Robots Finally Turn on Their Human “Masters”

Look at me! I'm cute. Don't worry, I will never screw up your election returns.SIPA Asia via ZUMA

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As near as I can tell, the Iowa caucus meltdown has finally gotten the media mad. For starters, it made them stay up really late when they weren’t expecting to—and with literally nothing to talk about. Second, the Iowa election poobahs refused to talk to them about what went wrong. Quelle horreur! And then, to finish things off, it’s Iowa. They really just wanted to announce the results from this pissy little flyover state and then move on to the East Coast.

Unlike everyone else, I guess, I sort of feel sorry for the Iowa folks. I mean, it’s one thing to screw up the rollout of Obamacare, which was genuinely a massive and intricate computer system. But to screw up the reporting of about a dozen numbers for fewer than 2,000 caucus sites? That’s epic. I know that many of you will think I’m exaggerating here, but this is literally the kind of thing a high school kid could do as a class project these days. The front end is embarrasingly simple, and the back-end database is literally less sophisticated than your average contact manager. Finally, there are the summations and calculations, and that’s sixth-grade arithmetic.

Aside from all that, I suppose I find this more humorous than outrageous. They should have stuck with telephone banks and—maybe—an Excel spreadsheet. I suppose they’re tired of hearing that by now, but it’s true. Not everything has to be computerized, after all.

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“This could be the first time a corporation would be held criminally liable for forced labor in their own supply chains,” according to a retired special agent we talked to.

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About that: It’s unfathomably hard in the news business right now, and we came up about $28,000 short during our recent fall fundraising campaign. We simply have to make that up soon to avoid falling further behind than can be made up for, or needing to somehow trim $1 million from our budget, like happened last year.

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WHO DOESN’T LOVE A POSITIVE STORY—OR TWO?

“Great journalism really does make a difference in this world: it can even save kids.”

That’s what a civil rights lawyer wrote to Julia Lurie, the day after her major investigation into a psychiatric hospital chain that uses foster children as “cash cows” published, letting her know he was using her findings that same day in a hearing to keep a child out of one of the facilities we investigated.

That’s awesome. As is the fact that Julia, who spent a full year reporting this challenging story, promptly heard from a Senate committee that will use her work in their own investigation of Universal Health Services. There’s no doubt her revelations will continue to have a big impact in the months and years to come.

Like another story about Mother Jones’ real-world impact.

This one, a multiyear investigation, published in 2021, exposed conditions in sugar work camps in the Dominican Republic owned by Central Romana—the conglomerate behind brands like C&H and Domino, whose product ends up in our Hershey bars and other sweets. A year ago, the Biden administration banned sugar imports from Central Romana. And just recently, we learned of a previously undisclosed investigation from the Department of Homeland Security, looking into working conditions at Central Romana. How big of a deal is this?

“This could be the first time a corporation would be held criminally liable for forced labor in their own supply chains,” according to a retired special agent we talked to.

Wow.

And it is only because Mother Jones is funded primarily by donations from readers that we can mount ambitious, yearlong—or more—investigations like these two stories that are making waves.

About that: It’s unfathomably hard in the news business right now, and we came up about $28,000 short during our recent fall fundraising campaign. We simply have to make that up soon to avoid falling further behind than can be made up for, or needing to somehow trim $1 million from our budget, like happened last year.

If you can, please support the reporting you get from Mother Jones—that exists to make a difference, not a profit—with a donation of any amount today. We need more donations than normal to come in from this specific blurb to help close our funding gap before it gets any bigger.

payment methods

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