CDR SALAMANDER: No Justice for the Fat Leonard Four: to what end all the billable hours, but the billable hours. “A decade ago. He was arrested a decade ago. . . . They were charged for events dating back to 2006 or so – 17 years ago at the most. This is like taking someone to court in 1945 from an indictment in 1939 from being accused for a crime in 1928. Think about that. Think about that real hard. . . . Every American – and especially anyone who has served – needs to look very close at this timeline. Look at the system of justice you think you live under. Look at the government that in theory is of, by, and for the people.”

I had missed that the charges were vacated due to prosecutorial misconduct.

Related: Ham Sandwich Nation: Due Process When Everything is a Crime.

Plus: “Prosecutors and our “Ham Sandwich Nation.”

AUSTRALIA BANS BAD GRADES. “University students who score less than 50 percent in their exams will be entitled to a slew of educational life-savers. University-funded tutoring, counselling, examination do-overs, special exams, and extended deadlines… [A] hefty fine of $18,780 per student will be introduced for those institutions that fail to help their students rise above the 50 percent benchmark.”

DON’T BE EVIL: Google Search caught publicly indexing users’ conversations with Bard AI.

Google Bard, the search giant’s conversational AI product, underwent a big update last week that earned mixed reviews. But this week, another, older Bard feature is coming under scrutiny: SEO consultant Gagan Ghotra observed that Google Search had begun to index shared Bard conversational links into its search results pages, potentially exposing information users meant to be kept contained or confidential.

This means that if a person used Bard to ask it a question — possibly even a question related to the contents of their private emails — then shared the link with a designated third-party, say, their spouse, friend or business partner, the conversation accessible at that link could in turn be scraped by Google’s crawler and show up publicly, to the entire world, in its Search Results.

On X (formerly Twitter), Ghotra posted a screenshot of evidence of several Bard conversations being indexed by Google Search.

Don’t trust Google.

Related: Huge new ChatGPT update highlights the dangers of AI hype.

Dr. John Licato, an AI researcher and computer science professor, said that this push into more modalities has been expected for a while and could lead to a litany of powerful applications. His concern, however, is that OpenAI has kept its models closed off so that researchers remain unable to understand the actual capabilities of these models.

“What worries me is that these new releases are coming under OpenAI’s business model, which is not very open at all,” Licato told TheStreet. “So long as OpenAI refuses to disclose the data they use to train their models, and the ways in which they update their models with user interaction data, we can never have any substantial guarantee of their safety.”

If OpenAI won’t tell it’s because they don’t want you to know.

THANK YOU FOR YOUR COOPERATION: Remain Calm! All Is Well! NYPD to Release Security Robot.

THERE HE GOES AGAIN: Commander Biden bites another Secret Service agent, the 11th known incident.

Previously: Dogs tend to adopt the same personality traits as their owners.

HIGHER EDUCATION BUBBLE UPDATE: Harvard, Penn, Georgetown refuse comment on being ranked dead last for free speech.

BREAKING: North Korea ‘Expels’ U.S. Soldier Who ‘Defected.’

EDUCATION: “Rather than fix the problem, they redefined it in order to meet the new normal of what they call it.”

BLUE CITY BLUES: Target to Close Stores in San Francisco, Other Cities, Citing Theft.

The retailer said Tuesday that stores in the New York City, Seattle, San Francisco and Portland, Ore., markets would close effective Oct. 21. The stores account for a small portion of the more than 1,900 locations the company operated nationwide as of late January, but the decision is the latest sign of actions executives say they are taking to protect their businesses.

Target is also dealing with a broad slowdown in sales compared with its performance through the Covid-19 pandemic. The company said last month that shoppers in the most recent period spent less on apparel, home goods and other discretionary items in the midst of higher prices for food and other essentials.

It couldn’t be happening to a more woke major retailer. So we’ve got that going for us, which is nice.

KRUISER’S MORNING BRIEFING: Michelle Obama Is the New Gavin Newsom in the Biden Dementia Sweepstakes. “Buy in for $25, correctly pick the date the Dems nuke Sir Sniffsalot and who his replacement will be and the prize is yours.”

CRAZY POLITICAL ADVICE FROM MATTHEW YGLESIAS: The Biden/Harris ticket should try hard to win. An idea so crazy it just might work?

