I think of myself as someone with a wide mental library & a brain good at making inobvious connections, but every time this guy posts I'm just in awe
During the COVID-19 pandemic, I felt a lot of pressure at work to follow policies I had concerns about. Masking and vaccination were strongly pushed. Posters were put on my classroom door. I was moved out of a leadership role. I was told I was putting kids at risk, even while we were behind plexiglass and forced to mask. Deaf kids need to see faces to communicate- we were shutting them out.
I lost friendships. People pulled away when I didn’t go along with the group-think. Keep in mind that as a deaf person, isolation is already something we face.
I was suspended on social media for sharing my experiences and asking questions about mandates.
Most people don’t push back. Not because they don’t think, but because it has consequences.
For me, it came down to autonomy. And being willing to question things, even when it’s unpopular.
Google lost two star researchers and fell 6%, its worst day in over a year. The headlines blamed the exits. They missed that Amazon fell 4% the same day, and Meta and Microsoft dropped too. Two people leaving Google does not move Amazon. Something bigger did.
Here is what actually moved them as far as I see. The four giants building AI will spend more than $452 billion this year doing it, and their cash is vanishing into it. Google's free cash flow has already fallen 47% to $10 billion. Amazon's has collapsed 95%, to barely $1 billion. The market did not panic over two resignations. It woke up to a number.
And the forward number is quite worse. Wall Street now expects Google's full-year free cash flow to fall around 72% in 2026, from $73 billion to roughly $20 billion. The company that printed cash for two decades is on track to keep a quarter of what it made last year. Its own finance chief says next year's spending goes higher still.
This is the moment the AI trade stopped being free. For three years the story was revenue, and the revenue is still there. Google's cloud grew 63%. But the bill has finally arrived, and it is being paid in the one thing Wall Street watches most: cash walking out the door faster than it walks in.
So why did the talent story dominate instead. Because two famous people quitting is something you can picture. A 72% cash-flow collapse across the entire industry is not. The market felt the second thing and reported the first.
I think this is the part that closes the loop. Those two researchers left for OpenAI and Anthropic. The exact two companies forcing Google to spend itself dry. The talent is running toward the fire that is burning the cash.
The headline was the brain drain. The story was the bonfire.
@deaflibertarian Your experience fascinates me. I try so hard to put myself into your shoes, but it’s such a far reach for me. Really an amazing path you’ve led.
120 US-Funded Labs. Ukraine Was the Biggest Recipient. No Scientific Publications. No Evidence of Biological Threat Reduction. None.
The stated purpose was the Department of Defense Biological Threat Reduction Program. The labs were supposed to be doing independent research. There are very few — if any — peer-reviewed publications that came out of them. And there is zero documented evidence of any biological threat being reduced. The suspicion is now on the record: the US may have been funding the development of new pandemic threats — not reducing them. All of it was secret.
Join the Fight: https://t.co/rvCeXmwJ2X
Courtesy of Real America's Voice @RealAmVoice, Steve Gruber Daybreak, The Steve Gruber Show @stevegrubershow
#MedicalFreedom
Why did Americans suddenly get obese? It's because they were being mass-poisoned by ultra-processed foods.
"The government has been lying to you for 50 years, and now you have a government that's telling you the truth...The [new] Dietary Guidelines are already having an impact on our country." — @SecKennedy
Reminder: Ellen Page railed against former VP Pence for believing in gay conversation therapy but shortly after she went through conversion therapy & surgeries, believing she is a heterosexual man. She & the liberal media promote that conversion therapy.
NBC News poll: How proud are you to be an American?
Overall
Extremely/very 56%
Not very/none 21%
Extremely/very by party:
GOP 90%
Dem 29%
By age:
65+ 75%
18-34 36%