The Ellison Media Takeover & France's Government Collapses

Hi readers, happy Tuesday! Today, we’re covering the Ellison family’s media takeover, Macron’s government collapse, a consulting flub, a deal in Gaza, defense contractors, Trump’s National Guard takeover, and Nobel Prize season.

“What and how much had I lost by trying to do only what was expected of me instead of what I myself had wished to do?” ― Ralph Ellison

Larry Ellison’s Not-So-Free Press

Strap in, because this one’s a doozy. On August 7, Skydance Media, a media company founded by David Ellison (the son of Oracle founder Larry Ellison) merged with Paramount to form a $28 billion media conglomerate named Paramount Skydance Corporation. In order to get the merger approved by the Trump White House, the Ellison clan promised that Paramount Skydance would represent “the varied ideological perspectives of American viewers,” and also said it would install an ombudsman at CBS News in order to address “complaints of bias” – a way to address Trump’s complaints about CBS’s alleged left-leaning election coverage.

The new company encompasses a massive roster of media names, including CBS, Paramount, MTV, Nickelodeon, BET… and now Bari Weiss’ The Free Press. Yesterday, Paramount Skydance announced that it would be acquiring the media company – which has 1.5 million subscribers (170,000+ paid) on Substack – for the price of $150 million. Weiss, a former New York Times writer, left the newspaper in 2021, citing an “illiberal environment” and quickly founded The Free Press. The publication gathered $80,000 in annual paid subscriptions within a week, and soon received millions of dollars in funding from current Trump allies Marc Andreessen and David Sacks. The Free Press and its founder are both known for their dogged dedication to Zionism, complaining about “cancel culture,” and their neoconservative views. As part of the buyout, Bari Weiss will become the new editor-in-chief at CBS News, instantly making her one of the biggest names in American journalism.

The Paramount Skydance merger and the purchase of The Free Press, combined with Larry Ellison’s key role in the U.S. TikTok deal, paint an interesting picture of the U.S. media landscape. In the words of Wired, “The Ellison family is cornering the market on attention and data the same way the Vanderbilts did railroads and the Rockefellers did oil.” 

What will the Ellisons do with their purchased influence? Besides being a close ally of Trump, patriarch Larry Ellison is also an unflinching supporter of Israel. Hacked emails have revealed the elder Ellison’s close links to Israeli officials, including one instance where he vetted Marco Rubio’s enthusiasm for the Zionist cause. Soon after he confirmed that Rubio would “be a great friend for Israel,” Ellison fed his campaign $5 million and connected him with a wide variety of political donors. Now, as Paramount Skydance is reportedly mulling buying out Warner Bros. Discovery (which owns CNN), his media empire – and political influence – is set to grow even larger.

Macron’s Machine Meets Its Maker

Less than a month. That’s how long French Prime Minister Sebastien Lecornu lasted in office after President Emmanuel Macron appointed him to the post in September. On Monday, Lecornu handed Macron his resignation letter, making himself the shortest-lived prime minister in the history of France’s Fifth Republic. Lecornu’s resignation announcement came just hours after he unveiled his new cabinet, which included only recycled centrist and conservative ministers from the last failed government… and also took him almost four weeks to piece together. 

“You can’t be prime minister when the conditions simply aren’t there,” Lecornu said after handing in his notice. “Political parties keep acting as if each of them held a majority in the National Assembly.” He added that “there are lots of red lines in the mouths of some,” but “there were rarely any green lines.” Macron has asked Lecornu to hold last-minute talks to keep the government together, but the negotiations are being seen as a hail mary by the president.

With five failed attempts at governing in the dumpster, it’s clear that Macron has run out of rope. The question is whether or not he’ll call snap parliamentary elections or end his term early by setting up a presidential election instead. In a very French moment, the president was spotted walking dejectedly alone by the Seine early Monday morning contemplating his future. 

Healthy Hydration Is Easier Than You Think

Can You Hallucinate Me That New Powerpoint By Lunch?

• Trigger warning: this story involves both AI and consultants. Read at your own risk! After completing a report for the Australian government, the world’s biggest consulting firm is refunding part of the $440,000 fee that the government paid for the report. Why? Deloitte used AI – specifically OpenAI’s GPT-4o – to produce the report, which resulted in multiple hallucinations (instances where the AI made up its own answers).

• According to the University of Sydney legal scholar who discovered the errors, Deloitte’s report contained multiple references to made-up sources. “Instead of just substituting one hallucinated fake reference for a new ‘real’ reference, they’ve substituted the fake hallucinated references and in the new version, there’s like five, six or seven or eight in their place,” he said. “So what that suggests is that the original claim made in the body of the report wasn’t based on any one particular evidentiary source.”

Getting Closer In Gaza

• Last week, Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu agreed on a 20-point peace plan which could end the conflict in Gaza. According to the plan, Israel will end its war in Gaza after Hamas hands over its remaining 48 hostages. After the conflict ends, Hamas will fully lay down its weapons and remove itself from power in Gaza. In its place, a temporary government of Palestinian technocrats (overseen by a “Board of Peace” featuring Trump and former UK Prime Minister Tony Blair), will transition power into the hands of the Palestinian Authority, which currently governs the occupied West Bank.

