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December 11, 2025
Trump’s Genesis Mission Needs the One Thing Washington Hates: Accountability
President Trump’s new Genesis Mission is an ambitious bid to energize American scientific leadership by harnessing artificial intelligence to accelerate discovery. It is a bold and correct step. But unless the administration pairs this vision with a hard requirement that the relevant federal agencies actually execute it, the effort risks becoming just another well-intentioned plan…
December 10, 2025
The Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board on Financial Surveillance
What a delight to see the Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board (PCLOB) taking a look at financial surveillance policy. It is as threatening to liberty and privacy as any other. Let’s hope its recent webinar-style panel discussion “Debanking and the Risks to Privacy and Civil Liberties” is an opening round on the problems created…
December 9, 2025
Federal Multidistrict Litigation and Social Media Addiction: Onward to Summary Judgment and Bellwether Trials
Tom Petty sang that “the waiting is the hardest part.” It’s a take-it-to-the-heart maxim currently holding true for anyone anticipating the trial-court resolution of more than 2,000 lawsuits (as of October 1, 2025) targeting social media companies in a years-long multidistrict litigation (MDL) proceeding before US District Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers in Northern California. Key…
December 8, 2025
Governor DeSantis Should Champion AI Innovation—Not Regulate It
Florida Governor Ron DeSantis has built a reputation for freeing markets and trusting Floridians. During COVID-19, he reopened the state early, betting that people could manage their own affairs. He has cut red tape, lowered business taxes, and defended the rights of employers and employees to negotiate work arrangements. The results speak for themselves: People…
December 5, 2025
Supreme Court Questions Broadband Provider Liability for User Misconduct
Intermediary liability—when a company should be liable for users’ misuse of its product by users—has been a long-standing issue in tech policy. Two years ago, the Supreme Court dismissed a case alleging Twitter aided and abetted terrorism by allowing ISIS to recruit on its platform. This week, the Court weighed in again, hearing argument in…
December 4, 2025
A Huge Retraction, the Usual Playbook, and Reason for Optimism
Some huge news dropped today that will reverberate through climate science and policy. Nature has finally retracted “The Economic Commitment of Climate Change,” by Kotz et al. (KLW24), more than 18 months after first learning that the paper was fatally flawed, with the authors acknowledging that its errors are “too substantial” for a correction. It is not just the retraction…
December 4, 2025
Wrestling with Hulk Hogan’s Litigation Legacy for Online Journalism
It’s the season when celebrities-who-died-this-year lists proliferate. Terry Gene Bollea—the wrestler Hulk Hogan—will make most 2025 rolls, but his legacy may be his influence over online journalism. Bollea, who died in July, scored a 2016 courtroom triumph over Gawker Media, Nick Denton (Gawker’s founder and owner), and A.J. Daulerio (Gawker’s editor in chief). The invasion-of-privacy…
December 2, 2025
Tracing Engineered Biothreats with AI Forensics: Five Steps to Improve Attribution
The 2001 anthrax letter attacks in the United States, the 2007 United Kingdom foot-and-mouth outbreak, and the COVID-19 pandemic have something in common: Investigators have struggled to determine their origins despite extensive efforts. This highlights a critical gap in biosecurity capabilities—the limitations of modern forensics in reliably tracing biological threats back to their sources. When a novel pathogen emerges, investigators…
December 1, 2025
THB Insider #28 – Thanksgiving Reading
It is Thanksgiving Day here in the US — My favorite holiday. Chez les Pielke we are getting ready to put the turkey in as the sun rises. We will have a big table of family and are looking forward to a fun day with family, football, food, and joy! Last year, on this day…
December 1, 2025
US Hurricanes 2025 in Review
For the first time in a decade, the continental United States experienced no hurricane landfalls.1 Islands in the Caribbean saw multiple landfalls [1], notably Hurricane Melissa’s landfall as a Category 5 storm in western Jamaica, which resulted in more than 100 deaths in the region and about $10 billion in losses. The usual media script was played —…