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Cubs shortstop Dansby Swanson was placed on the 10-day IL after an early exit from the team’s loss to the Cardinals.

Jamal Adams was dealt a crushing blow to his bid to revive his career with the Vikings.

A Florida man furious over unscooped dog poop allegedly barged into his neighbor’s home carrying the offending feces.

Texas is now slated to pass California in population, driven both by both immigration and domestic migration.

The publishing industry is in an uproar as agents and editors alike confront a mysterious new literary talent: artificial intelligence.

The Lakers now know their 2026-27 regular schedule – the longest road trips (the annual Grammy swing in late January/early February), the long homestands (three separate five-game stretches in December, March and April) and the competitive breaks. They also know the marquee matchups in which Luka Doncic will be the featured player, leading a roster...

The couple enjoyed a glam getaway together in Mallorca.

The couple enjoyed a glam getaway together in Mallorca.

Because Tarik Skubal returned to the Detroit Tigers’ spring training camp after making just one start in the World Baseball Classic this year, Clayton Kershaw didn’t spend as much time with him as he did with Team USA’s other players. But in the little more than a week in which they shared a clubhouse, Kershaw...

In a way, Caruso is a throwback to the leaders of the industrial age in America, many of whom invested their fortunes in public institutions like schools and libraries.

Kodai Senga may not want to be the Mets closer forever, but he’s off to a pretty good start.

Cade Klubnik’s first preseason appearance with the New York Jets wasn’t defined by a huge stat line. The rookie quarterback completed 5 of 7 passes for 56 yards while leading scoring drives on both of his possessions, but the more important part of his debut was how he handled the moment. In this edition of...

'Dems Don't Give A Crap About The Country': Martin Armstrong Sees Very, Very Tight Midterm Election

Greg Hunter’s USAWatchdog.com,

Legendary financial and geopolitical cycle analyst Martin Armstrong is out with a new report (more than 100 pages) that takes a deep dive on the “2026 Midterm Elections” in November. 

Armstrong says, “The computer is showing this is going to be a very, very tight election..."

"It’s a 50/50 deal where we didn’t see either party coming in with a landslide. 

The bottom line looks like the Democrats can take the House, but not the Senate. 

So, you will have a 50/50 divided government.  You are going to get a lot of the crazies on the Democrat side.  Even the conservative Democrats are getting very nervous. 

You recently had (Democrat) James Carville talking about how the party is going to split, which was our forecast in 2024.  So, this is where we are heading. 

By the Dems taking the House, you will see all kinds of investigations, there will be another impeachment of Trump, etc. 

They will be real obstructionists.  They don’t give a crap about the country. 

If Trump says the sky is blue, they have to say it’s red.  This is the way politics degenerated.”

The implications for the Democrats will be long lasting and not in a good way. 

Armstrong says, “If the Democrats take the House, they will basically make this a real shit fight..."

"Our computers show for 2028 something very, very interesting.  I have never seen it do this, and it’s showing the Democrats will lose dramatically. 

On the Republican side, it shows they win even slightly above 70%.  You take the two favorites from both sides, which would be Vice President Vance against AOC (Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez), Vance would blow her out, yes.  I think the Democrats need to take the House to show the world how screwed up they really are.  There will be a check against them from Trump and the Senate. 

They can do an impeachment, but the trial has to be in the Senate, and it’s not going to go anywhere.

...

It’s going to get much worse before the Midterms.  As I said, these people don’t care about the country.  This has turned into a bloodsport.  This is part of what the computer has been projecting. 

By 2032, we are looking at the collapse of Republican forms of government.”

On the war in Ukraine, Armstrong says,

“I am not optimistic.  It looks like it goes off the boards by 2030 or so. 

Even the EU looks like it’s going to collapse after 2029 and break up again.”

With the Iran war, Armstrong says, “China is using Iran to drain our resources, which has happened..."

"  It takes two to three years to replace the missiles.  Taiwan is up in arms saying to the US, you don’t have the fire power to protect us. . .. You see the same thing with Russia and Ukraine.  They say Russia is weak.  They can’t take Ukraine, and Ukraine has seriously weakened Russia.  That is what Ukraine is doing.  That’s the whole purpose of this, and that was to drain Russia.  Iran is doing the same thing to America.”

