexual attacks were prevented by the intervention of local residents.
Ascaso described the entire situation as a “health disaster,” with her department receiving an average of “300 to 400 migrants a day” while operating with the same staff and resources that existed before the massive migrant crisis in July.
After being discharged from the hospital, most patients have nowhere to go. She also warned of the risk of epidemic diseases.
“We do not know if people arrive with tuberculosis, hepatitis or other types of diseases that, today, we will not be able to detect either,” she said.
Meanwhile, the people of Ceuta are also competing for medical care with the migrants.
Ascaso said the “population of Ceuta continues to get sick and go” to hospital as well, where medical authorities have established two different areas, one for migrants and another for Ceuta residents, who “also have the right to receive assistance,” according to the doctor.
Organizations such as Save the Children have highlighted the heightened risk of human trafficking and sexual exploitation facing migrant girls and adolescents in Ceuta, largely because of gaps in identification, accommodation, and support.
Jennifer Zuppiroli, a migration specialist with the organization, stressed that an adolescent girl left alone and outside the protection system can find herself in a situation of great vulnerability.
The National Police have given priority to girls and children under 13 in their identification operations. Meanwhile, the Minister of Youth and Children, Sira Rego, has acknowledged a change in the profile of minors arriving in the city, marked by an increased presence of girls and very young children.