Two thoughts: (1) Can Biden “pivot to the center” without losing his woke activist base? and (2) Does this mean that the Dem establishment is giving up on replacing Biden/Harris before the election?

On the first, Bill Clinton and Barack Obama were able to convince their lefty base that their tack to the center was insincere. Today’s activist base demands political tribute at least as much as victories so that will be harder.

On the second, establishment mouthpiece Max Boot is saying it’s too late to replace Biden now.

SPACE: Soyuz returns ISS crew after record-setting stay.

IF THE RNC TIGHTENED THE QUALIFICATIONS ENOUGH TO EXCLUDE ONLY ASA HUTCHINSON THEN THEY NEED TO KEEP TIGHTENING: 7 GOP candidates have qualified for second debate, RNC says. “Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis; businessman Vivek Ramaswamy; former United Nations ambassador Nikki Haley; former Vice President Mike Pence; former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, Sen. Tim Scott (S.C.) and North Dakota Gov. Doug Burgum have all qualified, according to the RNC.”

Related: Gird Your Livers and Join Me for Wednesday’s GOP Debate Drunkblog.

THERE IS NO RIGHT OR WRONG, ONLY OPPORTUNISM: Russell Brand Gets Pilloried For His Behavior. Howard Stern Gets Celebrated For His. Guess Why.

LIGHTNING DEAL: JMIERR Men’s Linen Shirts Casual Long Sleeve Button-Down Striped Dress Shirt.#CommissionEarned

SHE SOUNDS KINDA MEAN: Fans Are Going After Katy Perry Over Her Latest Legal Battle That’s About to Head to Trial. “Why are you trying to kick a dying vet out of his house?”

REPORT FROM THE BLUE ZONES: Widespread Mass Looting Overnight in Philly.

A CATHERINE SALGADO EXCLUSIVE: Mich. Congressional Candidate Calls for Americans with ‘Intestinal Fortitude’ This Election.

COLLUSION: Hunter Biden Received $250,000 From Chinese Business Partners In Wires Addressed To Joe Biden’s Home.

BIDEN’S PICKET-LINE APPEARANCE DIDN’T TURN THE TABLES: How the game is played: Ford pauses MI EV battery plant construction, UAW in freak-out mode.

The Big Three may well see the strike as an excuse to pull back from government-mandated EV plans that are looking shaky.

DON SURBER: LBGT vs. Muslims: Libs baffled to learn Islam is actually a religion. ““If a Christian council had banned the Pride flag, liberals would have known exactly how to respond. Denounce the council for its queerphobic bigotry, and lead a furious protest march against heteronormative, patriarchal white supremacy. Simple. Unfortunately, though, this council isn’t Christian. As a result, American liberals are being forced to contemplate an awkward dilemma.”

ANTISOCIAL MEDIA: Meta’s Threads struggles to grow amid rivalry with Elon Musk’s X, ranking ahead of only Tumblr.

I still don’t understand why there have been so many attempts to clone Twitter… er, X. The genuine article is mostly awful, tiny by social media standards, and has never made real money.

MATT TAIBBI: Forget Collusion. Was “Interference” Also Fake News?

ANALYSIS: TRUE. Biden Never Would Have Joined the UAW Picket Line If Not for Trump.

MARK JUDGE: ‘We’ll Get You Through Your Children!’ The Night in 1958 That Launched the Culture War.

The Podhoretz essay, called “My War With Allen Ginsberg,” has stayed with me for years. I occasionally re-read it for its tremendous foresight, wisdom and power. It is a first-hand account of a night in America in which the modern culture war began. With elegant and at times very funny observations, Podhoretz predicted everything that would happen for the next 60 years: How we got to be a country awash in drug abuse, transgenderism (and the medical malpractice that comes with it), mental health problems, anti-Americanism and atheism. It’s the genesis of our modern cultural and political nightmare.

Most chilling is the part where Ginsberg, a drug user, sex addict and member of NAMBLA, the North American Man-Boy Love Association, bellows at Podhoretz: “We’ll get you through your children!” That very thing has indeed happened. It’s why Podhoretz, still going at 93, has never forgiven Ginsberg, who died in 1997. The left did in fact get back at square America by corrupting her children.

Read the whole thing.