Armstrong says don’t expect the stock market to crash anytime soon as money is flowing into and not out of America. 

Armstrong also is forecasting a new gold bull market in 2027.

There is much more in the 48-minute interview.

Join Greg Hunter of USAWatchdog as he goes one-on-one with Martin Armstrong to talk about Iran, Ukraine, gold, oil and the 2026 Midterm Elections for 8.15.26.

Tyler Durden Sun, 08/16/2026 - 19:50

The 13th annual Long Beach Kite Festival took over Rosie’s Dog Beach.

The Post's Cindy Adams recalls her one-on-one interview with the Duchess of Windsor.

Malachi Fields made an immediate impression in his first preseason action with the New York Giants, catching all three of his targets for 34 yards and a touchdown against the Minnesota Vikings. But the numbers only tell part of the story. In this edition of After Further Review, Dexter Henry takes a closer look at...

The offering is part of a broader push by the warehouse club to give members more convenient options for putting dinner on the table.

Apple Trains Custom AI Model For China With Alibaba's Help

Apple has trained a custom large language model specifically for the Chinese market, utilizing technical support from Alibaba Group, according to Reuters. 

Chinese flags hang from a lamp post in front of an Apple Inc. store in Shanghai. Photographer: Qilai Shen/Bloomberg

This arrangement would make Apple the first foreign company cleared by Beijing to offer a proprietary AI model in China.

The custom model is expected to power portions of Apple Intelligence when the AI suite rolls out to mainland China via an upcoming iOS update.

This marks a strategic shift from Apple's earlier plan to rely solely on third-party Chinese models for its regional generative AI features. According to the report, OpenAI's ChatGPT and Anthropic's Claude - which Apple pairs with its own technology in Western markets - are unavailable in China.

In July, China's Cyberspace Administration officially registered Apple's generative AI service, clearing the primary regulatory hurdle that had kept Apple Intelligence off local devices.

Under this approved framework, Alibaba's Qwen model will integrate into Apple Intelligence across compatible iPhones, iPads, Macs, and Vision Pro headsets sold in China, while Baidu's technology will separately support search-related features.

It remains unclear exactly how Apple's proprietary model will divide tasks with Qwen and Baidu, as the technical breakdown between the systems has not yet been disclosed.

China remains one of Apple's most crucial markets. Until now, the lack of native AI capabilities on Chinese iPhones has put Apple at a distinct competitive disadvantage against domestic rivals like Huawei, which have aggressively marketed AI-equipped handsets.

Apple Intelligence began rolling out globally in October 2024, but Apple said at the iPhone 16 launch that September that mainland China availability was "subject to regulatory approval." The CAC's July 15 registration came roughly 22 months later, clearing Apple alongside six other on-device generative AI services from Huawei, Samsung, OPPO, vivo, Xiaomi and ZTE.

The wait proved costly in a market Apple has been winning back. IDC put Apple's China smartphone share at 18.1 percent in the second quarter, up from 13.9 percent a year earlier on 24.4 percent shipment growth - the strongest gain of any major brand, and enough to move Apple from fifth place to second. Huawei held the lead at 22.6 percent. They were the only two vendors to grow at all as overall shipments fell 4.3 percent to roughly 66 million units, a fifth straight quarterly decline driven by rising memory costs and fading government subsidies.

Apple's gains came from holding iPhone 17 pricing steady while Android rivals raised theirs, and from signaling second-half price increases that pulled demand forward - mechanics that flatter one quarter rather than establishing a trend. Domestic rivals shipped on-device generative AI features throughout the wait.

Reporting has indicated Apple evaluated Baidu, ByteDance's Doubao and DeepSeek before settling on Alibaba as its primary model provider. Apple has said nothing publicly about the arrangement - every confirmation to date has come from Alibaba and Baidu, or from the regulator's own filing. No mainland launch date has been announced.

Tyler Durden Sun, 08/16/2026 - 19:15

The last major "super El Niño" during the 2015–2016 season famously failed to deliver the historic snow totals.

The move came after the heavy metal band addressed his departure via Instagram.