• Last Friday, Hamas announced that it would agree to release its hostages and hand over power to a Palestinian technocratic government – though it didn’t comment on Trump’s possible involvement or commit to laying down its arms. Yesterday, both sides took a step towards ending the conflict by carrying out indirect talks in Egypt. Egyptian and Qatari officials are reportedly shuffling back and forth between meetings with representatives from Hamas and Israel, with the intentions of “creating the field conditions” necessary for the agreed-upon hostage exchange. 

Additional World News

• Israelis gather to mark two years since 7 October Hamas attack that killed 1,200 (Guardian)

• Pakistan Fights Its Fiercest Taliban Insurgency in a Decade (NYT, $)

• Israel deports Greta Thunberg and 170 other Gaza flotilla activists (BBC) 

• Argentina markets on tenterhooks ahead of news of US support (Reuters)

• Georgia’s police use water cannons to push back protesters trying to storm presidential palace (CNN)

• ICC convicts former Sudan militia leader for war crimes in Darfur (Guardian)

You Shall Not Pass (A Basic Security Test)

• It’s a bad time to be a defense company named after an obscure object from Lord of the Rings. Last week, an internal U.S. Army memo was leaked – in it, the Army’s chief technology officer described a new battlefield communications network being worked on by Palantir and Anduril as full of “fundamental security” flaws, stating that it should be treated as “very high risk.” Palantir is named after a crystal ball from Lord of the Rings, while Anduril is named after a sword – just in case you were wondering.

• A few months ago, Anduril and Palantir (alongside Microsoft and a few other companies) were handed a $100 million contract to work on the Army’s new Next Generation Command and Control (NGC2) battlefield communications software. While Anduril crowed that it had the platform online within 8 weeks, it looks like the company’s quick work wasn’t anything to be proud of. 

• “Given the current security posture of the platform and the hosted 3rd party applications the likelihood of an adversary gaining persistent undetectable access to the platform requires the system be treated as very high risk,” wrote Gabriele Chiulli, the Army chief technology officer who penned the memo. He added that any authorized user could access any piece of data on the platform regardless of classification level, meaning “any user can potentially access and misuse sensitive” classified information without being detected. Yikes!

Guarding Against The Guard

• Over the past few weeks, President Trump has been threatening to use the National Guard to invade – err, keep the peace – in Democratic cities including Chicago and Portland (Oregon). Late last week, he attempted to pull the trigger on the so-called “federal protection missions,” which are supposedly being carried out because ICE agents need armed soldiers to protect them from protestors in a few cities.

• On Sunday, U.S. District Judge Karin Immergut blocked the Pentagon from sending Texas- and California-based National Guard troops into Portland, Oregon. The judge’s ruling was a quick follow-up on a previous decision from the same court, which had blocked the federal government from sending Oregon’s own National Guard into the city. 

• Meanwhile, Illinois Governor JB Pritzker lashed out at the Trump administration for its ongoing deportation campaign in Chicago, as well as its threat to send 300 National Guard troops into the city. Federal agents are “just picking up people who are brown and Black and then checking their credentials,” according to the governor, and Trump’s plan to send in the National Guard is just a ploy to “create the war zone so they can send in even more troops.”

Additional USA News

• 3 critically hurt after helicopter crashes on California freeway (NBC)

• Ex-NFL QB Mark Sanchez faces felony in fight that authorities say was over parking (AP)

• Shutdown Politics Has Republicans Singing Government’s Praises (NYT, $)

• No air traffic control crew at busy LA airport amid government shutdown staffing crunch (Guardian)

• As Money Rushed In, ICE’s Rapid Expansion Stalled Out (Atlantic, $)

• Donald Trump, Pete Hegseth, and the “War from Within” (New Yorker, $)

A Nobel Prize For A Noble Cause

• It’s Nobel Prize season! Each day this week (plus next Monday), the Nobel Committee will hand out awards recognizing “those who, during the preceding year, shall have conferred the greatest benefit to humankind” across six categories. The prize for physiology or medicine was awarded on Monday, the physics award will be given out today, chemistry tomorrow, literature on Thursday, the peace prize on Friday, and the economic sciences award will be handed out on October 13. Nobel laureates receive a paper diploma, a medal, and 11 million Swedish kronor (roughly $1.17 million) for their contributions to humanity – for groups of laureates, the prize money is split evenly.

• The Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine was awarded yesterday to a group of researchers who determined why immune systems are able to attack hostile pathogens while not harming the body’s own cells. The three researchers – Shimon Sakaguchi from Japan and Mary Brunkow and Fred Ramsdell from the U.S. – discovered “regulatory T-cells.” The T-cells subdue any other immune cells that they find attacking the body. According to the Nobel panel, their “discoveries have laid the foundation for a new field of research and spurred the development of new treatments, for example for cancer and autoimmune diseases.” For those curious: $1,170,000 ÷ 3 = $390,000.

Additional Reads

• Taylor Swift's new album breaks her own sales records (BBC) 

• Wendy Williams, Trapped in a Dementia Facility, Wants Out (The Cut)

• Thames Water removes 100-tonne fatberg from west London sewer (Guardian)

• The Most Reviled Tech CEO in New York Confronts His Haters (Atlantic, $)

• Why world records seem to be getting harder to beat - according to maths (BBC)

• Forget Cowbells. Cows Wear High-Tech Collars Now. (NYT, $)

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